Category Archives: Family Life

We rook off from Granville down 37 into Lancaster and headed west on 22.  We took 753 south just before Washington Court House and then hit 41 south all the way to the Ohio River.

We then crossed the river and grabbed a bite to eat before getting abck on 68 south in Kentucky to 165 East.   After a few miles we caught 32/57heading south towards Lexingotn. We missed our left turn on to 57 and pulled into a convenience store parking lot to turn around. Deb stopped with both tires on high spots as we were getting ready to pull out of the parking lot. Her feet didn’t touch the ground until her bike was leaning past the point of no return. Somehow she gracefully tipped over and bot herself out from under the bike and performed two reverse somersaults. I was off my bike hoping I wasn’t going to have to lift the bike off her before she finished her somersaults and sat up and yelled, “I’m Okay!”. After we lifted her bike and got her back on her bike we broke off on 57 west towards Lexington.  Deb didn’t appear rattled and handled the rest of the trip with no more mishaps. 57 ended up being a single lane road and after coming head on with several cars that were going 65 and never slowed down to pass us leaving us about 3 feet on our side fo the road, we decided it was time to change plans.  We took 460 west towards Frankfort and the scenery going though the north Lexington horse farms with miles and miles of flat stone walls and rolling hills was worth the detour/shortcut.  We ended up at the footstpes of the State Capital Building. 

We were just a few short miles from where we stayed in Frankfort.

We were offered a deal through OSU to attend the Zoo Wildlights before they officially opened to the public.  It was Veterans day and Veterans were distinguished guests as well with free admission.  We met Stephanie and Marcus and wandered the entire zoo looking at all the amazing lights and seeing some of the animals.  Not all of the zoo was open for zoo lights.  The Africa section and Primate sections were both closed.  We did get to watch the artic foxes playing for quite a while.   That was worth the $5 admission right there.  We also saw polar bears, grizzly bear up close sleeping, mountain lion, moose, reindeer, elephants, rhinos, tigers, flying foxes, sloth bear, the aquarium, manatee, australia area and reptile house.  We ended up spending almost 3 and a half hours there.

Nikki and I were invited to my cousin, Leslie’s, wedding near Muskegon, Michigan. I made a gift for them as well from the woodshop. The wedding was a very nice outdoor wedding that started to sprinkle during the ceremony, but luckily didn’t do any more than that to spoil anything. The bride and groom looked amazing as well as the entire wedding party.

The reception was fun. There was an open bar, the meal was great and they had Plainwell Ice Cream Company for dessert. The live band was entertaining and I would have loved to stayed longer, but we were staying with Nikki’s dad, Ken, who was home alone as Diane was on vacation in Florida with her sisters. Ken’s health had not been great for several months and we were supposed to be helping out.

Ken’s health actually took a turn for the better though and he looked great while we were there.

Overall it was a fun fast weekend.

Stephanie and Marcus are sub-leasing their apartment in Cincinnati and moving back to Columbus while Marcus is job hunting.  Marcus is moving into his Mom’s apartment, but dogs are not allowed, so Stephanie and Braxton are moving back in with us.  Nikki and I drove down to Cincinnati to help them finish packing and load the truck.  I ended up driving the truck to Columbus and we met Marcus’ mom and boyfriend who helped unpack most of the truck into the apartment and basement storage.  We then drove to Granville and unpacked the rest of Stephanie and Braxton’s things into our house.

Stephanie is hoping to only be here a couple of months, but they are welcome as long as needed.

Today I flew into San Francisco to attend WSO2Con for work tomorrow through Wednesday. I am flying back Thursday morning and not getting into Columbus until 6:30 in the evening.

Sunday after flying in my co-workers and I had some time after we checked in and decided to walk around. We walked up Russian Hill and then back down to China Town and walked through China town all the way to pier 39. From there we stopped at an In-and-Out Burger for something to eat around Pier 43, then back down to Pier 39 for a Boat tour of the Bay, The Golden Gate Bridge, and around Alcatraz island. We then walked up to Ghirardelli Square and were going to take a trolley back to near the hotel. The line was really long and it was probably a 45 minute wait just to get on the trolley. We pulled up the lyft app and had a ride within a minute back to the front door of our hotel for $12 for the 3 of us vs. $21 on the trolley.

We ended up walking about 6 miles up and down hills. My new knee held up great. This trip last year was the reason I decided on a total knee replacement and the muscles in my legs were sore due to being out of shape, but my knee held up very well.

Staphanie and Marcus got back on Monday and offered to meet us half way to return Braxton.  They were going to be in town the following weekend were going to borrow our Focus while Marcus’ car was in the shop since Stephanie’s Honda is unreliable and parked and we could keep Braxton until then, so we took that option.  He has kept our girls playing almost non-stop for 11 days now. I think both our Golden Retrievers really like him, but they are going to sleep for a couple of days after he is gone while recovering.  He was constantly active and several times a day has the crazies and just tears around the house cutting back and forth.  I think he enjoys the carpeting as Stephanie and Marcus have hardwood floors throughout the apartment.  It was nice having him for so long.  I think he is going to miss having the playmates when he goes back to Stephanie and Marcus.

He was really happy to see Stephanie and Marcus and got excited and tore around for a while.  When Nikki and I returned home, both girls were looking for him.  Later that evening the girls appeared more playful with each other and I think they already missed his active lifestyle.

Stephanie and Marcus are going to Michigan to do some camping and have asked Nikki and I to watch Braxton. We agreed and picked him up on Wednesday as tomorrow, Thursday, we have to drive up to Kent State to pick up Jonny.  I went from work to meet Stephanie to pick him up as that was going to save me an extra hour of driving.  When I got home Zoey and Penny were so surprised and happy to see him.  The dogs all played well, but Penny had to be put away a couple of times because when she is done playing Braxton just keeps trying to harass her into playing more and Penny shows her teeth and growls.  We don’t know how far Penny would go, but never want it to go beyond that anyway.  After a bit of rest Penny is usually ready to play with him again for a while.

[Update 5-14-2018]

All the dogs have gotten along great.  Both of our dogs play with Braxton and sometimes they are both against him, but they are all having fun and he is so quick he can fend them both off at the same time.  Nikki and I just sit and watch them play and its very entertaining.  Braxton is a runner, so we have had to keep him on a leash every time he goes out.  Stephanie left a 30 foot training leash and I have been able to let all the dogs out and tether Penny and Braxton together.  Penny and Braxton both understand and happily walk around together.  There are times when Penny lays down and when Braxton gets near the end of his leash she gets up and walks around with him.  She wanted to come in house once and it turned into a tug of war and she pulled him closed enough to the house where she could lay down and “keep an eye” on him.

We were taking Jonny back to Kent State University and had just started our trip on SR-16 eastbound just past the Longaberger Basket Building and were stopped in heavy traffic at the light at Marne Road about 15-20 cars back.  We had been stopped for about 5 seconds when we were rear ended.  There wasn’t much visible damage other than the bumper cover panel had a puncture in it as well as some scratches and the panel had popped out of the quarter panels.  We had Jonny call the police since Nikki was complaining about neck pain.  We wanted an official report.  Nikki was upset and the other drive had nothing but excuses.  No Appology, asking if everyone was OK, or anything like that.  She had told me she was messing around putting her sunglasses on when she looked up traffic was stopped so she changed lanes to avoid hitting the car in front of her and hit us instead.  The funny thing about that story is that it was raining hard enough to have the wipers on high and it was dark due to the cloud cover.   Not sure why she felt she needed sunglasses on.  I think she was texting.  Within minutes her husband shows up to the accident scene and starts pounding on the back of my car to pop the panels back in to make it look like there was less damage before the police showed up.  I got our of my car and asked him to stop because he was most likely breaking tabs off the panels if everything isn’t lined up perfectly.  He also popped in all the panels on her vehicle as well.  Luckily I took some pictures of the panel on my side before he popped them back in.  I felt like popping him in the head as he wasn’t respecting my wishes to stop.

The Sheriff showed up and took our statements and I showed him pictures of the damage caused before the other drivers husband without my permission started punching my car.  We got our police report and are definitely taking the car in to get it looked at and at least fix the minor damage.

 

After the Tennessee Relays Jonny was able to spend some time of Nikki, Stephanie and I. We waited for him to finish cheering on his team and get back to his hotel and shower. We finally left around 10:30PM and headed for Pigeon Forge where we had reservations at The Inn at Christmas Place. It was a Bavarian hotel with a Christmas Theme year around. Other than the Christmas decorations everywhere the hotel was nice and the room and beds were comfortable. The omelets, bacon and sausage were good, and after we all ate we packed up and headed out to the The Great Smoky Mountain National Park. The concierge at the hotel gave us a couple of recommendations and we decided on the Grotto Falls trail which is 2.6 miles round trip to the Falls and back. We headed into Gatlinburg and because it was early and shops were still closed, we drove through without any issues. We turned left at light #8 and headed out to the trailhead. As soon as we left town and were in the National Park, we saw wild turkey everywhere and even saw a few whitetail deer.

The scenery was beautiful although we could still see the scars from the fire which started in November of 2016. We stopped along a lookout and took a few pictures and headed up the rest of the way.

We make it up to stop #5 which was the trailhead to Grotto Falls. We say lots of beautiful streams and running water on the way to the falls and saw a few local species of birds and insects.

The falls were pretty and as they were posing for pictures, Jonny got a hand full of water and splashed Stephanie which you can see in the video.

Stephanie returned the favor which you can see in the photos below.

We continued on beyond the falls for a bit and then headed back down where we spotted this guy sunning on a log.

The kids wanted to see a black bear and we didn’t see any along the trail so before heading back to drop Jonny off with his team at the meet, we drove over to Cade’s Cove and took the auto tour. The entire loop is 11 miles, but we got stuck in a terrible traffic jam along the single lane one way road. We got up to where all the excitement was and the kids and Nikki got out to view the Mama bear and her cubs. We stayed for a few minutes and then headed back on the paved road to finish our trip. We got caught behind some people leisurely driving along at under 5 MPH and it was going to take way to long to get back. We got off the main loop and took a dirt road shortcut over to a place where we could take Rich Mountain Road out of the park. Rich Mountain Road is nothing more than a forest road that is gravel and switchbacks and another one way. We decided to take the chance and headed out of the park using that road. It wasn’t bad as there were no ruts or anything and my car handled it well as long as we kept it under 25 MPH. Along the way we saw a pack of wild boar and 100 feet further down the road down the ravine there was another mother bear and cubs.

Shortly thereafter we got out of the park and to a paved two way road. We had Jonny back to the University of Tennessee an hour before his bus left and we headed out of Knoxville for home. We dropped Stephanie at home and said hello to Marcus and Braxton again. We at dinner with Stephanie and Marcus and then headed home and arrived after 11:00PM where we were greeted by happy dogs that we didn’t totally abandon them.

Stephanie and I had a wonderful time in Florida, but it was time to head home. We had wonderful weather the entire time we were there. We were getting to leave at 5:00AM and at 4:55AM we got our only rain while we were there. It rained really hard, but by the time we got down to the lobby and walked outside, it had already stopped. We drove north towards Asheville, North Carolina. We planned on hiking Chimney Rock and having lunch at Lake Lure. We got to Chimney and they closed the state park due to high winds. We ate at Lake Lure, but the lake was down about 15 feet for maintenance. So instead of eating across from the beautiful beach, it looked more like a marsh. So far we were zero for two.

We headed up to Little Switzerland to check out the views and hop on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Little Switzerland was still closed for the season, which I did know, but I wanted to show Stephanie the views. As soon as we got out of the car in our shorts and sweatshirts, we realized why nearby Chimney Rock was closed. It was 39 degrees and 60 MPH winds. We quickly took a selfie and ran back to the car. Running against 60 MPH winds was a lot slower than when they were at our back!

We headed down the Blue Ridge Parkway with our destination being Cherokee at the end of the Parkway and through the gap to Gatlinburg. With the high winds we were dodging large limbs and branches that were all over the road. We got out at only one lookout and took some quick pictures before we froze! We decided we struck out on the Blue Ridge Parkway and got off after only 10 miles.

We decided at that point that we were just going to swap driving again and drive all the way through to home. We got Stephanie home about 10:30 and I made it home about 12:30AM.

It was a wonderful trip and I had a great time with Stephanie. She started me on some hard workouts and I feel like I am almost back to where I was a few weeks before Christmas before my back problems brought me to a screeching halt.