We're Back!

We're home in Iowa again! Josh picked us up at the airport late last night. It was supposed to be a 9:45 landing. The weather at the Denver airport had other ideas. We sat in the plane on the runway between 45 minutes to an hour waiting for the all clear to take off.

With no way to contact Josh at that point, all we could do was sit and fret! Steve and I worked cross-word puzzles during that time and the flight home. We've really started enjoying doing that together since seeing Jackie and Randy do it at their house.

The trip was wonderful (except that my back really paid for it). Saturday was the big family reunion. It was neat to see cousins that looked like relatives not in their immediate family. Cindy (Aunt Evie's daughter) did look a lot like her mom, but her sisters (Tammy and Connie) looked like our Aunt Muriel. Mike Moon looked just like his dad, Jim, and a little like my brother, Denny (not as much as his dad did, though).

Sunday there was a brunch at Sheila's and a lot of the relatives were there again. Saturday night Jim (Jr) gave me a hug before he left and it brought tears to my eyes when he said how great it was to see me. Most of these cousins I remember, but they don't remember meeting me.

Trina, Linda, and Ellie (Aunt Helen's) were so sweet and I really enjoyed having time to really talk to them. Of course, Sheila is the greatest and hasn't changed one iota since she was young. She took me to a place and paid for both of us to have acrylic nails done and our toenails to be painted.

Dave hasn't changed much either (except maybe the hair color, but heck, whose hasn't changed, huh?) We stayed with Dave the first three nights. Since he had just had hip surgery (quad landed on top of him the week before), he wasn't up and at 'em like he normally would be but we really enjoyed our time with him. Also, Dave had a barbecue in his back yard for us and Sheila, Tim, and Terry's families were all there.

Terry took us home from the fourth night on. He and Julie were awesome. We stayed in their RV (as it was cat-free), so we had our own little space. Then we sat in his hot tub and relaxed a lot. That really helped my back. The ride to Portland showed the true essence of Terry. He is sooooo funny. When we were on the plane, a steward was giving a lady on the plane sarcastic remarks as her purse strap was in the aisle. Steve said, "Imagine Terry and what he would say to that guy!" We both started laughing as we thought about it.

There is so much to tell, all the stories would take forever. I did feel overwhelmed by all the relatives who I somewhat knew and those I didn't know at all. I am still a little shy and it took me a while to get courage to go sit by someone new and start conversations.

I'll tell more about our saga in Washington later, after I recoup from being in planes all day and my back is better. I did gain 3 1/2 pounds while I was gone, looks like I need to check into fat burner pills soon! Halfmoon

P.S. I'll upload pics later.