The rush is over

Baptising Judah

Sittin' n spinnin'

Yellow submarine--blacksmith style

The candles are not metal

Another 'thinker'

Our trip to Ohio is almost over. We have made it to East Fork Lake and are camping on one of the seven full hookup sites. After a month and a half of visiting people in high traffic areas we are really enjoying the quiet. Since the Escapade we have spent 5 more days in the Latimer campground. On Thursday we moved to the Miami Co. fairgrounds and have been busy with the blacksmiths' Quadstate Roundup. Duane helped set up, man the Gallary (where people display their latest projects to compete for cash prizes) and tear down. I hobnobbed with my favorite blacksmiths, spent a couple more days with our adorable grandchildren, and visited with friends Gene and Barbara who came on Saturday. On a whim I took a couple of quilts to display in the Spouses' section. I was the only one so I couldn't earn First Prize. I did get an Honorable Mention and $25. Pretty good for a whim! Sunday we headed to East Fork, which today we learned was named for the east fork of the Little Miami River which feeds it. We had enough energy to set up and drive to the Frisch's down the road for dinner. Today was rainy and gray all day. We took our time over getting up and breakfast (by that time I had the first load of laundry done) then set out for the WalMart. All afternoon Duane computered and started planning the next leg of our journey. I did more laundry, changed sheets and towels, put away groceries and finally sat down for half an hour before we had to leave again. We met our daughter Stacy and her friend Ruth Ann for dinner then they came here to see our new house and visit for a bit. We will be home tomorrow then meet them for dinner again. Wed. we plan to relax and enjoy the park. If the rain is gone we will probably do a bit of hiking. There are plenty of trails here ranging from 1/2 mi wheelchair accessible to the 31 mile rugged perimeter trail. There is a horse campground and plenty of trails to ride. The lake has lots of good fishing. There are several campgrounds with over 300 campsites including several cabins. They all have paves cites and electric but no water (except for the 7 full hookups of course and we don't know what the cabins have). Right now there are very few people here but the weekends will be busier through the fall. We really enjoy Ohio's state parks. They don't have day use charges and some, like this one, are Passport America.

Our tentative plans for Thursday are to stop by Bowling Green KY to visit with Duane's brother Dean, then head to Boonsborough State Park for a couple of days. From there we will go west of Nashville and pick up the Natchez Trace Parkway and enjoy the longest narrowest national historic area all the way to its end.

PS: We just found out that the World Equestrian Games are in Lexington this week so no campgrounds available in the area....scratch Boonesborough. So we will be off to the Bowling Green area to visit my brother and see some sites around there. Might take another tour of Mammoth Cave. They have a number of tour options.

Basta por hoy.

Louise and Duane

Back in Ohio

We spent the last week at the Escapees Rally in Goshen, Indiana. We met a few new friends, saw some old friends and worked a lot. Yes I said worked a lot. I volunteered to instruct wood carving, Louise quilting. What we didn't realize was the time it required. We were both in the craft hall from 8:30 till 3:30 the first 3 days of the rally . I did get to attend a couple of classes on Wednesday. Louise stayed at the quilting tables all the time. I don't think we be doing that again unless we know what the hours will be going in. I enjoyed the teaching but not the hours it took.

We are in Celina, Oh tonight. Thought we would stop here and do some chores around the trailer before moving back to the kids yard for a few days. Thursday we will move to the Miami County fair grounds for the blacksmith convention. I try to go to that when we are in the area to see old friends and do a little hammering just for old time sake. I think we are going to head to Cincinnati to visit daughter Stacy for a few says after the blacksmith conference. At this point we have no idea where we are heading after that. We will let everyone know when we know...lol

That's it for now

Duane and Louise

TAPAMAG

Painter

Mowin'

Mr. Cool Guy

Crafters

Workin' man

Loves bubbles

Three generations

Good big sis

One of the twins

Stacy and (hopefully) the other one

Emma (I think)

Who knows?

So, ok it was more than a peek. The title came from a little box my mom carried in her purse. Inside were mini pix of grandchildren so: Take A Peek At My Adorable Grandchildren. These were taken since we arrived here in Troy, OH a week ago Sunday. We have been parked in the back yard of our daughter Rachel, son-in-law Benji, and grandchildren Madeleine, Simon, and Judah. We have managed to meet with quite a few of our friends, but spent most of the time visiting and playing with the kids. (They were the ones that visited us at Raccoon Valley). On Monday we celebrated Labor Day with our other daughter Stacy and son Duane Jr, daughter-in-law Brandey and of course Emma and Ava. (Jr and family were visiting from Texas.) From the top the pix show Jude likes painting (kids' paints, wash right off but he didn't want to quit), pushing his mower, bubbles, riding with Sissy, and anything else his sibs are doing. Simon likes his new sunglasses and riding his Deere. Maddy loves crafts, and one-on-one time with grandparents. The little girls are cheerful and pleasant most of the time and look more like each other every day. Mom and dad can tell them apart, and take pity on everyone else by putting in different color earrings. The ones we visited here are 5 of our 9 adorable grandchildren who live in three different states. We were fortunate to have so many close together at one time.

We have had ten great days of visiting, but now it's time to get those tires rolling back to the Goshen, IN fairgrounds for the big Escapees rally starting Friday. We will be back in the kids' back yard in about a week, though, for more visiting and playing. We hope to meet with more friends and relatives then too.

Enough for now,

Louise and Duane