Road Trip

Oh boy, I'm SLOW in recording our fun September weekends, but better slow than never, I guess.
I promised to quick rundown of our road trip to Levittown, PA September 18-22.

We had been looking forward to this trip for a long time. Why?
• Extended time with our buddies Bill and Verna Weber.
• Opportunity to see our grandson, Miles Johnson, perform with his high school marching band.
• Celebrate Miles's birthday Friday night and Saturday.
• Spend time with our whole family, Jen and Matt and Geoff and Lisa, in addition to Miles.
• Hear Matt preach and attend church at Levittown Christian Church.

And all of the above is exactly what we did.

Evelyn got home from teaching Thursday afternoon after 4:00. The Webers had arrived here some time before that (they drove here from Indy--this was a long day on the road for them), and soon after Evelyn rolled in, the four of us rolled out, on our way to PA. We chattered all the way to New Stanton, where we spent the night (after a nice dinner at--where else?--Cracker Barrel!).
We were on the road in good time Friday morning and made it to our hotel outside Newton, PA by 3:30 and to Jen's by about 5:00.

We stopped and got sandwiches and made it to the football stadium in plenty of time to get good seats for the whole evening. It was Homecoming, so we got to see floats and the king and queen and court.
But the main attraction was the marching band. (Oh yeah, the home team won the football game!)

Geoff and Lisa made the long and challenging trip to be there--Geoff drove with Frankie, and Lisa took  no planes but trains and automobiles to meet us there. I really appreciated their effort to join the party.

After the game we retreated to Jen and Matt's for wonderful birthday cake (four layers, cookies and cream cake--it was wonderful!).

The next day we met late in the morning to ride together to Philly, where Jen and Matt had picked a wonderful Chinese restaurant for a family birthday dinner to celebrate Miles's 16th birthday. We had wonderful food--just too much of it. Evelyn and I wished we had split a meal. We walked around the city--to the riverfront, to a festival--enjoying the sunshine and the company--and a stop at a favorite
tourist site to try Mr. Franklin's ice cream.
And then we crashed at Matt and Jen's place before supper.

Geoff and Lisa left for the trip home, and then the rest of us enjoyed sandwiches and salads for supper, followed by a bonfire and s'mores in their backyard. What a fun, fallish evening.

Sunday morning we enjoyed worship, including one of the best sermons preached anywhere in America that day, all about Gideon by Matt. Jen fixed a wonderful lunch (country ribs in the slow cooker!), and after lunch we went to a state (?) park for a nice long walk. Nikki enjoyed the walk and we enjoyed the scenery. For supper we went to the Johnsons' favorite Mexican restaurant, and Bill treated. (Thanks, Bill!) The evening was still young, though, so we decided a stop at their whippy-dip place (I'm writing this too long after the events; I'm forgetting the names of things!) would be the best way to end the day. Oh, it was good!

We stayed as late as we dared (Matt is an early-to-bed guy, and Miles had school the next day). Jen wanted us to hang on after the guys went to bed, but we had a long day of driving ahead of us Monday, so we said good-bye about 10:00. It was a weekend we'll always remember.

It's a long drive home from Philadelphia, but we made it in OK time (lots of bathroom stops for us oldsters, plus a nice lunch), and said farewell to Bill and Verna about 7:00 p.m., thanking them for the weekend of fellowship as they began two more hours on the road to their place in Indy.