Indiana Day 8 – Our final day! A shady character, fun, sun, goodbyes, a big purple friend, and a feast
15 Jun 2009 Author: Paul In: IndianaAnyone still around? WELL, good! I didn’t update our last day yet because I’ve been back to work and didn’t have a whole lot of time. But enough about work, let’s talk about our last day of our vacation!
We woke up around 9am, it was time to check out of our hotel after a week of being in Elkhart. Today was our last day! ! We were both happy that the reunion the night before was a success! However I was a bit groggy from all that coffee from the night before.
If I remember correctly (it is all kind of a caffeine-induced blur) Heather had pretty much passed out after we had returned back to the hotel from the reunion, however because of the 10 shots of espresso or so that I had, I had spent a few hours bouncing off the walls and gibbering like…well, like a gibbon actually! I also completely packed my suitcase and finished reading a book I had brought with me and I think I may have also crocheted a quilt.
Too much coffee can have weird effects, it may explain why I had a dream that night where my arms turned into huge catepillars. You know, sometimes I think I share too much about myself on this hah hah.
The worst part about ending a trip is packing suitcases, so it was great that I had already done it the night before. So that morning all I really did was watch Heather pack while I made sure to give Heather words of encouragement such as, “You should put your socks there on the side! HURRAY! Now the shirt, WAY TO GO! HIGH FIVE!”
We finally checked out of the hotel and started driving to Heather’s grandma’s house, but as we pulled out onto the street we saw a really suspicious looking character on the side of the road.
Doesn't something look suspicious about this guy?? I don't think I trust him.
We arrived at the house to find it pretty full already! There was a lot of leftovers from the night before so everyone who was still in town was gonna stop by for lunch. I went downstairs to the basement to watch ping pong being played and to have a nice discussion with one of Uncle Paul’s sons, Titus.
"So in my dream, these small catepillars somehow got inside my body and layed eggs and then my arms turned into catepillars!" I said.
"CATEPILLAR ARMS? GLAAaaAaAAARG!!"
Heather found one of our wedding favors in the basement! Coooool. But she was kinda bummed that the chocolate dipped macadamia nut cookies weren't still inside (she completely finished the other cookies stashed in the basement freezer.)
We decided to go outside to play some baseball as it was a beautiful day. Philip was at bat and he's a natural and totally cranked it pretty much out of the ballpark.
Unfortunately another errant hit caused the ball to go into the bushes which was filled with poison oak. We figured maybe we should abandon the ball instead of poking around for it. Also, Titus and Matthias are actually practicing some of the tap moves they learned from Uncle Mark at the reunion.
As the threat of poison oak killed our baseball game, off we went to the next sport.
Hoops! Here I am showing my infamous hook shot. It's infamous because it sucks.
I think Heather got tired of watching the basketball game so she took some photos of her cousins who were at the playground nearby. That's Englebert (Owen) on the left, Henrietta (Olivia) in the middle, and Penelope (Morgan) on the right. The names in parenthesis are their actual names, I had to ask my wife Heidi since I'm horrible at remembering names.
I like this photo cause you got the slide and in the background you can see Uncle Tim watching the kids spin themselves silly on the merry-go-round
I don’t know about you, but being out in the sun with a bunch of kids playing baseball and basketball can be pretty tiring!
So I snuck away and headed back into the cool basement to play some more ping pong.
OHHH baby, lunch is almost ready!!!
Lunchtime!!!!
Heather posing as the food procession goes by. Heather has chipmunk cheeks because she was chomping down on some grub when I snapped this photo.
Good thing there's enough people to eat all these wonderful leftovers, otherwise Heather's grandma would have fried chicken and pulled pork for 6 months
Heather's mom realized it was a perfect time to make a skype video call to Heather's brother and his family up in England. Everyone gathered around to say hi. Isn't technology from the internets outstanding?
Mira, Chris, Kian, Danielle, and Kai up in England. HELLOOOOO!!!
HELLOOOOO!!!
The tradition is to take a photo of the three of them together in the backyard. Three generations right there folks, three generations! That's like more than two!
One by one the families left until we were almost the last ones. It was time to go because we had another long drive ahead of us back to Chicago.
Too soon it was time to say goodbye. Charles is saying goodbye to Maryann because she's going to stay up until the end of June.
Heather says bye to grandma
Goodbye!! See you later!!!
Because I was driving, I didn’t get on the freeway and instead veered off towards another direction. “Where are you going!??” asked Heather.
OH YEAH, Culvers baby!! AND LOOK AT THE FLAVOR TODAY! Butter Pecan Chicken Dinner?? That's a weird flavor
We couldn't possibly leave without one last snack now, could we??
Even the little tyke in the back seat got his very own chocolate shake for the long ride ahead.
It’s a good thing we made that side trip, because who did we see on the side of the road?? YOU’LL NEVER GUESS!! It was Heather’s most favorite purple furry blob in the entire world, Grimace!
We asked for just a photo with Grimace only, but the Hamburglar had to steal a place in the photo and jumped into it. And I really don't trust the fact that I can't see what he's doing with his hands back there behind Heather!!
We drove all the way to Chicago without any stops and made it to our hotel. The Hyatt Regency which was cool in a 70’s retro sort of way, but was still really nice, especially the rooms.
Check out this chandelier at the hotel?? It was MASSIVE. I want to get one of those for our house.
We were pretty tired so we decided to rest up for an hour or two and then grab some dinner. There’s a certain Greek restaurant in Chicago called Greek Islands that we’ve been to 4 times previously. Twice just Heather and I. Once with my parents on a trip back from Spain and we had an overnight layover in Chicago (yes I dragged my parents through 40 minutes of subway and taxi even though we were all exhausted just so we could go to Greek food). And once with Heather’s mom when we were in Chicago on another trip. So there was only one other parent we had not taken to Greek Islands. Heather’s dad! What a perfect opportunity!
At 9pm on a Sunday night, there luckily wasn’t much traffic so it only took us 20 minutes to drive to the restaurant.
Greek Islands! OPA!
"I'm ready to eat some food, are you ready??"
"Yeah!! Let's do this!!"
We ordered this entire meal thing that included appetizers, salad, main entrees, AND dessert.
First up, the appetizers! The fire is FLAMING CHEESE, that's right, FLAMING CHEESE. It's a Greek dish called Saganaki. Cheese is delicious, but if you haven't tried FLAMING CHEESE, you're missing out!
There's eggplant on the left, similar to baba ganoush, gyros meat on the top, and to the right all brown and shiny with a lemon wedge is the flaming cheese. Not shown in the picture is tzatziki which is a sauce made of yogurt, garlic, and cucumbers. They were all soooooooo goood.
The main dishes soon followed. On the left is Moussaka (sort of like a Greek lasagna), on the top is Dolmades (stuffed grape leaves), on the top right is Spanakopita (layers of spinach and cheese in phyllo dough), at the bottom right is potatoes, at the bottom is rice, and the middle is lamb. If you're thinking, "Wow that's a lot of food for three people, especially after those large appetizers", well, you'd be right.
"We need a game plan if we're going to finish all of this. I need your help Charles."
"I'll eat ALL of that" I say.
"Well I can definitely eat all of that!" says Charles
"And Heather will eat the rest!" I say
We ended up making a full plate EACH similar to Heather's plate from all the food there was. After eating our entrees, there was no way possible we could eat anymore, the idea of any more food after this would be truly disgusting.
But then dessert arrived. Baklava (nuts and honey in phyllo dough) and a custard filled pastry. And coffee too. They need a defibrillator to be included with this meal.
That was our last meal! After that it was back to the hotel to go to sleep cause we had a flight to catch in the morning.
Heather in the hotel elevator, so ahead of the times in this 70's hotel with her 80's jacket.
We didn’t take any more photos for the rest of the trip as we were so busy getting to the airport, returning the car, and then catching the LOOOOOONG 8 hour plane ride directly to Hawaii. But actually it wasn’t a bad flight and in no time at all….
We were back in sunny Oahu. Here's me walking to the curb where my mom was gonna pick us up. We love travelling but there's something special about having to go to Hawaii to END your vacation.
We got to our house and found our yard an overgrown mess but otherwise everything was fine.
We did see a family of chickens though who had taken up residence in our yard. Who feels like chicken tonight?? Like chicken tonight??
Thanks for sharing another trip with us!! Who knows where our next trip may be?? It has been a lot of hard work and FUN writing this trip journal as a way for us to remember our trips but I hope you also enjoyed reading it as well. From Heather and I, we wish all of you the best and I hope if you get ANYTHING out of this blog, it is a desire to go and do some travelling yourself!!
Love and Aloha,
Paul and Heather
Indiana Day 7: The Reunion!
9 Jun 2009 Author: Heather In: IndianaThe big day finally arrived! Paul and I awoke starving and knew our vacation breakfasts were now limited so we opted not to have the same old hotel waffles and went back to The Daily Grind where we previously had lunch. This place has easily become our favorite place in Elkhart for grabbing coffee and quick great meals, but this would be a first for having breakfast there. We were not disappointed!
Paul sowing his wild oven-baked oats with a bagel on the side. He was never an oatmeal kinda guy before, but somehow this breakfast had a profound impact on him. Now all he ever talks about is baked oatmeal. Baked oatmeal this, baked oatmeal that... a conversation with him now is really quite captivating. Truly.
I ordered a bleu cheese and mushroom quiche with a blueberry muffin on the side. Plus I'm wearing blue. No this was not planned! Come on, color-coordinating with your food, that's ridiculous!!
After breakfast we headed over to my grandma’s house to start helping prepare for the big party, but when we got there, no one was home!!! We decided to just take a walk around the neighborhood to wait.
Here we are walking around the neighborhood, drinking coffee, waiting for the peeps to come home (sorry I couldn't think of a better caption for this one!)
Uncle Tim and his wife Penny drive on by while on our walk. Here Uncle Tim is telling Paul how funny he thought his "Funication at the Fountain" photo was in his recent blog post. I'm not so sure Penny appreciated it as much! But thanks for reading our blog, Uncle Tim & Penny! You're probably our biggest fans!
We made a full circle around the block and when we got back we saw that everyone had returned.
The walk around my grandma's neighborhood is always pleasant. Everyone has big yards and they keep them up nicely. That's the new red gangster mobile out in front.
Turns out, everyone had gone to pay respects to my grandpa at his grave that morning. Doh! Were we supposed to be there too??? OOPS. Sorry Grandpa! But if it helps, I always think of you every time I come to Indiana. You are surely missed!
The rest of the afternoon involved getting ready for the reunion which was to be held in the evening.
You may think they're in serious thought about the party plans, but in actuality they're quite captivated by Paul's PowerPoint presentation of the glories of baked oatmeal.
OH! Umm... hey! It looks like Uncle Mark color-coordinated with the cookie. That's... uhh, a brilliant idea!
Meanwhile Dad fires up the grill for his famous teriyaki skewers, they're legendary in this family.
Flashback some thirty years ago at another big reunion right here in my grandma’s backyard, my dad made teriyaki skewers during the party and he couldn’t keep up with the demand! People were grabbing them as soon as they came off the grill. Would they be as popular this time around? WE SHALL SEE.
Paul's saying "Excellent! But let me tell you about a little something I like to call 'baked oatmeal'..."
We were ahead of schedule and had some time to spare. Paul relaxes and catches up on the latest Woman's Day magazine. Judging from his expression, it appears that he discovered a great recipe for a certain baked breakfast cereal. And my my, look at those shapely gams!
Dad finished barbecuing and Grandma approved!
And finally it was time! We all headed over to the party location to get the place ready.
Uncle Mark and cousin Philip get the decorations ready. "Family Tree" was the theme of the reunion, so real topiary trees were a fitting centerpiece.
Dad fires up the charcoal grill to give the pre-cooked skewers a quick and final heating.
And cute kids everywhere have fun around the park.
My cousin Micah and his nephew Josiah (yes, his nephew!)
Meanwhile, Paul helps Penny organize the food table. "Put the food there!" says Penny. "Yes maam!" says Paul. His official title on my mom's Job Assignment list was gopher. As a side note, Paul says gopher yourself.
Believe it or not, my cousins set up a full espresso bar! Paul is in coffee heaven with unlimited no holds barred all you can drink bottomless cup of caffeine, it's his best dream come true.
This is my best dream come true. Look at the variety! All homemade of course. The two apple pies on the end are my grandma's.
Meanwhile my cousin Charity helps put the centerpieces on.
And Dad finishes up the teriyaki skewers with Uncle Bob hovering.
When my mom rented out the venue for the reunion, she had to put down $300 as a deposit for any damage done OR if anyone broke the strict ”no alcohol outside of the building” rule. She was adamant about letting everyone know they can’t bring alcohol outside and even posted signs up at all of the doors saying “NO ALCOHOL OUTSIDE!!!” Well, we all obeyed the rule, MOSTLY…
Paul's $300 infraction!!! Luckily he didn't get caught by the authorities. My mom is gonna have a cow when she sees this picture!
On the inside, the centerpieces are on the tables and everything's going as planned. Mom is happy!
Another shot of espresso. Paul is spastastically happy!
People start arriving and the food table is fit for a king.
Mom starts the evening with greetings and introductions and re-emphasizes the rules... "AND IF I CATCH ANY OF YOU WITH ALCOHOL OUTSIDE, YOU'RE IN FOR A GOOD SMACKIN!"
Finally, it’s time for the most important part of the entire event. DINNER TIME!
Paul and Penny unload a cooler full of piping hot fried chicken.
And the people start digging in! Look at all of those teriyaki skewers.
People were smart, they made sure to grab dessert at the same time as serving their dinner. In this family, desserts do not last very long!
Between snapping photos I finally had time to make myself a plate. I was lucky enough to grab a couple of Dad's teriyaki skewers... THEY WERE AWESOME!!!
After dinner I was so stuffed that I barely had room for dessert, so I just grabbed a few small morsels to nibble on.
And dessert was accompanied by a cappuccino for me and ANOTHER shot of espresso for Paul.
After dinner, we had entertainment!
Uncle Paul's youngest sons demonstrated an African stick dance which they learned during the 8 years they lived in Africa.
My dad sang a moving song he wrote himself, "Kaanapali" one of my favorites.
My cousin Matthias played us a tune.
My cousin Andrew played a funny gesture game with brave volunteers.
Uncle Mark taught the kids a tap dance lesson.
And Paul sneaked into the kitchen to snort up the leftover coffee grounds.
After the entertainment my mom talked more about our family tree and our heritage which she had been researching for months. She also gave away a children’s book about the oldest American family farm, I think we’re descendants of the family (sorry I wasn’t paying full attention at the time, I was wholly preoccupied by my dessert plate.)
Morgan shows off her prize, Tuttle's Red Barn
In addition, my mom passed around this shocking x-ray of when my grandmother swallowed an open safety pin as a child!
Ouch! I don't know how they got it out, I'm sure my mom explained everything but well, I was still a bit preoccupied...
And finally the reunion ends with group pictures.
The entire group minus Paul who was the one to take the photo, so sorry Paul... we forgot to bring the tripod.
Grandma with her children.
Grandma with her grandchildren and great grandchildren (minus a few that could not be here including my brother and his family.)
The largest clan of the family. Uncle Paul & Aunt Teresa with ten of their twelve children and three of their six (soon to be seven)grandchildren. Two of their older sons could not be here.
And that was the end of the big family party! It was time to put the food away and clean the place up.
Nothing says the party's over like a lonesome skewer of teriyaki! (that is a great quote all on its own, someone please put that on my grave's epitaph.) I'm sure a lot of people wanted to eat it but were just too polite to take the last one.
The Wonder Dad finished the clean-up with a quick mopping. Finally everything was done and it was time to go!
And lastly, I CAN’T have a blog post without a doggie!! In the parking lot on the way out a boy was riding his bike in circles with a cute little dog running close behind.
It felt like he had been hanging around the parking lot all evening long hoping to join the party or at least sample the last teriyaki skewer. I just smiled at him, took pictures of his dog, and told him to get his own darned family!!!
And that’s it from me! I’ll leave it to Paul to wrap up this edition of our travel blog with our last day spent in Indiana where we said our goodbyes, met my most favorite purple fast food mascot (how many are there?) and had our last belly-stuffing hurrah! HURRAH!
Indiana Day 6: A side trip to Chicago, and more family!!
7 Jun 2009 Author: Paul In: IndianaToday we decided to spend the day in Chicago which is a couple of hours away. So we woke up bright and early at 8am and headed out. Heather graciously offered to drive the way there!
Just filling up some gas. I figure since Heather is driving I could at least clean the windows.
We decided to change our rental car since we were going to be in Chicago anyway. Our existing rental was for a week and we’d have to pay BIG money to keep it until Monday (which is what we wanted to do), so I went ahead a booked a new reservation. It would be nice to switch our car from a gangster hearse car to something more normal that didn’t stand out so much.
I asked the rental agency if they had anything that wasn’t a PT Cruiser and they were happy to oblige….. However it didn’t quite work out as well as I had hoped.
After we got our wheels, we wanted to go eat! We had read a lot about this place in Chicago called M. Henry, so we figured it was worth trying out.
Behold the new bright red gangster hearse! It isn't a PT Cruiser, but it is a Chevy HHR. Apparently that's all they rent in intermediate sizes, OH WELL.
M. Henry, where all your food dreams can come true
Heather is so excited at the prospect of coffee, fresh orange juice,and food!
Our drinks arrived. I think it is impossible to not feel great in this place!
Heather found the one person in the whole restaurant who wasn't that happy. haha
I got an open faced Santa Fe sandwich. It had wilted spinach, goat cheese, tomatillo salsa, red bell peppers, and chicken on it. As you can see from the photo, the plating on this food was very appetizing and the food was great!
Heather ordered a vegetarian sandwich that had goat cheese, avocados, and a whole lotta stuff in it. It was beautiful and incredible.
After our great breakfast/lunch, we drove further into Chicago. We had originally planned to go to the aquarium, but the day was so beautiful we decided to spend it outdoors which turned out to be a great idea!
They had a beautiful fountain that reminded us of our time in Rome.
Look how nice the sky is!! and the skyline! And the flowers!! And look at the clouds!!
They even had some nice gardens with purple flowers blooming
Doesn't she look beautiful??
More purple flowers!!
There was a lot of interestingly dressed people out and about today. From the casual to the super fancy. She ALMOST made the fashion mistake list for being too overdressed. What do you think??
If Heather and I start looking alike and dressing alike as this couple is, can someone please shoot us repeatedly? This is a total couple fashion mistake. Collectively they're a walking fashion mistake.
They have this cool kidney shaped bean mirror sculpture thingy that is really fun! People naturally congregate to it and everyone is taking wacky photos and there's all kinds of interesting things to see. Take this photo for instance, you got people on the far right doing weird poses with their arms and legs up, you got the yoga group on the center-right, the 3 people in the lower center having a nice serious discussion, us further back , and the two red-shirted kids with one of them with his leg being squashed.
There really were a lot of fancy dressed people
They have a tunnel going through the kidney bean and from inside, everything is all distorted and weird looking. We're at the very center of the photo if you can find us. We took the photo upwards.
I had to put this photo up. We have a friend, let's call him "Myles", he once went spelunking with us in California and you're supposed to wear kind of junk clothes because they get pretty much destroyed in the mud. However "Myles" must have thought that by junk, they meant "most ridiculous clown-looking pants imaginable" so that's what he brought. His pants were 5 times more clown-ridiculous than this lady, but even so, this lady deserves a fashion mistake award. I really gotta search my old photos if I can find a photo of Myles wearing the infamous clown pants, for now, enjoy this ridiculous photo.
They have a big outdoor theatre too with a lattice roof over there. All of this stuff is in Millennium Park I think.
Just a mom and her bimbo son walking by
Heather was so happy to notice a woman wearing a POPCORN shirt! Just like the ones they were selling at the flea market in Shipshewana. You know, now that we actually see it on someone, it really doesn't look that b...ahh who am I kidding
As big time traffic would start in Chicago once the evening commute started, we figured we should try and get out of the city as early as possible. But we couldn’t resist a drive down Michigan avenue.
I always liked the painting American Gothic and they had huge real-life replica of it!
We’ve been to Chicago several times now over the years, and one of our favorite places to go and get a coffee or a sandwich is right below the John Hancock observatory. As luck would have it, we found parking within a block of it!! I think it was some higher power’s way of telling us we had to go and get a snack, even though neither of us were THAT hungry.
Here's Heather in front of the cafe
Since we both were coffee’ed out and we were both full, we decided to just get a snack.
Gelato!!!
We were so happy to be able to have a snack at this restaurant and we still had a few minutes left on our meter so we went across the street to a church for some photos.
I like these old looking Churches with the ivy/plants growing on the side of the walls
I captured this bird having a good time in the fountain
One last photo as we cross the street to head to our car and leave the city back to Elkhart. 2 hours more of driving, hurray!
The drive was pretty easy except for a little bit of traffic getting out of Chicago. I think we missed the worst of it though!
We arrived back to Heather’s grandma house to find a full house! A lot of Heather’s grandma’s children and grandchildren had arrived and were visiting.
Heather's grandma and her 5 children! From the far left: Tim, Paul, Bob, Maryann (Heather's mom), grandma, and Mark
ALRIGHT! Leftover pizza! (yes we were already hungry after the 2 hour drive so we had a few pieces)
I'm not a big root beer fan, but Heather loves it! Especially in a root beer float! This is home made root beer one of Heather's uncles bought. There's gallons of it!
Heather's uncle Paul and his wife Teresa brought 6 of their 12(!) children along with them that night. Heather's dad decided to hang out with them for awhile. First it was darts and ping pong.
Then it was around the merry go round
and around and around and around
Now I know where Heather inherited her "get really sick while on the merry go round" ability haha. I think Paul's kids were smart to keep their distance just in case he got really sick!
Tomorrow is the big reunion! So we called it an early night, but not after doing a few last minute checks.
I'm just shaking the cole slaw and making sure it has enough salt.
Heather stole another cookie from the freezer just to make sure they were still delicious. YUP, still delicious!
See you tomorrow!!!
All blog postings reflect Hawaiian time. Add six hours for both Toronto and Indiana.
Travel Dates:
Toronto, Canada — May 24 - May 31, 2009
Elkhart, Indiana USA — May 31 - June 8, 2009
Our Pictures
