Songs and A Trip

I like to sing. Always have. And I sound pretty good, except when I don't. I have a limited range, and sometimes, my voice won't cooperate with what I hear. I wouldn't say I was tone-deaf because I can hear when I'm off. I just can't always correct it, but that doesn't stop me from singing. Just ask Ward or Wally or Theo. 

All of my sisters have nice singing voices. My oldest sister is the best, and she was the leader in teaching us many songs when we were young. It was a time of folksongs, and she learned to play the guitar and sing many. That, along with all of the songs she learned in Girl Scouts, gave her quite a repertoire. The routine would go something like this. We'd eat supper, then my parents would retire to the living room to watch the evening news. We, girls, would then do the dishes. And while we worked, we sang. I loved it. (The singing part, not the dishes part.) We'd also sing in the car. Again enjoyable, but more importantly, it helped with carsickness. While it helped, I wouldn't exactly say that it always worked. But maybe I don't need to go into the details of that just now.

I sang at school, I sang at church, I sang in plays, and now I sing during storytimes. But mostly, I sing to myself. It seems that many things remind me of a song, and I just need to sing a few bars when the one pops into my head. Sometimes, when it's not appropriate to burst into song, I save it for later.

So what song just popped into my head? Leaving on a Jet Plane because of the first line, "All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go..." But the way I'm singing it now is, "All my bags aren't packed, I'm not ready to go..." That's because we're leaving Wednesday morning for a week-long vacation in the Blue Ridge, and we're not ready yet. Of course, we don't have to be ready until Wednesday, so it should be okay, I tell myself when I look at my To Do list.

Where we're staying doesn't have internet, so I don't know if I will be able to check in with you during our trip. But, I'll share our adventures with you when we get back, if for no other reason than this is where I record the main parts of our trips.

Do you like to sing?

Until next time...

P. S. If I'm lucky, I will get Wally and Theo to sing with me on this trip. 

Hello

 Hello, again! Looks like I'm in a regular poster of irregular posting these days. :)

Things are busy here, but with mostly everyday stuff. We had beautiful weather this week before returning to cold and rainy. We took the opportunity to start our spring bed cleanup. I leave most old growth in the fall to protect the roots during the winter, so there's a lot of cleanup to do. However, we've had a relatively mild winter except for some single-digit temperatures in December. It's always interesting to see what comes back in the spring. I hope some mums I planted last year come back, but no signs of life yet. It felt good to be outside digging in the dirt again. And as it always seems, the yard work stretches infinitely before our eyes this time of year. But it will get done, slowly but surely. Unless it doesn't.

Our car had some problems last week with wildly varying estimates of what it would take to fix it, one from a dealer and one from a local, trusted mechanic. Luckily, the lower estimate from the local mechanic won, and the car runs well now. 

And just in time because we leave on Monday for a driving trip south to visit with family and friends. We are definitely counting our blessings that the car trouble happened before we left. We will have a two-day drive down and a two-day drive back. It's been a very long time since we've driven that far for a vacation. Usually, we would fly, but the airlines seem to be having problems now, as well as rental car prices have soared, so driving won out. We shall see how we do. Preparation for the trip is well underway, although some things can only be done at the last minute. I have to work all weekend before we leave on Monday, so we've been doing everything ahead of time we can. 

I will post along the way if I can, but internet access, time, and motivation are still to be determined during our travels.

Until next time...

Seeing the sights

Ward and I took a break from our everyday routine and spent a couple of days exploring central Pennsylvania this past weekend. As we do most on our trips, we made sure we had a place to stay, snacks and sandwiches, and a few ideas of what we might want to do. We also thought about how we would work around the weather on this trip, which was predicted to have temperatures in the 90s and the threat of severe storms. However, timing was everything, and we managed to avoid any real problems. Here are some highlights from our trip.

We visited the Hershey Gardens in the morning before the stifling heat of the afternoon.
The temperatures were not too hot, but we did have a bit of rain.
Notice the Hershey's Kisses on the signposts. This is in the town of Hershey, where everything is related to Mr. Hershey and his chocolate enterprises. 

The gardens were established in 1937, so there were many mature plantings.

Many of the spring flowers were finished blooming, and the summer ones, like this allium, were starting.

In addition, to the outdoor gardens, they had a butterfly atrium. (Although, this is a moth.)

The gardens were host to many school field trips, but we managed to maneuver around them with no problems.

After the Hershey Gardens, the skies were darkening with severe weather threats, so we weren't sure what we wanted to do. Proceeding with uncertainty, we headed to Hunter Mansion in Harrisburg. As we explored the park along the Susquehanna River associated with the mansion, the rain began. With a mad dash, we were able to make it under the cover of the mansion porch before the heavens opened. And as luck would have it, there was a tour guide waiting, and we then had our own personal tour of the entire house.

Ward especially enjoyed our private tour because he could look at the
details of the woodworking, some as old as 200 years old, as long as he wanted.

After the rain stopped, we explored the grounds
before heading to the hotel and having an early dinner.
This is an ice house they filled with ice from
 the river in the winter. It lasted most of the year.

The next morning, we explored the back roads on a barn quilt tour. But after a couple of hours, we decided it was too hot and headed for home.

But along the way, we stopped in Gettysburg at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Historic Site. We had explored the battlefields in Gettysburg but had never been here before. Unfortunately, we saw that the house didn't open for tours until next week, but we decided to scope it out for another time.

But luck was with us again when we found a ranger who spent an hour or so with us telling us about the house, farm, and President Eisenhower. Eisenhower bought this farm after he retired from the military, and it featured prominently during his presidency. The afternoon was hot, but under the shade of a big tree with gentle breezes blowing, it was an enjoyable afternoon. And interesting. I learned many things about Eisenhower that I didn't know. 

We were able to make it home before another rainstorm, and much to our delight we saw that the electrician had finished the lighting in the kitchen. Slowly but surely we are getting there.

Until next time...

Travel Log, Day Five

 Our Trip to WV and MD

Today, we were back in Maryland in Cumberland. We had visited Cumberland before seeing some of the sites, but planned to explore more areas this morning. Unfortunately, it was raining, so that put a damper on things. However, we did manage to see a few sites before we put the pedal to the metal and headed home. 

Cumberland was a thriving coal and transportation center in the late 1800's and numerous wealthy families were located here. Many of their grand houses are still around today but this is the only one we got a picture of because of the rain.

This the only remaining structure of Fort Cumberland for which the town was named. It was headquarters for British defense in the French and Indian War. A 21 year old, George Washington, led his first command here. Also, his last when he gathered troops at the fort to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion. And bring it back around, this is where the troops started from that crossed the bridge we saw on the first day at Casselman State Park. 

After we got home (and they woke up from their naps),
the cats welcomed us with demands for lap time. 

This vacation was interesting in that we found several connections, both on a historical and a personal level, from place to place that we hadn't planned or even knew about. That made it fun as different pieces fell into place. Next time, we might actually research ahead of time and go with a plan. But maybe not. What would be the fun in that?

We had a great time on our little excursion. There was just the right amount of family time and back road exploring, sprinkled with some history lessons, hikes, and fun restaurants. Sometimes vacations work out and sometimes they don't. This one definitely worked out in the best way. 

Looking forward to our next trip, but for now, regular life is calling.

Travel Log, Day Three

 Our trip through WV and MD

Ward measuring a board to see
 if it will fit in the van.

Today was the day that we fulfilled the main reason for this trip - to get wood that came from my uncle's farm. My aunt and uncle had a large farm with rolling pastures and wooded hillsides. Every time a tree went down, my uncle saved the wood for his many building projects. Unfortunately, both he and his wife have passed and his kids are trying to get things ready for an auction. Before all of the wood was sold, Ward wanted some for sentimental reasons to use in a future project. 

We spent a lovely morning touring around the farm and looking in all of the different buildings where wood was stored.  With so much to chose from, I don't know how Ward made the decision on what he wanted, but we ended up with 10 long boards of different species. Afterwards, we had a good lunch with more lively conversation with my cousins before we were on our way.

While we were looking around the farm, my genealogist sister texted me and wanted to know if we were going to follow the back roads or go on the Interstate when we left because she had something that she wanted us to find. She had read about a roadside stone that marked the spot where our 4th great grandfather was killed during a Shawnee ambush. It was located outside of Philppi, WV. Ward loves to explore back roads and I do too (if I don't get carsick), so off we went on our hunt. 

After arriving in Philippi, we had no idea where to turn. None of our maps were detailed enough to find the county roads we were looking for. As luck would have it, we stumbled onto the county history museum. Actually, the town was small enough, it would have been hard to not find it. We got in just before closing and tried to explain what we were looking for. Nothing we said rang a bell to the couple who was there, but after some digging, they were able to give us a map and more precise directions to what we were looking for. And while we were there, to support the town, I bought some hot dog sauce made by the local Methodist women's group. With a map and a jar of sauce in hand, we headed out to find the marker.

The helpful Barbour County Historical Museum
is located in the old train depot.

 After a bit of a hit and a miss, we found the gravel road we were looking for. We went up and down the road slowly looking for signs of the marker. We weren't sure what we were looking for, but we kept looking. On the second time down the road, Eagle Eyes Ward, saw two stone markers about 25' off the road. Bingo! We found them. As it turns out, the marker only mentions James Minear, who was also in the party. The Minear Family paid to have the stones put there, so they didn't include others. But my ancestor had passed right in this spot in 1781. It kind of blew my mind when I thought about it.

We took a few pictures, trying to avoid poison ivy, before we headed back into Philippi to look around. The long day of daylight was very nice for exploring. After a full day, we headed to our hotel for the night. Below are a few more pictures of the day.

THE STONE. Daniel Cameron (my grandfather), James Minear, and 3 others had been to Clarksburg, WV, to get land patents, which BTW were signed by Patrick Henry. Unfortunately, they didn't make it all the way home.

Philippi is a town of about 3000 people.
It is the location of the first land battle of the Civil War.

The major highway into Philippi passes through this covered bridge. The original bridge was built in 1852 and used by both North and South armies during the Civil War. It was rebuilt in 1989 after a fire. 

Ann R. Jarvis lived outside of Philippi and was a champion for the public health and the sick. Inspired by her mother, Anna M. Jarvis founded Mother's Day. The first service was in Grafton, WV in 1908. By 1914, Anna had gotten Woodrow Wilson to recognize it as an official holiday. Early Mother's Days were observed by displaying the US Flag.