Friday, February 17, 2012

Everyone Loves A Road Trip!!

What a blessing God has given us! Last Fall, Glenn and I were chatting about how wonderful it would be to go to Florida that coming winter. We hadn't been to visit my folks in over 8 years! They live in Ocklawaha Florida during the Fall and Winter. This is northern Florida. About 1.5 hours north of Orlando.

So...we calculated the cost of gas to drive our 15 passenger van down to Florida. At that time it gas was $3.12 a gallon. We figured it would cost about $800.00 round trip to go down, and then we had places we could stay with friends along the way, which would be great. We knew it would have to be LOW budget for sure. So....we prayed!!  Then...about 2 weeks later, the man we bought our van from called Glenn out of the blue and asked if he could rent his old van from us! He offered us....drum roll please....$900.00 to rent it from us! Well....there you go.....it was a no brainer...this was God's answer to our prayers! We said yes, and they lent us their old beater 15 passenger van for the 6 weeks that they needed to rent our van. It was win/win!!

So...now...the day finally came...we are on our trip!!! Yippee! We packed up our van last night, got up at 3:00 am this morning and headed for Delaware. Our first stop. Our dear friends the Lowmans---Janette and her daughter Suzy live in Bear Delaware and opened their beautiful home to us to stay the night. We'll spend another 2 nights here in 2 weeks on our way home, too!

Here's a peek at our first day on the road!!

Here we are at 3:00 this morning getting our last minute things together and saying goodbye to Levi!



Everyone did so well, even though it was super early!!


One big happy family in our van!! Even though we have seats in for 11, we had so much stuff including my parent's trash compactor and computer to bring to them, that we had to sit in the 8 seats...snug and comfy!!


Glenn did the first leg of driving...from 4:00---6:00 am. We ended up at a rest area in Massachusetts for our first fuel fill up before we hit CT, and higher gas prices, and to have our breakfast. We brought all our own food. So our breakfast was homemade granola and milk, and fruit!

Here is the gang in Woodstown, NJ. This is where we had our lunch stop and refueling. On the lunch menu was turkey sandwiches, goldfish, and fruit. Yum! Everyone is still doing really well!


Here is are our lunch ladies in action!! Go girls!


Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders...they don't upset us...all we ask is that you let us, serve it your way!

Okay...so we don't get out much....here is a toll booth on the NJ turnpike and it's the biggest we've ever seen! So we had to take a photo!


Here are some photos of the Delaware Memorial Bridge. It's a beautiful double bridge!



We've finally arrived at our luxury destination! Oma and Aunt Suzy's house!!

Junior loves to help out! They wanted to have dinner for us. Aunt Suzy had to work tonight, but she made wonderful stuffed shells, and bread, and salad, and a veggie! Yum!


There is Oma at the end of the table!

Mine and Glenn's room! Nice!
 So we'll head out here in the morning, around 9:00. Then we'll head to Wake Forest, NC, and meet up with our dear friends the Hillman's. We'll be staying at their friend's home, the Burke family! God is sooo good!

We made it here in record time, and didn't have any traffic at all!

I'll try and post daily!

Love to you all!

M

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