day 6 Virginia trip 2008

Outside at the bottom of the hill they climbed. See the sticks Adam found? We don't have trees here where we live, seriously. We definitely don't have cool walking sticks. The hills, the mountains, I think it's the trees we love most of all.

The living room, but the pool table is there so that you have room to shoot. We had several great games, discovered that John is better than us, but that we all stink. =) That door goes out to a 2nd porch, which is really the front of the house.

Jani and Jovi's room. We put Jovi's pack n play at the foot of the far bed. It's a really sweet room. Florals, pinks, girly. At night it's really dark. Really really dark. Each room has it's own thermostat. Some kind of heater is along the bottom of the outside walls under the windows. I've not seen this type before but it worked really well. Bad thing...kids can reach the control by standing on the bed. Bad girl. =)

This is the room Adam and Jace slept in. Jace's pack n play was just on the other side of the bed. As it turns out, Adam had the best bed in the house.

Our room was to the left of this room, across the hall from Jani. I failed to take a picture of it. =( It was the bedding that I loved. These sheets were really thick. And the comforter was so soft.

The living room (but I think it's the master) has a bathroom thru the door you see and the other sliding door walks out onto the porch. We loved the chair and couch, some sort of suede I think. Very soft. This is also where we sat to see the election results.

The kitchen. Very cool. Just needs a cabinet to put food in for those staying longer than 2 or 3 days. Like a small pantry. Or even a small bookcase under the bar overlooking the pool room. It did have a 2nd tv mounted over the table. Not useful for us though. They painted the chairs different pastel colors so it was easy for the kids to know where their seats were.

This morning we got up and started packing. John walked over to talk to Chuck and tell him we were leaving and why. Sarah got sick with the flu. I just had to cry off and on that we were leaving early. Just so sad. But it will be ok. At least we can figure out what's wrong.

Something we learned about Uhaul. We rented a 5x8 trailer to bring our stuff here. Total it was $172. When John went to the same place we dropped the first one off, to rent a 4x8 or 4x6, it was $315!!! No other choice, so he got it (our stuff would not fit in the van). The man told him the price was based on where you were leaving the trailer. See in Lexington when we dropped it off, there were only 3 other trailers. But in our town, there were maybe 15 trailers. So if there are too many trailers or trucks or whatever where you want to leave it, they make you pay more! I guess to cover their charge for making them redistribute them? Or maybe to discourage you from leaving it somewhere? Either way, we had a new 6x12 now 1/4 paid for.

John and Adam are the best. They love me. And though we were all sad about leaving, they both said said it was ok, that I was more important. Gotta love it when your family loves you. So off we went, headed for South Carolina. But first we had to stop and tell Grammy goodbye. It's always sad leaving her. You never know when or if you'll get to see her again. And it's always sad for us to leave this area. We just love it. But I think it's the memories. And the trees. That's what we love the most. We were able to see Miss Edna, Grammy's dear neighbor. She's so sweet and kind. We just love her. It was about 2:30 before we finally got on our way.

Something else we learned. If your directions tell you it's about 6 hours to get to your destination and you have 4 children, 3 that are 4 and under, what it really means is that it will be about 8 hours. We were headed to our friends house that we've only talked to online and on the phone. Excited about meeting and hoping we liked each other in person just as much. I also thought about calling my cousin that I haven't talked to in 10 years but with our travel being so far behind we skipped it. It wasn't until about 930 before we hit Greenville. We all agreed to have breakfast together the next morning.