Josh and Becca Thrap and Family

My how the Summer is flying by. We had a very busy 4th of July week and I had intentions to blog more as things were happening this month, but now I can’t believe it’s the 23rd already! So, before I forget everything, here is a post about my little trip to Indiana with my mom and sister and my sister’s friend Colleen. We left on Thursday afternoon, the 8th, and with some traffic delays and stops for gas and dinner we finally made it to Aunt Jan’s in time to unload and settle in before Jan left to work the night shift. In the morning we let Jan sleep until about 10 or 11 and then we went shopping! Jan took us to a favorite little ice cream shop that also serves sandwhiches for lunch–Valpo Velvet.

Then with some food in our tummies we were ready to hit the Goodwill! Colleen was not prepared for what Goodwill shopping can mean in our family, so after about an hour, maybe hour and a half she and Sarah walked around outside for a bit before coming back to hurry the rest of us along. We found some cute things for “Baby Gaga” and Jan got some porch furniture. I found a fun t-shirt that had the flag of Kazakhstan on the front and above the flag it said “Kazakhstan” and below the flag it said “it’s nice” which made me laugh, but it wasn’t a size that would have fit anyone in my family so I did not buy it. Purchases made, the next thing to do was figure out how to fit back in the car along with all of our Goodwill goodies.

After dropping off all our new treasures as well as Sarah and Colleen, Jan, Mom, and I went on to the grocey store to pick up supplies for dinner and breakfast. We had squealers and grilled veggies for dinner and shared some laughs when Mom kept talking about “Mike & Ike’s hard lemonade” and Jan asked for some “ice clubes.” After dinner we played a very long game of Apples to Apples (I won ) before zoning out to “Say Yes to the Dress.” Saturday morning Jan made her famous stuffed french toast for breakfast complete with fresh blueberries to get us all geared up to go berry picking! After breakfast, with buckets and sun protection (and in my case, a solid dose of bug spray) in place we headed off into the fields for some marathon blueberry picking. The bushes were pretty full and the buckets seemed to fill quickly at first. (As did some people’s tummies.)

But the sun was awfully hot and we’d left all the water back in the car, so after about three hours I took the first load of full buckets back to the car and had a break. Not long after I’d stopped, Sarah and Colleen came out with several more full buckets and it started to rain. After another 10-15 minutes in the rain it became obvious that the mommas were not coming and so Sarah and went back to retrieve them. While I waited in the safety of the car a little yellow airplane buzzed just overhead and cropdusted the fields of corn surrounding the blueberry patch. I tried several times to get a good picture but failed. With blueberries picked and sorted and stored we took turns showering and decided that there was still enough time to drive up into Michigan and visit some wineries. Although I remember visiting wineries as a kid on vacation with my family, this was my first experience with the “wine tasting.” The first place we went gave us small samples of 7 wines each of our choice and one vodka made entirely from grapes.

The next stop was beer tasting with 6 varieties to choose from. I smelled them but I just think beer is gross so I only tasted the tiniest amount of one which had intrigued me with its name of “Cocoa Stout” but it too was gross so I didn’t bother with any others. Then we drove to another winery which offered not only 6 more wine samples each, but also a sparkling grape juice and chocolates.

On the way back to Jan’s it stormed some more and we discussed what kind of pizza to order from “Country Folk’s.” This time we dropped Mom and Jan off to walk the lane while Sarah and Colleen and I picked up the pizza.

After dinner we watched Mama Mia. Despite my meds, all the outdoors and “hairy girls” (Jan’s dogs) were really doing a numer on my nose and eyes. But all was well Sunday morning when Jan made uber yummy cinnamon rolls for brekky. After a leisurly morning of rolls on the porch, watching Colleen go off to run her 7 miles, we divvied up the blueberries and loaded up the car. On the road we listened to the final game of the World Cup between Spain and the Netherlands. The AM radio station that seemed to be the only one broadcasting the game was faint and so we listened for hours through lots of static and just as we pulled into Mom’s driveway and Sarah was about to run into the house to catch the exciting overtime on the tv, Spain scored a goal in the last minutes of overtime and it ended, so we didn’t see any of it.