Conway, Arkansas

What a luxury to be able to outrun a storm. It is balmy, warm, sticky in our jeans and snow boots and sleeveless shirts here in Conway, Arkansas. We left the Waffle House in Lebanon, MO at the ungodly hour of EIGHT AM! We had trucks coming in and out all night and each and every truck had a refrigator unit which was not only deafening, cycled All Night Long. I was very happy to be driving out of the parking lot at EIGHT AM IN THE MORNING with breakfast in all the kids’ lunchboxes, coffee for Jamie and myself and a day of driving OFF interstate. We took I44 down to Springfield MO (the Simpsons creators decided on a good name for their town; there is a Springfield in each and every state we’ve been to in the midwest, and probably many counties as well). I had tried, unsuccessfully, to stop at the Lincoln Museum and Library in Springfield IL but it was located in a mall of downtown buildings with only parallel parking and nothing to accomodate a big ass trailer.

Last night Jamie and I downloaded days worth of weather maps and decided we’d outrun the storm coming down from Canada and turning all the states blue with cold, snow, sleet and ice. We drove lovely roads through the Ozarks and were amazed by the beauty of the mountains. We found all the leaves which were missing from the trees in the northlands; they’ve all migrated down here to Arkansas. Lots of beautiful turning color maple leaves still on the trees. We decided to take highway 65 south through Branston, Harrison and eventually Little Rock and from there we’ll head to Louisana and Mississippi. The coldest of the storm is west, so the beaches and south Texas will be very cold but southeastern Louisana and Mississippi should be ok. At least no snow or ice. According to the weather maps and prognostications, Texas should thaw by Saturday or Sunday and we’ll head down then. For now, we’ll hug southeast Louisana and Mississippi and wait it out on the edge.
For only the second night since we started travelling, we’re at a WalMart. I refuse to shop them and will not even park in their RV-friendly parking lots, but Jamie really only feels comfortable at WalMart so here we sit. I was able to find a Goodwill in walking distance that is not quite as expensive as its midwestern cousins and bought swimsuits for the girls, 2 pairs of pants for Sissy (FINALLY she has enough pants, now that we’re Mexico bound and will be wearing only shorts or dresses until these new (well, new to her) pants are outgrown), a dress for Ellen, books galore and a bear for Pikey. If we are overweight, it must be from the 3,982,355 bears the kids bring everywhere with them.

Lebanon, Mo

I suppose I should be grateful that he doesn’t insist on staying in a paying campground each and every night, but Jamie sure has amazingly high standards of comfort when it comes to urban boondocking.  We have passed large parking lots, churches, hotels with long semis in the parking lots, Cracker Barrels (reported to be friendly to RVers), museums, all in search of the elusive WalMart or Target or Lowe’s.  When the entire family is on the brink of exhaustion he will then abandon his standards and allow me to pick the spot; last night it was the truck parking area of a Conoco gas station and tonight it is the truck parking area of the Waffle House.  There have been lovely quiet areas but by the time he abandons his standards we are all starving and take the first area we see.  There is free Wifi across the street, at a cluster of three or four hotels, but he won’t park over there, so here we sit, surrounded by refrigator trucks (the noise of which knows no bounds) and to get online, I walk out to the roadside and do a quick download and upload.  The trucks are stacked in here like lumber; when we arrived we had 3 or 4 semis accompanying us and now the parking lot is full, with other trucks occupying the edges of the parking lot.  Jesse says it sounds like a thousand cats are purring beside his bed.

We left Janesville, Wisconsin on highway 51 and followed this meandering 2 lane road all the way to Peru, Illinois.  It was a lovely road that traversed many family farms and flattened out into rural Illinois.  Jamie was insistent on making tracks though, so we abandoned the back roads for this and that and tonight find ourselves on I44 in Lebanon, Mo.  He promises me though, that tomorrow we will leave I44 and head into the Ozarks where there are no interstates and I will be at peace again.  We have been traveling very long days; six or more hours of travel and over 200 miles.  For us, this is a LOT of daily travel.  It makes it an even longer day when we don’t leave “camp” until noon or later.  Tomorrow I plan on being on the road by 8 or 9am.

What can I say about this mode of travel; it is tiresome and boring but we did show the kids the Gateway to the West (St. Louis Arch) today and they got some run time at a rest stop.  I’m really looking forward to Texas when we can rest from outrunning the cold front (due tomorrow in Illinois and Missouri) and relax on the beaches before heading into warm Mexico.

I really shouldn’t complain though; I used the very last of our whole wheat flour to make a loaf of bread and the generator ran out of gas with 2 hours left in the bake cycle.  We topped off the genset and restarted it and the breadmaker started up where it left off.  So we have fresh bread for midnight snack.  And Michelle, if anyone, should know how my kids LOVE to eat right before bed.

La Crosse, Wisconsin

Weather Alert!  Winter expected on Wednesday.  mark your calenders.  We watched the weather report on the local station last night.  We’re staying at a wayside stop (CLOSED FOR WINTER) off state highway 14 just south of La Crosse.  Not content to experience the Mississpii once, we realized we missed the exit for highway 14, turned around, back over the Mississippi on I90, exit to highway 14, down the road a bit, back OVER the Mississippi at La Crosse (which has an AMAZING Christmas display in the waterfront area, but with the trailer, I wasn’t about to chance it at night) so we simply enjoyed it from the Mississippi bridge.

We tore ourselves away from the mansion, Michelle and Slade and their four amazing boys yesterday.  It was really hard.  The kids really loved every minute they spent with their cousins and will miss them terribly.  Ellen has already tantrumed about missing Sebby.  Pike is ready to settle down Right Now and doesn’t want to go to Mexico; he wants a house.  It really took no time to get used to the stickness of the mansion; not worrying about water usage and the need to deal with the grey or sink or black water after its use; not worrying whether we had enough propane for heat; having so much room to spread out; having an enormous (in Minneapolis, the word is GINORMOUS, apparently) oven to cook in; coffee flowing at all hours of the day; it was all heaven.  And the company made it even better.  But tear away we did, and a good thing as La Crosse predicts that winter will arrive late Tuesday or early Wednesday and we definitely DON’T want to be around for that.

We spent Friday night at the Camping World; we spent about $300 on stuff there and needed a night to charge the new batteries we bought.  What a deal; we left the trailer there the entire time we were at the mansion; hooked up to electricity and it was all free.  Course, we did spend $300 when we picked it up…  We got such an incredibly late start, anyone in an RV will simply laugh or shake their heads in disgust.  We NEEDED to spend even MORE money at Camping World, the kids did NOT want to get ready to go, we had to test the repair of the black valve and then dump; it was a long, lazy (though not for me, trying to “encourage” the kids to get ready) morning and we finally got rolling around 1:30.  By 5pm we knew we weren’t going to make Janesomething Wisconsin that night so we pulled into a wayside stop just south of La Crosse and setup for the night.  “No Overnight Camping” (we’re parking!) and “CLOSED FOR WINTER” signs adorned the reststop.  We hoped for no interference last night and got none.

If you’re following along on maps, we took 94 out of Rogers to 495 (accidentally; you get very little warning to freeway splits in Minneapolis and there are not quitck manuevers with the trailer) through Minneapolis.  Turned out the 495 accidental routing was good; Jamie decided we’d take 52 to I90 instead of I94 the whole way.  It is a great road; 4 lane and divided.  We listened to “Words of Stone” all the way to Wisconsin and followed that with Prarie Home Companion (live from Cinci).  While we were in Minneapolis, on one of our library forays, I found the “Friends of Minneapolis” store across from the central library where you could purchase old books and audio and cassette books.  I picked up a LOT of cassette books and now I’m worried we’ll run out before Texas…  Yesterday we listened to “The Jungle Book” narrated by Jim Weiss (all the kids recognized his voice “This is the guy who does the Greek Myths!  And Giants!”) and “Words of Stone”.  We took I90 from Rochester (did you know there is an Austin and Houston Minneapolis???) Minneapolis to the Mississippi (which we crossed 3 times trying to find the right exit) and now we’re in Wisconsin 14.  Tonight we’ll be in Janesomething and after that we are making a break for warmer weather.  I think we might take I80 over to I35 and blast down as far south as we can get by Wednesday.  Though, last night, we ran the generator to power the furnace (now that we have working batteries, Jamie is loathe to acutally USE them) and the generator ran all night on one tank of gas.  At least 12 hours so far…  Interstates are really weird; after years of not using them, we’re making great use of them (but still prefer the backroads) to get SomeWhere.

I’m not sure if we’ll actually check out Arkansas or not; we had planned to check out the communities of Hot Springs AK and something else on our way to Texas and Mexico, but now that we’re headed south, I don’t want to stop until I’m on the beach.  And I don’t think we’re Arkansas people.  I think Silver Springs, NM is more our speed…

the dog ate my post. I SWEAR!

Minnesota is either getting warmer or I’m getting used to it. Coming back from somewhere today the radio announced the temperature as 35 and having just been in it, I realized that it wasn’t that bad. Coming out of Yoga today it was “nice” and “warm” and when I got home, seeing the number reading 53 made me agree that it indeed was “nice” and “warm”. My definition of cold has now decreased to temperatures in the 20’s and teens.

Yoga is getting amazing. I started a week ago Sunday, doing my normal practice (Primary to Mari A) and Michelle convinced me to try a local Yoga place (some people call them studios, some call them shalas. Not sure of the difference or what this one is.). We took the Tuesday class (a week ago today) and then Ladies Holiday forced me to wait until Friday for the next class. We attended Friday, Saturday and Sunday and each day I learned something new. Before taking a class, I had worried that classes would stifle me or that I was not good enough for a class. I have learned new facets to poses, corrections to what I was previously doing in poses and been enlightened to nuances that had passed me by relying solely on The Book. Today, Michelle and I got stoned. We were so blissed out after class that we were absolutely S.T.O.N.E.D on Yoga. I’ve never had that happen with my home practice and I’m so going to miss the ease of class. It is a different level of practice, harder than home practice but at the same time easier in motivation. Oh, and chanting. I’ve never done (or known what they were) the invocations and the chanting is starting to grow on me. I’m not doing it yet, but I’m considering it. I was totally roached before today’s practice and even considered not going but we dragged our sorry asses to the shala/studio and I’m so glad we did. I am learning something new each and every time, even today when I had to stop after Mari D due to my aching back. OH! And I got headstands! One class we got to get pointers on specific poses and I was shown how to get up in headstands and I can now do them. Without a wall. Amazing. I’m SO going to miss classes when we hit the road.

Ellen is eating food. The day we arrived I was talking to Michelle about how she and Jesse survive on air and it seems she must have heard me. She must have set out to prove me wrong as she eats all day long and finishes the day with yogurt at 10pm.

You honestly cannot have too much coffee in one day. Slade starts out morning right by making us all a lovely pot of coffee before he leaves for work. We work on that through the morning and sometimes make a second pot for the afternoon. With Oregon Chai at $1.79 a box (I’ve seen it as high as some $6 a box in Santa Fe), we work on that in the evening. Going back to road and restricting ourselves to one or two cups will put us into definite withdrawl. But we’ll instead think happy thoughts of massive amounts of coffee and a pot that never empties. This is a very good house for coffee.
It is absolutely possible to completely double your family size; double your 4 children; double the adults, and in a mansion, it doesn’t even feel tight. The hospitality continues to flow, the kids continue to play; Sebby and Sissy have found wonderful playmates and companions in each other (a first for Sissy) and we’re only using two of three full floors. And the kids are LOATHE to venture outside, so it is all INSIDE time.

Yellow Tail Shiraz is well worth the seeking and finding especially in Minnesota where you cannot purchase wine and bread at the same time. Insanity I tell you.

I’m so glad we came here. The cousins are such a breath of fresh air, the kids are LOVING spending time with them and they are introducing them to all kinds of concepts from video gaming to Montessori school methods.

I picked up a pair of lower rise (though not hip hugging) jeans at a flea market in New Mexico. Today I decided to give Jamie Christmas a little early and replaced my old granny undies with nice and smaller items. I put one on and was writing this post at a backless chair when Ellen passed by me.
“Mommy what’s this?” (she pulls on what is peeping out of my lowrise pants)
“It’s my underwear.”
“It’s very small.” (thong)
“Yes, it’s a different kind of underwear.”
“Do we have any? (she and Sissy)”
“No.” (weesh!)

Apparently this wasn’t enough as later, she came by and pulled, HARD, on the offending item, giving me a marvelous wedgie and proclaimed them very stretchy. I have a feeling the granny panties will be making a much needed comeback.

And that’s the news from not-so-cold-anymore-Minneapolis AND just to show how much I love you all, I re-created this entire post after my hosting server crashed just long enough for me to lose the original post. I can’t tell you how difficult it was to start all over a-freaking-gain.

Minneapolis must be lovely when it isn't freezing your teeth...

The central library in Minneapolis is stunning beyond words. We spent many hours there yesterday and went back for another dose today. I actually got a good exposure to many of the libraries; I hit Northeast, Sumner, one in the SE (Hosmer), Central and Franklin. If Lynden Hills were open I would have hit it. I was able to score 8 museum passes with my sister’s library card (thus the need to hit so many branches). We’ve finally started leaving the house after spending what seemed like too many days without getting out at all. Tomorrow we visit my good friend, Bonny (whom I have never met), Thursday to the Mall of America or and Friday we’ll probably head to the Science Museum I killed myself getting passes for.

Minneapolis is a really easy city to get around in. The downtown is easy to see and head for should you get lost coming home, say, from the library only a 1/2 hour WALK from your sister’s house. I’m already feeling very comfortable with the city but we still need to hit Trader Joes and I don’t think we’ve yet been to that part of town. I’m thinking that is SW. And there is so much to do here and many opportunities for freebies. I got $8 coupons from a convenience store for the Mall of America. I would totally consider living here, were it about 1000 miles to the south.

This weather is insane in the winter and I keep reading advertisments saying, “No mosquitoes” (indoor). So I can only assume that the mozzies are a force to be reckoned with in the summer.
Today I took my first Ashtanga primary class. It was a very different experience. Ever since I began doing Yoga I’ve been reading my friend Julie’s blog (I’ve actually met her) and reading of her deep and moving experiences with Ashtanga. I don’t get that with my home practice and didn’t get anything but a workout from the Green Bay class I took. I’ve never really experienced the mindful part of Yoga but today something was different. Interesting. Still processing. It was a 10 o’clock class and coming out, I felt like it was late afternoon. Weird. I don’t do the chanting or invocations; just doesn’t feel right. If I can still function tomorrow (I’m not more sore than normal yet) I’ll try a class tomorrow evening and then again on Sunday.

we're FREEZING up here!

Jody has asked anyone with kids to link to Kyle’s video and spread the word that a 5pt harness is safer than a booster. Here is Kyle’s video and a picture of my kids. Sissy has upgraded to a Britax SE (from the pictured Marathon) and Ellen is using her Marathon (we sold the Roundabout) so we are now a 3 Britax SE and 1 Britax Marathon family. I’ll weigh the boys tomorrow, but I’m pretty sure they’re still under 80lb.

It has been very hard to get the kids to leave the house. I don’t know if it is the plethora of games and books or incredible company (cousins) or massive amounts of room, but they are all four loathe to leave. Uncle Slade gave Jamie and I a wonderful tour of the town today and we saw more beautiful homes than I ever imagined existed. Living so long on the left coast, I think we figured all towns were like ours; some beautiful architecture here and there but really rare. The further east we came the more innundated the towns were with amazing homes; block after block in town after town, and we decided today that this is the norm in the midwest. Incredibly beautiful homes with gorgeous “bones” and stunning architecture that would make any Bay Area home buyer drool with envy.

We somehow managed to drag the kids to the Minneapolis Institue of Art where Pike was mesmorized by a still life of fruit. I also came to the realization that the boys’ carseats (Britax SE’s) are now too small as they tip the scales at 85 and 83lb. Just two years ago they were in the 65lb range. How they have grown! So I’m researching alternatives but the possibility exists that their seats are good to 105lb (which is what I remember from when I bought them).

We have all found Uncle Slade to be such a most excellent cook that Ellen and Jesse, who previously found air to be a wonderful souce of fuel (instead of actual food) have been eating real food! Ellen has actually been eating all day and just before bed, completely blowing me away. One of the first things that Michelle and I talked about was Ellen’s lack of appetite and thankfully, she is making a liar out of me.

Rattling around the mansion in Minneapolis is getting weary for Jamie and I so we’ve decided to try to lure the kids out. Michelle can get museum passes for the kids at her library, so we’ll try that and I have found a wonderful Yoga studio which Michelle assures me is just around the corner. So there is always that.

There is so much going on in this town, but the cold is simply amazingly cold. And a little too cold at that.

it's kind of hard to sleep in a mansion...

(was the answer Sissy gave when we asked the kids how they slept last night)

We’re in Minneapolis at my (other) sister’s house and it is, to our eyes, a Mansion. She assures me, however, that the real mansions are a bit more toward the lake and I can’t wait to see them.

I honestly don’t know where to start; when I get behind in posting it seems like I can never catch up and insurmountable to try. And honestly, it is boring beyond belief.

Grandma Elinor is doing much better and Maca soldiers on. For 96, hell, for 76, she’s a strong woman, and Dan is taking wonderful care of them all. I picked up a breadmaker at the thriftstore in Neenah after pondering the purchase these last two years and decided the $5 and space it will take is worth it. Converseley, it only took me 6 months to decide to spend $250 on a new camera. Once Dan found out that I had a breadmaker, he wasted no time in showing me his baby and he walked me through the making of a loaf of bread. I’m so glad he did, because I would have been lost when I tried at the hotel. It is such a luxury to make your own bread; to know the ingredients are whole and not to have to scour markets for the whole wheat which is not full of crap. We eat about a loaf (or more) a day, and living in the trailer, it was a daily purchase.

The camera! I have been pondering and wondering and hemming and hawing about a DSLR. I have an SLR in the storage unit and have processed my own film so the idea of a DSLR wasn’t daunting, but the pricetag certainly was. So I hemmed and I hawed and I decided to purchase and I reconsidered. I’ve always been very impressed with my sister (in CA)’s S2IS and kept it in the back of my mind as an alternative to a DSLR. I finally decided that the cost of a DSLR and lenses and probably lots of other stuff just wasn’t worth it for the zoom, video and picture capabilites of the S2IS. Thanks to birthday money, I ordered it today and it should arrive before next Monday! So, expect even MORE pictures to come!

We left Neenah after spending a few hours with Grandma Elinor, Dan and Maca to say goodbye and headed for Minneapolis on an unusually warm day. By the afternoon we were all in shortsleeves and wondering what the weather gods had in store for us. Jamie was under the impression that Minneapolis was a mere 200 miles from Neenah, so we readied the trailer, did errands, spent a bit of time in the pool and finally said goodbye to the Days Inn. They really did well by us; we cooked in the room, brought cooked food into the room, parked the trailer in back and ran an electric cord, kept the breakfast bar open for the kids on Sunday and never gave us the impression we were the incredible imposition I’m sure we must have been. We did clean the room each and every time we had the maid come in, as it was almost impassible with kid crap.

Once we hit the interstate, just outside of Eau Claire, we realized that Minneapolis instead lay some 300 miles from Neenah instead of 200. When I noticed an informational sign on the interstate for a Laura Ingalls Wilder Highway Information thingie, I was off the freeway in a flash and heading through Menomonie. It was dark and closed but Jamie finally relented and allowed us to stop for the night. He was very motivated to get to Minneapolis, but it was a very warm night and everyone else needed to get out, stretch, run, move and stop. So we camped at WalMart. I hate WalMart so much that I will not spend the night in their RV-friendly parking lots but Jamie is very nervous about urban boondocking and only feels comfortable at WalMart. So far, I’ve been able to avoid it, but ran out of alternatives that night.

As warm and lovely as that day had been, the next was as windy and cold. We arrived at Camping World, convinced them to work on our trailer (work ethic on vacation?), parked it and plugged it into electricity. Even if they don’t do the work, as long as they don’t screw things up too badly, we’re still out ahead. There is No Way In Hell the trailer would fit anywhere near Michelle and Slade’s mansion (she is going to give me absolute HELL for calling it a mansion ) so we really needed a place with electricity to leave it. With nightly temperatures in the 20’s for the next week (or more), Jamie actually headed back up today to winterize it (put antifreeze in the plumbing).

The kids are LOVING their cousins, the enormous rooms, the staircases, the boardgames, the videogames, the luscious food and the incredible hospitality of their family. Michelle and I have walked to the local organic food coop and she has a lovely neighborhood filled with homes that Jamie and I will no doubt be drooling over once the kids give us a chance to get out. But as lovely as Michelle, Slade and their kids are, and as incredible as the house is, I can’t get to warm, tropical, sandy Mexico soon enough.  And my children, my “we must find a stick house to settle down in” and my “I can’t travel any longer” and my “when are we going to settle down” children were SINGING and CHANTING “WE’RE TRAVELLING TODAY!  WE’RE TRAVELLING TODAY!  WE’RE TRAVELLING TODAY!” as we left Neenah.  I think I’ve finally managed to brainwash them with wanderlust.  All but Pikey.  He’s a tough nut to crack. 

Love Thursday

I’ve been reading Chris’s Love Thursday posts for a while now and always wished I could do the same.  It just didn’t feel right to me, so I never joined that particular bandwagon.  But tonight, after deciding to exercise again, the SECOND day in a row (!!) a lightbulb went off and I figured out my Love Thursday.  Self love Thursday.  I think that many moms have trouble putting themselves first especially when The Children really “should” come first.  But I think I finally got it when I started doing Yoga; I liked doing something for me and finally, my youngest was normally able to do without constant mommy attention for the hour it took me to do yoga.  Last year I also did a lot of walking, but I have not yet been able to stick to something.  And that is where Love Thursday comes in.

In the spirit of Love Thursday, I am going to hold myself accountable for the past week of self love.  It seems somewhat hopeless exercising after consuming mass quantities of Halloween candy (DAMN that Sugar Sprite!), but I convinced myself tonight and did it.  30 minutes of pool exercise.  10 minutes of leg exercises and 2300 running steps in the water.  Tomorrow I hope to add yoga to the mix, but for now, my immediate goal is 30 minutes a day.  And I hope YOU will hold me accountable.  And that is my Love Thursday.

I took an “accountable” picture tonight and even covered up the naughty bits, but I’m not sure I’m ready to share yet.  We’ll see.  Honestly, you DON’T want to see it but it will hopefully motivate me.

does the Sugar Sprite take Nestle?

We’ve been heavy into negotiations with the boys and finding and paying off all the Sugar Sprite requests by the kids. The boys negotiated $9 for their stash (after they ate what they wanted the night of Halloween and the morning after) and the girls kept bagging up requests and leaving them in odd places for the Sugar Sprite. I think next year we’ll have to introduce the idea of one big gift (or something like that) as they are bleeding me dry. Sissy and Ellen both got about $5. Ellen remembered the Sugar Sprite a few weeks ago and started taking the chocolate chips out of her homemade granola bars and leaving them for the Sugar Sprite. Since she and Jesse really wig out on sugar, their combined love of all things CASH has helped with the sugar roller coaster of All Hallows Eve.

To back up a bit, yes, we’re still in Neenah. As a matter of fact, still at the Days Inn. Maca has been unexpectedly living with Grandma Elinor and Grandma Elinor has been very sick pretty much since we arrived. So we’re trying to help Elinor with Maca’s doctor appointments and simply getting her out of the house.

Monday (I think?) turned out to be a wonderfully warm and beautiful day and we met a wonderful family at the local park. They had an 11yo, 9yo, 7yo, 2yo and 8mo and their three eldest had a lovely time with our 2-3 eldest. Sissy alternated between pouting she couldn’t play with them and hanging out on the perimeter of their play. The mom, Amy, is an amazing soul; she was so patient and loving with her kids; a real inspiration. The 2yo was such a typical 2yo, frustrated and excited all at the same time; he really reminded me of the boys at that age. I must confess more than a little bit of babylust. They homeschool and the boys found out that they are “Democrats”. In all the political discussions we’ve had, we’ve never discussed parties; simply ideas and values. These kids support George Bush, according to the boys, and I was really proud that they were able to put that behind them. They are so rabidly anti-Bush that I have been worried about their black and white stance. As much as Jamie and I hate what he has done to our country, we try to discuss (the little ) humanity that must exist inside him with the boys. Anyway, they really took to the kids and I was not the least bit surprised to find out they are homeschooled also.

The children have been falling, one by one, from a respiratory illness, but we’ve kept it to a couple days of sickness with liberal doses of raw garlic. Ellen got food poisoning from the hotel breakfast the day of Halloween and was far too sick to go trick or treating. Her siblings bought her a Polly Pocket and shared their treats with her (which she sold to the Sugar Sprite but honestly ate more than she sold off) so she didn’t feel TOO bad.

With all the sickness of the kids, the concern about where Maca will live and Grandma Elinor’s illness, we’ve decided to stay in Neenah at least another week. If Elinor is better by the weekend, we’ll probably leave next Wednesday, otherwise we’ll look to rent a home here until all is under control. I’m really glad we could be here to help out. It has been amazingly cold and the hotel is so nice for that; the kids were trick or treating in 16 degrees (with windchill) and the highs this week haven’t climbed out of the 30’s. Ugh. Today we will get snow if it rains and snow is forecast for Saturday. I never imagined September and October could be so cold.