Well, as usual, our plans turned out just slightly different than anticipated. We had originally planned to take a run down to Columbus, spend a couple peaceful days with Brenda and her family, and then take off on I-75 for places south after eating a big Thanksgiving dinner cooked by my daughter. Well.... a few days before Thanksgiving Arnie (my son-in-law) was FINALLY diagnosed with an infected gall bladder, after suffering for almost four years with stomach pains. He ended up being scheduled for surgery on Tuesday to have his gall bladder removed. If everything had gone perfectly, the surgery would have been done on an outpatient basis. However, since he was literally FULL of gallstones, and his gall bladder was quite horribly infected, they ended up doing a big incision and keeping him in the hospital until Thursday. Plus, Brenda is really busy with her new bakery right now, so things got just a little hectic (but everything turned out fine in the end).
We had a relatively uneventful drive down to Columbus, other than the fact that it rained the great majority of the trip, which is always a little stressful when you're driving an RV and pulling a car behind. But we made it down to Buck Creek State Park in Springfield, Ohio, in about 6-1/2 hours, which was pretty good. We got set up and Brenda and Tessa and the oh-so-adorable little Emma stopped in about 9:00 that night to show off the baby! Brenda had spent the majority of the day at the hospital with Arnie and Tessa ran the bakery for her. Arnie wasn't feeling too good Tuesday night so Brenda stayed at the hospital overnight and got up at 5:00 AM to head back to the bakerty to stock it for the day and get some cake orders done for customers. Dave and I headed out to the bakery in the morning and got there around 11:00, got underfoot for a while, and then took Emma with us so the two girls could work in peace. Dave went back to the campground and got in a little fishing (it was gorgeous sunshine all afternoon) and I took Emma home, made a couple pumpkin pies and played with the baby. I had kind of forgotten how a little three-month old baby can totally consume your time! But what a little sweetie she is!
On Thanksgiving, we took Brandi with us and let her play in Brenda's fenced-in yard with her two dogs and we all pitched in and got dinner started. At about 11:00 Arnie called and said he'd been released so Brenda went and got him, while Dave and I finished the majority of the dinner (although Brenda ordered me to wait on the gravy until she got there!). But after all was said and done, we had a great dinner, Chelsey and Ashley were there, Arnie did remarkably well and the day was really wonderful. It was great to see Chelsey and talk to her about school (she'll be a "buckeye" in January, as a junior in the pre-vet program) and her work at the Humane Society - she looks and sounds wonderful! And of course it was wonderful to spend time with the whole family - it makes me sad to think I won't see any of them until next spring, so my "thanks" for "thanksgiving" are that my family is happy and well and everything is going well, after some tough struggles earlier in the year. (My only regret is that I can only be in one place at a time, so wasn't able to spend any time with Alan and his family, or with my mom and the rest of the family at the big family Thanksgiving dinner at my sister's house.)
And, now! Off to Florida! We'll pull up tomorrow morning and head down I-75, probably stay Friday night south of Knoxville, Saturday night somewhere in southern Georgia, and be at our first state park in the Fort Meyers area on Tuesday. Wish us luck! Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and hopefully my next update will be from Koreshan State Park.
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