On May 7th we settled into Lewis & Clark State Park in Onawa, IA. As most of our reservations were made in March, we had chosen a park where we could settle in for a bit since it was my birthday on the 10th and we wanted to be relaxing and not moving around. My friends kept asking me "what are you going to do for your birthday?!" to which I replied: "uh, well I'm gonna be lounging at a State Park in IOWA!!!". I didn't really see the need to do anything more special than that, since this new RETIRED lifestyle was pretty much a gift unto itself! When we were at Hansen's Farm, Karl had splurged and gotten some Wagyu-Holstein steaks. The farm also had a small separate herd that they raised for beef and my sweetie paid a pretty penny to get me a special dinner for me to have on my ”BIG” birthday. So I was pretty damn content with the plan to hang around a campfire eating some of the best steaks on the planet.
Granted I usually am big about celebrating my birthday for a good week or so. One of my best friends, Alyson, and I actually had a wonderful tradition going where we would always take the day off to spend each other's birthdays together and play tourist! We seized the opportunity to appreciate the gems we had "in our own backyard". So whether it was a boat ride out to the Boston Harbor Islands, hiking in the Blue Hills or Wachusett Mountain, a Duck Boat or Trolley Tour, going to Plimouth Plantation, bopping around Newbury Street after going on a ride on the Swan Boats in the Public Gardens, The Norman Rockwell Museum in the Berkshires, or going to Rockport or Newburyport or P-Town for the day, or the Salem museums and the waterfront, the Bridge of Flowers in Shelbourne Falls, the Whaling Museum in New Bedford, or a hot air balloon ride in Western, MA (to name a few)...Alyson and I did it and we did it on either my birthday in May or her birthday in July. It's a wonderful (and brilliant) tradition and I HIGHLY recommend doing something of the sort! Unfortunately, 2020 and the damn pandemic interrupted our tradition and in 2021 I was living "on the road" - so my lack of a big specific plan made total sense to me.
On Sunday May 9th (Mother's Day) I was minding my own business in our trailer at Lewis & Clark State Park working on updating our camping app with my hubby. My sister and I had plans to FaceTime at some point in the afternoon after she was finished her Mother's Day brunch with her mother-in-law in Maine. We had been texting a lot over the weekend because she and her husband were doing a bunch of projects in their (massive/gorgeous) garden and she was sending pics of their progress. So she face-timed around 12:30ish and asked me what I was doing and what the weather was like in Iowa. When I looked out the window to tell her, she got all bossy-pants on me and told me to stick my head outside and give her an accurate report!! So I climbed over Penny (who was asleep on the floor) and made it to the door of the trailer to give my best Dick Albert impersonation. But, there was no weather report to be given because said sister and my bestie Alyson were STANDING OUTSIDE MY TRAILER DOOR IN BLEEPIN' IOWA!!!
Attached are the videos Alyson took from outside and my hubby took from inside the trailer. My SINCERE apologies for my language (this is DEFINITELY NOT G-rated) but shock is shock and anything you say under such conditions should be forgiven! The funniest thing about this is that after the shock of it all and when I realized they had videotaped me my response was: "Well at least I didn't swear!...and I can't believe Penny didn't bark!"
You have AWESOME FRIENDS and SISTER!!