3 States Within a Week and Then Goodbye Again

Blog Post About July 2021

Believe it or not, 36 hours after arriving in Mississippi, Kylie, Keira, and I headed 6 hours back to Nashville.

In the three full days that we stayed in Tennessee with Kylie, we ran errands, looked for places for Kylie to live, and visited Franklin, Tennessee.

Because Covid was in high season when Kylie started school, we never got to visit her campus last year. This time, I went up for Student Appreciation Week. They were serving homemade cookies, and I don't know if this is a regular thing at an art school, but there was sidewalk chalk available outside for whomever wanted to use it.

And of course, art students were taking advantage of it ;)

July 19, 2021

Inside the halls, some of Kylie's past projects were on bulletin boards.

And then suddenly, our trip to Nashville was sadly over, and we flew to Virginia to see my sister. This was the first location we stayed more than three days, and it gave us a chance to rest a little (except for Keira's and my one day mad-dash trip to DC).

We got up really early and drove my sister's car to a subway station way outside of the city and took a train right to the Mall by the Washington Monument. 

We walked out, met a nice woman who took our picture and started our big day.

July 23, 2021

After last year's trip to the International Spy Museum with my sister, Keira was REALLY wanting to go again.

We didn't get to finish the last third of the museum last time because we went so slowly through it.

Our tickets were for 1:15pm, so we crammed in a lot until then.

We walked fast and talked while we went, squeezing in a lot of history conversation in a short amount of time.

 

We took too-quick glances at the World War II Memorial, the Korean War Memorial and then quickly on to the Vietnam Memorial.

This was definitely not the way I wanted her to see them, but it was better than nothing.

We waited in line for 30 minutes to get into the Natural History Museum, which was allowing small numbers at a time because of Covid.

We literally raced through the museum seeing the highlights. 

I have been a few times, so I knew where to take her so she could see stuff she was interested in (the Hope Diamond did NOT impress her; however, a wall of quartz rock did :)

We watched the time carefully, ran out to catch a subway to L'Enfant Plaza, ate lunch in a food court and made our ticket time for the International Spy Museum.

We stayed almost five hours, until closing, and loved every minute of it again.

Then we took the subway back out to the last tram stop where the car was and drove back to my sister's.

The only other thing we did besides rest, go to church, and do some paperwork, was take Keira and my sister's boys rock climbing.

July 24, 2021

Then it was time to get back on a plane and fly to Texas.

July 27, 2021

We slept one night with a friend, gathered all of our extra luggage, and then headed to my parents' house to prepare for final packing, Covid tests and washing and returning the car we had borrowed.

On the way to my parent's house, we passed some zebras grazing with horses...in Texas!!

July 28, 2021

We said goodbye to my parents a few days later, and then one of my best friends from high school drove Keira and I to Houston to the airport. 

July 31, 2021

We went to the airport early so we could meet up with Karis who was flying in from Mississippi.  

Karis met us at arrivals, I said goodbye to my high school friend, and then another friend who lives in Houston took us all out for Mexican food while we waited for our later flight.

Arranging all of the houses and transportation for our short trips to America takes quite a bit of time (and re-reading all of it kind of exhausts me); however, NONE of it would be possible without the amazing people who offered or said "Yes" when I asked a favor. People drove us, let us borrow cars, picked us up, let us stay in their homes (or AirBnB), fed us, and allowed us places of rest everywhere we went. At the same time, volunteers at the dance camp took Karis to get a Covid test the day of her final performance so she could fly internationally right after camp was over.

Thanks to all of you!!