Well, it is that holiday season again so I thought I’d update you about our 2023 year.
Early in the year, we were in Florida and cruised for a week on the MSC Divina in January. It was good to visit with our friend Guglielmo, the hotel director on the ship.
February was a quiet month. We attended regular meetings of the Cresthaven Stamp Club and the Tropical Postcard Club.
In March, our niece, Deanna invited us to spend the week in Orlando to watch her daughter, Kaeli in a college softball tournament. We had a wonderful time and the weather was perfect. I had forgotten how much I missed softball games.
March meant that it was warming up in Florida so we did our last-minute things to get the house ready to close it up for the summer.
On the first weekend in April, we headed back to South Carolina. A broken water pipe welcomed us home but it was repaired quickly on that Monday. We spent a lot of time preparing the camper for an upcoming camping trip. At the end of the month, we went camping in the Smokies and enjoyed our trip. We missed the mountains while we were in Florida.
Don had hand surgery in May and so was unable to do much for a couple of weeks while he healed from the surgery. It corrected his Dupuytren’s Contracture of his pinky finger on his left hand. It went really well and he is now able to use his hand much better. I finally talked Don into buying a riding lawn mower and we bought a zero-turn John Deere mower.
In June, we went on a road trip heading to Minnesota. We drove through Missouri and were able to visit my friend Cindy at Laumiere Park. We also stopped in Springfield, IL to visit the Lincoln Presidential Library as well as the Lincoln home before he became President. Next, we went to Peoria, IL, and went to the Caterpillar Visitor Center. Those big tractors were amazing to see! Then we spent a few days around Moline, IL, and Davenport, IA to learn more about John Deere machinery. We even took a tour of the John Deere Plant in Davenport. At the end of the month, we ended up in Rochester, MN for the Zombie Knitpocalypse knitting retreat.
On the way home, we stopped in Elkhart, IN to visit the RV Hall of Fame that we had visited years ago. We still enjoy seeing how RVs have changed throughout the years. Next, we stopped at the Museum of the Air Force in Dayton, OH. Our original plan was to head north to Cuyahoga National Park but due to the Canadian wildfires, the air quality was too dangerous so we headed home.
July was quiet for us. This was the first July in years that I hadn’t had to teach a Furman course. We don’t usually go far from home because of the crowds and the heat.
In August, we went on a cruise to the British Isles and Iceland on the Holland America Nieuw Statendam. We flew to Copenhagen and we were on the ship for a month. It was an amazing trip and I loved the cool temperatures. I’m so glad we got to see Iceland because they were having problems with earthquakes and volcanoes after we left. It seemed to take a long time to get over jet lag!
In September, we started to prepare for our trip to Florida for the winter. We finished up with scheduled doctors and dentist appointments. At the end of September, we went to the Blue Ridge Parkway for the Spartanburg Knitting Guild knitting retreat.
In the middle of October, we headed to Florida so we could help with the Fall Stamp Show and the Fall Postcard Show. Then we flew to Valencia, where we boarded the MSC Magnifica for a cruise to the Mediterranean and a transatlantic cruise to Miami for a month. Our wonderful neighbor, Bob, took us to the airport in October and picked us up at the port in Miami in November.
It felt good to be back on land and back to a normal routine. Don was thrilled to be back with his postal collection and I loved sitting on my front porch knitting.
December had us putting up Christmas decorations. I am still using the tabletop tree that my dad and Marge used for years. One year, I knit Christmas ornaments to put on it. We also put up the same outside lights that they used. It brings back such wonderful memories of our Christmases together. On each side of the tree, I hung up stockings that my mother knit for us the year we got married.
I hope this year has been for you and your family. May the new year bring you lots of happiness and good health.
