A 'Free' Weekend in Town

The 11th-13th June was a busy weekend here in Coshocton! We had the MMS spiritual life seminar from Thursday-Saturday which was a good chance to spend some time with the other MMS families with some guest speakers. The kids had separate sessions and Abigail had lots of fun making things, colouring and playing in her group during that time!

Friday to Saturday was the Coshocton County Balloon Festival ... unfortunately due to stormy weather the skies were only filled with balloons once during that time but we just happened to be out and looking up when they did manage to fly off!

One flew right over our house ... Abigail was really excited to see the brightly coloured balloons flying overhead ... as were we!!!

On the Saturday evening they have a 'Night Glow' which was really effective ... the cute 'old style' fire engine keeping watch on events is not an old style one at all but an every day working machine!!

Once it got dark the balloons looked almost magical lit from below at the county showgrounds.

On the Sunday there was a Corvette car rally at Roscoe village with a couple of hundred cars of all ages, lining the streets ... but all in great condition ... some lovingly restored and some brand new!

It was so interesting to see all the different shapes and styles and we had a chance to chat to some of the owners too (Mark spent a lot of time deciding which one he would like to own in his retirement!!).

Something that did amuse us were all the personalised number plates we saw ... here are just a few of them ...

All these events were completely free of charge and a lot of fun ... Jenny's friend Rachel was here from the UK (more to come on her visit!) but it was great to be able to share these memories with her too!

The rest of Grandma & Gramp's Visit

As well as having a nice break in the Hocking Hills ... we had lots more fun with Grandma and Gramps ... they were here for most of May ... and it seems unbelievable that it's already been a couple of weeks since they headed back home to the UK! Abigail soon set about renaming them ... Grandma and Gramps was too much of a mouthful, so Gargar and Bubba was her choice and both names have well and truly stuck now!!

They were taken to see the usual sights round here ... the hangar ... where Mark is busy training. They were able to see what he's up to on a normal working day ... as well as visiting during the Open House weekend. Mark's Dad also spent a day up in the hangar working alongside the guys on a little project for us!!

We took Bubba and Gargar to Zanesville ... the closest 'real' shops and of course up into Amish country too! The last couple of weeks they were here they also rented a car and took several more trips into Amish country exploring the beautiful countryside just half an hour from our home.

While they were here we also took them and Pastor Dan and his wife to have dinner with an Amish family ... something we had done when we'd only just moved here back at the end of October last year. It was lovely to return to the same family and they remembered us, especially Abigail and were pleased to see she is growing up fast! Jenny was also able to go and watch Mark play softball as part of our church team, while the grandparents babysat ... and another week Mark's dad went to see what it was all about!

Abigail enjoyed having a couple of extra people to play with every day and it was really nice that Val and Phil had a substantial amount of time to spend with Abigail (and us!!) too!

As well as playing ... Val and Phil also helped us out a lot ... doing some of things on our to do list which is ever growing and never getting completed!! Val made Abigail some very cute monkey pyjamas from material we found a couple of months ago ... and Phil made a great little gate (the day he was in the hangar!) so that our front porch could be much more Abigail friendly!! We have been out there daily since!

They also gave us some money towards a very early 2nd birthday present for Abigail ... it was something we'd been thinking about getting ... and knew that it would get a lot of use before September 13th (which it has already!) ... so it was definitely a great choice! Not sure who had more fun during the assembly process!!!

One of Abigail's favourite pastimes continues to be reading her books ... and so true to form ... no visitor escapes without sharing lots of time on the floor enjoying them with her!

As always when visitors leave ... Abigail spent the next couple of days after they flew home asking where Bubba and Gargar were ... thanks to Skype we won't have to wait for them to fly out again before we can see them face-to-face!!!