The way to Peoria

It was a strange and wonderful trip to Peoria.  We left from Hilton Head where I led worship on Sunday morning and made it to Griffin to stay with Yaya and Big Papa.  From there we drove to French Lick, Indiana, seriously the middle of NOWHERE and stayed at a hotel attached to a water park that also served breakfast.  THIS is a fabulous idea.  The kids loved it, and Elsie even went down the very large and fast water slides toward the end.  We rented a room with bunk beds, which the kids thought was wonderful.

Along the way we stopped and blew bubbles, ran around, watched movies, and ate an unbelievable amount of snacks.

At Grandma's

We spent 12 days at grandma's house in Peoria.  The day we got there, grandpa's hospital bed arrived, and he got in it.  By God's providence, we were enabled to be with grandpa, and with our whole family, for the last 8 days of grandpa's life.  I am profoundly grateful that God planned things this way.  For having to lose a dad, it could not have been any better.
Outside of the bedroom where we cared for dad, the kids played and played.  They went to a VBS Michael found 2 miles from mom's house at a Baptist church.  They played on the slip and slide and in grandma's new zebra pool.  They went to story times, Home Depot kids' events and the local YMCA.  Michael kept them busy and allowed us all to care for dad, cry, and be together.
We even spent some time together at a small farm in East Peoria.  Maggie went with us.  We saw lots of animals and Elsie particularly liked feeding the rabbits.  Papa and Elsie took turns practicing milking the cow, which was really a wooden cow with a bucket of water.

It was not the trip that we expected.  But I'm so glad for exactly what it was, and that, as Elsie keeps telling me, "grandpa's happy now, because he's not sick anymore; he's in heaven.'