GAITHER CONCERT at OLIVE BAPTIST in PENSACOLA

We are sitting here with storm all around us. Gary lucked out today and can not do his sewer repair on the motorhome?? I am sure that he would rather have the work done, but it sure won't be today.
I just downloaded pictures so might as well go ahead and do a Blog to show our last couple days, though it seems that most of what we have done is eat out. And we have another week ahead of more of the same!!
Wednesday we went to dinner with local friends for a lasagna special of the day. It was awesome and a wonderful visit!! Then Thursday we went out to Applebee's with another couple of friends before going on to church to the Gaither Concert. We thought it would be a hassle getting in line but with the large foyer at the church and pre-sold tickets there was a lot of late arrival so it wasn't bad.

This is the center entrance to the main sanctuary
with the main entrance to the balcony above.
There are six other entrances to the main floor
but only four available that evening.

 We did not pay the extra $10 for the Artist Circle, so my pictures were not very good as I had forgotten to take my camera with the zoom. But our friends were sitting down front at center stage. But we will do better next time!! Thank goodness I could get pictures from Lana. Thank you!!

 Just beginning to fill.

Show time coming soon!
Don't know what causes the yellow pictures occasionally.

Some of the bright lights, though there was more red  also
at show time!

It was a full house!! It was a wonder that Gary did not get a migraine from the lights, but lucky he didn't. We could have done with out some of those lights aimed out at the audience and the flashing swirls on the ceiling. I guess they think that it enhances their show.

But the show was very good (though my favorite would have been the Homecoming Show). This was the Gaither Vocal Band Show, with lots of volume and humor. Now I'll show you Lana's pictures:

 

The men were all awesome voices! But we missed some of the voices of the past!!
We especially enjoyed the pianist and violinist!! Two and half hours of music was great. They are headed to Fort Myers next, then on to Tallahassee. They will be at Stambaugh Auditorium in Youngstown in March and many locations in between.
On Friday I went to lunch with the ladies from our Sunday School at O'Charley's and had a great visit. Listened to a lot of shopping experiences in the area! From there I drove back to the motorhome and Gary and I later went to dinner in Alabama to meet up with an Ohio friend who now lives in Foley AL. We try to see her each time that we are in the area. She lost her husband, Dennis, this past year so has a lot of adjusting. We realized that our relationship with her went clear back to 1972 when she and her first husband and their twins rented our second floor apartment on West School Street in Salem. Many years and many memories!

Karen, Gary and Audrey

She had us meet her at the Derailed Diner at an I-10 exit. It was good food, but greater desert, Pecan Pie Cheesecake. We don't usually do desert, but we went for broke this time!
The ambiance was interesting also.

Our entrance

Another entrance

Wall across from us.

Table behind us.

No more eating out until after church tomorrow. Just leftovers!!
Then we usually eat out after church with some of our class. And Monday we will be meeting up with my brother's neighbor, Miki, at Panera Bread. I keep in contact with her throughout the year from wherever we might be.
So I doubt that my weigh-in on Tuesday will be very good, though most of my damage gets done late in the evening. I did take a picture of part of our TOPS chapter officers.

I sure have let them down, but I hope to do better when we get farther south. I already have a chapter location there.
Not much more in news at this time so will close for now. Keep checking in and maybe we will do something more interesting.

TRIP THROUGH ALABAMA and on to PENSACOLA, FLORIDA

Our trip was great until we hit Birmingham AL.  Though we had kept hearing warnings of storms moving through and all businesses and schools were closed, we had a hard time believing it until we hit it!  We seldom saw snow flurries and there sure wasn't any snow on the ground. So we just kept on cruisin'.
Our first day we stopped on the south side of Louisville and the second stop was at Athens AL to visit with Gary's nephew and wife, Michael and Cindy. We had a wonderful visit there and shared lunch with promises of stopping again sometime. They live out in the country with very winding roads. But it was beautiful countryside and many lovely homes along the way.

One of the churches that Michael serves as minister.
This one is right across the road from their home
and the second one is about ten miles down the road.

In spite of sitting on pins and needles going through Birmingham which took us THREE hours, I did think to get the camera out.

This looks like standing water, but NOT!
Probably a half inch of ice.

Where the sun hit, it was beginning to melt.
But let us hit a shady area and WOW!

I hate to imagine what it was like the next night
as I am sure it was not all melted!
No SALT there!!
We saw sand a couple times only.

This was the last leg of the journey through Birmingham,
mostly doing five mph or sitting still.

The bridges were as bad as the hills!

By time we got to Holt FL to pick up the motorhome from storage, it was getting dark. So when we reached our park destination in Pensacola it was dark and we were glad that our spot was a pull through. I was following Gary, so I had the easy part. 

We did nothing except plug in the electric and settle for the night. The rest of hooking up could wait until after church on Sunday.

It was lovely to meet our friends in Olive Baptist's Sunday School Class. We do keep in touch with them where ever we are, so it was like old home week. We went out to dinner at O'Charley's with some of the couples, and PoFolk's the next Sunday. And I will go to the Ladies lunch this Friday also. Seems that all we do is eat out with friends. Not a good thing for the waistline!

Audrey, JoAnn, Dennis, Howard, Robert, Gary, Lana and Henrietta
They had a hard fast rule of ladies together and men at the other end.
Thus we were not talking over each other and the men
were not intruding on the ladies conversation! 

The service was as usual except they no longer use the choir robes because of the cleaning bill.

The choir and orchestra is always wonderful! We always go to the early service. So I imagine the second service has many more attending. And Pastor Ted Traylor preaches like few others! He is the reason that we went back to this church after the first visit in 2012. I heard the other day that the sanctuary seats 8000. We will find out tonight as The Gaithers will be in concert there and we are going.

The church is just finishing up the construction on a school building for middle school. They just keep on growing though nothing near 8000 for a Sunday morning. They have many areas of outreach for the community, including a sports gym.  I went to a full scrapbooking day which is from 10am to 10pm, though I only spent about six hours there. I didn't like leaving the church after dark to navigate their city streets and many outlying streets with no lighting. They only meet once a month, so will have to wait for another visit to meet with them again. The leader of the group could use your prayers for her son who had a stroke just four days after his graduation. He is gaining function all of the time, and no longer has any paralysis. But has much ground to cover yet.

It took us several days to unpack and put away stuff that we had used in the condo for several months while the motorhome was in storage. But after getting that settled, we began our doctor and dentist appointments and a trip to our favorite used book store (not that we need more books right now). I also got the 2016 Blog book ordered and downloaded pictures. 

After the first COLD night here, it began to warm up gradually. It got into the 70's so we took a day and drove down to Perdido Beach to enjoy the Gulf. That was a great beach as we did not have to walk over any big dunes. 

People were enjoying the sand, surfing and fishing. We sure enjoyed the sun and sat out for an hour or more. We also were glad for the chairs that Bill and Jane introduced us to. They are a little heavy, but so easy to carry and keep in the car because they fold so small. 

We were going to get lunch at the Purple Parrot up the road,

but found that they were not to be open until a week later. So we went on into Pensacola to our old haunt, The Oar House, and enjoyed fish and shrimp. We could watch the boats coming and going there.

The rest of the month will be more of eating out with friends, seeing doctors and having tests and sightseeing. Unfortunately, it will be gone before we know where it went and then we will move on farther south.

Stay with us.

CHRISTMAS WITH THE FAMILY WRAPPING UP THE YEAR 2016

Time in Ohio coming to a close!  We were trying to cram in all of the visits that we could and slowly packing up what we need to move from the condo to the motorhome which has been stored in the Florida panhandle for the past four months.
Christmas was our usual making breakfast for all at Richard's. I always enjoy that and consider it one of my gifts to my daughter-in-law.

In stead of just missing Ben who now lives in Minnesota, Victor left and went to spend the holiday with Ben. I am sure that made the holiday more pleasant for Ben. Weather there had begun to change to very cold, much like in Ohio. We just hope that the dry roads hold out until after we get south through the mountains.
Miranda and Doug needed to go to his family's homes for the day, but they did spend an hour with us. It is always great to spend some time with them also.

Doug loves his hats!

Lynn with Miranda and Doug

Grandpa with Richie and his girlfriend, Savannah

Charlie always love this time of freedom
and being made over by Lynn.

Most of the living area of Rich and Lynn's home is about finished, except for the cabinets in the kitchen. He has done a beautiful job, but they are outgrowing the space, for sure!

January 2nd we went to Niles to meet up with Audrey's cousin and wife, Larry and Betty for breakfast at Bob Evans.  We always have such a wonderful visit with them. Because of reminiscing their wedding some forty years ago, when Victor was their ring bearer, we usually take him along. This year we also took Richard and Lynn, and Larry and Betty brought a couple of their grandchildren also.

Before Christmas Audrey got to have dinner with her friend, Louise, one last time. That same day Audrey also spent much of the day taking Janet to the emergency room and admitting her to the hospital with what appeared might be a broken hip. Later they also found blood clots in the lungs. She sure has had more than her share of health issues since the first of June. Prior to this last hospital visit, she had been doing so well. This sure was a disappointment for her. She had to go into a rehab facility after the hospital stay to let the hip heal since she is not a candidate for surgery because of her other health issues.
Since she was going to be well taken care of there, we decided to head south as planned for the worst of the winter. We were tired of the cold. Ha-ha, Florida panhandle was just as cold when we got there as it was in Ohio. But it did warm up the second week.
We got to finally get to meet up with Bob and Eugenia for dinner at AngeNetta's in Canfield. We had a great dinner and were surprised when Ralph and Ethel came in for dinner at the next table. Funny that we met up with them at another visit there in the past. The restaurant was busy because of the holiday, so we continued our visit by taking Bob and Eugenia to our condo for a while. It was a wonderful visit!!!
Gary also made a stop at Kufleitner's Classic Cars in Salem. He always enjoys cars!!

It is time to order my Blog Book since I have wrapped up the year of 2016. That is another job and I am always relieved to have it finished.
Take care and we wish you a blessed and happy New Year!!