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First Iowa, On to Ohio, & Finally D.C.

Washington, DCRecently, I have been trying to make the blog more about Cozy Mysteries and less about personal goings-on. But, I am so excited about what my husband and I are doing that I cannot contain myself. I absolutely have got to tell you about it!

I have spoken about how important my grandmother was to me. She was the person who inspired me to read, and I am so glad she did! Well, my husband and I had kept talking about going out to visit my grandmother’s (and father’s) hometown in Iowa, and we finally did. We drove from San Antonio up to Northwood, and my husband was finally able to see the area he has heard about so many times >>> when I talk about my fondest memories.  I think my favorite stop down memory lane was seeing how well the current owners are taking care of the house my grandparents built.

After visiting Northwood, we headed on over to where my husband grew up: Northfield, Ohio. I had visited there many times before, but enjoyed seeing some of his old haunts we hadn’t visited before.

We are now in Washington, D.C. visiting our daughter, who lives in Arlington. I am sitting in our hotel room writing this entry while my husband takes a nap. My view from the hotel room is the Potomac, and it is absolutely wonderful. The Pentagon is to our left, and every time I see it it brings back memories of when my dad worked there.

Our son, as usual, is taking care of our house so I feel quite worry-free and am having a terrific, no worries time.

Comments

  1. So glad you have the chance to make this wonderful trip! My dad worked in the Pentagon, too. He was career Navy and worked for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the early 1980’s. Hope the rest of your trip goes well, and prayers for safe travels home! 🙂

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  6. Sounds like it was a heartfelt visit to your grandma’s neck of the woods. It’s wonderful the new owners are treating it well. Going to Washington D C would be so much fun. Besides your daughter I would love to visit the regular sight seeing options. I have always wanted to visit there. Thank you for sharing. Melody

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    • Melody, we lived in the D.C. area for five years, so we’ve done a lot of the sightseeing options. As a matter of fact, we’re meeting our daughter downtown tomorrow for lunch, and she suggested we go to a museum >>> which right now I’m not so sure we’re going to want to do. It’s nice just being with her…

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  7. So happy to hear about your wonderful trip.
    Your husband sounds like a great guy.
    I really all your recommendations. Please keep them coming.

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  8. It is such an extraordinary experience to re connect with our past once we have distance and maturity from it. I did the same, not too long ago. For me it was so very wonderful while somehow a bit sad too, missing my parents and I suppose my own youth. Sounds like a neat trip for you…will be hard to leave your daughter but at least your son is waiting for you back home.
    And you picked lovely weather for your journey east..after weeks of rain, we finally have sunshine.
    And will you take an hour to travel to Rappahannock County , directly west of Warrenton? It is a very special place…not a single traffic light in the entire county. It has no chain grocery stores in the county, only a few general stores. One farm here exceeds ten thousand acres while most are under a a few hundred. From the mountain tops one can sometimes see the National Monument….it is only seventy miles away but yet is fifty years back in time. Hope you visit there sometime.

    Safe travels….Kim

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    • Kim, it sounds like you experienced a very similar trip! I just felt it was time for both my husband and me to go “back home”. My husband just said that visiting Rappahannock sounds like it would be a really nice trip for us to make on Monday. Thanks for the idea!

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      • If you do come to Rapp, take a few moments to google the area. There is one calling the area the Sonoma of the south or something like that…you might enter this in your search box.
        Aside from the famous Inn, the town of Little Washington, you might enjoy stopping at the Thorton River Grill in Sperryville and wandering the art displays in the River arts district hidden back in that village. Flint Hill also has some nice restaurants. If you wanted to visit, look my name up and give a call and chat or stop by our farm. Be sure to check out route 231 for exceptional vistas, named one of the top ten in some survey of roads with gorgeous beauty. Route 211 from Warrenton is the main highway to the area..starts out gentle rolling from Warrenton and turns quite hilly and magnificent at Massie’s Corner, intersection with route 522 and 211. Sometimes they stop the mild traffic to allow cattle or sheep to cross the road. We have several authors living here….but not cozy types yet.
        Hope these suggestions are helpful…Kim

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        • Kim, we’re on our way out for the day, but I want to thank you for these suggestions. We’ll see our daughter after she gets off from work and talk these over. If we don’t make it during this trip, I think she’ll want to go there with some friends. It sounds beautiful.

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          • Not sure how to send you article re this county…it is indeed very unique. Of course there is Middleburg, add to your list, quintessential horse hunt country with a lovely village to shop with a stop at the Museum of the Horse and Hound, the art displayed adjacent to it and visual terrain of Jackie O, former First Lady who once hunted the area. Rapp is different. It is equally populated with the famous and the indigent, aged hippies, the farmers and the retired folks who are able to afford the minimum price requirement of 25 acres. There are hidden enclaves with ex CIA, former heads of state and folks who live off the land in rather modest circumstances. It is a tricky place to visit as a tourist since it does not appear to offer much except wide open vistas and a few small villages. The New Yorker did a spread about the place..it showed a lady in a lap pool and one on an inner tube…it said if you identify with the latter, you belong in Rapp, the former being Middleburg. Both have their merits and are worth a visit. Please share your adventures…Kim

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  11. Danna, I think it’s interesting to find out what you have been doing. You visited NorthWOOD and then you visited NorthFIELD. Ohio is east of where I live, and Iowa is northwest of me. History is IMPORTANT. After my mother died I wished I had recordings of her voice, so now I often tape voice mail messages that people (especially people important to me) leave on my answering machine. I also wish that I had asked my parents more questions about certain events and people that there is now no one else to tell the answers. Youth really goes by fast because you are busy with school and competition to get a mate and a job…and then all of I sudden, I noticed, there is so much I wasted my time with when I could have been asking my parents about important things…things that are NOW important to me. My Dad was in WWII but he didn’t talk about it. I could have asked him so many questions that I now have about that experience, and deceased family members that I would love to know more about, questions and events that NOW interest me much more than dating and schoolwork. I am thrilled to see you, Danna, are re-exploring your roots and showing off your hometown. You might not realize now just how wonderful an experience that is, but I am quite interested in your excursions, and am glad that you got to do it.

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    • Merrilee, your comment is so on-target with what my husband and I have been discussing all along the way. (OK, I guess it would be truer if I said “what I have been talking about and he has been agreeing with”!) I think I have said that I wish I had paid more attention to my grandmother’s stories at least a dozen times on this trip…

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  12. I hope the rest of your trip is just as enjoyable. I really like your blog even when it’s not cozy mystery related. Have a safe trip home.

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  13. I really enjoy reading your personal anecdotes about your family. To me, it makes the blog more inviting. Of course, I love reading about cozies, learning about new series and revisiting cherished reads. Keep the stories coming
    Enjoy your family and travels!!!

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  14. Glad you are enjoying your trip! I’ve been to D.C. many times as our oldest son went to Catholic University. If you can, peek inside the cathedral on campus – it’s quite breathtaking. My time in Ohio was limited to when my mom had valve replacement at Cleveland Clinic- so not exactly a fun visit. I’ve never been to Iowa. I’d really like to see more of our less “typical destination” states as I’m sure they are wonderful.

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    • Mary Joy, my husband and I drive north to Colorado Springs a lot, and the drive to get out of Texas is long, flat, and dusty. Seeing the lush green of the midwest has been wonderful. The views have been beautiful.

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    • Melissa, it’s been great. This morning, our hotel had a fire alarm where all of us had to go outside while the firemen went through to make sure there wasn’t a real gas leak. (Luckily it wasn’t a fire!) I had just gotten dressed so it was OK for me, but my husband was in his pajamas >>> so it was interesting…

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      • That’s cute. That’s funny that your husband had to go outside in his pj’s. At least he had those on….and a robe perhaps. That’s funny. It’s funny now and just think how much funnier it can get with the telling over the years. Also, it sounds like one of those things that you can say, “It may not be funny now, but you’ll laugh about this when you’re older.”…Oh, and I’m glad there was no gas leak or fire.

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  17. What a fantastic trip for you! There’s just nothing like family history. My mother came over from Italy when she was three and during the Depressions, she lived all over NYC. One apartment was on 1st Avenue and 11th Street, over an Italian restaurant called Lanza’s that’s still there! I contacted the person currently living in her apartment and we took our daughter, who was 8 at the time, and doing a genealogy program at school, to see it. My mother was with us, so then we took her for dinner to the restaurant below, which she dreamed of eating at when she was a poor, young immigrant.

    Last year we took a family trip to eastern Montana to see the homestead land my mother-in-law was born on. It was 900 miles from nowhere! My dream is to visit the Italian village where my mother was born someday.

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