Days 90 – 93
We locked up Legacy and spent Thursday, 12/10/20, driving in our rental car from Orange Beach, AL, to central Arkansas for an early Christmas celebration with the kids and grand-kids. The most direct route included mostly highways through Mississippi and Arkansas and felt like it took us 3 days, when it was actually only 10 hours. During the drive, I mentioned to Steve several times that our rental Chevy Malibu did NOT have the comfortable seats I’d grown used to in our Lexus RX350! ☹ Somehow we powered through and arrived in Conway about 4:30 pm, driving directly to our 10 x 10 storage unit to check on the few personal belongings we saved from the big estate sale back in May. While we were there, we picked up my beloved 1982 model portable sewing machine to return with us to Legacy, so I can enjoy sewing onboard. (I even ordered blouse patterns and fabric online to ship to Stock Island Marina and be there for us when we arrive there on Legacy the end of December!) We met my brother, Steve Elliott, at Mike’s Place in Conway at 6:00 pm and enjoyed a great meal and visit with him. I was grateful to my brother for making the hour drive west from Cabot to Conway to meet us after he’d gotten off of work. After dinner, we drove back to daughter, Tara’s, house where our own private upstairs suite is always available to us whenever we visit. Very nice digs, indeed! A special treat this year was meeting our newest grand-dog, Kya, who is a true sweetheart, even if her older dog-brother, Liam, did not really request her presence! 🙂
On Friday morning, 12/11/20, we drove the Malibu down to Hot Springs National Park to visit with my dad for the day. We told him stories about our travels in the boat, and he reminisced about his long and productive life. We are all fortunate that, even at 91 years of age, my dad’s memory is just like an elephant’s. We returned to Tara’s that evening for our 13th annual visit from the REAL Santa Claus! A fun, yearly celebration that we started back when the grand-kids were tiny. Santa is portrayed by Conway’s Santa, Craig Imboden, who does a wonderful job that convinces even the adults that he’s the real deal. After Santa’s visit, we talked and laughed with both of our daughters, Tara and Kinsey, Tara’s husband, Paul, and all six grand-kids, while eating delicious Christmas treats that both of our girls prepare for us every year. Skipper and Gilligan stayed up way past our normal bedtime, 9:00 pm, which is known as “Looper’s midnight”.
On Saturday, 12/12/20, all the females in the house (with the exception of Kya, the dog) worked on the Christmas gnome crafts for which I’d brought supplies and instructions. It was a fun project that resulted in some very cute gnomes, if I do say so myself! “Gram” has been crafting with the kids since they were old enough to squeeze glue out of a bottle. I’m pretty sure they still enjoy it, but they always get to “craft with Gram” every year, whether they want to or not! 😊
On Sunday, 12/13/20, we spent another “3 days” driving back down to Orange Beach, AL, where Legacy anxiously awaiting our return.
Position: N 30° 17.699, W 87° 37.816
Marina Nights: 78