Vacation Is Over--For Now!

What a busy last two weeks! I have been on the road again but this trip was not with the company of You Go Genealogy Girl #1 in the drivers seat. On July 25th I headed east towards the Family History Expo in Kansas City. First stop was an overnight at the home of Girl #1 in North Platte, Nebraska. We shared some notes, updated our I-Touch family apps and visited about the upcoming Expo. Tuesday morning I headed to Hastings, Nebraska to visit with my cousin, Joy, for a day. She and I do not get many chances to be together so it was a really fun visit for me. We went out to eat, toured Hastings and took some photos of the old historical buildings in downtown. She showed me the way to the highway that I would leave on the next day before we returned to her house. We played on her new piece of body inversion equipment and then had some wonderful berry pie. Hanging upside down definitely gives one a new look at the world. We thankfully saved the pie until after play time! The evening went by fast while we played on the computer, looking up some of her ancestors on various sites. She wants to start doing some genealogy and she enjoyed finding some of her unknown great grandparents--a good start for her future research. She has a large garden which can be seen from her kitchen table window and the morning I left there we had pie for breakfast(acting like we were kids again!) I loved watching the birds and seeing her beautiful garden flowers. Wish we lived closer as our short visit brought back many of the fun times we had growing up together.

Wednesday, July 28th I arrived in Topeka, Kansas at the home of our son and his family. There I got to spend time with the grandchildren and do a little research at the small library of the Topeka Genealogy Society. It was a really nice facility and jammed full of good books and held a large variety of genealogy periodicals. I was quite surprised at their holdings given a fairly small building that houses the collection. My son accompanied me there and we even found some good family info which I did not have! On Thursday, son Jason, and I packed up and left for Kansas City to attend the Family History Expo on the 30th and 31st.

Bright and early on Friday, we checked in and prepared for the full day at the Expo. Our first stop was setting up in the Blogger area. I was an "honor blogger" for the expo and we handed out bags of jelly beans and business cards for the You Go Genealogy Girls while we blogged and twittered during the day. It was a very busy day indeed. Meeting all the other wonderful bloggers, attending classes, buying books, and getting acquainted with many of the people from the world of genealogy. It was such a fun day and the lectures were packed with awesome research aids and helpful information. Saturday brought another busy day too. We both attended some different lectures and a couple classes together. We came home with pages of notes to be organized and put in our syllabus for future reference. Jason is a history major and really enjoyed the two days. He was surprised at what Mom really did with my researching as he thought it was just gathering names and vital records. Genealogy took on a whole new aspect with him and he picked up some very useful information for his field of study. With respect to the study of history, he was thrilled to have a different perspective on researching other than the common college classes offer. He is ready to attend another Family History Expo. We had a wonderful time together, the first real Mother and son outing for the past several years!

As the Expo ended we again packed and headed back to Topeka, Kansas. I spent a couple more days with family there. We did a bit of shopping but mostly stayed in where it was cool with temps of 106° and heat index of 115°. I had planned on some time at the public library but stayed home with the kids due to the devastating heat! Tuesday, Aug 3rd was the day that all the family packed up to head to my home in Alliance, Nebraska. Everyone was meeting again at my house to gather up some of their kids who had been visiting family in Wyoming and Alliance. My grand daughter, Katelynn who is 10 rode back home with me. We drove 7 hours back to North Platte, Ne., where we spent the night again with You Go Girl #1. She was anxious to see all my new books and get copies of my notes from all the Expo lectures. She and I spent a fun evening discussing genealogy while Katelynn played with her cousin, Tyrah who was staying over with her Grandma. The girls had great fun and it was nice because they do not get to see each other very often either. (The You Go girls really are "grannies"!)

Wednesday when Katelynn and I got home, the rest of the family was already there and packed-ready to leave for several days of camping. We got out of one vehicle, hugged the dogs, changed luggage, unloaded most of the books, and piled into another vehicle for the trip to the lake. Are you tired yet?--I was! Off to the lake we went, boat and camper in tow. Son, daughter-in-law, seven grandchildren, two Grandfathers, other in-laws and more kids! Needless to say, the few new books that I took along to read while I was relaxing never saw the light of day. Fun in the lake for the kids, cooking out, fishing for the guys and sitting around camp took up the last four days of my vacation. It was fun having family here as we do not get together very often. However--

This You Go Girl missed having a constant internet connection while traveling. At my son's house where there was a 3G connection, I had to share with others and sometimes could not get online and I had no internet while at the lake. I was having serious genealogy withdrawal, new books were waiting at home, and the heat was not helping my mood.

Today, life is getting back to normal, family all headed home to Topeka yesterday and we got the camper home and stowed until next time. All my great Expo notes need to be organized and pictures need to scanned for Girl #1 who is working on an exciting new project. Salt Lake FHL findings are ready to be entered in Legacy, books need to be read, and papers need to be sorted--again. Starting tomorrow I will share some pics and findings from the Kansas City Family History Expo. Thankfully, vacation is over--for now!

You Go Genealogy Girl #2- Cheri