Cleveland Trip

Our most recent trip to another country was to a familiar place - Cleveland! Our friend Chris got married and asked Carson to be a groomsman and we thought that was the perfect reason to visit our old stomping grounds - so over the pond we went!

March 8Here we are at 5:30am (11:30pm EST), ready to begin our journey.

The morning sky at the train station was just beautiful. Our trains to Dusseldorf got us there quickly, and then our flight out to Amsterdam was delayed a bit. 

We had to rush through the airport to catch our flight to Atlanta once we hit the Amsterdam airport and went through customs - there was a guy wearing a Beaufort, South Carolina shirt on both of our flights, and we chatted about my hometown (he visits Dataw every year). 

Our flight landed in Amsterdam after our next one had begun the long boarding process, so we got to skip a bit of the wait as we hurried to the plane, which was nice since it was over 9 hours. I snoozed on and off but don't truly know if I slept - I felt like I just had my eyes shut. We watched movies (Girl on the Train for me, Jungle Book for Carson, and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them for both of us) and we ate. I think they fed us every two hours or so and it was mostly good food. The Delta flight attendants were friendly and kind, and honestly although it was definitely a very long flight, it wasn't so bad. 

I've never seen self-service passport control, but Atlanta has it and it was kind of fun. You scan your passport, answer some questions (like, have you been in contact with livestock and are you carrying over 10,000 worth of merchandise - both no) and then take your picture. A receipt prints out and then you hand it to a border agent who stamps your passport and you're on your merry way. The process was pretty fast!

Our first stop? Chick-fil-a! We made a list of foods we wanted to eat in the States and mostly completed it while we were there, but this first stop made sense. 

Chris and Megan (the bride and groom) picked us up from the airport and took us to Evan and Heather's house. 

Now if you have a good memory or are a person reading this who knew us in Cleveland, you know that they now live in our old house! We all lived there for about three weeks when their lease ended and before our move to Tallahassee (posts here and here). So we got to stay upstairs in what was at one time our bedroom (we eventually moved to the downstairs bedroom)! We caught up with Evan for a little bit and then went to bed. 

March 9

The next morning, Carson drove Heather to work and then she let him borrow her car for the day. This was really very kind of her, and we got to do a few fun things! This day was my birthday, so Carson let me sleep in (I woke up before 8 but then was just lazy for a while) and brought me a bagel with cream cheese (it was on the "food list") and gave me my birthday present - a new watch. Since we had the car, we hit up Target, the mall, had lunch at the Cheesecake Factory and stopped by Walmart before picking Heather up again. I didn't take very many pictures of our day for some reason!

When we got back to the Storey's, Heather needed to get ready for Community Group. We'd decided that since we aren't members of the church anymore, that we shouldn't attend, but we helped get ready by taking down their Christmas tree. Somehow, that thing was still alive with green needles in March - apparently if you need a quality fresh tree, they know the place! Heather had promised her community group the week before that she'd have the tree down, so she was able to keep the promise!

Megan picked us up and took us to Chris' apartment where he and Carson moved some heavy things out for him to move into Megan's place. After the heavy lifting, we went to Dewey's Pizza for dinner. It started snowing while we were eating! (no pictures of any of this - I'm going to blame jet lag for this one)

After our first dinner, Deanna picked us up and we went to a second dinner at 8:30. We were going to go to Barrio, which just opened in Cleveland Heights, but the wait was going to be an hour and a half, so we went down the street to The Fairmount instead, which was a lot quieter and had no wait. I struggled to stay awake but really enjoyed catching up with friends!

After dinner, as if we hadn't had enough to eat that day, we enjoyed the piece of cheesecake we'd taken to go. 

March 10

The next morning, Carrie picked me up and we went to her house to hang out! We got to sit on her couch and hang out while her baby girls played. It was so crazy being there because just three years ago we sat on the same couch and watched Call the Midwife together and just before we moved, she told me she was expecting the first of those two girls. Since then she's moved to New York City and back again, had another baby, and is getting ready to move to Indiana. She's definitely been busy! We tried to get a good selfie of the two of us, but the lighting was a problem, so we just tried our best.

It snowed that day, and I recalled not all that long ago when we lived here and this backyard had snow that went over my knees. I'm glad that wasn't the case this time (also the garage has been rebuilt since we lived there which is good because it was on the verge of falling down).

Not too long after we got back to the house, Chris and Megan picked us up to drive down to Columbus for the wedding! I will recap that in another post, but the drive down there was nice - Carson slept and I talked with Chris and Megan!

We checked into our hotel (Columbus Marriott Northwest - for some reason we were on the concierge floor and it was fantastic! Our tv had Netflix on it and tons of cable stations, plus the room itself was wonderful!) and freshened up and then headed to the venue for the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. I'm not sure why I didn't take pictures of it, but the food was amazing. They had a taco bar (tacos were on our food list too!) and a really terrific dessert assortment. The jet lag and probably our breakneck schedule had me really tired, so I hitched a ride back to the hotel with Joel and Allison who had kids that needed to get to bed early. Carson stayed and hung out with the bridal party at the venue and then later at the hotel restaurant. 

March 11

We got to sleep in! After we'd gotten up, we watched Zootopia on US Netflix (they don't have it in Germany).

While Carson had plenty of groomsman duties to perform, I had nothing planned, so when Lana texted that she was in Columbus, I was free to spend the afternoon with her! Her husband Mark dropped us off in Westerville and we had lunch at Uptown Deli and Brew which had delicious sandwiches. We got all caught up on life and it was so good to see her! They dropped me off at the hotel so I could get ready for the wedding, and we took this picture inside. 

I went to the wedding after that, but I'll share that post later!

March 12

We started the morning off at church! We were initially a little afraid that we'd slept too late because we didn't know if our German phones would automatically "spring forward" on airplane mode, but they somehow knew what to do and we made it! It was so good to be back singing songs we know in a familiar place, hearing a sermon in English, and seeing what's changed at Heights Church! The first service wasn't very well attended, but I heard that it was spring break and also of course Daylight Savings, which probably meant that some people showed up an hour after the fact. We didn't see a ton of people we knew there because of this, but it was still so great to be back.

Our good friends John and Rachel (old post about their Spokane reception, although they're in a lot of these posts) drove down for the weekend from Grand Rapids in part because we were in town, so we got to enjoy lunch with them and Heather and Evan (Rachel and Evan are siblings) before they had to head back up to Michigan. It was so good to see these friends again. The six of us planned a Disney trip for the sometime future and I hope some sort of reunion actually happens!

After lunch, we'd intended to do things with other people, but since we didn't have phone service unless we were on wifi, we couldn't make plans. Instead, we took what felt like a very deserved nap. It was glorious. 

After we woke up, the Storeys drove us to the Wilson's house on their way to the evening church service. We enjoyed dinner with the Wilsons, whose children are now huge (picture of us with them at our going-away party here - and everyone looks so little!). We really loved our short time with them, and they made a fantastic Southern meal (Cory is a fellow southerner, from Mississippi). The time with them felt too short, but we are so thankful for this family!

Our whole trip was basically one meal after another, so to continue that trend until the end, we went directly from the Wilsons to Chris and Deanna's house, where Deanna hosted a joint birthday party for Evan and I (he's 366 days older than I am). We enjoyed even more food (Deanna knew I'd been missing cheddar cheese so she had some for me) and good times with friends. 

I finally got a proper picture with Carrie, one that wasn't taken on a propped up iPhone (and this is when I regretted this being the first time I'd used my camera all weekend - way better pictures!).

Carrie and Abe's oldest daughter Rhoda (their baby, Alice, was in her carseat, but I got to hold her for awhile too).

Jen! I got to meet her son EJ for the first time (everyone had kids after we left!).

Claire (she visited us in Tallahassee too - here)

And Deanna, who got married two weeks before we visited and then hosted this shindig in her new house!

March 13

We packed up our suitcases, which were very full. We'd stocked up on snacks and other things while in the States (taking advantage of those free checked international bags) so we had to really cram things in there, but we got it done! 

Claire picked me up and we went to Grumpy's (or Lucky's? I can't remember. We talked about both) for breakfast. We both got this massive meal, mostly because pancakes were the last thing on my food list, and I'd been thinking about them the whole time. This was way too much food and I didn't finish it all but still ate too much. I blame the (delicious) pancakes. It was good to really get face time with Claire and to hear what's going on in her life as we ate. 

Hello, downtown Cleveland!

After we quickly stopped by Walmart for bagels (they're hard to find here which is just so weird to me!), Claire dropped us off at the airport in Cleveland. Bye friend!

A snowstorm was coming, so we were worried we wouldn't get out of Cleveland at all when our flight was delayed two hours. We never saw a flurry of snow, but I guess they got quite a bit not too long later. 

Our flight was supposed to have landed at JFK in New York at 5:30pm, but we didn't leave Cleveland until after that time, and when we finally got to New York, they didn't let us land and then when we did, they didn't have a gate for us. Tons of people on the plane missed their next international flights, which was a big deal because that same snowstorm was coming for New York. I heard that 5000+ flights were cancelled that night. By the grace of God, we barely made it on our plane. It was scheduled to leave at 8:25 and thanks to Carson sprinting ahead while I waited for our gate-checked bag, we made it on there at about 815. We were the last to board, and they shut the door behind us. Whew. 

Here's Manhattan from the sky though! 

We watched The Secret Life of Pets and then Carson watched a couple others. I thought this movie was cute!

March 13-14 (our flight left at 4pm EST but landed at 9am CET the next day)

Our flight from New York to Amsterdam was much shorter (a little over 6 hours) than our flight from Amsterdam to Atlanta had been, so Carson was disappointed because it meant less food. It also meant no sleep for me. I was tired, but just couldn't seem to nod off. 

Here we are in all our glory about to land. We needed sleep! (Carson got a few hours, but plane sleep isn't like real sleep)

We landed in Amsterdam and got our passports stamped again before we made our short connection to Dusseldorf. 

I tried my best to sleep on this plane but it was less than an hour's flight, and I couldn't do it.

We had two hours until our trains left Dusseldorf for Muenster, so we hung out in the airport McDonalds. Carson told me to smile and I gave it all I had. I look like I'd been crying, but that's all lack of sleep. 

Our trains were delayed, and by the time I made it onto mine (we take separate trains sometimes because Carson can only take regional trains with his student card but those aren't always cheapest for me), I was barely awake, so I set an alarm and fell sound asleep. I don't usually sleep in public when I'm alone, but I was OUT. I would not be surprised if I'd snored or even drooled. It wasn't much, but it was nice to have a little rest for about 30 minutes. We walked home probably slower than ever before and made it back by 4:30pm. 

Carson's friend Brandon was at our apartment when we arrived, so we said hi, Carson showered, and they headed out to see the city. I couldn't stay awake, so I showered and then took a nap from 6-9pm if you're doing the math, that's 1pm EST (the time changed in the US but not in Europe yet so we're five hours difference for a few weeks), which means we hadn't changed, showered or had really great sleep since we woke up at 8am EST the day before - very little or no sleep for almost 30 hours. I woke up and hung out with them again for a little bit and then went to bed at 10:30... 13.5 hours later, I woke up. Sooooo I guess I was pretty tired. 

The trip to Cleveland was so fun! I wish we'd have had longer, but in our short stay we got to eat great food, see great people, and attend a wedding! We couldn't ask for more! Next time we come, I'd just really like it to be warm!

Carson's Parents Visit!

Carson's parents came into town for his graduation! 

They arrived on Wednesday night, and there aren't pictures of that. It was late, and we spent a little time chatting before bed, but that's pretty much all we did. 

On Thursday, Carson was rained out of work, which turned out to be a great thing! We decided to drive down to Akron, which is where they lived from 1997-1998. We drove by their old elementary school-turned community center, their old church, the place Mike worked, the burger place with sweet burgers, and the house they lived in. They were nervous to take a picture in front of it, but I insisted. 

We drove through downtown on the way back and decided to stop in Lakeview Cemetery because it's on our bucket list and we're always being told that we MUST go. Gorgeous and sobering. 

After dinner that night, we stopped by Sweetie Fry. I don't know if Emily and Jillian will see this, but we took this picture for them!

We watched The Bourne Supremacy that night and went to bed. 

The next morning, Carson's work was rained out again. He went to a luncheon for the graduate assistants in the early afternoon and then joined us and we decided to venture out east to Chagrin Falls. We walked around the little village and stopped for a bit at the playground. 

We considered seeing a movie, but nothing good was showing at the time we wanted, so we went to dinner instead. Carson and I saw this restaurant on our first day in Ohio and thought that the tagline was HYSTERICAL... "A really good Italian restaurant"... and since then we've said that we'd go there before we left Cleveland. Unfortunately though, we'd forgotten exactly where it was, and neither of us knew the actual name, just a paraphrase of the tagline so Google was no help. The weekend before their visit, we actually drove out east looking for this place just to see if we could find it. And we did! So since we knew where it was, we decided to go. 

We went to East Coast Custard that night (so good) and ended the evening with The Bourne Ultimatum. 

On Saturday morning, we woke up to yet another drizzly sky. We decided to go for it though and explored the west side of Cleveland. 

Our first stop was at Edgewater Reservation. This is the place where Morgan and I walked on the lake, and where I took Jillian and Emily in April. It has a great view of the city, isn't too far, and there are place to walk around. 

Since it was nearby, we walked around the West Side Market as well, which was the hit we fully expected it to be. Right outside the market is a chalkboard wall owned by one of the breweries, with a prompt to write why you love Cleveland, or something like that. We found the tiniest piece of chalk to write "Carson's Graduation!" but it was too small so we got his nickname.

Once we described Happy Dog, it became a must-do place. We love the way it's set up, and it was a fun lunch that we all enjoyed. 

Danita added a little crazy with the fruit loops. 

We parked next to the public library, which was one of Carson's additions to our bucket list, so we went inside looking for the special collections. It was a beautiful room full of really neat things, including many unique chess boards from all over the world/history.

The smallest book in the world:

Entrance to the special collections suite.

This was altogether a gorgeous building and I'm so glad Carson insisted that we go (and that we didn't take the elevator on the way down!)

The Arcade

We walked through Public Square and discovered that the Soldiers and Sailors monument in the middle has a little one-room museum inside it. The men working inside were incredibly knowledgeable about the history of the monument and the contents inside. You could tell that they loved sharing their knowledge with the public. 

See the bird on the tip of the gun?

The marathon was the next day, so we watched some of the setup right by the Browns Stadium and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The next day was Carson's graduation, which you can read about by clicking right here.

On Monday, it was sunny again and Carson had to return to work. His parents walked to Starbucks where one of my coworkers wrote this on Danita's cup :) 

And here's a picture of our list. A few things aren't on there, but we did SO MUCH! I did have to superimpose a couple of the check marks here on things we did, but didn't get checked off before I took the picture.

Before their flight, the three of us set off for North Chagrin Reservation, where Squires Castle is. It's an old mansion that's completely empty inside and open for the public. 

This little redhead happened to be standing there as Danita went to take my picture in the window.

Behind the castle are trails that go all over the reservation. We chose one and walked down it for a little bit. 

Our adventure was concluded with a trip to Mitchell's Ice Cream (which I think means we had ice cream every day, but I'm not sure)

We went back to the house, where they packed up and drove off to the airport. It was a really fun visit and I'm glad that we were able to do so much in our time together! We hadn't seen Carson's parents since the day before we moved to Ohio (they came over to say goodbye and help us clean our apartment) so it was great to spend several days enjoying and exploring with them. Next time they get to visit Florida!