Trip 1 Part 2 -

 Auburndale, FL  (Hi 88  Lo 65) and Shalimar, FL  (Hi 77 Lo 59)

Monday I started out for the second half of the trip to Auburndale, just east of Lakeland. We lived there five years and I never got to say bye to anyone because the trip to Illinois for graduation came to a halt when we found out Jim had Glioblastoma. I stayed with a friend, Donna,  that was the first to talk to me when we moved there and also loves crafts. 

Tuesday we went to Walmart to get a few craft items and I needed a few things to take home with me.

 We worked on baskets made from cards to see if we could put one together. We never did figure it out, but at least we got one started. Good project for cards that are laying around. I like fake fruit in the basket. 

Wednesday was the day to see all the friends I had at Lake Juliana. It was wonderful going to coffee and talking to so many I knew. 

                                    The three amigos are back together, Linda, Dee and Donna

I will be back, they're only six and half hours away.  Later in the afternoon we got together with my hospice boss, Mary and George another worker at hospice and lives beside Donna. 

I packed up and got ready for the trip home on Thursday morning. I checked and rechecked storms that were coming in and was hoping with the early start I'd miss the worst of it. 

Thursday I was on my way at 7:15 Central time. This whole week was on eastern time an hour ahead so I was up early every day. I thought I'd be ok and miss the storms by maybe an hour, but that didn't happen. I got a message and a call from my sister and Roberta (the one I visited last week) that I was headed into tornadic type storms. I was two hours out, near Tallahassee when it started raining. I didn't get into major wind or hail, but the rain was brutal. The traffic slowed to 45mph and I could still see the white line on the right side of the road, so figured I was ok. I did a lot of hydroplaning, but didn't go into the next lane. I got home about 3:30, not bad since there was such a slow down. It was good getting back in my own bed. 

 Friday I didn't see a soul outside. It's warm but very nice, so I don't have anyone to play with today. I did have chime practice, our concert is tomorrow. I got my emails caught up and got some videos watched that I wanted to see. I also was on  the North Carolina zoom. 

Saturday the prediction was severe storms in our area and we had a chimes concert in a nearby town at a place called Heritage Museum. We got there early and started playing half hour earlier then we were suppose to then started over at 12 at a faster pace. We were done just as it started sprinkling and after we loaded the car it started pouring rain. I didn't take time to take pictures.  We went back to the village and celebrated one of the gals birthday with a cake. It was a delicious white cake. 

                                                This is part of the chimes group. 

                                   We drove around the area and found this boat that about sunk from hurricane Ian. 

Later in the afternoon I went to the Saturday happy hour. We had a really good turnout tonight.