October 30
Another long day driving north zigzagging our way to see loved ones. We took our favorite drive along the coast to Santa Barbara then due north to Santa Clara. Mom was excited when I phoned her about our afternoon arrival. She met us by the garage and took us into the dining room where she showed us a binder crammed with colorful printouts from the Internet. She had followed our itinerary each day and joined us in spirit, sharing her research with the nuns and friends at the monastery as well as with the neighbors. We had no idea that so many had followed our journey. Mom went through the binder with us and we recalled our adventures. We shared a few pictures on the laptop although they haven’t been edited or organized yet. To beat the afternoon traffic jams we left Fatima and Lourdes rosaries for Joyce and Mike, and Zoe and Mike, kissed Mom goodbye, and headed northeast to Valley Springs.
The sun was setting by the time we saw Jenny. She was alone with Sienna who had just had the cast removed from her broken arm.
Steve, Wyatt, and Helena were at a nearby Internet café where Steve was hot on the trail for appraisals. When he arrived a little bit later he was excited that he had grabbed at least one appraisal quickly before someone else got it. He was also delighted that he had passed a test with flying colors which put him at a higher level of certification as an appraiser. We dropped off rosaries and statues and did a quick tour of Paris and nearby sites on the laptop. I took a picture of Sienna without her cast.
A few days later Jenny put pictures on Facebook of the Halloween costumes which Wyatt and Helena had described to us. It was getting late, so we said our goodbyes and headed to Sacramento. We stayed in Rancho Cordova so we would have a short drive in the morning to Georgetown to pick up our mail.
