There's no Place like Home

Hello my friends.  We are home.  ::whew::  We said farewell to our daughter and two granddaughters on Tuesday morning and headed North and West away from Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri.  We were traveling through picturesque country back roads quite a while and saw many cornfields and farms.  Our first night we spent in Grand Island, Nebraska after about 7-8 hours of driving.  Eventually the scenery turned to desert and rocky mesas.  I thought this rock was interesting.. it was pretty big!

We passed by many "wind farms".  Rows and rows of huge windmills.  I left the highway orange traffic cone in the photo so I would remember to tell you that we passed through MANY, and I mean a LOT of highway construction across this fine country.  Most of them had no obvious work going on.  Whoever is selling traffic cones is making a massive fortune.  :-)  Our second night was spent in Rock Springs, Wyoming.

I took all these photos from a moving car.  :-)  This rock formation was before we reached Salt Lake City, UT - but actually we took the bypass and didn't go through the city.  

This is the mountain range north of SLC and where we got on Interstate 84, which would bring us all the way home!  Our 3rd night was spent in Meridian/Boise, Idaho.  I am thankful for my cellular iPad - I was able to play Scrabble, Words With Friends, check my email, read Facebook and post occasionally.  I also read the book by an author that is a friend of mine called "Stoneheart" by Baer Charlton.  I bought the book on my iPad and highly recommend it.  I finished yesterday.  Dayle drove the entire way home.  Verizon had amazing coverage all across the country for me.

Yesterday halfway through our way home we approached Pendleton at lunchtime.  I googled for restaurants and we dined at "Roosters".  It was good!  Then we drove back through town to the old original Pendleton Woolen Mill and visited the mill store.  Dayle actually bought a king size blanket for us!  I'll show you later.. it's sage green, gold and rust.  

This place is so wonderful!  I'd never visited the home of Pendleton and so I was doing a bucket list visit.  

These are all the designs.. which one do you want?

There is a small museum area off the sales room.. I loved this carved wood Indian on his pony.

This vest is completely hand beaded with seed beads!

I was drawn to this seed beaded medallion necklace.  I've done a similar one.

This is the blanket that Dayle got for us.  The green looks great in our green bedroom!

We then went to a very famous western store, Hamley's.

This fabulous bronze sculpture of an Indian chief on his horse all dressed up in his Eagle feather headdress greeted us at the door.

I was amazed at the gorgeous hand made chandeliers of wrought iron, the base is painted rawhide and there are rawhide teepees on the top all lit up and also painted.  See the copper metal ceiling tiles?

Need a hand made leather saddle?  Some rope for catching calves?  No problem!

This place is famous for it's custom made saddles, here is the saddler at work in the wonderful workshop.

I love this amazing bronze statue of a bucking bronco and cowboy!  This is the hat room.. ALL the guys out here are sporting their summer straw hat.  

They sell new and used saddles.

Men's Western clothing and a big bronze statue of a chief.  See the pretty copper ceiling?

Unfortunately we didn't find anything to buy, although I was lusting after these handmade pocket knives.. but they were very spendy.  Next up we drove by the big beautiful Pendleton Round-Up arena.  I've never attended the famous rodeo but it's on my bucket list.  Click on above link for the history of this rodeo.

A life size bronze sculpture of a bucking bronco and cowboy on the street side of the famous rodeo arena.

Leaving Pendleton we see the Columbia River greeting us.  Can you believe how arid and desertlike it is here?  

We were actually surprised to see Mt. Hood looming above The Dalles!  Snap, snap... from the moving car.  And we're getting some trees now.  I have to tell you something amazing!  I saw a bunch of big white birds on an island in the river and they were White Pelicans!  What?  So, I googled it while we zoomed along and sure enough, they breed on the islands of the Columbia River near Arlington!  We were not able to stop to take a photo in that area of the freeway.  :-(  But I will never forget seeing those big white birds with big long orange bills.  They have the the biggest wing span of any bird in Oregon!  I also saw a Bald Eagle sitting amongst a bunch of sea gulls!

Getting closer to home.. I truly cannot tell you how happy we were!  I was soOOooo tired of sitting in the passenger seat all cramped up!  Let me out!  

It was this hot when we passed through The Dalles.. one hour from home.

We finally pulled in and Kristi let Buddy off leash and he ran to us and was so happy to see us!  Then the boys ran and hugged us!  Everyone was talking at once and we were so happy to be HOME!  Kristi took us into my craft studio and showed me that she'd organized EVERYTHING!  There were labeled bins in the cabinets and the desktop was clear and they'd built a jewelry display behind the door and she'd hung up all the jewelry I'd made!  I will do a whole post on that.. soon.  Kristi is amazing!  And so.. we're resting in our beloved easy chairs.  Kristi and I both went out and took photos of the "Blue Moon".  I must say our bed felt truly fabulous after sleeping in different beds for so many nights.  

5,379 miles we drove.  Ahhhh.  Home.  I hope you're enjoying your summer!  Today is the 1st day of August!  It's going fast.  OK.. time to rest some more.  
((hugs)), Teresa :-)