Home sweet Iowa...

Thursday through Sunday I'll be vacationing in Iowa with my Dad. My cousin Ryan is getting married on Saturday in Denison Iowa. We are originally from Iowa, but moved to California when I was only 3 years old. I love going back to the Midwest it feels like home to me.

When I was 7 or 8 years old I started flying back to Iowa for a month or two during the summer so I could be passed around family members. I LOVED this! I think traveling at such a young age, by myself, has helped me to become the adventurous traveler I am today. As a child I wasn't clingy or "attached" to my parents as most children are, so being away from my parents for a length of time was not a big deal to me. I have always been an independent person.

My mother is 1 of 13 children, so I had a lot of family members to take me in. I have so many pleasant memories of these hot mid-western summers. I used to love the heat showers with thunder and lightening. As a child I didn't mind the thunder and lightening, but now as an adult I get a little stressed when the lightening gets too close. Probably childhood trauma, I don't know.

So Thursday morning I departed California a little before 8am, and I met up with my dad in Denver Colorado. We then flew from Denver to Omaha, Nebraska, where we rented a car and drove 1 1/2 hrs to Denison Iowa. We pulled into the parking lot of our motel about 10pm.

This morning (Friday), after stepping out of our motel room we were greeted with a very unpleasant smell. I almost lost my stomach the smell was so horrible. It smelled like pig crap to the extreme. By the afternoon the smell had calmed down, or we are now used to, either way it is now bearable.

The motel we are at is the Historical Park Motel. They had a nice website and it was recommended by the bridal party, but if we hadn't pre-paid I think we would be relocating. The sink hadn't been clean so there was left over toothpaste form the previous vacationers. The Motel is located between the train tracks and the main highway into town, so there is a constant roar of traffic through out the day. When ever a large truck goes down the road the whole building shakes, which gives it a real historical feeling. All night long we could feel the floor shake, which in turn vibrates the bed. Being from California my first intuition of a shaking bed is that it is an earthquake, so through the night I would wake up thinking there was an earthquake, not realizing I'm in Iowa where earthquakes are very, very rare.

Well the rehearsal dinner is in a few hours so I better start thinking about what I'm going to wear.

Take Care!