{"id":10137,"date":"2017-07-04T22:31:00","date_gmt":"2017-07-04T22:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=10137"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:35:28","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:35:28","slug":"summer-in-the-states-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=10137","title":{"rendered":"SUMMER IN THE STATES PART 1"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This is the trend for our summers: blog updates get lost<\/u><\/b> in all the commotion of …TRAVEL<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u00a0SPEAKING<\/p>\n\n\n

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CATCHING UP WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY<\/p>\n\n\n

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and EATING.\u00a0Lots of eating. Mostly ice cream and pizza.<\/p>\n\n\n

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After all, our first stop, Le Mars, is known as the "Ice Cream Capital of the World".<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

I have internet access available today, so I thought I had better post a few photos and a quick update.This is our fourth summer back and I am finding there are things I can expect to experience upon each return.Like being overwhelmed by the abundance of choices in food and snacks.<\/p>\n\n\n

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So much salt water taffy…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

Being puzzled by some weird aspects of American culture.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Keep it classy, Walmart.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

Enjoying a happy reunion with Oreo, who has been living with Grandma Trudy since we moved to Haiti.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Her expectations for our summer together: belly rubs 24\/7.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

Participating in special events that happen at the right time for us to enjoy being a part of them.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Dixie and Calvin (some of our kids' "extra" grandparents) celebrated their 50th Anniversary. Wishing this wonderful couple many more together!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

And visiting some unusual places.<\/p>\n\n\n

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BUT this summer has been full of changes, too.Some come with our kids growing up. This summer Caleb (16) took the SAT in Iowa and Hannah (15) took the ACT in Indiana. It was strange to drop her off at the huge high school here in Columbus that she would have possibly attended if the Lord hadn’t moved us to Haiti.<\/p>\n\n\n

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By the way, she got a 29 on her first try. Not bad!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

Even Iowa was different for us this year. Our good friends, Phil and Connie, have hosted our family for several years now in the spacious parsonage of the Grundy UM Church. But Phil was in the midst of retiring and all their belongings had been moved to Des Moines. We still stayed in the Grundy Center parsonage, but it was bare bones.Phil and Connie hosted a cookout for us to have an opportunity to share about Haiti, and it was all folding chairs and collapsible tables in the empty living room.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Caleb and Samuel spent a bit of time one day helping to clear out the last of the odds and ends from the basement.<\/p>\n\n\n

And Samuel enjoyed rummaging through some final garage sale items and playing dress up.<\/p>\n\n\n

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A happier reunion – last summer, Bill and Jodee visited us in Indianapolis for a day.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the trend for our summers: blog updates get lost in all the commotion of …TRAVEL \u00a0SPEAKING CATCHING UP WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY and EATING.\u00a0Lots of eating. Mostly ice cream and pizza. I have internet access available today, so I thought I had better post a few photos and a quick update.This is our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10137"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10159,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10137\/revisions\/10159"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}