Mitchell Trip West

Jason had a long trip and was away for several days this week so my mom, Daniel, and I took a road trip to visit some of my mom's relatives. We started by meeting Mom's cousin Judy at the Pittsburgh Zoo. (Yes, Daniel gets to go to the Zoo a lot. It is helpful that our zoo pass is good at just about every zoo around.) Daniel took to Judy right away and we all enjoyed yet another really nice zoo. Some of the exhibits are amazing - tigers, wild dogs, African Savanna, and Monkey house to name a few. They have an aquarium too that we had to skip because Daniel was starting to fall asleep. Maybe another time; a two year old can only take so much excitement. Daniel on our way to Judy's for the evening. Poor little guy was totally pooped!


This is Daniel and Judy playing together after dinner that night. He hasn't laughed that hard and long in a long time. We all just sat around and took it in. Thank you Judy for everything!

In the morning we drove to a nursing home in Brookville to visit the last of my mother's aunts. Daniel and I didn't go in, we didn't want to overwhelm aunt Vaughn, so we played in the little village of plastic houses for a while.

Later, we stopped in Dubois at Hoss's for lunch with some more of my mom's cousins. The parking lot was full of Harleys! I don't know what the occasion was exactly but they had a fire truck hanging around too. We were encouraged to hop aboard and check it out - we even got shut in and took a little ride around the parking lot. Daniel was very tired seemed to be fascinated at the same time.


Our last stop was Lanse for an overnight with my cousin Matt and his family. They have four kids (ages 7-11), a few acres of wooded domain, free range chickens, and lots of stuff for a 2 year old to explore. I wasn't feeling good at this point so I slept rather than take pictures, but they had a great time playing. We'll have to go back again soon.