Destination: College – Day 4

I woke up at about 7:00am this morning, rolled off my air mattress (the leg muscles one builds when one sleeps on the floor – incredible!), and quietly completed my morning routine.

Katelyn, clad in sweat pants and sweatshirt, helped me carry down my bags and walked me all the way out to my car in the 40-degree weather. The sages teach us to accompany our guests as far as possible on their journey, which usually means to at least walk them down the driveway or to their car, or suchwhat. Katelyn more than fulfilled that mitzvah, and made me feel very treasured. Especially with it being so cold.

I drove off, down TN Highway 30 East, encountered a bit of snow just before Asheville, reveled in the novelty of driving through two tunnels, bounced around in the driver’s seat to my mix CDs (complements of Joshua & Mary), and made it safely back to The Residence.

Two things worth mentioning: one, I enjoyed a delightful repast with our beloved “Aunt” Darnell in Asheville – such fun to catch up with good friends. The other, my car officially broke 100,000 miles on my return trip, and I plan to have a party celebrating that fact.

Suggestions welcome.

As much fun as it is to travel, to spend time with friends, to see place, to build memories, there certainly is no place like home.

Hoping For Long Life

by Julianna Squicciarini

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is Exodus 20:12:

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the L-RD your G-d gives you.”

There are a lot of ways to honor one’s parents…and I think we can all agree that it should be something we never stop doing. I strive to honor my parents through my obedience and general respect of them. Not that I’m always obedient and respectful…ha! I wish. Those are both intangible things. I think I work best with intangibles.

When the second Sunday in May rolls around, it’s easy to focus on doing something special for one’s mother. Besides, for the past month, I’ve been bombarded with emails about Mother’s Day coming up – chocolate, jewelry, books, cookware…you name it! Every retailer on the planet wants to remind us that we should be doing something for Mom. But like I said – I work best with intangibles. Perhaps because they say my love language is Quality Time?

So this year, the Mother’s Day celebration started early, on Thursday, May 6. We had told our mom to keep the day blocked off and available. Since our mom puts 2 and 2 together and gets 4 faster than anyone else I know, I’m thinking she probably guessed it had something to do with Mother’s Day. But, other than the frequent questions and sly tricks to try to pry information out of us, she didn’t say much. Meanwhile, we concocted an elaborate plan to make her feel extra-special.

We decided to take her to Asheville, to a place called Posana. This place is a gluten-free heaven. Everything on their menu is gluten-free. And we’re not just talking about vegetables and rice. They have all kinds of baked products, including scones and muffins and cinnamon rolls and…you get the idea. Our mom, Morgan, and Christine all eat gluten-free, and they have been missing out on a lot of the fluffier items on their menu, if you catch my drift. Another family we know, the Hergenreters, also have two gluten-free eaters. So we got together with Emily Hergenreter and planned a daytrip to Asheville for our moms (and us, of course) to enjoy this amazing restaurant.

Here’s something you might need to know about our mom: she does not like surprises. She may try to tell you that she does. She may try to convince you that surprises are fine – just not really big ones (like the time we had a 50-person surprise party for her a few years ago; two words: heart attack). This, however, is not the case. Her insatiable curiosity will not allow her to relax and enjoy the surprise. She needs to know. Therefore, we told her we were taking her to Posana in Asheville on Thursday morning, giving her an hour to prepare for being gone all day. What we didn’t mention was that the Hergenreter ladies would be joining us. <cackle>

Our mother was suitably surprised. And I have to say that everyone seemed really excited about trying this restaurant. For the record – it was DELICIOUS. Wow. They don’t really even advertise themselves as a gluten-free restaurant, probably because they don’t want to scare people away. And there’s no need – the food is so well-crafted, you can’t even tell it’s not “normal”. We all started talking about making this a tradition for Mother’s Day. Next time we want to try brunch. Think French Toast and pancakes… <yum>

My Father’s House: Part 1

Or more accurately, “without Dad in a hotel room…”

A scarce 24 hours after the guys returned from their camping trip/mini vacation, three of us left for Asheville to rendezvous with our ride to Wisconsin, Steven and Darnell Rogers. Mom, Julianna, and I spent Monday night in the Rogers’ lovely mountain home and left early the next morning to begin our week long “trek” to Hudson, WI for the annual FFOZ Shavuot Conference.

I say “trek” because 4 total days of driving is no joke, especially when you’re used to quick flights (like me) or occasionally get carsick (like me) or need 24/7 internet access (…like me).

As you might have guessed, 18 hours in a car with friends will make you really close friends by the end of the trip! Or… well, we won’t consider the alternative. Julianna and I had no choice but to come up with a list of what we’ve learned about Steven Rogers, our dependable chauffeur:

• He’s full of those incredibly valuable pearls of wisdom, like, “What can I say? Part of being smart is knowing what you’re dumb at.”
• He is superhuman. On Tuesday, we started driving from Asheville, NC shortly before 6:30am, and made it to Rockford, IL by 5:30pm local time. That, for the uninitiated, is a solid 12 hours of driving. No real breaks to speak of, either. The 7-minute gas stops (both of them) don’t really count, in my mind…
• If you are habitually quiet, people actually listen to you when you speak. You should try it sometime; Mr. Rogers is an expert.
• He is a true Southerner… in accent, style, and gentlemanly behavior.
• He has a deathly fear of MSG (“torture” would be going a Cracker Barrel) but will eat ice cream or beef at almost any time of the day or night.
• He prefers to be addressed as “Mr. Rogers, sir.”
• His long-term vision is to own a farm and be self-sufficient.
• He’s always on the lookout for a Dick’s Sporting Goods, Bass Pro Shop, or Walmart… in other words, a place where he could buy ammunition.
• He has handled being the only man in a car full of women with remarkable aplomb. Our hats are off to him. =)

“IF they have their seatbelts on…”

During the second half of our oh-so-early USO shift yesterday morning, Julianna and I observed that exactly a week ago we were contentedly waking up in a gorgeous hotel room, to a scenic view of the sunny NC mountains… getting ready to order our customary room service breakfast of grapefruit juice. <blissful sigh>

It was a quick escape from Charlotte to enjoy the wintery mountain air and scenery, accompanied by two amiable friends, our cute Garmin Nuvi and the equally cute Emily Hergenreter. Having calculated that 4 girls + VW Beetle + mountains + shopping = FUN, we packed everything into my car and headed north. I say, “packed everything” but that was harder than it sounds. Using our new Vera Bradley “weekenders,” we went bohemian chic and confined ourselves each to one bag… but then Emily shows up with what appeared to be the entire contents of her wardrobe plus a hair dryer, and expects that it’s all going to come with us. She had about 14 pieces of luggage… it was astonishing.  

Somehow it all fit. I’m still not sure how that happened.

So, once on our way, we discovered the Garmin Nuvi was unfamiliar with the legendary shopping available in Blowing Rock, strangely enough. Emily, the navigational assistant, set our course for Tweetsie Railroad instead. Nothing like a spontaneous change of plans to make the trip memorable.

…and we ended up shopping after all. [Q: Can you ever get away from places to shop? A: No. Christine and I were at the top of a mountain in the Israeli desert, and sure enough, the place was swarming with bedouin merchants selling beads] Emily, it turns out, is a professional shopper. Professional shoppers spend most of their time in the dressing room. And they usually buy something. It’s all kinds of fun.

Then we were faced with the difficult choice of what to leave in Blowing Rock: 1) Emily, 2) her stuff, or 3) her shopping bags…

We “came across” a quaint and unusual place for dinner, on the outskirts of Asheville, in a town called Weaverville. It was basically an exotic upscale Greek diner, if that makes sense. When we arrived, they said regretfully that it would be at least half an hour, so we made plans to go elsewhere, but as we reached the door, they came running after us, practically begging us to stay… so we did, and it was the best dinner I’ve ever had in NC west of Hickory.

The rest of that evening is a blur. We drove through a dark forest, on narrow winding roads… large wrought iron gates slowly opened, revealing a beautiful castle illuminated from within… I think Dougray Scott was there to meet us…

Sorry… got lost in Ever After for a minute there. But it was a magical evening.

 

Emily, chérie, you are an ideal traveling companion. Thank you for coming with us – we’d love to repeat the trip sometime.

A Tale of Two City-Girls: Day 5

Mary and I spent the entire day at Biltmore Estate with Rachel & Julia Allison.    Since we knew the girls would be gone these two particular weeks in November, we planned this GirlTrip way in advance.  The house and grounds were completely decorated for Christmas, including the enormous Banquet Hall Christmas tree.  Some of the displays were simply breathtaking, and we enjoyed ourselves immensely.  The weather was also perfect, which was a godsend.  I have never, even with my frequent trips to the Estate this year, seen the house after dark.  It is absolutely lovely!

A big plus about today?  It was Passholder Shopping Day, which means I get 20% off all my purchases.  Plus they have food samples out all over the place.  What fun!

Our dad also received an email from Morgan today.  It went like this:

!hello family
.having a great time ,christine and i are in jerusalem
!yay ,down to ben yehudah street \we are going for a walk tonight .everything is fantastic .better today than yesterday 200%we feel
i think we will be in our rooms after ?night call us maybe tomorrow .love everybody and will talk to you soon
.erev shabbat
t talked to yet’who i haven ,and pete ,mary ,hugs to julianna
from christine and morgan
!miss you sooooo much

Now, is it just me, or does all that sound a little garbled?  Is it because they’re in Israel that the email appears to be written backwards?!

Teacher’s Pet II

by Julianna Squicciarini

Forget meeting for lunch – this time I really did it!  I invited my (former) piano teacher, Phyllis Teague, to come with me to Biltmore Estate this past Sunday to see the amazing Carpet of Flowers.  I know it seems like I am going off to Asheville every other week, but as a matter of fact I have only been three times prior to this as of April of this year   With a 12-Month Pass, I NEED to go as often as possible, right?  Right.

So anyway, August 29-September 14, Biltmore Estate advertised this Carpet of Flowers.  They had pictures up on their website to let you know what it looks like.  Believe it or not, it really does look like a carpet – very colorful – and is a 1/4 acre in length.

That was the draw, but as it turned out, Mrs. Teague had not been to Biltmore in 30 years.  <shocked expression>  We went ahead and toured the house, winery, and some of the gardens, because Biltmore has grown so much since she was last there.

The more the merrier, so I invited Morgan to come along.  Some of you may be unaware of her masterful powers of conversation.  This was, I have to admit, the primary reason I asked her to come :)  May no one ever say I don’t know a good thing when I see it.

The weather was absolutely perfect, although it did get just a little warm walking the gardens at the heat of the day.  But brunch at Deerpark was sumptuous and afternoon tea in the gorgeous Inn on Biltmore Estate was so elegant and delicious.  We had such fun just spending time together.  I am happy to say that Mrs. Teague really enjoyed the whole trip.  And although I drove both ways (which is 5 hours round trip), the car and passengers were still completely intact when we returned home

Who’s up for the next Biltmore trip?  I haven’t scheduled one for October yet, but if you want to go – let me know!  My pass gets discounts for friends…