SISTERS' WEEK -- DAY 2 (MONDAY)

 Today Elaine and I took a road trip to Lancaster County.  This is one of our favorite places.  It is so beautiful there.

Lots of farms.  Hard to believe it's so close to a large city such as Philadelphia.

We began by going to Kitchen Kettle Village, a group of shops in Intercourse, PA.  It is a huge tourist attraction and always crowded.  Today was no exception.  We had to squeeze through the stores.  At least the economy is good for them!  There is always some type of entertainment in the courtyard.  This time it was two men playing banjos.  They were doing old-time favorites.

There is a Christmas store there where we go every year and pick out one ornament for our Christmas tree.  It is a tradition with us now.

Elaine collects nutcrackers.  When I saw the window I knew she had to have her picture taken in front of it.

This is one of the beautiful houses in Bird-in-Hand that we passed.

There were lots of Amish out and about today.  However, as I said before in this blog, I respect them enough to not take their pictures.  I tried to take some of their buggies or horses, but things were moving so quickly all the pictures turned out blurry.

After we left Kitchen Kettle, we went to the Lenox outlet in Strasburg.  I got a couple of Christmas gifts there.  As we left the store it started raining, so we decided to just go eat.  We went down the road to Hershey Farm.  Because it was Elaine's birthday, her meal was free.  We had such a lovely waitress named Erin.  And the hostess Karen was great too.  At the end of the meal, Erin brought out a whoopie pie with a lit candle in it for Elaine.  Yesterday a cupcake, today a whoopie pie.  After we ate I ordered food to take home for Joe and we went through the stores.  Then we went back to get the food and left.  It had stopped raining by then so we decided to walk through the grounds a little bit.  The hibiscus were beautiful.

 

There was a part of the grounds that dipped really low.  It was surrounded by large stones.  We took our lives in our hands (ha, ha) and stood by the edge.

The landscaping is so beautiful.

See the geese by the lake?

There is a little bench by a waterfall where Elaine and I sit each year and have our pictures taken.  Here is this year's version.

Before we left we went to see the goats and chickens.

 

 

On the way home not only did we get lost (we missed our exit), but there was a horrible rain storm.  God (and my brother Larry's directions given to us at our frantic phone call) brought us home safely and Joe got his dinner.  ;)