Greetings from Eugene!

Hello loved ones!

We hope that this posting finds you well.  As you can tell from the title of this post, we have made it to Oregon!  It took us 11 days and 3,449 miles.  Also, this trip came in less than $100 more than our original trip to Oregon in 2006.  Pretty amazing when you consider that we took the same amount of days, the cost of gas prices, and that Cliff and I did some shopping on this trip (you will hear about this soon!).

So we love you all and want to keep you posted on what is going on in our lives so we decided to start a blog.  Our first few entries will be about our fabulous trip across country and then it will just be about things that we think are pretty cool and exciting.  Cliff and I will both be posting and please feel free to leave comments!

So for those of you who did not get the see the picture of our pod packed....here it is!  I was super impressed.  Cliff compared the whole event to playing Tertis and he apparently always got to the last level.

 

The Tetris Genius

Once got on the road we headed to Newell, West Virginia.  Newell is in the little tip of West Virginia that is between Pennsylvania and Ohio.  The trip went really smoothly until we got caught in traffic in Pittsburgh.  The whole situation was made better by the fact that there was an older gentleman in the car behind us who was making super cute googly fingers at Rudy.  Super adorable and entertaining (for us...not so much for Rudy).  The first night we camped in Tomlinson Run State Park.  We ate string cheese, crackers, and black bean soup (thanks Mom and Pam!) and then went to bed.  Rudy did really well on his first night camping.  He barked at every noise at the beginning but eventually feel asleep.

So many of you have been wonderful and have asked how Rudy is doing on our adventure.  Let me tell you, he did a great job overall but the first few days were rough.  Since we got the new car he has started to whine.  We think it is because he can't sit with his face between our heads as we drive.  Well, Cliff and  I decided that we were going to ignore his whining behavior in the hopes of making it go away.  This was going well until we stopped at a toll booth and he barked at the attendant.  Without thinking, I told him to stop.  This did it.  He then decided that barking would get him attention.  He spent 55 minutes barking solid as Cliff drove on small, winding, West Virginia roads.  Stressful....but we decided to keep him :)

Cliff and I in the China Museum

The next day we went to the Homer Laughlin Factory in Newell.  Homer Laughlin makes Fiesta ware and apparently dishes for a ton of hotels, restaurants, and the military.   The factory makes all of the Fiesta, they have a tour, and a wonderful room filled with Fiesta seconds.  How could we not stop?  The tour was between 1 1/2 to 2 hours long and it was very much a tour of a working factory.  No glass walls to separate us from the workers, no cheesy educational videos.  We were actually standing over their shoulders (with eye protection) asking questions, dodging fork lifts, and getting clay all over ourselves.  It was amazing.  Cliff and I can now tell you about all of the different ways to create the different pieces.  Barb, our tour guide, has worked at the factory for 48 years.  Most of the workers we spoke to had worked there somewhere between 20-35 years. Unbelievable.  Currently the factory employees about 900 people but it use to employee between 3,000- 4,000.  Less demand and robots helped to shrink the workforce.  After the tour, Cliff and I went through the seconds room.  We found a few really nice pieces in colors that we did not currently have so we were both really happy (also the seconds cost about 20% of the retail cost).

 

   

Me and Barb

I wish that we could have taken pictures during the tour but because it was a working factory they didn't want the pictures to cause safety issues.  Oh well.  If you are ever in the area you should go as it was alot of fun.

A quick Fiesta trivia question for you until next time:  What is the most popular Fiesta color sold to date?

Also-  Happy Birthday Pam!