Highly visible with Donate Life magnets displayed all over it, our van does turn some heads. Needless to say, I don’t want to brag about exceeding the speed limit, or the next thing I know we’ll have every state trooper on the lookout for us. Let’s suffice it to say, in honor of the Indy 500 Motor Speedway, we wanted to speed but rather maintained a law abiding speed throughout the entire Hoosier state. In fact, the only thing speeding in Indiana was the time.
Here are some highlights from our speedy week in Indiana:
Best Tourist Spot: Indy 500 Motor Speedway. The Hall of Fame Museum located inside the track could have been dull for those of us who aren’t particularly into racing - if it weren’t for the docent. Once again, the docent saved the museum with interesting stories. For example, we were looking at the “tropical rose” race car, and the docent walked up and told us about the recent pink race car in support of breast cancer awareness. The driver, whose name was Lloyd, was all decked out in pink from the car to his helmet. Appropriately they nicknamed him “Pink Floyd.” Wouldn’t it be great to have a blue and green Donate Life race car?! I'm not sure about a good nickname for the driver yet, though...
Most Family Fun Spot: The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. While Levi is getting too old for most children’s museums, this one held his interest, and of course, Chloe loves them. The Children’s Museum of Indy always ranks high in the list of the best children’s museums, so when some friends talked about meeting there, we jumped at the opportunity to see them…and go to the museum. Before we knew it, we had spent all day at the museum! There is so much to see that it really requires a full day.
Worst Closure: The Grounds Tour at the Indy 500 Speedway. The tours don’t operate in rain or snow, so imagine how disappointed we were when it snowed the day before our tour! Sadly we couldn’t ride the bus on the racetrack nor stand at the brickyard for pictures. Worse yet was knowing that we just missed it.
Most Beautiful Sight: Freshly fallen snow. Something I’ve never lost in adulthood is my love of waking up to freshly fallen snow. I especially love to see it still falling…when I’m at home, that is - not on a trip driving a minivan around the United States! I’m awful with measurements, but I’m guessing there were a few inches. Chloe was dying to have a snowball fight, so we bundled up with what little snow clothes we had and threw some snowballs around in the hotel’s courtyard…fun.
Best Meal: PF Chang’s. Their lettuce wraps are delicious, especially with that sauce they whip together at the table. In fact, they’re so good, I’d put them in one of the top 10 meals we’ve had on the trip!
Worst Meal: Hardee’s. We were short on time, so we desperately grabbed something to eat at the only place around – Hardee’s. As we sat down, Chloe commented, “I feel like I should be old and drinking coffee to eat here.”
New Foods: Chocolate marshmallow topping for popcorn. Oddly we’ve only seen this popcorn shaker flavor in Indiana. It sounds disgusting but think caramel corn or kettle corn. Yum.
A First for the Trip: Doing a puzzle. We were thankful that we were able to set up a table at the IUPUC campus in Columbus to sign up organ donors and raise awareness for organ donation. At a nearby table, a puzzle was sitting out for anyone who wanted to help assemble it. Since it's not something we can normally do on the trip, Levi and Chloe enjoyed working on that puzzle the entire time.
Biggest Revelation: On Mike’s birthday, we did something unusual and went to see a movie. During Tangled, there’s a scene where Rapunzel has the same fear that I have occasionally: what happens when your dream is over? Flynn responds, “When this is over, you'll find a new dream." So simple, so powerful, and yet so comforting. We are living a dream on this amazing trip, and when the trip is over, we can dream a new dream.
Biggest Twinge of Homesickness: Being so close to home was just weird. All we had to do was hop on I74 and be in Illinois in a couple of hours. (We didn't, but we could have.)
Best Drive: Meridian Street in Indy. Seeing all the historic homes, especially in the evening when they were lit for Christmas, was beautiful.
Worst Drive: The drive over from Ohio was snowy and a little slippery. Welcome to winter in the Midwest!
Biggest Surprise: You can do that with gingerbread?!? After attending the wonderful Christmas event at Conner Prairie Interactive History Park, we enjoyed browsing the gingerbread houses on display and voting for our favorite. Chloe’s favorite was the giant gingerbread cup of hot chocolate. Mine was the gingerbread library with all the antique looking books made from fig newtons! They're so cute. Be sure to check out the pictures.
Biggest Disappointment: The cold. We were taking a risk spending a week in Indiana in early December. It was cold and even a little snowy while we were there, but it certainly could have been worse.
Funniest Memory: Comedy Sportz - their Christmas theme show. In one game each player took turns singing one and only one word of a Christmas song for as long as they could go without messing up. That was harder than it sounds! Try singing just “Rudolf” and stopping before “the red-nosed reindeer.” We played our own version driving in the van. It’s amazing how often you don’t know the next word, or you sing two words because they flow together. We laughed and laughed when we duplicated this game in our van!
Biggest Disappointment: The cold. We were taking a risk spending a week in Indiana in early December. It was cold and even a little snowy while we were there, but it certainly could have been worse.
Funniest Memory: Comedy Sportz - their Christmas theme show. In one game each player took turns singing one and only one word of a Christmas song for as long as they could go without messing up. That was harder than it sounds! Try singing just “Rudolf” and stopping before “the red-nosed reindeer.” We played our own version driving in the van. It’s amazing how often you don’t know the next word, or you sing two words because they flow together. We laughed and laughed when we duplicated this game in our van!
Worst Memory: Mike’s sickness was lasting much longer than it seemed it should. We started to worry that it was something more serious and wondered what that meant for the rest of the trip. We just had to leave it in God’s hands though. As it turned out, he recovered from the nasty bug and is fine.
Best Memory: Laughing with friends. We hadn’t laughed with good friends in so long! It was wonderful that our friends drove over to meet us at the museum and then hang out afterwards. I’m thankful for their friendship. Our values are so close to each other, and it’s awesome spending time together as iron sharpens iron.
My IN Hike: What pipe dream was I thinking when I hoped to hike in Indiana in December?!? It snowed 2.5 inches when we were there, and we surely don’t have room to pack boots in the van!
What We Did Miss: Holiday World, Indiana Dunes, West Baden Springs Hotel, and so much more all recommended to us.
In Summary: The week we spent in Indiana went speeding by, but you certainly didn’t see a minivan with Donate Life magnets speeding by on your roads!
-The Mom
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