Steven’s pal Kate from 3rd grade, and The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame made Cleveland, Ohio a travel destination. We missed the Rock Museum as we arrived an hour before the Cleveland Browns game. Chaos and expensive parking made us choose pretty walks as the best way to experience Cleveland.

The Peace Garden and Labyrinth in Chagrin Falls (utilizing Kate’s design), and the “Metropark” system surrounding Cleveland with parks, bike routes, and waterfalls, was a far better choice.

On route to Bloomington, we took a lunch stop in the Columbus, Ohio “North High Street Art District”. There are some great murals.

We also spent a fantastic day with Steven’s cousins, Jo Ann (and her family) and Karen (and her husband) in Springville, Indiana at the family’s Red Horse Hollow. From the great meals at their sister Katy’s house in Florida, we knew to arrive hungry.  The gals (skinny, tall, and long-legged like all of Steven’s family) provided us with mountains of Bill’s delicious BBQ, “Mom’s Homemade” blueberry, and sugar cream pies, and too many sides, including fresh picked Indiana corn on the cob. The only sane thing to do was take a nap that afternoon but…Joanne’s five horses needed to be groomed and worked.

Easy choice:  sleep v. groom/ride/bathe horses. Afterward, I smelled deliciously of horse poop and horse sweat…Yippee!

The beautiful gray was my ride…sweet! We stayed in this lovely log cabin where the family even provided another five dogs to make sure we felt welcome!

There is nothing like swinging on the porch watching fireflies at night, and fawns at dawn. Check out the big Rottweiler mix snoozing through the fawns visit 15 feet away. If it wasn’t so much work maintaining a big spread like this, I would recommend we all just sit on a porch swing in Indiana and eat corn on the cob all summer.