We’re on the road. After three months spent almost solely in our California home, we are on the move. Typically, you’ll find us at various airports over the summer. This year, our trusty Toyota Highlander is getting us from all our point As to point Bs.

The 2020 Gelineau Family Road Trip is brought to you by lots of prayer, Peppa Pig paraphernalia, cucumber facial wipes, Pippa’s portable potty, and a bottle of hand sanitizer in every car door. We have listened to the Daniel Tiger Song “A Tiger Family Trip” at least 65 times.

I’ve logged a few new states, which is exciting for me as someone who keeps a world map with places-visited pins on my mantel. Colorado, Missouri, Kansas. At one point we drove 99 miles past my cell phone, which is a story for another time, but I got it back that same night. Wonder of wonders.

We spent two nights in Kansas City, Spotted: An “Uncle Teo” in his native habitat. (That’s what Pippa calls our friend Matt, of Dragonfruit Sea Creature Angel Pie fame.)

Matt grew up in Kansas City, but doesn’t live there anymore. It felt both surreal and comforting to be together at his childhood home. Anyone else having this problem, where you can’t remember the last time you actually hung out in person with your friends because you’ve been Zooming too much?

As it turns out, Pippa doesn’t love back to back car travel days, so we took a short breather in KC. On the morning of our rest day, Matt said to me, in a way both offhanded and carefully considered, “One thing we could today, if you wanted, is make pie. There’s definitely everything you need to make a pie here.”

After considering the fruit available to me, I chose blackberries, a mixture of blueberries (some larger and fresh, and some smaller Wyman’s frozen wild blueberries), and a few peaches. Then we had a lesson in lattice-weaving. My pie lattice technique (first learned from Ken Haedrich) doesn’t involve meticulous spacing or measuring, but it certainly gets the job done.

Typically I’ll sculpt leftover pie crust around the pie edges to make a ridge, especially for a single-crust pie or a pie with a crumb topping. Sensing that we didn’t need much extra pastry on this one, I cut around the pie plate with a knife, bound the edges together by pressing them with a fork, and donated the extra pastry to Pippa, who, at the time, wanted to use it as play-dough.

In the afternoon we got a brief, Covid-19 Era tour of Kansas City. A few snapshots below. (The internet is not kind these days, but I know you are, my readers. ❤ I’ll say it anyway, just to be clear…we are not dismissing what is happening around us and though the pictures don’t show us wearing masks, we are always masked when it is required and/or when we are walking even remotely near fellow humans. Please trust that in all of our travels we are being as prudent as we know how.)

First stop: Levi’s first and not last E & T (espresso and tonic) experience. So impressed with Thou Mayest. Yes, that is tajín on the rim.

Then, a stop at the imposingly beautiful World War I memorial. I never knew Kansas City had such a skyline.

Boulevard Brewing was a fun destination; I’ve been a fan of their Tank 7 Saison for some years now. We tried several brews including the following “Test Beer”. My jaw dropped open when I read the description. Read along with me carefully now.

“Peach Berry Pie Berliner Weisse – Bursting with peach, blueberry & blackberry over a light graham cracker crust” Wait what?!

Okay yeah it’s not a perfect match (no graham cracker crust for my pie) but still. Spooky.

In the evening, we ate pie and ice cream on the back deck and ogled at/conversed with several barred owls. Whatever else is going on, there is always wonder and inspiration to be found in Creation.