After a fun time with our Georgia family over Thanksgiving and Christmas, we started in on 2020. Our first outing was breakfast out at Fagan’s Biscuit Barn in Cumming (just north of where we live) with our housemates for New Years.
An historical building in Cumming’s history, the Biscuit Barn is a typical Southern eatery with the menu on a board. The biscuits were great!
The last couple of years we went to a Waffle House for this tradition but decided to spread our wings a little and try a new place.
film extras
Our next adventure in January 2020 was getting to be extras for a 2-minute film clip produced by our church, North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, to honor Martin Luther King Jr. on the Sunday before his birthday.
The production team filmed for more than 8 hours on the day we were sitting in the audience, plus another full day of filming with the students to make this clip. Now we know why it takes so long to make a movie! Many of the extras were being paid, but we enjoyed meeting them while having a great lunch provided by the church.
We enjoyed seeing the movie clip at the beginning of the service when MLK was being honored. The young boy looking out through the curtain (on the right) is the one who delivered King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech and who was honored by a standing ovation from his “grandpa” in the audience and the rest of us. No, we didn’t see ourselves in the film.
a new Starbucks
I know a favorite theme in our posts is our love of Starbucks; one reason is because our local one is less than a mile away. Since I worked at home while I had my business for 10 years, I would start each day at Starbucks with my breakfast and interacting with others before going home to work. On the weekends, Barney started joining me, and then when he retired, he joined me there in the mornings and got to know my Starbucks’ “friends” too. Here are some of my favorite pictures from over the years.
new location
Our new Starbucks is even closer to home! While the old one was cozy, the new one is bright and open—and the district manager promises to make it quieter.
What’s been interesting with this move is that a whole new crowd of people have started coming, so even though the inside is larger, often the tables are full.
The other day Barney asked me how long I’ve enjoyed going to Starbucks. This question took me back to my early days working at Watkins-Johnson Co. in Palo Alto, California. I would stop at Starbucks on Main Street in Los Altos for a cup of coffee to take into the office with me since the coffee in the vending machines was so bad. Le Boulanger across the street had wonderful muffins for a morning treat.
a party!
I know we all get invited to fun birthday parties, but this is the best one we’ve ever been to!
One of our small groups from church a few years ago was an international group representing Nigeria, India, Brazil, and the U.S. Recently we were invited to a surprise 50th birthday for Florence who grew up in Nigeria.
After dinner, the DJ started playing music that sounded similar to Caribbean music to us. Guess it’s called Afro-beat. It was so good that we even got up to dance!
RV show
January is the month for the annual RV show in the Atlanta area. At one of our early shows we went to, we found the RV that we ended up buying. Now we love going once a year or so to see what’s new. Ready for a 2020 look at RVs?
cutest
smallest
most like camping
largest
new this year
One of our goals when walking around was to look for the changes that 2020 is bringing to on-the-road life.
new truck
As we were walking down an aisle, Barney saw the new Ford diesel F250, King Ranch edition, behind us. He wanted me to see how comfortable it is inside (oh my), and how the side view mirrors were so much better than what we have on our 2001 truck.
conclusion
You’re probably wondering if we found our next RV while walking around. Actually we decided that we really like what we have and have no reason to change in the (near?) future. Great conclusion to come to!
snow
About once a year we get snow in the Atlanta area—that day was the day after we went to the RV show! Weather forecast had called for a light frosting, but instead we got a few inches. So beautiful, and because it came on a Saturday, no problems with traffic to contend with. The next day was about 12 degrees warmer and the snow melted away.
Here are some of our favorite pictures.
During this “down” time between long trips, we got to see our families in California and Florida and recorded our visits in the next 2 posts.
