"Rubens kids" Adventure ! (plus two)

When I was 18 and needed a place to live while attending THE ROCHESTER BUSINESS INSTITUTE, I connected with a single mother with six children (the RBI hooked us up)....and agreed to live with her and her six children and help out in return for room and board.

I moved to Rochester and into this house on Berkeley Street. (this is a recent picture, it looked a lot different back then)  My bedroom was on the top floor (those two windows were right over my bed) and I had my own bathroom.

to live with Marcia Rubens 

and her six children.  

The oldest was Debby (age 12), then Cindy (age 11), Pam (age 10), then the boys: David (9), Danny(8) and Aaron, who was three years old.  I stayed for close to two years while I completed a one year course in Medical Secretarial Science (I think thats what it was called) and found a job and paid off a school loan and put some money aside for a place of my own.  

Unfortunately, I lost touch with the family.  I married and started my family, and they moved away from Rochester.  Over a year ago, I started looking for them on facebook, and we finally made contact a few months ago.  Unfortunately, Marcia passed away in l990 at age 55.  She had a seventh child, Jennifer, who I have also gotten to know through facebook.  

Five of the six grown Rubens kids came  to Rochester a week or so ago to attend a Bat Mitzvah of a cousin and we arranged to meet up in Batavia for lunch.  

I left mid morning to head to Batavia.  I arrived first and anxiously awaited  their arrival.  I was so excited that I could not even sit down.  They arrived in two cars.  Danny had brought his wife, Elsie and his son, Kevin, along.  

We all had beef on weck and sat outside on the patio.  We reminisced about our memories of the time I spent with them.  We caught up on what has been going on in all of our lives.  It was so much fun.  Pictures were taken.  

from left to right, Deb, Cindy, me, David, Danny and Aaron.  If only Pam could have been there!  

We went to COFFEE CULTURE to have desert.  I had ice cream.  Debby gave me a CD of a band she was in years ago (she was the drummer).  Then we parted and they headed off to Niagara Falls and I headed home.  

It was a wonderful time!  Goodbye Rubens kids!!!!

Getzville ADVENTURE

Peggy and I decided to do some geocaching today.  I had found info. about several geocaches hidden in or near Getzville.   The first one was one of the "bee" caches, but it might be missing since we could not find it.  The second was another "bee" cache which we found easily.  Then we found another one not too far away that involved a bit of a hike off of a dead end street.  Then we headed

Getzville, New York is a hamlet in the Town of Amherst in Erie County, New York, USA.^[1] Getzville's zip code is 14068, and has a post office located on Millersport Highway (NY 263)  It is northeast of Buffalo. (according to wikipedia)

We found OLD GETZVILLE quickly and easily and went into a couple of antique/collectible shops nearby. This one is particularly interesting.  I bought a colorful plate.

 They are all getting ready for a huge flea market which will take place tomorrow.  One of the shop
owners recommended a nearby restaurant, but we checked it out and decided against it.   
   We looked for one more geocache but could not find it.  Peggy drove us to an area where there are a lot of stores and restaurants and we saw KYOTO

A quick check of the menu helped us decide to stay and have HIBACHI.  

It was delicious!!!!!

After lunch we headed back to Lockport where we went to Aldi's for a few items and then to Faith Tabernacle to  pick something up.  

AND THEN we went to a location which Peggy found recently where there is a STAIRWAY to NOWHERE.  We hid a cache there:  

This is the third on our NOWHERE series.  Both Road to Nowhere and Bridge to Nowhere are very popular!  

It was a great day!!!

Another LEWISTON Adventure (including geocaching)

I asked my cousin (second) Becky if she wanted to go out today for lunch and to the Lewiston Museum.  She said yes and arrived at my place at 10:30 this morning and we headed out. After we were sure we were on the right road, I asked her if she was interested in trying out geocaching and she enthusiastically said "yes!"

Our first stop for a geocache was at a winery where we found a large geocache in a pile of rocks close to the road.  Becky really enjoyed this one.  The second stop was at the Molyneaux Cemetery on Route 104 in Cambria.  This one took a bit longer to find, but we got it and then looked around the cemetery a bit.  This is the first time I have ever seen anything like this:

When we left this cemetery, we headed towards Lewiston.  We stopped briefly at THE FRONTIER HOUSE, hoping that it had a restaurant, but it didn't. so we continued to THE SILO.  We both had THE HAYSTACK (the second time this month for me).  Becky really liked the wooden carved bears around THE SILO and THE CABOOSE!  

Then it was on to the LEWISTON MUSEUM: 

This is a very well planned out museum which tells the story of the history and development of Lewiston from the beginning.  The most interesting part was about Lewistons connection to the Underground Railroad.  

As we left the museum, I suggested  to Becky  that we go to Hibbards for frozen custard. Unfortunately, they did not have chocolate peanut butter cup, so we both had black raspberry, which was delicious.  

 As we were leaving, I realized there was a cache nearby...and it turned out to be right in the park across the road from Hibbards.  

We stopped for one more roadside cache which turned out to be huge.  Becky found this one all by herself and she was thrilled.  

Return to the USA Adventure: Day Three: August 14th, 2014

The adventure ended late this morning when Megan, Chris, Cassandra and Tyler headed out.  First to Lewiston to handle a financial matter at a bank there and then  crossing over into Canada to drive to Michigan for the closing on their new house tomorrow.  Here they are, all ready to go, a few minutes before they left.

RETURN TO NY Adventure: Day 2

The kids and I had our traditional meal consisting of ALL junk food....this time it was for breakfast.   I provided all sorts of goodies including potato chips and  chocolate covered pretzels and chocolate cake and whipped cream, cheese doodles, caramel corn etc. and each kid prepared a plate and had a glass of chocolate milk to go with it.

We played DOUBLE BOGGLE, Chinese Checkers, Bananagrams and started a TUCO Puzzle.  We took a long walk.

Chris prepared BLTs on grilled cheese bread for lunch....it was delicious.

Supper was last nights leftovers.....still very good!

RETURN to NEW YORK Adventure DAY ONE, July 12, 2014

This is not really MY adventure......my oldest daughter Megan and her family completed their three year commitment to Ross University on the Island of Dominica in the Caribbean.  My son in law, Dr. Christopher Keater was teaching first year medical students, but when his contract ended, he secured a job in Michigan USA !!!

They flew into Buffalo International Airport on the afternoon of July 12, 2014 and arrived at my house around four fifteen p.m.  bringing their three cats with them.  After getting the cats settled in upstairs, we all had supper (including Peggy and David, who picked them up at the airport) in my apartment:  sloppy joes, mac and cheese, green salad and chocolate/cherry/marshmallow cake for desert.

My granddaughter, Cassandra, had hardly been in the house five or ten minutes when she said she wanted to go to LAKE EFFECT ICE CREAM.  She mentioned it again at around 7 p.m. so she and I and Tyler went.

Then we took a walk up to the Big Bridge

and around the block, passing Old City Hall and returning to Lake Effect where we purchased two pints of ice cream to take home for Megan and Chris.  

The kids bedded down in my apartment while their parents (and the cats) slept upstairs.  

ANOTHER Lewiston Adventure

My sister and I have been trying to go to Lewiston to eat at THE SILO for a few weeks, but it did not work out.  It looked like today was a sure thing, but Peggy was not feeling well, so she cancelled out.  I called my friend Barb (we met in the sixth grade) and she was free and she had been thinking about going to Lewiston for the arts and crafts show, so she was happy to have someone to go with.

We met up at my place and headed towards Lewiston.  Our first stop was at the book sale at the former school.

where I found five books for $5.00, two of them by Frank McCourt (author of ANGELA'S ASHES.)  After that we went to THE SILO for lunch.  It was very good.  I had the HAYSTACK (their specialty).  

It is basically a steak sandwich on a hoagie roll with cheese, onions and toasted onion strings on top.  It was DELICIOUS!  

After that we headed to the LEWISTON ART FESTIVAL on Main Street.  Finding a parking spot was a bit of a challenge, but we got one not too far from the festival.  

We walked through about 3/4 of the festival.  The prices were very high, but the artwork was magnificent.  We went into DeCamillos and I bought two peanut sticks.  

After that, we headed back to Lockport.