June 27, 2014 - Granville, OH

This morning, I set my alarm for 7:30 AM and when I got up George was out walking Abby. I had mission to my madness, as I wanted to get the sausage McGriddle at McDonald's and they stop making the breakfast items at 10:30 AM. I have only ever had 5 of them before this trip, and I can tell you exactly when and where. The very first time was out in Seattle, WA, the morning we went to Mt. Rainier National Park. And we have both enjoyed them 3 other times this trip. We had our coffee/chai and headed out to tour the Longaberger company in Frazeysburg, Ohio. On our way, we saw a giant Longaberger basket which actually was the corporate headquarters. Since we didn't see a McDonald's on our way, I found one close to our route, and my phone steared us to the location via over hill, over dale. George couldn't believe some of the roads we went on, and was positive that at the end, there wasn't going to be a McDonald's, but there was. Then we reprogrammed the phone to the Longaberger Homestead. We parked and went inside and they directed us to the manufacturing building where the tours took place. We arrived for the 10:30 tour. I have several "vintage" Longaberger baskets that I bought 25 years ago, and our everyday dinner ware is Longaberger vitrified china, which is extremely durable due to its high heat firing. It is microwave, oven, dishwasher and freezer safe, and although it is expensive, it is well worth it as it is difficult to break but not impossible. Over the 20 years of ownership, I have only had two things break. One was a baking dish and the other a dinner plate when dropped on to a quartz countertop. Of course my pattern was retired, so I can only get replacements from Ebay or Amazon. My dishes were made in the USA and have that baked into the bottom of each piece, however, I have heard that they have since outsourced the manufacturing of their pottery out of the country. The tour of their basket manufacturing was interesting as everything is handmade, which expains why their basket products are so expensive. Back in the 1990's at the height of their business they had two shifts of 1000 basket weavers working making baskets, and now a sign of the times, they are down to 75 basket weavers during their busy season, which begins in July in anticipation of the holidays. After the tour we went to a huge gift shop featuring all of their products. Everything except the Make A Basket, Tomboy Tools and Spices was 50% 0ff in price. We took photos in front of a giant round basket with jumbo apples inside and on the way to our next destination we stopped and took photos of their National Headquarters as it was sculpted to look like a basket. We then headed to what I thought was a tour of a bread manufacturer, but I had a bad address. Then we we went to Flint Ridge Memorial but opted not to go on the trail to it as it was heading down the mountain. We stopped at a farm stand and bought corn which we enjoyed with the final 6 leftover ribs. We also went to the pool, took Abby for a couple of walks and settled in for the night.