Missouri Vacation Day 2

On the second day of our trip the plan was to drive to Hannibal and take the Mark Twain Riverboat cruise and do some sightseeing. Well, things don't always go as planned!

That morning Nathan said he didn't feel good. Nathan...the one who is NEVER sick! The one who hasn't thrown up in at least 6 years. Well, he was sick. We think it was food poisoning. Thankfully, no one else got it. But it changed our plans a little bit. We ended up getting into Hannibal much later than we had planned. By the time we finally got there Nathan was feeling ok. We missed the boat...literally. The riverboat cruised at 1:30 and we didn't get in until around 3:00. I was worried that there would be storms the next day and it wouldn't cruise and we would miss it completely, but it all ended up working out all right.

Since Nathan was feeling better when we got into town we went ahead and did some sightseeing. Here are the kids in front of the Mark Twain House.
This is the Becky Thatcher house...real home to Laura Hawkins, Mark Twain's childhood sweetheart. They are right across the street from each other.

Here are the kids whitewashing that famous fence Twain wrote about!

We climbed to the top of Cardiff Hill to see this lighthouse. Great views of the Mississippi from here!

This is the view from only half way up. The Mississippi was pretty full!

That night we ate at a great little restaurant on Main St. called the Ole Planter's Restaurant. They had really good homecooked food. Poor Nathan...all he ate was bread and crackers!

Stay tuned for more adventures of our Missouri Family Vacation!

Postcard Friendship Friday #73

We just got back from vacation so boy, do I have postcards! The first day of our vacation we drove through Oklahoma and Kansas to Kansas City, MO. We didn't stop anywhere in Oklahoma that I could buy postcards, but we did stop at a mega mart gas station thing in Kansas so I got some there. I had never been to Kansas before. All I really saw was interstate though. Here's one of my favorite cards. I like cards with the state and then different stuff all about the state on them. :)



And I thought this one was appropriate for Memorial Day Weekend...



Postcard Friendship Friday is hosted by Beth at The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Missouri Vacation Day 1

We just got back from a great family vacation to Missouri. We went lots of places. This is what we did on the first day...

We drove to Kansas City. We took the kids to eat at Fritz's . It was really cool. A train delivers your food. The kids loved that!

After dinner we went to a Royals game. We lucked out...the Rangers were playing the Royals the day we were going to be there. It was neat to watch our home team in a different stadium!

Of course, we all wore our Ranger shirts!

Kaufman stadium was really nice. This is a view from inside their Hall of Fame...

We stayed in KC just one night. The next day we headed to Hannibal, MO. (Which was our original destination for this vacation) I'll post about that when I have more time.

L.E.N.S. Photo Challenge

The L.E.N.S. Photo Challege is hosted by Home is Where you Start From.

This week's theme is "Remember"

I remember this little boy with a love of baseball. I remember him learning to hit, learning to catch, and learning to pitch. And to this day this is still the same little boy I see every time he steps up to the plate.

But for some reason, every time I get home and look at the pictures he looks like this:




Funny how a mother's memory works. Sometimes it just takes over, I guess. :)

Wordful Wednesday

Our new furniture finally arrived! We ordered it back in March, but it was backordered or something and we didn't get it until yesterday. Now, I need new bedding! :)

And the dining room table (still sporting the tags!)....

wordful Wednesday is hosted by parenting by dummies and seven clown circus.

Hidden Treasures

When I was a little kid my mom was cleaning out a drawer or something and found a double 5x7 frame with a picture of her as a little kid on one side and her brother on the other side. They were really cute pictures and I wanted them so she gave them to me. Well, they got put in another drawer and eventually another drawer at every place I've lived. I was cleaning out a drawer this weekend and found them again, but the glass in the frame was broken. So, I decided to take out the pictures and toss the frame. I had never opened the frame before. When I did I found a bit of "lost treasure".

First, out fell these pictures of my mom and her brother. This first one must be him in his little league uniform. It is light so it didn't scan well, but I think its so cute. I just love that uniform!

The second one that fell out is of my mom and her brother and a dog. I have no idea where they are. I'll have to show this picture to her next time she visits and see if she knows. It doesn't look like the safest place for children to play! :)

I just LOVE old photos and when they are of someone you know its even better! I had never seen either of these pictures before. I felt like I discovered a little hidden treasure.

Then, the next thing I took out of the frame was the picture that came with the frame...a picture of Ava Gardner. I guess back in the forties (when I'm guessing these pictures were framed) they must have put movie stars in the photo frame pictures. I thought that was neat.

All of this was in one side of the double frame. I eagerly opened the other side hoping to find more photos, but, alas, there weren't any in that side.

I also came across lots of greeting cards that my mom saved from my childhood as well as the baby instructions that the hospital gave her when she had me. These were hilarious! I'll have to share some of them in another post. I'm also thinking of doing a weekly vintage greeting card post. I have so many and I'm a "card" person so I would love to share them.

Postcard Friendship Friday #72

In honor of Mother's Day this weekend here is a post card of Mary Cassatt's "In the Omnibus".


I got this at the Amon Carter museum in Fort Worth. I've always loved Cassatt. She has wonderful paintings of mothers and children.

Postcard Friendship Friday is hosted by Beth at the Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Wordful Wednesday: dining room makeover

I started a rather ambitious project on Easter weekend. We are getting new dining room furniture so I wanted to paint the dining room before it arrives. Well, I got a little too ambitious at Lowe's and decided to remove the popcorn ceiling and paint the wall paper in the entry way too. BIG mistake! Removing the popcorn wasn't difficult, but texturing the ceiling was, and the wallpaper in the entry way was showing through the paint. After about the 4th day of working tirelessly, I called my husband and said we have to get someone to come finish this! So we did. I'm very happy with the final result. Can't wait until the new table gets here. :)

Here's a "before" picture of the entry way....

Did I mention I HATE wallpaper? Here is the "after" shot...

Before shot of the dining room. (That's just a spare table we had set up to use until the new one gets here.)

And after...

I even talked my husband into new light fixtures. :)

Here is another after shot that shows the dining room better.

Wordful Wednesday is hosted by Seven Clown Circus and Parenting by Dummies.