Kiwanis Kid's Day Parade

I believe this annual parade began 40 years ago, or so. Our two children first participated at ages 9 months and 3 years, after we first moved to this town. I pushed our son in his stroller and we decorated our daughter's tricycle. This event always occurs on or near her birthday. :-)

Our daughter's goal of the last 6 years was to bring her family here for this fun day. And it finally happened! They drove over from Omaha on Friday, September 18. The parade began at 10:00 A.M. Saturday morning. We added a pirate, Snow White, a mommy, a daddy, and a grandma to this year's parade!

Brave Handsome Daddy carries Snow White.

Brave, Beautiful Mommy marches with Pirate.

Happy Grandma with her Protector Pirate!

The parade was exceptional this year. It seemed as though it's really grown - the number of floats, the two bands (Jr. High and Sr. High), etc. But the weather was very cooperative: Sunny and cool!

Grandpa was downtown at 5:00 A.M. because the Kiwanis Club members also serve pancakes from 6:00 A.M. through 1:00 P.M. (although that generally stretches by an hour or so). The pancakes were yummy, and we ate more than we should. :-)

There was also a petting zoo, a tractor pull, a clown, etc. for entertainment.

Caveys (relatives of guinea pigs)

As always, time is fleeting. And flee it did.
The weekend was over before it seemed to have begun! But we had a lot of fun.
Maybe again next year? :-)

To My Daughter

Found this on her Facebook page. Had to put it here! I'll be posting about her birthday weekend soon - when she was here! ;-)

Visiting our Michigan Family in Iowa

Our best-ever daughter-in-law visited her parents' home in Iowa
because her brother had ventured home from Florida.

They were there long enough that we could make a trip up last week for a short visit.

Short but very rewarding - lots of smiles, hugs and happiness.

Our soon-to-be 4-year-old granddaughter enjoyed an early birthday celebration
amongst all the other excitement.

Here are a couple of photos.

Thanks, Brenda and Dan, for opening your home to us, too. :-)

Dinner-time!

The Genes get mixed nicely together when you combine families.
I just thought I'd put in a couple of photos of our own kids around these ages.

Our daughter is 2 years and 4 months older than our son.

This photo was taken August 23, 1981.
Keith would have been 2 years, 7 months
(Cheryl bumped a front tooth at 2 1/2 years and had to have it pulled at 4 years)

Keith - 2 years, 7 mos

Photo taken Nov. 1, 1981
Keith - 2 years, 9 months

April 1982
Keith - 3 years, 2 months

Just for fun. :-) What wonderful memories!

Camping at Platte River State Park, NE

Friday, July 31, 2009
Click on any of the photos... most will enlarge.

We met our D family in Omaha
and drove to the Platte River State Park southwest
of the city.

The weather was perfect. The cabins were as cute
as could be. We had a wonderful time... and here's an
account of some of our activities.

These are our cabins. Whitetail 2 is theirs and
Whitetail 3 is ours. Sheets, pillows, towels, washcloths,
etc. were all furnished. These one-room cabins had
refrigerators and fans. There were two outdoor grills
behind each cabin.













Grandpa Shady cooks dinner.













Yea! Dinner! And sweet corn - our favorite!













After dinner, we're going to climb The Tower!













Ground floor and climbing. After climbing many, many
flights - we made it!















We are Very High... way above the treetops. Click on the
photo on the right to see Mommy way down on the ground!

We're right here... and there's the Platte River.











What do you see, way down there?

A teepee! Yea!

Looks like this tree drank some sour lemonaid.

Saturday, August 1, 2009

Good morning D boys! Ready for a big day??

While Mommy made breakfast, the other 3 Ds again
climbed the tower!
















After breakfast, we got the bikes ready and headed out.
(Daddy got the work-out!) We rode around until we found...











a little Paddleboat Action!














Lunch is over - let's head for the Wildlife Safari!















At the very beginning of the Safari, we found Elk (EEK!) right next to the road.
Shortly thereafter we drove by a small herd of White-tail Deer.










After leaving the elk and deer, we drove by a creek.
We saw Pelicans and resting turtles.











A walking tour took us past a Long-eared Owl,
a Screech Owl,













and a Barn Owl










We were able to see a Black Bear and a Gray Wolf.











We found a pond and wildlife... a leopard frog (I assume)
with its frog spawn,

and a little painted turtle.
(click on the photos)


























L had a Pearl Crescent climb aboard.


It was hard to let him go.














Pronghorn Antelope











Bison in the wild.

After the Safari Driving tour, we stopped at the visitor center.
This fellow, with some companions, were resting outdoors.

I'm just a bit nervous, but I guess
as long as he is content, I'll be okay! :-)















Mr. Shady and daughter seem quite at home on the range.











Ride 'em cowhands! ;-)













But do be careful!!









Soft-hearted girl gets a nice gentle ride.









At the visitor center, there was a building with pens and small animals.
A Bobcat and a Swift Fox.










A Bald Eagle and a couple of colorful Chuckers.

By the time we left, someone was tuckered out!

Saturday night dinner preparations included preparing fresh green beans.
Dessert by Chef Mr. Shady -
cherry pies baked over the grill. :-)

Sunday Morning, August 2, 2009

We are so efficient. Sunday morning we woke up, had breakfast (yum!) and headed out to visit the horse stable and then the craft house.

This cicada was walking across the sidewalk when we got up. I've never seen one inside its skin... usually you find the discarded shells at the base of trees.

While this toad (variety?) was hanging around the craft house Sunday morning.

Hiking to do our crafts. Once L & A donned the paint shirts, we were set!

Busy at work on a pirate ship and a ceramic fish.

And a great time was had by all! We really liked this park!
We'll need to return!

Visiting Michigan Family, June 2009

Didn't we have a Great Time?

We visited the Farmers' Market Wednesday morning.
While I didn't get photos of the market,
I took plenty during our visit to the playground. :-)

Note the variety of slides!

This was one of the smaller slides.

Every rung goes higher, higher...

On Wednesday afternoon, Grandpa and I walked to the neighborhood school playground for a little fun. Here's our entourage.

Note the handle-lengthening device. :-)

Grandma's "On a Roll" with Alphabet Garden Markers
this Summer! :-)

Now that the backs are painted, we must let them dry.
(Each child painted two.)

Now we can work on the fronts.

Are you sure we painted the markers?? ;-)

Have you ever seen such a nice collection?

Mommy found a croquet set, at a great price, at an antique store.

So, here we are... trying it out!

A little friend joined us for awhile. You can see her looking over her mallet.

On Friday, some of us spent a lot of time at the motel. That morning Mommy and I took the youngsters swimming in the motel pool while Daddy and Grandpa worked around the house. After lunch, we returned to the motel for naps. That evening we had "Girls' Night Out" while the three fellows stayed home. :-)

After bath-time and hair-shampooing, the toenails were painted,

the fingernails were painted,

and a great time was had by all!

The following photo proves the fellows worked very hard.
Our son shows the remnants of dirt!
:-)

We also enjoyed the variety of the continental breakfast before returning home on Saturday.

Boots? Check. Bubble Wand? Check. Everyone is ready? Check. Oops - Where's Grandpa?

There he is! :-)

This invention made Great Bubbles!
:-)

Well, we missed photos of a few activities such as our Swimming Session in the motel, Church and Children's Church on Saturday afternoon, our picnic afterwards and the visit to the hand-packed ice cream place (!) but this is a pretty good representation of our time together.

And yes, I was there the whole time. You can tell who the photographer was! ;-)

We miss them already, and it goes without saying that we look forward to our next time together! :-)

Mother's Day Weekend

Our Omaha Family visited from May 7 through May 10!
Here are a few photos.

We painted piggy banks
(Which they forgot to take home.
We'll see them at the end of the month, so we'll take them with us!)

And we painted Garden Markers for the
Alphabet Garden!

A (Grand)Mother's Day present! :-)

Bedtime Books

We went Morel Mushroom hunting on Saturday morning.
This was what caused me to "Whoop!"

This was the first mushroom of the day!

Now we're getting serious!

Click on this photo. How many mushrooms can YOU find? :-)

They're getting larger!

And we're guess-ti-mating 4 1/2 - 5 lbs. of mushrooms.
NOT BAD!

That calls for a tea party.

And engineering a train.

We enjoyed warm sunny weather and a great visit. :-)

Christmas Celebration #2

Our daughter, son-in-law and their family were here this weekend!
We celebrated "Christmas" a little late.

Crazy little tree this year!
(My bird tree!) ;-)

After opening our gifts (except for the puppet theater), we had a little dinner and headed downtown for the "First Friday Art Walk." The organizers are so inventive! This is a chainsaw, ice artist from Minnesota, hard at work. He's using flat blocks of ice to create a city-scape.

We think we live in Christmas City!
(this is the town square)

The carousel

Puppet Theater

Presenting....

Making angel ornaments...
Everyone gets involved!
"You Must pay the rent,
I Can't pay the rent,
You Must pay the rent,
I Can't pay the rent,
... I'LL pay the rent!
My Hero!"
;-)
A great time was had by all!
There was a day of ice-fishing with grandpa and dad
(with a ride the sled on the pond pulled by a friend).

Grandpa and dad put together two bluebird houses
with the grandchildren while
Grandma and mom ran to the grocery store.

You never know what might happen around here!

:-)