Farewell - trip home to Kansas

Too soon it was time for us to say good-bye to our daughter and family.

 Take good care of Oreo, Claire!

Today, Claire called to tell me that Oreo accidently got thrown in the washing machine with the bedding!  And he came out with curly hair!  

At least he is clean!

The family came out for silly waves (our family tradition)

We choked back the tears off and on all day.  

As we drove along, I began to notice the different barns.  It seemed like most of the barns in Wisconsin were red.  Know why barns are traditionally painted red?  Here's what I found:

"Rust was plentiful on farms and because it killed fungi and mosses that might grow on barns, and it was very effective as a sealant. It turned the mixture red in color. When paint became more available, many people chose red paint for their barns in honor of tradition."

 Is this a hotel or conference center?  Not sure.

Then there was this white barn

...and this blue one!  Yay for Culvers!  Ever eaten at a Culvers?!  Oh yum!  Perhaps these folks who own this bar supply milk for their frozen yogurts and beef for the hamburgers and cheese too?

Leaving Wisconsin

 At one point, we realized we were VERY near to empty!  We hadn't been paying attention.  We bit our nails for awhile until we finally pulled into a gas station!

 KANSAS!!

 Love  Flint Hill country!

 We got home just as the sun was setting.  We could tell immediately that something had changed in our neighborhood while we were gone.  The next morning we went to check it out.  All the trees in our field south of us had been pulled out.  Our kite-flying field was being renovated!

I guess it is a matter of time until there will be new homes and a pond.  Something to watch and keep our attention as we miss our Wisconsin grandkids.

A storm, a tour and ice-cream

There was a storm while we were at the kids' place. 

 Almost looked like Kansas clouds!

 It was short-lived.

We took a tour of the town.  Such a fun name for a grocery store!  Makes me laugh!




"Piggly Wiggly®, America's first true self-service grocery store, was founded in Memphis, Tennessee in 1916 by Clarence Saunders. In grocery stores of that time, shoppers presented their orders to clerks who then gathered the goods from the store shelves. Saunders, a dynamic and innovative man, noticed that this method resulted in wasted time and expense, so he came up with an unheard-of solution that would revolutionize the entire grocery industry: he developed a way for shoppers to serve themselves."

The web-site said the reason the grocery store was named Piggly Wiggly remains a mystery.

We got to see where the kids were going to school, places to shop and then the church.

Daddy's office

 Yes, He does!  God is sovereign.  A verse the children and I are memorizing is Acts 17:26-27.

So thought provoking!  God knows just where we will live for the express purpose that we would reach out for Him!!

It is a rather lengthy couple of verses but I put it to action to help us learn it.

I got the idea (and the pictures) from the book "My First Bible Verses" by Christine Suguitan.  Reproducible verses to help children learn.

The kids will have some pretty awesome rooms where they will make new friends and learn more about God and His Word.

 A 'fridge door stuck on the wall.  Al tried to see if it would open, but it didn't.

 

 We are excited for this new opportunity for them!

One evening we went out of town to a dairy farm that makes its own ice-cream.

We ate outside

Jill brought along Claire's "special" ice-cream, as she is dairy intolerant.

They actually had non-dairy ice-cream there at the store so they won't need to bring their own next time.

On the way home, a deer jumped across the road in front of us.