Iowa Trip (1 of 2)

After all the travel and 4th of July fun, we all slept in late on Thursday (July 5). Except Grandma and Grandpa, who went to 7:30a mass. After we finally stirred, we had v. good breakfast - featuring typically awesome cinnamon rolls and banana bread.

Turns out that Theresa McKibben (Sonny's sister) was selling some of her collected items (she being a beyond-avid collector). Grandma was inspired to organize a trip to Livermore because the items included a statute of the BVM that originally had been donated to St. Joseph parish in memory of Irvin Bormann. After some wrong turns in urban Livermore, our party of seven found the McKibben residence.

The amount of stuff that TM has collected is truly interesting. She has lots of stuff, and lots of categories of stuff. We looked over the stuff in the garage (her less-favorite stuff, which is being put up for sale), and then looked over the stuff in the house. Small tractors, ty animals, cookie jars galore, Roseville pottery, "evening in Paris" cologne (which smelled particularly alluring on Chris) - simply, absolutely amazing. It was fun looking it over and talking with M/M McKibben. Grandpa settled up on the statue and some "Gales" chocolate boxes, then back to the house for dinner (or lunch, if you will).

Grandpa and I next went on a road trip to see some interesting sights: (1) putting up a cattle building at Matt Bormann's place (Altman farm); and (2) some guy operating a bale-eater at Mark Bormann's farm. Drove around the area a bit; I hadn't seen the Geishecker farm in many years, pretty strange to see it basically flattened. A beautiful property.

While we were away, the rest played cards, Chinese checkers (Grandma's continuing specialty), etc. They claimed they had fun. The boys started learning 500.

Time for early supper (dinner, if you will). Drove over to Clarence & Caroline's place at 7p. This ended up being extremely fun, and featured a card-playing marathon. First we all chit-chatted for awhile. And Clarence served beverages, including the traditional 7&7s. I think the pleasures of that beverage somewhat escaped my sons, but they gave it a try.

In round one of the card playing, Patricia and Caroline beat up on Clarence and me in 500, while Grandpa and Paul Jr. pounded on Chris and Patrick in euchre. Pretty resounding poundings all around, so we switched games. Caroline and Patricia proceeded to pound on Chris and Patrick in 500. Clarence and I actually went ahead two games to one against the two Juniors in euchre, then just started getting beat up - pummeled 30-8 over the last three games.

But this was all too much fun. Caroline and Patricia seemed to have an amazing run of good play or affinity or whatever. Chris and Patrick had no luck whatever. Grandpa called Paul Jr. "Chris" a few times, so Paul Jr. called him "Romie." Etc. The time flew by; we had a delicious dessert about 12:30a, finished the last game, hit the road around 1a. The card playing must have gone on for about five hours. My sons were impressed that their grandpa could theorize pretty much nonstop throughout. A fun visit, as always.

On Friday (July 6) we got off to a very slow start. These 80-somethings are wearing us out. So we didn't accomplish much other than eating breakfast and dinner and chatting, looking at Grandpa's pictures, checking out Google Earth sites, etc. Grandma made a rhubarb pie.

Early afternoon we went off on another tour. Drove to Wesley - visited Marguerite Laubenthal and Gary at the farm there. Grandpa threw up an impressive dust screen as he dusted us driving along the gravel road. Gary had a bunch of stuff to show us - he had a neat-o utility vehicle; took a walk down to check out the 22-year-old gelding; tried to get Jodie to be our friend; new-ish pickup; etc. Then we went inside and talked, all very pleasant indeed. We hadn't gotten out there for a few years and it's nice to see the house and farm again. I had forgotten that the kitchen cupboards were a Howard Barton job pretty much identical in style to the house in which I grew up. Enjoyed cookies & lemonade, then hit the road to Mason City.

This turned out to be v. fun. Steve, Liz and entire family were there; also Liz's sister and family up from Kansas City, we enjoyed getting to know them. Sat on the patio quite awhile, it was a gorgeous day. Excellent supper, we liked the grilled stuff, all the sides, strawberry pie (clearly a lot of work). Some picnic bugs visited, which was a novelty for the desert types. Watched Twins game a bit. There was a HORSE game. Very pleasant just chatting and catching up. Drove back to St. Joe and arrived around 11:40p. Grandpa and Grandma had gone a bit earlier.