Sunday, August 31
After a good night’s sleep, we just lazed around until 10:00 a.m. and then left the motel to go over to Jim & Whitney’s house. Luckily, their place is located less than two minutes from the hotel, so it’s an easy jaunt.
As we got to the house, the kids were bringing Little Jimmy out and transferring necessary “baby transportation” things to their smaller car. After hugs and kisses, we got back in the Vibe and followed them to I-435 North, where we traveled several miles up to highway just beyond the point where it crosses I-70. There we were introduced to Kansas City’s newest outdoor mall, Legends.
Legends includes a multitude of national and regional name-brand stores, restaurants, and watering holes, and the layout gives one the impression of a town, rather than a shopping mall. Beautiful sculptures and fountains give the non-shoppers a great alternative to spending…instead of spending cash (or plastic), folks can wander around the area and spend time enjoying the views or, as we did, learning a little history from the plaques that are associated with the various sculptures.
One of the settings that really grabbed our interest was a series of
sculptures depicting a runner in the various stages from the beginning to the end of a race. It memorializes three legends of Kansas running history, Glenn Cunningham, born in Atlanta, Kansas, Ashland native Wes Santee, and Wichita native, Jim Ryun. Each of the men has an event in the Kansas Relays named after him.Another setting that we found not only artful,
but amusing, was a sculpture of a fisherman in a lake (fountain) casting his fly rod. Around him little jets of water, simulating jumping fish, were intermittently shooting up. One of the main reasons we came to Legends was to eat at the T-Rex Restaurant. Almost a theme park in itself, the restaurant is designed with a series dining areas in pre-historic settings. Little Jimmy loved the aquarium room (where we ate), but also wanted to see all the different dinosaurs as they moved and roared.
After our meal, we went for a walk through the mall, stopped at a shoe store to by Little Jimmy a new pair of running shoes (and trust us on this, he CAN run) before saying goodbye to the kids so they could go visit Jim’s folks for the afternoon.And no, Shawn Riggs and Wes Fox, we didn’t make it to Cabela’s on this trip…we just had a little different agenda.
Of course, we can’t end the discussion of our day at Legends without including this collage of Little Jimmy in action. Barbara tried to capture the essence of a 16-month old doing his imitation of perpetual motion.
At 7:00 we went back over to the house to visit, watch a movie (Little Jimmy loves The Incredibles), and have some dessert before calling it a day and returning to the motel. Jimmy may love the movie, but Barbara and I enjoyed watching Jimmy more than the movie as we captured his various “watching” positions.
Monday, September 1
HAPPY LABOR DAY EVERYONE! After packing the car and checking out of the motel, we drove back to the kids’ house and then followed them to the nearest Cracker Barrel where we met Abby (Reimer) and her husband, Dan. Abby graduated from Liberal High School with Whitney, and was a member of the band and our Odyssey of the Mind program when she was in high school.
During the quite lengthy wait for a table, Little Jimmy enjoyed trying out the K-State rockers for children out on the porch. Since Whitney, an avid KU fan since that is her alma mater, needed to stay close to him, she found herself sitting in an adult version of that rocker. We just couldn't let the moments pass without documenting such an occurance. We felt like Jimmy's Uncle Mike, a K-State graduate, would take much pleasure in seeing his sister sitting in a chair from the "opposition," while Jimmy obviously enjoyed the experience.
Since a large number of people seemed to have had the same plans that we did for breakfast, we got to spend quite a bit of time visiting with Abby, Dan, Whitney, Jim, and Little
Jimmy before we finally got called for a table. The conversations continued as we ordered and ate our meal, and of course, much of the conversation was centered on Little Jimmy, who soaked up the attention; especially when he was entertaining us with his rendition of “Ittsy Bitsy Spider” in the above picture.When we finished eating, we went outside for a final round of pictures, said our goodbyes to everyone, and got in the car to start the long drive south. From that point on, it was just another travel day.
As we got close to Durant, we realized that even if we drove on to Mineola it would be too late to get Big V out of storage and set her up tonight, so we elected to spend the night there (the last town of any size before reaching Mineola) and start out again tomorrow morning.Tuesday, September 2
We both managed to sleep in this morning, but that was okay, because we weren’t in any great hurry. Mineola was only 2 ½ hours away and we had plenty of time to do all that was necessary to get re-established at Lake Hawkins.
We were on the road by 10:30, fighting high winds and dust, part of the remnants of Hurricane Gustav as it veered to the northeast. We drove through a few heavy rain showers between Durant and Mineola, but nothing very serious.
Back in Mineola we stopped at Mother’s house to check in with everyone, gather up our refrigerator foods that we had left there while Big V was shut down in storage, and then returned to Lake Hawkins where we went through the process of moving Big V and the cycle into a new site and getting everything set up for another week of lake living.
We went to the grocery store in Hawkins later in the evening and bought a few items and then returned home to settle in for a rainy night.
Wednesday, September 3
I could borrow Snoopy’s line of “It was a dark and stormy night” to more or less describe today. Although it wasn’t really stormy, it was dark, dreary, and drizzly all day…a perfect day for sitting inside, reading, watching television, and napping…and that’s about all that can be said about it!
Thursday, September 4, 2008
I was “up and at ‘em” early this morning. T.J. and I were to take Mother to Tyler for some doctor appointments and I needed to be in Mineola between 8:00 and 8:30. Luckily for me, the weather had broken during the night. It was still cloudy, but the rain had stopped, so I elected to ride the cycle into town and leave the car behind in case Barbara needed it during the day. Barbara: I didn’t need it, because I chose to hibernate the entire time Jim was gone and I enjoyed every moment!
We left Mother’s house in T.J.’s car and made the drive to Tyler where both of them were scheduled for bone density tests at the medical center. Of course, that also involved a lot of waiting, but it also gave me a chance to catch up on some magazine articles that I evidently missed 8 months or so ago.
When they were through with their bone density tests, we drove to another building where Mother had an appointment to re-establish with a neurologist. The doctor she had seen a couple of years ago when they first discovered that she was in the onset stages of Parkinson’s disease has left that facility. I was immediately impressed with the new doctor. I’m guessing he must be at least 21 years old (he really did look young), but he took lots of time to ask good questions and put Mother at ease with his manner. Rather than changing her medications, he gave her a prescription for some physical therapy that she can do at a facility in Mineola.
With appointments out of the way, we got back in the car and headed back toward Mineola, stopping first at a family style restaurant in Lindale, where all three of us ordered the special of the day, liver and onions, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, salad, and hot rolls…yum yum!
After getting Mother back to her house, I fired up the cycle and headed back to the lake and Big V to spend a quiet afternoon.
This evening we spent some of our time looking around the park for a new site to park in when we have to move on Tuesday. First order of business…check cell phone signals at each of the sites. If we get a decent cell signal, we should have good telephone and internet service!
Friday, September 5
For the most part, it was just a travel day. We got away from the lake a few minutes before 9:00 and headed south and west through Tyler, Palestine, Round Rock, and Austin on our way to San Antonio…arrived at John and Carol’s house around 3:30 p.m.
After John, Carol, and Randi all got home we sat around and visited. John had brought their 19-month old grandson, (our step-great grandson)Rhett, to spend the weekend and one of Randi’s friends from school, Sarah, came to spend the evening with Randi. At 7:00 we all went to El Chapparal, a family-owned and operated Mexican restaurant a short distance from their house.
After eating, we returned to the house and whiled away the rest of the evening. I started playing a card game with Barbara, Randi, and Sarah, but later turned my hand over to Carol while I went back to the living room to alternately watch a movie with John, help entertain Rhett, and keep an eye on the Artesia vs Hobbs football game that was being carried over the internet. Since it was an away game for the Bulldogs, they only had an audio feed, so I guess I really kept an ear to the game instead of having an eye on it. In any case, 4-A Artesia defeated the 5-A Hobbs Eagles 27-15 and remained undefeated in the young season.Saturday, September 6
After taking our time getting around on a lazy Saturday morning, we all had a great breakfast that Carol prepared and then got cleaned up and ready to wander out to one of the local shopping centers for some looking (John and me) and shopping (Barbara, Carol, and Randi). Rhett did a little of both and managed to break in a new pair of shoes by running all over the place, exploring and playing hide-and-seek.
Carol and Randi needed to do a few more things so they sent John, Rhett, Barbara and I to have lunch at Whataburger. It was just after we placed our order that John realized he no longer had a wallet! Leaving Rhett with us, he hot-footed it back to the mall area just praying that his wallet would be at the last store we visited, where Randi had bought a purse. Sure enough it had been found beside the chairs that Jim and John had spent time sitting in during that shopping adventure.After lunch we drove back to the house to while away the afternoon watching TV, talking, and occasionally checking our email.
The evening was spent in family time…talking, playing washers, watching Rhett as he entertained all of us, enjoying college football games, etc. All-in-all, it was just a delightful time with family that we don’t get to see very often.
Below: Pictures of Rhett as he enjoyed a beautiful Saturday morning in Poppie and Mima’s backyard.
“The trouble with being a parent is that by the time you are experienced, you are unemployed.” - UnknownCelebrating life with family in San Antonio,
Jim & Barbara
