Spring Hill Fall Festival Parade

The nearby town of Spring Hill, Kansas, has an annual Fall Festival, which includes lots of displays, exhibits, food, performances, and, of course, a parade. Our church, Hillsdale Presbyterian entered a float and also had many members riding and walking in the parade handing out invitations to visit our church.

I had signs made for the doors of Carole's Sebring convertible and led the Hillsdale Presbyterian group in the parade. Some of the church members who could not walk the length of the parade route rode with me in the convertible and tossed candy to the kids along the way.

Nice looking car, huh?



The church float followed, a horse drawn wagon carrying a church replica, with bell, and several church members. Other church members walked behind the horse drawn wagon/float.

Those white draft horses were really beautiful animals.




It was a fun day . . . and our entry in the parade won first prize for the "Best Float"!

They didn't say anything about Carole's convertible . . . but she loves it. It's her baby.

Sweet 16

Madison "Maddie"Crowl, my granddaughter and John and Becky's youngest daughter, turned "Sweet Sixteen" today. We celebrated her birthday at John and Becky's home with a vegetarian dinner . . . as Maddie requested.

After dinner, she open her gifts and we then had birthday cake and ice cream.



Happy Birthday, Maddie.

The Sunflower State

The Sunflower is the State Flower of Kansas . . . and Kansas is known as "The Sunflower State".

All States have a State Flower, but in most cases you never see them. Not so in Kansas!

Every year in the late Summer months, wild Sunflowers begin popping up all over Kansas . . . in the fields, along the woods, around the lakes and ponds, and along all of the the roads and highways.



Our wild Sunflowers are not as large or as tall as the domestic variety, but they sure do add a lot of color to the Kansas landscape.
















Late Summer in Kansas is a colorful place to be . . . for Kansas surely is "The Sunflower State".

Chinese, Again

Carole loves Chinese food. In fact, I think she would eat Chinese every day if she could.

So, it was no surprise when a new Chinese restaurant opened nearby in Overland Park, Kansas, that we had to try it out during their Grand Opening.



It is a buffet style restaurant with a very large number of dishes . . . lots of variety. We tried too many and, as usual, ate too much. But all of the dishes were good, fresh, and hot.

I know we'll be back here again.

Carole's Birthday

We returned home from Table Rock Lake on Saturday, 9/11 . . . Carole's birthday. However, we chose to celebrate her birthday the following day on Sunday. We went to the New Theatre Restaurant to see a play titled The Sunshine Boys . . . a Neil Simon play which was produced as a movie in 1975 starring Walter Matthau and George Burns.

This stage play at the New Theatre Restaurant starred Howard Hesseman, of the TV show WKRP in Cincinnati and was really funny. Carole was presented with a Birthday Card signed by the entire cast.

Carole and I are shown below enjoying the wonderful food served here. It's a buffet with fabulous choices.



Of course, during the intermission, Carole was presented with a Birthday Cake . . . no candles, but it was an ice cream cake, which she shared with us. Delicious!

Happy Birthday, Carole.

Branson

While we were at Table Rock Lake near Branson, Missouri, we had to take in a few shows. It was only about a 30 minute drive from where we were staying in Kimberling City to the theatres of Branson.

We saw three shows during the week we were there: the Dutton's, the Six, and the Rankin Brothers. All were pretty good, but we all thought the Dutton's were best.

You can't be in the Branson area without taking in a few shows!

Eureka Springs

When in the Branson area, a visit to Eureka Springs, Arkansas, is a must. Neither Jim nor Shirley had been there before, so we spent a day to visit Eureka Springs. It's only a 30-40 minute drive from the Branson area.

Eureka Springs is a town which was built on the side of a mountain in the Ozarks of Northern Arkansas back in the late 1800's. Natural springs here were believed to have therapeutic value, so people flocked to town to bath in the waters.

One of the most interesting buildings is the Crescent Hotel which sets on top of the mountain. It's a four story stone structure which has been well maintained over the years and is still operating with a spa on the lower level.

It looks like a horse drawn carriage should pull up to the front entrance at any moment.



Although we did stop in the lounge on the fourth floor for a drink, we did not take time to bath in the mineral waters at the spa.

The most fascinating sights in town are the many large old homes from the 1800's built on the side of the hill like the "painted ladies" of San Francisco. Most of the houses are of that vintage and many have been restored and painted like the "painted ladies". Sorry, but I didn't take any pictures of those old homes.

The main street through the old downtown is pretty steep with the mountain looming up behind the buildings on one side of the street. In fact, there is an old hotel downtown that is seven stories tall . . . and every floor has a ground level exit.

Many of the stores downtown have been renovated are are interesting galleries, decorating shops, and, of course, souvenir shops.

It's a must place to go if you are ever in the area.

The Landing

Since Jim & Shirley had not been to Branson recently, we made a day trip touring the "big city", and ended up at "The Landing", the most recent addition to the town. The Landing is an area adjacent to the old downtown along Lake Tanneycomo. They cleared a large area along the lake shore and constructed a huge shopping area with a brick street down the middle making an open-air mall. This mall stretches about 6-8 city blocks with upscale shops, restaurants, and outdoor bandstands. Of course, it's all beautifully landscaped with numerous fountains.



The only traffic on this street is a free trolley which continuously runs from one end to the other. The trolley will stop to allow passengers to get on or off almost anywhere along the mall. Of course, we all got on and off the trolley several times to look at various shops.



Shown below are Carole and Shirley resting on a bench while waiting for the trolley to come by on its next round.



We stopped for an Irish Brew at an Irish Pub and had a late lunch at an interesting restaurant, Garfield's.

The open mall, The Landing, is a really nice place. It is definitely a "destination", not just another pretty place to shop.

Table Rock Lake

We made it to Table Rock Lake and checked in at the Kimberling Inn Resort, which is about a 30 minute drive from Branson. Our condo unit is right on the lake. In the photo below we are on the left end of the building on the ground floor. The two decks are ours, one off the living room and one off the master bedroom.



We have a nice view of some of the lake. Of course the lake is something like 100 miles long, so we are only looking at a small part of the lake. There is a boat ramp right out in front of us with four large covered floating docks, so we have a lot of constant activity to watch . . . boats and boaters coming and going.



The weather forecast is for nice, warm, sunny weather all week . . . so we are looking forward to a pleasant week visiting the sights around the area and attending some shows in Branson.

Home of Throwed Rolls

We left home this morning headed for Branson, Missouri, with Carole's cousin, Shirley, and her husband, Jim. I arranged for a two bedroom condo unit on Table Rock Lake adjacent to Branson, so we left "The Bus" at home.

On the way to Branson, we stopped at Lambert's Restaurant in Springfield, the "Home of Throwed Rolls".


Lambert's isn't just a good place to eat, it's a destination. People come from all over the region just to say they've been to the "Home of Throwed Rolls". We were here on Labor Day Weekend and faced a long wait to get in. People were lined up outside waiting on the porch and we had an hour and a half wait. If it had been just Carole and I, we would not have waited as we have been here several times before, but neither Jim nor Shirley have been here before . . . so we waited on Lambert's porch along with the rest of the tourists.



Once seated at out table inside, the atmosphere was quite festive. In addition to the usual clutter of old fashioned decorations and wall hangings reminiscent of farming and the Ozark Mountains, they had streamers and balloons all over the place. Lambert's is a very large restaurant, but the place was packed and everyone was obviously enjoying themselves.




Yes, they really do throw rolls here. In fact, that's the only way rolls are served. If you can't catch yourself a roll, you just go without! I tried to catch a waiter in the act of throwing a roll to someone, but they were either too fast or I was too slow with the camera. But, believe me, they were throwing rolls to all of the customers.

We had a nice lunch of down-home cooking, caught a few rolls (which are really good yeast rolls), and then got back on the road to Branson. Now Jim and Shirley can say they've been to the "Home of Throwed Rolls".

Chopping and Bagging Corn

Most farmers around here pick corn using a conventional corn picker, store it, and then when the market is right, shell it and sell it through the local farmer's co-op. Others may shell it to feed to their own livestock.

The Frankie Dairy Farm, my neighbor here in Kansas has always picked, stored, shelled, and ground corn to feed to the dairy herd. A couple of years ago, however, they brought in a traveling team from Western Kansas with equipment to cut and chop the entire stalk while it was still green including cobs and kernels, and then pack the 1/4"-1/2" pieces into a huge plastic bag.


Every year I've missed this operation, so I asked Curt Frankie to give me a call when the chopping and bagging team arrived. When he called, I rushed down to the farm to witness "Chopping and Bagging Corn" . . . I even had the opportunity to ride in the chopper.

This is a picture of the front "business end" of the chopper which is self-propelled and runs through the corn at about 5-8 MPH.

It sure cuts and chops a lot of corn stalks in a big hurry.





As the chopper drives through the corn, an open top grain truck follows along beside while the chopper chute blows the chopped stalks and ears into the bed of the truck. As you can see, the chopper cuts the stalks about 3"-4" above the ground and leaves the field very clean.

When the truck is full, it pulls out of the way and another truck pulls in beside the chopper.








The full truck takes its load to the farm yard where a large piece of equipment is waiting to put the chopped corn and stalks into a huge plastic bag. The truck backs up to the bagger and activates the conveyor floor of the truck moving the load onto the bagger. The bagger then packs the chopped corn and stalks into the bag, unrolling more of the bag as needed.

Pictured below on the left is the front of the bagger with the truck unloading onto the intake conveyor of the bagger. The picture on the right below is the back of the bagger where the bag is being unrolled and packed with chopped corn and stalks. As the bag is filled, the bagger continues to move forward as it unrolls more of the bag.

















When the operation is complete the bag lays there like a giant worm. This bag contains 450 tons of chopped corn and stalks . . . and it only took the team about 3 1/2 hours to fill this bag.



The contents of the bag will be allowed to ferment for at least 2-3 weeks before it can be fed to cattle. This fermentation process increases the nutritional food value of the chopped corn and stalks. During the Winter months, they will open the end of the bag and use a front end loader to remove some of the feed, then re-seal the bag by placing a pile of dirt on the end of the bag. Every few days they will re-open the bag to remove a few days of feed and then re-seal the bag.

This 450 tons of feed should last the Frankie Dairy Farm for the whole winter. Of course they are also feeding hay and ground feeds to their 70-head dairy herd as well.

This "Chopping and Bagging Corn" operation is indeed a very fascinating and intriguing process. I'm glad I had the opportunity to to witness it up close this year.