Sara and Trinity Grace, Topeka and environs
August 18, 2009

This was our last day to spend time with Sara and Trinity Grace. We will see them briefly before we leave in the morning. What a joy this visit has been. At six months of age, Trinity is an extremely good-natured child, just looks at a person and laughs or offers her smile that says, “I am happy and you make me even happier”.

She is busy as can be, always moving, drooling, stuffing things into her mouth or pulling Mom’s hair. She’s especially fond of sucking on her big toe; we’ll hope she outgrows that before she starts school.

We have spent time at Sara’s and Ray’s house, taken the baby to have her portrait made, had them for dinner, watched a video, played air hockey, gone bowling, out to eat and for walks. The highlight may have been the day we babysat all day while Sara was at work. We loaded baby up in her pack and took her for walks, which she loved, and survived by tag-teaming. Folks in their 60s are not meant to care for infants. It brought me back to the time when I had an 11-year-old, two babies in diapers, one nursing, and having them with me while working full-time. This should have seemed like a vacation compared to that, but of course I did that when I was 30 years younger. Funny what a difference a few decades makes.

It is so fun to see mother and baby cooing and talking and laughing together. I would so love to be a day-to-day grandmother, not so far away.






Farmers' market, KOA, neighbors . . .

Saturday morning Chris and I ran downtown to the farmers’ market, a bustling affair with everything from handmade white cedar lawn furniture, live music and home-canned produce to spinners, weavers, herbs, vegetables and flowers. It is held near the capitol building; Topeka is Kansas’ capital. I began to like the city more than I had before. They are romancing new industry, evidently with some success, but it does seem to have more than its share of rundown areas.












































I couldn’t resist snapping a shot of the handsome Chief Drive-in Theatre marquee. Too bad there is a Walmart now in place of the drive-in, but at least they had the sense to leave the sign.

We are staying at the same KOA as last year. It’s a pleasant place with three good-sized ponds wherein lurk some huge lunkers - bass, catfish, bluegill and carp - a great game room, workout equipment (I didn’t wear that out) and super walking trails and birding areas. The ponds have a resident green heron in addition to ducks, geese and many other birds. We see lots of brilliant American goldfinches here. Kansas also showed us our first fireflies of the trip. I think they are just magical.

Our neighbors are fun and interesting. On one side are Russell and Theresa with Reggie, their rescue goose. It remains to be seen whether the names stands for Regina or Reginald. Reggie seems to fancy itself as a pet dog, following closely at the heels of its “parents”. He’s a beautiful gray color, incredibly soft and sweet.

To the left of us is a woman camping, so to speak, in a passenger van (not a camper) with four St. Bernards. She is here showing that quartet of her 16 dogs of the same breed left at home. I can scarce believe that she lives (temporarily, thank goodness) in there with those behemoths - a stronger woman than I. They are gentle and nice, as St. Bernards tend to be, and two of them took championships this time.

We were pleased to find that our friend, Ben, is still there. We met Ben last year and enjoyed having him over to jam on his guitar with Chris last time and again this year. His father passed away the week before we got there, so he and I spent quite a bit of time talking about that. Obviously, my loss is close on my mind right now. We find Ben to be a well-read, introspective and inquiring young man, and a good conversationalist.

At the end of a long day, we sometimes like to turn on the television. After all, we haven't had that experience for the past 35 years, so it's novel to us, and to Rowdy, who hogs the remote.





Abilene, Ike . .
Our one day away was to go down to Abilene to tour the Eisenhower Center - presidential library, museum, boyhood home and burial place. It was an incredible museum: I learned much about the first president I remember being in office. I’ve always thought highly of him as a statesman and leader, but did not realize much of what he did. I also loved learning about his family; however, my genealogist side was surprised to see that one of his early female ancestors has not been identified. Makes me feel a bit better to know that even the top researchers sometimes can’t find something.

The entire block of residences around Ike’s boyhood home was purchased and removed so that the campus now consists of only the Eisenhower family residence plus the two major facilities and a beautiful meditation center/chapel where he and Mamie were laid to rest. Personally, I would have preferred to see the house in its original context. It was not overly large for a couple with seven boys, six of whom survived.

I am especially taken with that area because of a family connection: my great grandfather, George Washington Taylor (unrelated to the Yates Center bunch) worked the second drive of cattle from Texas to Abilene on the Chisholm Trail. He was accompanied by his brothers, Daniel Meridith and Louis Dixon. We are fortunate enough to have an account of the harrowing journey written by Lewis.

We liked Abilene and would happily spend more time in the area. We also ran over to Manhatten (“the little apple” they call themselves) one afternoon to do a genealogical burial search. We had discovered earlier that Fred Sherwood was interred there, so the proximity encouraged us to look for him. After a stop at the genealogical society library, we found him in the Rebekah/I.O.O.F. Home cemetery, evidently indicating that he resided in that short-lived home, once a resort, a Job Corps facility now. It may have been the strangest graveyard I’ve encountered. The perimeter of a fenced grass field is lined by a sidewalk on which are stones for each burial. Are they all around the outside as the stones indicate? Who knows?

Flint Hills, rain, ants, oh my . . .
Much of this week’s travel has been in the Flint Hills region, which I’ve mentioned before. It truly is a wonderful area - awesome in scope and beauty. I am totally in love with the ochre/yellow limestone found here, must find a way to haul some home and utilize it in landscaping.

As we prepared for our departure this morning, a thought flitted through and stuck for a moment before I was able to dislodge it. It went something like this: “I wanna go home where it doesn’t rain all the time.” Cripers, it does get old after a bit! Last night, I arose somewhere around 3 a.m.and ventured outside to secure chairs, rugs, tablecloth, etc. away from the latest precipitation. I needed to get that done to avoid having to pack up everything wet and then possibly not be able to get it out to dry at the next place. The good news is: the rain stopped long enough after our short visit with the kids to allow us to get our packing done without getting soaked. The bad news is: we had water damage to containers in the lower compartment again . . . and . . . the ant infestation we experienced continues at the new place because oddly enough, the little creatures just rode right along with us; who knew they were such good travelers. Surely, I will have eventually vacuumed, stomped, crushed and brushed them all away.

Next time through: Fort Leavenworth, Barbara’s Clay Center, birding and fishing. Also a picnic and swim at the lake; it rained the day we had that planned.