Lincoln Presidential Museum

It was raining today so I was glad that I saved the Lincoln Presidential Museum for today and did the outside things yesterday. This is the 7th Presidential Museum I have visited and is by far the best. Of the official Presidential Museums that are part of the National Parks, I have been to the Kennedy, Truman, Clinton, Johnson and Eisenhower. The Jackson and Lincoln Museums are state run. What makes the Lincoln so good is the diorama exhibits that depict his live from childhood to death. I learned a lot that I had either forgotten from school or never knew. An examples is that I didn't know he was re-elected to a second term.

 The Lincoln family standing in front of the White House. 

 Abe as a boy in his log cabin home. He taught himself to read by the fireplace. 

 Lincoln reading this Emancipation of Proclamation speech to his cabinet. The man on the right is a real person but you could not tell it until he would make  subtle move. 

 This painting that covered an entire all was amazing and so life-like. Since I have found out that my Great-Grandfather was in the Civil War, I look at the war differently. 

Lincoln's tomb where he, his wife and three of their four sons are buried. 

The long awaited conference starts at 8 a.m. in the morning. I checked in this afternoon and got my packet so have to figure out tonight what time my classes are and which room they are located in. I will be attending 19 classes/lectures/dinners with speakers/workshops over the next 3 days. I have decided to go home Saturday morning instead of staying for the last 3 classes on Saturday afternoon. By then my brain will be fried anyway and will be past the point of retaining anything more. Plus I want to get home to get unpacked, etc before Darryl arrives on Sunday. I do plan on going back through Hannibal and will stop to take some pictures of Tom Sawyer, etc along the way. A busy 2 weeks....

New Salem and Botanical Gardens

I had a great time yesterday sightseeing but last night was nothing but frustration with computers!  I don't use the laptop except when traveling so I was several upgrades to Windows behind. Yesterday seemed like a good day to just let the computer upgrade while I was out and about. I get home in the afternoon and the upgrade is still going on. So I didn't get to start the blog until about 9:30 last night. THEN after the Windows upgrade, there was several things I had to do on the computer to get it set up the way I wanted it. THEN the hotel WiFi was acting up, affecting the whole hotel,  so I couldn't access the blog. As you know from my past rants, I do not have patience when computers don't do what they are supposed to do when I tell them to do something!!!!!!  Anyway, this morning everything seems to be working 8-)

New Salem, Illinois
Lincoln's New Salem State Historic Site is a reconstruction of the former village of New Salem in Menard County, Illinois where Lincoln lived from 1831 - 1837.  While in his twenties, the future U. S. President made his living in this frontier village as a boatman, soldier in the Black Hawk War, general store owner, Postmaster, surveyor and rail splitter, and was first elected to the Illinois General Assembly. It was during his years in New Salem when Lincoln became a lawyer. Lincoln left New Salem for Springfield in 1837, and the village was generally abandoned by about 1840, as other towns developed. In the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps built a historic recreation of New Salem based on its original foundations, establishing a state park commemorating Lincoln and Illinois' frontier history. The village is located 15 mi northwest of Springfield. I got to the park when it first opened and was the only person strolling through the village for a long time when 2 other people joined me on the streets.

 One of many log building in the village. 

Food for the soul....

Perfect timing!

It was hot at the village and got hotter as the day went on. The heat index was 101 and the humidity was a killer!   But, I wasn't going to let that stop me so the next stop was the Washington Park Botanical Gardens in Springfield. 

 Besides the park and gardens, there is a Carillon in the gardens. 

A carillon is a musical instrument that is typically housed in the bell tower of a church or structure. The instrument consists of at least 23 cast bronze, cup-shaped bells, which are played to produce a wide variety of music. This particular carillon is one of the largest in the world's largest. It has 67 bronze bells covering a range of 5 octaves. The total weight of the bells is 82,753 lbs; the largest weighs 7.5 tons and the smallest weighs 22 lbs. The bells are all played manually by means of a special keyboard located on the 8th flower of the tower. I heard them play twice while I was wandering around and the sound was beautiful.

I think this is a type of hydrangea but the shape, color and bloom size is different than any I have ever seen before. The blooms were probably 10-12 inches long and the color on one bloom ranged from pick to white at the tip. Beautiful! 

Most of the roses in the garden are way past their peak but there was still a few pretty ones to be found if I looked hard enough. 

For dinner last night, I went to a nearby restaurant that was the recommendation of a person at the hotel.  I had a glass of wine and a good dinner while enjoying the music from the early 50's on their sound system. 

The restaurant was a saloon back on Nov 6, 1860 when Abraham Lincoln was elected President. 

And it is the same building where Lincoln celebrated his election on that night. Pretty cool!

Today is the Lincoln Museum, Tomb and Church he attended. Then I can check in for the conference after 3 p.m.

On the road again....

Today I drove to Springfield, Illinois to attend the Annual conference of the Federation of Genealogical Societies which is one of the top 3 genealogy conferences in the country each year. Going to a national conference has been on my genealogy bucket list for several years and here I am. The conference starts Wednesday morning at 8 am and goes until 6 pm Saturday. But, until Wednesday morning, I will be playing tourist in someplace new!

During the time I was planning my route here, I found out that Darryl's brother is buried in Carlinville, Ill. Carlinville is only 12 miles off the freeway so I made a side trip today so I could get a picture of the cemetery and a picture of his brother's grave for Darryl. It turned out to be more of an adventure than I anticipated......  I ate lunch at a Cracker Barrel in the St Louis area and then gave Samantha the cemetery address we wanted to get to. Now I assumed that she would take me around the city, connect with the freeway to St Louis and make then the 12 miles side trip to the Carlinville.  But no.......she wanted to take a leisurely Sunday drive on multiple 2-lane roads winding through corn fields, past farms, through little towns, etc before we got to Carlinville. She has always taken the fastest, shortest route until today! Anyway, she takes me to the address which turns out to be not the cemetery but the funeral home. Then I look up "Mayfield Memorial Park" and Google takes me to the charming town square - no cemetery in sight. I decide to find a police station for directions but on the way, go by a church with some people standing out in the parking lot talking so stop and ask them for directions. They gave me directions - go back to the 3rd stop sign, make a right, go past the Shell station, vere right at the Y and go to the 2nd cemetery on the left - the first one is the Catholic cemetery and not the one you are looking for. I followed their directions and found it!  After getting the pictures for Darryl,  I went back the the town square to look around.

Carlinville is on the original Route 66 and is 1,796 miles from Los Angles at this corner of the square. 

This is the gazebo in the town square. Very pretty and well maintained. I noticed these lawn chairs setting in various spots around town, including one in front of the old, historic jail - not sure why. 

This beautiful building is the Macoupin County Courthouse. The picture doesn't do it justice. 

It was a very pretty, small Midwest town and an unexpected surprise. Then it was back to the freeway and 30 more miles to Springfield, IL. Tomorrow I will be a tourist and learn all about Abraham Lincoln.

Life's next chapter.....

I started this blog on Oct 23, 2006 just to write about life after Larry and I moved to Tucson. The blog then became a way for me to chronicle our travels so friends and family could follow along with us. Then it became my journal when Larry got sick with cancer and passed away 4 weeks later. The blog because a way for me to express my gut-wrenching feelings and get them out. Never in a million years did I think I would be that open with my feelings for others to know what I was feeling. Next the blog chronicled my life without Larry, travels with friends, travels by myself, Morris and I moving back to the Midwest to be near family and then loosing Morris 2 years ago. During the almost 10 years of writing the blog, I have written 666 posts that have been viewed 12,569 times. As most of you know, I'm starting a new chapter in my life and have been debating whether or not to continue the blog. However, after thinking about it for a couple of weeks and talking it over with Darryl, I am going to continue the blog. 8-)  Over the last 10 years it has become my journal and I enjoy it - plus it is a way to chronicle my life. To me, it is like writing a book in which I cover the good, the bad and the routine parts of my life. There is software available that will let you take a blog and turn it into a book which I'm thinking about doing it. Anyway, here goes with...

Life's Next Chapter....
You have a lot of heavy conversations with your spouse when they are sick and know they only have a few more days/weeks to live. There was two things that Larry was adamant about in those conversations where he talked and I listened because that was nothing I could say to him. First was that I would rely on my friends in Tucson who he knew would help me get through the next few weeks/months. I did and they got me through the hardest time of my life. Larry's second request was that I be open to love again with someone else down the road. Little did we know that it might come by way of the man I married at 17, divorced when I was 32 years old and them reconnected again with him when I was 71 years old. The chain of events that led to us reconnecting is far too complicated to try to explain but only could have happened with the guy upstairs having a hand in it. Darryl and I don't know for sure where it is going but time will tell. We have spent many, many hours on the phone since early last May and last weekend we met in Hays, Kansas for a face-to-face meeting. Darryl is coming here for a week in September and then I am going out to Denver in last September for 10 days to visit him. Time will tell....

Hays, Kansas
Hays was chosen as a place for us to meet because it is a 4 hour drive for me and a 5 hour drive for him so kinda in the middle. It is a small Kansas town, population 21,044, home of Fort Hayes State University and the largest town in northwestern Kansas. Here is some of what we found there.

There is a heard of about 40 buffalo next to the Old Historic Fort Hays Army Post. Here is two of the adults and the calf that was born this year. They were nice enough to come over to the watering hole that was near the fence and then went back to a far corner of the pasture.

Fort Hays Historic Site: The original fort was established in 1865 in the land of the Cheyenne and Arapaho, the fort protected railroad workers and travelers on the Smoky Hill Trail. The US Army operated Fort Hayes on this site from 1867 to 1889. The fort also served as a military supply depot for forts south and west of here. The fort consisted of 45 building on 65 acres of land. Only a few of the original buildings still exist. This building was built in 1872 as a guardhouse replacing the original wooden guardhouse.

On Sunday morning we drove the Smoky Valley Kansas Scenic Byway - one of 11 in the state. I had never heard of this particular one before. I had hoped to get some sunflower pictures so was delighted to see fields full of them along the drive.

This is an old church is set back in a grove of trees along the road. The carved stone sign above the door says: Swedish Luthern [not a misspelling] Emmanuel Church Trego Co. Kansas 1902.

These bluffs are along the banks of the Cedar Bluff Reservoir that was built in 1949 for flood control.
The bluffs were a landmark for wagon trains and contains name carvings dating back to the mid-1800s, and some are still visible today. Many of the inscriptions were carved by the "Pike's Peakers" in 1859 and U.S. cavalrymen (3rd Wisconsin and 13th Missouri) traveling along the BOD in 1865.

And then there is my favorite - The Basilica of St. Fidelis located in Victoria, Kansas - about 10 miles east of Hays. It is know as the Cathedral of the Plains and is one of the 8 wonders of Kansas. The town was settled in 1876 by immigrants, known as Volga-Germans,  from southern Russia. They built 3 smaller churches after outgrowing each of the previous ones. Construction on this building was started in 1908 and completed in 1911.

The exterior is constructed of native limestone. The stone for this massive e structure came from a quarry seven miles south. The extracting of the stone, loading it, hauling it, and then dressing it was a gigantic task and an amazing feat considering that it was accomplished without automatic lifts and power tools. The church structure is a cruciform, or built in the shape of a cross 220 feet long and 110 feet wide at the transepts and 75 feet at the nave. The massive twin bell towers are 141 feet tall and dominate the prairie landscape.The stones are about 8 inches in height and weighs 50-100 lbs each. The church was built entirely by the town members. Some families are recorded as hauling as many as 70-80 wagon loads of stone from the quarry to the church.

During my recent years of travels I have seen a lot of large, beautiful Catholic churches.  This one if right up there near the top. It is just magnificent! Besides being so beautiful, it is large and seats 1,100 people. Certainly not what you would expect out in the middle of nowhere in Kansas.

So, yes it was a good trip and we will see what the future holds for us. Stay tuned.... 8-)

Yes, I'm still alive...

I knew it had been awhile since I did a blog but didn't think it had been over a month... Life has been busy!  I had company from Arizona for 2 weeks in July. Then last weekend I was at the Missouri State Genealogical annual conference for 3 days. This this weekend I am over in Hays, Kansas. In between all that, I have coordinated one of Skill Building Classes and worked on the Quarterly that is due Sept 1st. Then I leave Aug 28th for Springfield, IL to attend a national Genealogy Convention. This will be my first national convention so really looking forward to it.  I don't know how I ever found time to work.....

I had the laser procedure last Tuesday to get rid of the film that appeared after the cataract surgery on my left eye back in January. I couldn't believe how simple the procedure was. I thought he was just checking the eye and then he says "all done." I got my new glasses on Wednesday and cannot believe how much better I can see after having the cataracts taken off both eyes. I put them on, looked across the parking lot and said "WOW!" The difference is night and day. We were hoping that I would not have to have computer glasses but am going to need them after all. It is either that or set with my head up, so I can see the screen out of the bottom of my glasses which will hurt my neck. I have noticed that I my eyes are much more sensitive to sun and light since I had the cataracts taken off. I have to wear my sunglasses more when driving where I didn't used to have to.

More later...

Eye update

Today I went for my 2-week checkup on the right eye where I had the cataract removed last month. According to the doctor, it is doing wonderful and with glasses, they can correct my vision in that eye to 20/20. I can see  20/20 without glasses for reading. Before I had the surgeries, my left eye was corrected to 20/50 and the right eye was corrected to 20/30. Before I get my new glasses, I am going to have the film removed on the left eye by a laser procedure on Aug 9th. With the film, the left eye could only be corrected to 20/30 today. I decided that there is no reason to wait and see if it gets worse and then have to get new glasses after it is removed. I'll just do it now and get it over with. 8-) However the laser will mean I keep doing drops longer and I HATE doing drop because it is so hard for me to hit my eye ball the first time. I have found that practice does NOT make perfect when it comes to me putting eye drops in my eyes. Oh well......

The following Ziggy comic was in the newspaper today. I love it!

I was telling someone last weekend that if I have to evacuate my house and could only take a few things then my trip books are what I would grab!  But if I couldn't rescue them, there would be a mass reprinting of the books. They are so valuable to me because of the memories in them.

Happy July 4th

Dinner tonight: Years ago I used to BBQ on a grill and usually my Christmas dinner when I was in California was a T-Bone steak that I cooked on the grill. Sometimes the plant didn't shut down for Christmas and if the guys had to work then I didn't take Christmas off - to me it would not have been fair.  I didn't work all day but went to the plant at least once during the day or evening and did some paperwork after saying "hi" to everyone. Anyway, after Larry came along, he took over the grill and did a fine job. I haven't grilled since he died until today. You can't have a gas or charcoal grill on an apartment patio or balcony in Overland Park and it's the same in many cities. However, a way to get around it is to have one of the little 14" Smoky Joe charcoal grills and put it out in the yard at least 10 feet from the building on the ground. So that is what I did and today was the first time I used it. I cooked a perfect medium well strip steak and had a salad with it. I could hear Larry on my shoulder giving me instructions... 8-)  My goal is to learn how to cook salmon on the grill.

Weekend: It was a pretty laid back weekend for me. Vivian came over Saturday morning and we mostly just hung out here at home and visited, looked at old pictures, etc. Saturday night we went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant that I have never been to before and had a wonderful dinner. Sunday morning we went down to Union Station for a leisurely breakfast before the crowds got there. We hadn't planned to but the new streetcar was not crowned so hopped on it and rode it for the whole loop down through downtown, to the City Market and back to Union Station. Vivian had never been on a streetcar/light rail before so it was a treat for her. Then we went over to Kauffman Gardens which is probably my favorite place to go around KC. I LOVE it and am always interested in seeing what are blooming. They totally replant it 4 times a year so it is always changing. Here are some pics from the gardens:

Meet Crazy, the garden cat. Yes, that is his name. He is one fat, lazy cat. He has the run of the place and his feeding dish, bed etc are in the conservatory. A sign over his dish, in big letters, says "Do Not Feed The Cat. He is fed regularly and is getting too fat from everyone feeding him." He just wanders around and ignores people although he did come up to Vivian and let her pet him which is the first time I have ever seen that and I have seen him many times.

This is a pink double echinacea. I have never seen one before and it sure is pretty. 

A very large bumble bee setting atop this echinacea having lunch. 

This guy didn't want to be left out so posed perfectly on a limb in the garden. 

It was a good weekend!

Summer Sunday

Since I will be having my right cataract removed tomorrow, when I usually do this blog, I thought I would write it today while I can still see the computer screen. The biggest surprise for me after they did the left eye was that when I took the patch off several hours later, that eye was totally blurry and I could only see light and dark. It took a few more hours before I could make out shapes but it was much better by bedtime. Not what I expected based on what other people told me about their experience. But this time I know what to expect - at least if it is like last time. 

Yesterday was my last class/public speaking for the year - at least as far as I know. I found out today that there was 92 people at the meeting yesterday of the genealogy society. It has been at least 20 years since I stood in front of that many people and spoke. It doesn't bother me if I am prepared and I was prepared for yesterday. There was 27 slides in my PowerPoint and it was good - even if I do say so myself. 

This was the cover slide and the title of my talk. Besides talking about why a person should do their own story for their descendants, I walked them through how I do my spiral bound books that most of you have seen. The closing thought was "If we don't leave a written history of our life, we will just be faces that stare out from a faded picture or a name on a chart."  

I talked about how you don't have to just write a big book but can do a cookbook and used Vida's book as an example.  Two people came up to me after the meeting and wanted the recipe for the Chicken and Noodles that I used as an example of what is in the book. I had several of the books that I have done on a display table that people could look at after the meetings and the table drew a big crowd. Allow me to brag just a bit and say I got a lot of compliments after the meeting. Plus, here are  a couple of the emails that I got last night. "Just wanted to let you know that I thought your program today was the best we have had since I joined the group" by someone who has been a member for about a year. A long time member wrote "Your program this morning was the firs one I've heard that made me feel that I might actually be able to write my life story. Writing a book is so intimidating but what you described mad it seem possible." Mission accomplished for me"

Life after teaching: Today I am cleaning off my desk and getting ready to think about something besides teaching classes. Most people don't understand how much work goes into getting ready for a class or do one of these presentations.  It is good to get them behind me. 

 For you not on Facebook, I took this earlier in the week while out for my morning walk. I was so focused on taking the picture that I didn't see this giant bee coming in for a landing and was then too shocked to move. He only stayed for a couple of seconds and flew off. A thistle isn't much of a plant but I think the flowers are really pretty. 

Monday Misc - June 20, 2016

Another Monday....Some updates....

Last week's carotid artery dopler test: I don't have the official results yet from the doctor but I don't have any problems according to the tech who did the test. There is 1 small spot of plaque in each artery. She explained everything to me as she went along and I got to watch the screen so could see what the inside of my carotid arteries look like, blood flowing through them, etc. Kinda neat! I just assumed that since I have so much plaque in my heart arteries that it would also be in the neck arteries but not so.

Last Friday's Neuroscience Happy Hour: I am hooked on this series of lectures at the Prairie Fire Museum. Last week's topic was on migraines. Some of what I learned...  A severe headache, even if not a migraine , effects the whole brain chemesty. There are 4 kinds of headaches - migraine, general, tension and sinus. A "general" headache is really a low-grade migraine.   Migraines usually happen less frequently as a person gets older. Migraines can start with children as early as 4-5 years old and a person's tendency for them can be inherited.  You can have a migraine headache without the aura (seeing flashing lights, etc). People with migraines respond to environmental things that don't bother other people such as odors, temperature, food, alcohol, etc. The goal for doctors is to control migraines in people rather than the migraines contolling the person. They cannot be cured. Next topic is OCD, ADD and ADHD.

Long-lost niece found: Terrie, my oldest brother's daughter, lived with Darryl (my ex-husband) for 2-3 years back in the mid-1970's, when we were living in Denver, while her parents were still in Japan. Her dad was in the Navy and she came back to live with us when she graduated high school. Anyway, I lost touch with her around 2001 after she left her husband in Alaska and moved to Georgia to be near her widowed mother.  I have tried many times over the years to find her or her mother. Terrie's mother died in January of this year and her obituary popped up as a hint in my genealogy software program. In the obituary was where the children were living. So back to Facebook I went for the another search. I found Facebook pages for Terrie, her brother and her daughter who now goes by her middle name - not the first name that I had been looking for. None of them had been active on Facebook for a long time. However, I went ahead and send a FB message to Terrie's daughter in February. Last week I got a message back with Terrie's phone number in it. So after looking for 15 years, I called Terrie on Saturday and we caught up a bit. She lives about 30 minutes south of Memphis in Mississippi. I feel a trip coming up.....

Odds and Ends - June 19th

Nothing major happening this week - just odds and ends of stuff that is taking up time.

Classes: Two classes down and one to go. Last Monday I taught a 1 hour class on "Why Should I Do a Timeline?" to 53 people who attended the genealogy class. We ask everyone to do evaluation forms on various aspects of the class and the "speaker" scored a 4.85 out of a possible 5 so I guess I did o.k. On the 25th,  I speak to the Genealogy Society's general meeting on "Writing YOUR Family History" with the emphasis being on writing it for you or your immediate family. If a person is writing a family history,  they usually do it on past ancestors - like 3X Great-grandfather, etc but not about current people. People don't like to write/talk about themselves. I will be glad when this last class is over and I can get on to other things.

It's HOT outside: I have had several people who know I moved here from the desert ask me how the hot weather here compares to the summers in Tucson. I will take the weather here because even when the heat index is 100, there is a breeze when you go outside. It isn't just the "oven heat" like it is in the desert. Plus, because of the humidity here, I can breath much better.  In the desert, in the summer when the humidity was so low, I felt like I was breathing in a closed plastic bag when I was outside.

Car problem: Yesterday I left a restaurant with Vivian at about 1:30 - hottest day of the year - and the air conditioner in my vehicle wouldn't work. It was just blowing hot air and I do mean hot - like you had the heater on high. It was working fine up until then. So I called the dealer and they got me right in this morning plus gave me a loaner car since they didn't know how long it would take to fix it. I got a call a little while ago that a valve broke so they were fixing it and then recharging the air conditioner. I can pick it up in the morning. One thing about them, I can get a loaner anytime I want it and I get relatively new vehicles of the same kind I have. Today I got a new RX350,  like mine,  with less than 10,000 miles on it.  I wait if I'm just in there for an oil change and it will only take a couple of hours but could get a free loaner for just an oil change.

Until next time....

Happy Monday!

Heart Doctor: I saw my heart doctor last Thursday for a routine yearly checkup. Again, I am impressed with the doctors at KU Med. This guy is the head of the cardiology dept and only sees patients 2 afternoons a week. Yet he and the resident take the time to read my file in the computer BEFORE they came into the room to see me. I don't feel like just a number that they have no idea who I am or what my problems are like it was in Tucson. He took me off one of the meds that I have been on for a year since it didn't bring my triglycerides down like he hoped it would. Cholesterol is good so that med is doing it's job along with walking and diet. Because of family history, he is scheduling me for a carotid Doppler (ultrasound of the neck artery).  They didn't do the neck when they did the heart a couple of years ago. I like that he said "yes, you are a high risk but go live your life and do what you can that is within your control - you can't change what you inherited." We talked about me going back to taking Trilipix, the only med that worked on triglycerides for me,  but he wants to review all my liver numbers first.

Neuroscience Happy Hour: I went to another one of these last Friday night and learned all about Parkinson Disease. Bet  you didn't know that the stethoscope was invented in 1816 so a male doctor would not have to put his ear on a woman's check to hear her heart? The doctor's other tidbit comment was "There is NO advantage to getting older." He was speaking medically because otherwise I would have to disagree with him. Parkinson is a neurodegenerative disease like Alzheimer's or dementia is. It is on the increase because people are living longer. He compared the body to a car as we get older.... The engine (brain) and transmission (heart) may still be good but all the other parts are wearing out. The production of dopamine (enzyme in the brain that makes us feel happy/good) slows down as we get older so we don't enjoy things like we used to. If you have hand tremors when you are holding something but it goes away when you rest your hand in your lap then you do not have Parkinson's. The head movement of Michael J. Fox is not due to the Parkinson that he has but is a side effect of the medication he is on for the Parkinson's. The next Happy Hour topic is on migraines and I plan to be there. Where else can you learn from a doctor while enjoying a glass of wine and appetizers?

Otherwise...: I'm still plugging along on preparing for the classes I am teaching this month. I'm prepared for the first one and making progress on the 2nd one. I'm also working on the trip book from when Nancy was here for a visit last month. The pictures are all in the book and am writing the text. I'm also doing some planning on things to do when Jane comes out for a visit next month from Tucson. Busy week coming up.

Memorial Weekend

I don't know why people in the west don't put flowers on graves at Memorial day like they do in the Midwest. Just a difference in regional traditions.... I enjoy it after having been gone for so many years and not doing it. I think I am more aware of it now maybe due to having had more birthdays and also my interest in genealogy. It is just that taking a minute to remember family members and friends.

Anyway, here is what the back of my vehicle looked like when Vivian and Karen left here last Saturday.

 We put flowers on 18 graves this year. This is the 3rd year we have done it and now have the process down pat. I have a list of people to get flowers for, take a marking pen to the store and we write the names on the flowers when we get them.  Then they are sorted in the car depending which cemetery we go to first.

Last year on Memorial weekend,  Vivian and I worked a very long time to clean her mother's tombstone and get the dirt, algae, etc off it.

Above is what the tombstone looked like before we cleaned it. Below is how it still looks this year after we got done cleaning it. We were surprised that it still looked so good this year.

I talked to a company that makes tombstones and he told me what to do and that is what we did and it worked. He said to use Dawn dish soap,  water, scrub with a soft bristle brush,  a really lot of elbow grease and rinse really good with water when done. There are a couple more tombstones that are starting to discolor but decided to wait another year before doing them and do it in the fall when it is cooler.

I'm taking the Quarterly to the printer this morning and then have to get back to getting ready for the class I teach on the 13th. PLUS, I have to prepare for the one I'm doing on June 25th so those are my focus this month! Then I don't have any more classes to teach for the year at this point. I don't mind doing them but it is so much work to do the PowerPoint, research, etc to get ready for them.

A Different Weekend...

I realized this week that I'm am back in the habit of "working" during the week and taking weekends off. That makes no sense as my "work" (genealogy class prep, etc) can be done any day but it is just habit. Right now my volunteer stuff is taking a lot of time but it will significantly drop off at the end of June when all the classes I'm teaching will be over for the year. Oh well.....

On Friday night I went to the Museum at Prairiefire's Neuroscience Happy Hour that is on Fridays, 6-7:30 p.m.. It is an informal presentation by a doctor from St. Luke's Hospital Neuroscience Department. I 'm a member there so get their emails and I ignored the first one a couple of weeks ago about a class on Dementia but decided to go last Friday and am really glad I did. Besides enjoying the free wine and appetizers, I learned more than I ever wanted to know about Time is Brain: Guide to Recognition and Treatment of Strokes. The doctor was the head of their stroke department and knew her stuff. I learned I have a moderate risk for a stroke based on my blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking, A-Fib, weight, exercise and family history of stokes. Some of the questions on the risk survey were just yes or no do you have them while other questions for what is my blood pressure, cholesterol, amount of exercise, etc.  I know I have a lot of plaque in the heart arteries but did not know that I also have it in the brain arteries - it it is in one place in the body then it is in other arteries also. I always thought it was  plaque in the heart that broke off and traveled up to the brain. Now I know the plaque is already in the brain and can just break off in the brain and travel to a smaller vein where it causes a blockage. I  learned that 32,000 brain cells die every second during a stroke or 1.9 million die every minute the blockage is there. There is only a 3 hour window for them to give you the pill that may break up a clot from the first onset of a symptom. We hear that our blood pressure should be in the 120/80 range but for someone over 80, it should be under 150/85 - a higher allowable limit that someone younger. She also showed a video of a new procedure where they can go up through an artery in the groin to the brain and pull out a clot.  It was all fascinating!  They are scheduled through August with different topics on the 1st and 3rd Friday of the month. I will definitely pay more attention to the emails I get from them on future Happy Hour's at the Museum.

Yesterday I went with a friend to the Johnson County K-State Research and Extension's 2016 Garden Tour. There were 6 homes, all owned by Master Gardner's, and we could wander around their yards and see what they had planted, how the yard was designed, etc. We only went to 4 of the gardens and that took a lot of hours. Of course one garden was my favorite - I would love to have it in a yard. However, I am not willing to spend the amount of them she and her husband (both Master Gardeners) spend each week on their yard. They have lived there for 18 years so it wasn't done overnight. It wasn't just the plants, but she is wonderfully artistic and had so many creative ways to use yard art to add interest in the gardens.

Over the table on the patio, is a chandelier where she replaced the bulbs with little bowls and then planted cascading plants in the bowls. 

This was an automobile wheel that she cleaned up, painted and them put ceramic tile on it and turned it into a planter. It was beautiful. 

Interesting mix of flowers, yard art (sun dial) and shrubs. 

And yes there were lots and lots of flowers. 

So back to "work" tomorrow and working on my next class which is 2 weeks from tomorrow....

Koala Flats and other zoo items

Yes it was pretty cool this morning - 45 degrees when I got up but it was sunny. So I headed out to the zoo after stopping by the Farmer's Market for some more strawberries that were picked yesterday and some bread that was baked last night. I have learned to be at the zoo when it opens and I head straight to an exhibit I really want to see. Most people go through the gate and then meander towards nothing in particular. Even when I go to a zoo in another town, I print out the map ahead of time and know which exhibits I want to see. I know... 8-)

Koala Flats:  Burra and Coedie, are brothers who were born at the San Diego Zoo in Aug 2013. They are being rented out to the KC Zoo for 8 months and will then return San Diego. The 2 flew here on Southwest Airlines accompanied by their San Diego handler while sharing a row of seats.

 Meet Burra. I think they are absolutely adorable! 

Koalas ONLY eat eucalyptus leaves. So....since eucalyptus trees don't grow in the Midwest, the zoo gets 2 shipment a week from San Diego, via Southwest Airlines, of eucalyptus branches. The branches are cut and stuck in 6-8 containers around the enclosure - mostly by their "trees".  According to the zoo docent, the absence of local eucalyptus trees is why we won't ever have a permanent exhibit of koalas at the KC Zoo. 

 Eucalyptus is very low in energy and can be very toxic to most other animals. Koalas rest about 20 hours per day when they are detoxifying the poison in eucalyptus. These guys woke up twice int he 30 minutes I was watching them. Once when the keeper sprayed some disinfectant on the floor prior to washing down the floor and the second time was when she prodded them awake. After a few minutes they went back to sleep. 

One advantage of having a zoo membership, is that I can come as often as I want. I go, see what I want to see that time knowing I will be back again and again and again.....

This "baby" orangutan is 7 years old and usually has his security blanket - a burlap sack. Part of the time he had it completely over his head. 

The little guy and his mommy. Orangutans stay with their mother until they are about 8 years old. Then they will breed the mother again when she has kicked the baby out on his own. 

I am fascinated by jelly fish - they are so graceful in their movements! The little "tails" only come out when they move. 

And of course, I had to get a few flower pictures in while I was there.

I'm not sure what this is but it was bright and colorful.....

And just a plain Shasta daisy with a bug having lunch. 

Even though it was cool, it was a beautiful day and the place was packed when I left at noon.

2 down and 2+ to go

This week I taught 2 classes for the genealogy society that I belong to. On Monday, I taught a 1 hour class in which I compared the 4 most popular genealogy software programs. It has been many, many years since I created a presentation like that and I used to do it routinely when I was working. This was the 2nd in a series of 9 monthly classes we are doing. I'm the coordinator for the series in addition to teaching 2 of the classes. The society has never done anything like this before and we had no idea how many people, if any, would come. Last month we had 34 people and this time we had 46. I already have 26 registered for next month! We ask the attendees to do an evaluation on the class when it is over and as a speaker, I got a 4.82 out of 5. Of course, I would have liked to have a 5 but that is unheard of so was happy with what I got. I'm teaching the class next month and then I am done  teaching - others are teaching the rest of them. Next month my topic is "Timelines" , which if you aren't into genealogy the subject won't mean anything, Yesterday I did a 45 min class on building a Website - very simple for the society writing group. No evaluation on that one.....  Plus I have to get the June Quarterly done!!!!!  My desk is always a mess but I know what is in which stacks. 8-)  However, I left my big desk in Tucson and am using Larry's much smaller desk which doesn't have as much room on it for stacks. Hence, there are stacks of folders, notebook and papers on the floor around me...... I need to get started soon on the 2nd class I am teaching next month which is on "Writing YOUR Life Story".  Can't wait until July 1st when my classes are all done and I have some play time.

Shingles update: After 3 very long months, it is mostly gone. I still have one place on my arm will randomly feel like someone drove a hot knife into it and after a few minutes the pain is gone. It was broke out at  one time in that spot but not any more. I keep hearing about people who had after-effects for months and sometimes even years. At least the back isn't bothering me any more.

Koalas:  I read yesterday that the 2 koalas have arrived at the zoo here from San Diego and are on exhibit. I immediately looked at the weather to pick a good day to go and there is nothing but cold weather for the next few days. May go anyway....  They are only here for a few months and then go back home. Hopefully, we will get a permanent pair. I think they are so, so adorable! Stay tuned....

January trip:  While Nancy was here, we talked about taking a trip in January to LA and asking Jane to go with us which she has agreed to do. I will meet them there.  Nancy and I are on a mission to visit as many of the Presidential Libraries as we want to knowing we probably won't get to all 13 of them. Some of them don't interest us... In LA we will visit the Regan and Nixon libraries. I can't believe I lived there for 7 years and never went to visit them but those years were all about work. I have already visited the Kennedy, Truman, Clinton, Johnson and Eisenhower. The Hoover library in Iowa and the Carter library are also on our lists for sometime in the future. To me they are fascinating and I have learned so much about being a president and the person - not just what we see on TV.

Later....

Art and flowrs

We are TIRED!  I tell myself it's because I have had another birthday since the last trip.....

We got back from Abilene around noon yesterday. After unpacking, we went and had lunch and then went out to the Arboretum just to go for a walk. It was so nice out there and the flowers were beautiful.

This morning we went down to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art to see the "Reflecting Class in the Age of Rembrandt & Vermeer" exhibit. The exhibit was good but we both expected more paintings by Rembrandt & Vermeer. There was only 2 by Rembrandt and 1 by Vermeer. It was more about the the 17th century Dutch painters depicting the class levels of the Dutch people.

This painting by Paulus Moreelse was probably my favorite. I am just in awe of the finite detail (below picture) of the painting in the lace, her jewelry and all the pearls she is wearing. It looks more like a photograph than a painting.

This Vermeer, titled "A Lady Writing" is good but didn't do much for me. 

After lunch in the courtyard cafe, we went over to Kauffman Gardens to check out the early summer plantings which were beautiful. As many times as I have been to the Gardens since I moved here, they are always different. 

Even these ornamental onion plants are really pretty. 

Nancy leaves tomorrow and the house will seem very empty....