Iowa State Fair 2008

Make a Smilebox photobook

Sara and Dan Kelley

Parents of the groom

Weekend Pictures

Marie and John Kelley- Bride and Groom

Weekend Pictures

Marlene's Dahlias

Iowa State Fair!

Iowa State Fair!

The tractor pull.


















Friend Mickey's grandaughter, Abby Brown does a 4-H demo
explaining the meaning of the 13 folds in the American Flag.

Iowa Sunrise

At Mozingo Lake-near Maryville MO

I am a little late getting these posted but better late than never. We have pictures of Gary and Susan's RV and ours. And my favorite shot of this bunch is the sumac. I love the swirl of the leaves and the contrast of color.

On the trail again...

Butch and I rode to Cooper and back yesterday, a nice and moderate 15 mile round trip ride. We tangled with the wildlife a bit. I have never ran over an animal on the trail till yesterday. I think it was a ground squirrel but it happened so fast I really do not know. My front tire was up and over it before I could even see it. Then a bit later Butch had a rabbit run into the spokes of his front tire. We got a very good look at a deer too. Please click on that one to increase the size for a close up view of her. The new signage on the trail is a super addition. It felt really good to be enjoying the ride and the trail. Jefferson is very lucky to have such a great feature.

National Wildfire Locations

An interesting website about locations and current status of wildfires around the country. I will mark this one to view again.

http://www.nifc.gov/fire_info/nfn.htm

Leo and Keri's Ragbrai

RAGBRAI- Registers-Annual-Great-Bicycle-Ride-Across-Iowa. This event has been taking place for well over 20 years, nearing 30 I believe. Participants come here from all over the world. This year the route came through Jefferson Iowa. Leo and Keri hosted several teams at their home as well as riding in the event. Keri also catered food for the church making over 1500 ham balls with all the fixings to go with it. Food is a big part of RAGBRAI. A week long party!
These are pictures Leo sent me from the event.

The Old Hometown

We arrived at Leo and Keri's in Jefferson IA about 10:00 AM. I hopped right to getting our house cleaned and Butch fairly soon landed on the lawn mower. He first put on a mask as the weed pollen is high right now and he sprayed himself down to ward off the mosquitoes. It is still warm and humid but not quite as bad as the last two days.
I do not know how long we will be here. It may depend on when the mowing gets caught up. I do have a fast and reliable Internet connection here so I will try to post more pictures. I have plenty on the back burner.

In Iowa

We have moved...from Missouri to Iowa. Lake Anita to be more specific. Paid up for a couple of days. I have hopes of a better Internet connection but that remains to be seen. On the surface it seems to be better but I have had that happen before only to be disappointed later.
Butch and Gary enjoyed their tournament. I think. Golf has become an undiscussed topic.;-)
We enjoyed our anniversary supper at the Redwood tonight. Our anniversary is July 25th but I had said that was one of the places I would like to go for our anniversary so now we have. We both had Pork Tenderloins and they were scrumptious.
On to the weather!!! It is muggy..very,very muggy. The good news is that it is not windy or raining...but very, very muggy. Coming from the rarefied air of the Rockies this is oh so uncomfortable. We have yet to acclimate and not sure we will.
Tomorrow I will be catching up on laundry and cleaning.
Till next time...
Barb & Butch

Missouri-Mozingo Lake

The sounds of crickets, doves cooing, the smell of corn , the outside air wrapping around you like a warm ,wet blanket. This is the midwest in August.
The pictures are of things I saw while on my walk yesterday.

Abreast

We left McCook NE yesterday in the rain and we were in rain all day and night! The mountain dust ran down the side of the motorhome in what seemed like chunks! We haven't seen that much rain in a very long time.
Hwy 34 in Nebraska is great, not so with hwy 136. We took it because it was a direct route to Maryville MO. I doubt if we take it again. It is narrow and no shoulder on most of it but the rough stretches were a bigger aggravation. After arriving at Mozingo Lake we unhitched the car and went into Maryville to buy groceries. That was a bite in the budget after not buying groceries for two months! It was nice to pick up some items I hadn't enjoyed for a time and I will have to pace myself on some of them.
Our phone coverage and Internet connection were iffy last night. It does seem more stable this morning. Butch discovered an ember burn on the hood of our car so he is currently checking the roof of the MoHo. We may have to talk to the next neighbor who decides to build a fire! Campground host duties never end!
I am working on a Swedish weaving project and I finished the center section while we were on the move. The finishing on the ends are remaning and that is my favorite part and that is what I plan to do while the golf tournament is occupying Butch.
We will miss the hummingbirds!!

Over the Mountain...

And down the hill....We left SMR about 8:15 this morning and boogied up and over Berthoud Pass without a hitch. Butch was very impressed with how our 2004 Newmar Kountry Star performed. Our route was I-70 to I-76 to Hwy 34 and it is all good road. We had looked at our Good Sam book prior to leaving SMR and had chosen McCook NE as a probable destination. I asked Butch before we left if I should scope out a place to stay on the Internet and he said "Naaaw, there are plenty of RV parks along 34." We couldn't find one so finally he pulled over and gave me time to connect and I went to my trusty resource- www.freecampgrounds.com and we found Karrer RV Park on the east side of McCook. 50 amp electric and they restrict your stay to 3 days. Price- Donations!! It is a great little park. That website has saved our fanny more than once. Check it out.
We already miss our SMR friends. What a great bunch of people!! :-)

Hosted Ragbrai

Leo & Keri hosted several Ragbrai groups and I asked Keri to tell me what it was like. Here is her reply:

"Sorry I have not written sooner – it has been a busy and tiring week. RAGBRAI in Jefferson was really a great opportunity for the community. The Jefferson theme was “With all the Bells and Whistles”, but the true underling theme was hospitality. In general, the citizens welcomed the bikers with open arms. I was in charge of the meal at our church; I decided it would be a good way to see if this is what I want to do in my retirement years. The menu included ham balls, cheesy potato casserole, green beans, yogurt and fruit parfaits, and home made pie. We decided that we could feed 500 from 4-8pm. It was great. I might never eat a ham ball again after making over 1,500 of them. The bikers were so nice and appreciated the AC, a clean “real” bathroom and the home made food. When I finally returned home (exhausted) around 10pm, I was greeted with a yard full of motor homes and tents. Leo had invited additional groups as he rode on Sunday and Monday. I would guess we had around 50+ people at our home. I was too tired to spend much time with them and many of them had gone to bed. The next morning I was up at 5AM getting ready for the ride to Ames, I walked out of the house and the sun was just beginning to come up, I wish Barb would have been there to get a picture of the tents and the dew in the early morning light. It was fun to watch the bikers start to stir and get ready for the day. I had lots of bananas and granola bars to give the bikers to get the day started. I think I was the first biker out of the driveway, I was scared about not being able to make it to Ames, so I wanted to leave early to ride in the cool and have the whole day to make the trip. When I arrived back home on Tuesday afternoon it was as if Monday had never happened, not one piece of trash anywhere. What a great group of people to have at my home. I had a great time riding to Ames and only suffered a little sunburn. Leo is still on the road with a group, I think it might take several days for his recovery."

Come Monday

Come Monday we will be headed over the mountain and down the hill to Maryville MO and Mozingo Park and golf course. Butch is pictured here at Adam's Falls near Grand Lake CO. It is a beautiful place and one worth seeing again. We will miss all our friends at SMR but we look forward to fun with other friends and family the remainder of the summer.

At Steamboat Springs CO

Butch thought he looked very fine in this jacket but I said we didn't need another closet ornament. We will be leaving Snow Mountain Ranch next Monday headed for Maryville MO where Butch and Gary will be playing in a golf tournament at Mozingo. So soon we will be "On the Road Again".

Donn & Peggy

While friends Donn and Peggy were here we had a busy and fun-filled 3 days. They made walking sticks, and we went to Hot Sulphur Springs for a soak. We stopped at Grand Lake after our trip through Rocky Mtn Nat'l Park and they were unsuccessful in moving a rock.

Friends Visit

Friends Donn and Peggy Gordon of Carson City NV came to Snow Mtn Ranch for a visit and we spent yesterday at Rocky Mtn Nat'l Park. We went to Estes Park and returned on the one way road. I was able to get some great pictures and will put the best of them here now and make an album later.

Our Glenwood Springs, CO. Trip

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Auntie get your gun

This is a picture of my Aunt Ruby. Neither her granddaughter, Joanna Neff , nor I know the story behind the picture but it is a nifty picture nonetheless.

Shawn Johnson

Jason and Laura were privileged to attend the induction of Shawn Johnson to Iowa's Hall of Pride. Laura is employed by Iowa Boys Athletic Association and thereby received an invitation to attend. Pictured is her coach, Chow. Another with Jason and Shawn's mother. Laura is pictured with Shawn. It certainly adds interest to watching the Olympics in August.

Now the news

We work on Friday, Saturday and Sunday- off the other 4 days. That is by choice. The busiest days are the weekends and the time flies.
Tonight we are going on a staff excursion to Boulder for a dinner theatre. There are 18 of us going. Should be fun. You will most likely see photos of it on www.smrvolunteers.blogspot.com tomorrow or so.
My job of taking care of the blog has been a bit of a challenge lately because of an ailing Internet connection but I called Verizon yesterday and we determined my aircard was not functioning properly and a new one is on the way. Friends Terry and Lisa pulled in a couple of days ago and they have Verizon also which was working great for them. That helped in the diagnosis.
So I hope ya'all are keeping up with the posts...till next time...

Long Dry Spell

We have just been busier than hmmm..scat!!! We work the weekends and right now the supervisor is in Oklahoma so we ...ahem...are in charge!!! The campground has been full on weekends. With fuel prices such as they are we are getting primarily Colorado people.
The weather has been in a word perfect!!! Highs in the 70's -lows in the 40's!
By the way...Did any of you know you can volunteer here for as little as two weeks? And you do not need an RV to do so. They would house you in a room. Wow! A working vacation!! You put in 3-8 hour days and the other 4 you can play with the YMCA footing the bill for many things including food.
I do not understand why we are not swamped with volunteers.
Butch is playing golf today with Mike Bryce. They are using Grand Golf passes whereby they golf on very expensive courses($89) for free!! That is a new feature this year and one that will most likely bring Butch back again next year.
Things a running smoothly this year-enjoying the people and the work and all is well.