A Small Town With A Lot Of History

Thursday
October 22, 2009

I woke up at 6:30 freezing and looked at the thermometer which showed 32 degrees. It’s too cold and I’m not getting up. I put my head back on the pillow and fell back asleep. I guess around nine o’clock we both woke up and I put coffee on. Gina grabbed her laptop and got on Facebook and I grabbed mine so I could update our blog. We just sat in bed enjoying the morning in our truck. I finally updated our blog around noon. We then went inside the customer service center where they have nice bathrooms and showers. We have been living out of our truck since Tuesday which normally isn’t bad. However, the weather has been wet and cold. We both took showers and got dressed so we could figure out what we would do today. We normally cook outside but with this weather it has been impossible which has kept us eating out which is not what we normally do. Gina has been seeing these rocks at most houses that had names on them.

Examples Shown in a Downtown Business Window

So we set out to see if we could get one with our name on it. It didn’t take us long before we found the creator of these. The company is JS Limestone and Wood Products. We went inside and met the owners and he showed Gina some examples.

Gina Talking to Joe About What She Wants


A Few More Examples Joe had on the Floor

Gina really wanted one so she went out in the back to pick out a rock.

Limestone to choose from


There were all sizes

She found one and now she had to decide what and how she wanted our name on it. After we finished there we wanted something to eat since we were both hungry and it was now five o’clock. We decided we wanted to try out Duffy’s Steakhouse.

Duffy's Steak House


Just a Photo Looking Down Mainstreet

We had heard a lot about this restaurant so tonight we would try it. Gina got the chicken fried steak and I got the chicken fried chicken. They both came with mash potatoes and gravy. We both really enjoyed our food and agreed that it was good enough to eat again. The surprise for us was the seasoning. Not only were the steaks seasoned well but the gravy was seasoned the way it would be in Louisiana. While we were there Ralph from Excel’s service department came in with his wife Theresa. We had both finished our food at the same time so we visited with them for awhile. They used to own an RV dealership in Missouri but they decided to close it down and Excel offered Ralph a job as the assistant manager of their service center. They’re a very nice couple and we wish them the best in their transition to living in a very small town. We then headed back to our truck and settled in for the night. The low temperature tonight is forecast again for the low 30’s. We had another slow but great day. Gina’s happy for sure since she is getting a rock with our name on it.


Friday
October 23, 2009

I got up at 7:30 this morning and got the coffee brewing but then got back in bed. Around 9:15 Joe from JS Limestone called and wanted to see if we could come down and pick out an eagle to engrave on the rock. I told him sure but give us about 30 minutes. We both drank a cup of coffee and then jumped up and got dressed. It was still cold outside (39 degrees) but was definitely warming up. We arrived and met Joe around 9:45. We said goodbye to Joe after Gina had chosen an eagle design.

Just a Sneak Peak of the Rock Gina Picked Out

Neither one of us had eaten anything yet so we decided to eat at the “Second Cup Café”.

Second Cup Cafe

It’s very small but inviting café. Gina ordered a piece of raspberry & peach pie and I ordered biscuits & gravy with eggs and hash browns.

Look at those Biscuits & Gravy


What kind of Breakfast is This??

The food here tasted alright. However, it’s not one of those places that you just want to come back to. From there we decided to drive around town. First we stopped at a field of Sorghum (more commonly called milo).

Milo up close


A Field of Milo

Kansas is the largest grower of milo and there is field upon fields of it around here. After that we stopped by an Old Dutch windmill that has been restored and the area around it is now a beautiful park.

Dutch Wind Mill


The History


Here We are sitting in the Park


Gina is so Fascinated with these Colors
(She made me stop in the middle of the street to take this picture)

We then headed back to our home so we could grab a big pot. We decided since the weather was so nice that it would be nice to relax outside while we cooked a big pot of chicken & sausage gumbo. We had bought some smoked chickens last week at the Kensington meat locker. Gina has wanted to use them to cook gumbo to see if the smoke flavor would enhance the taste of her gumbo. The weather was turning out to be very nice with clear skies, a light breeze and a very nice 57 degrees. I filled the pot up with water and got the chickens boiling and then grabbed a lawn chair and sat outside enjoying a beautiful day God had made for us. While I was relaxing and cooking Gina jumped onto Facebook and was very upset because they had changed how the home page looks. After the chicken was done boiling I took it out of the water and Gina began deboning it while I cut up sausage.

This has been our little setup for the past four days
(Gina deboning Chicken)

Once we had the gumbo cooking I told Gina that we needed to walk over to the manufacturing plant and make sure we would have our home back for the weekend. However, before we could get over there Curtis was already bringing our home to us. He got it backed up and then we got all the slides out. While I was moving the gumbo to our home Bryan stopped by to invite us to the tailgate party that Excel was sponsoring before the local high school football game started. I told Gina that I wanted to get our satellite moved before we went to the game. Trying to setup the satellite in the dark is just too difficult. It only took about five minutes and then we were off to the Smith Center Redmen football stadium. I believe just about the whole town was there. Excel had grilled hamburgers and hot dogs for everyone there.

Tailgate Serving Line

We got in the line and I got a hamburger while Gina got a hot dog. We enjoyed our free meal and then Gina got a cup of hot chocolate. Bryan and Curtis invited us to sit with them on the 50 yard line. It felt like we were at a friend’s family reunion. Everyone there knew everybody and just accepted us as if we were a part it.

This is the Van that Excel is letting us use
(This is what I mean by family)

Tonight’s pregame was recognizing all of the parents of senior athletes.

This picture is of a Father Recognizing his Daughter even though she was sick and unable to attend the ceremony


This is both the Junior High and High School Band


This is almost all of the students except for the football players

While we were waiting for the game to begin Curtis told us some history about the Smith Center Redmen football team. Years ago Head Coach Roger Barta set high standards for his players. Instead of trying to explain it I thought I would just give anyone who might be interested a link to a short story published in Reader’s Digest. “Life Coach Roger Barta”

Curtis caught and gave the football and tee shirt to Gina after the Redmen scored


The Smith Center Redmen Cheerleaders

The Smith Center Redmen are going for their 75th consecutive win. In 2007 the Redmen made national headlines by scoring 72 points in the 1st quarter of a game. Joe Drape which is a writer for the New York Times flew down to write a story about the Redmen. The team and town people so impressed him that after returning back to New York he decided to write a book about The Smith Center Redmen football team. The book “Our Boys: A Perfect Season on the Plains with the Smith Center Redmen” was released this year.

The Book "Our Boys"


The Redmen defeated the Osborn Bulldogs 47 to 7

Once the Game was over we left and went home. I was tired so I kicked back in my recliner and watched a little TV. Gina decided that she wanted to bake her Cran apple walnut pie. I tried to tell her that it was 9:30 and that it wouldn’t be done until a few minutes before eleven o’clock. She insisted so I put the pie in the oven. While the pie was baking I fell asleep because she woke me up and asked me if I wanted a slice. I said alright. Here it is 11:15 at night and we’re both eating a slice of pie topped with vanilla ice cream. The pie was good but we both still like the berry medley pie better. Finally around midnight we went to bed. I know that I have not described Smith Center or the people very well. However, we have really enjoyed being in Smith Center, Kansas and have met a lot of wonderful people while we have created some great memories.

Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.

Camping Out In Our Modified Motorhome

Tuesday
October 20, 2009

I had all intentions of getting up at seven o’clock this morning and dumping our tanks before they came to get our home to adjust our slide. However, it didn’t happen. We have been staying up way too late and last night was no exception. We did get up at eight o’clock and made the rig ready for travel. We only had to go a few hundred yards but the process is still the same. We got hitched up and were dumping our tanks by a little after nine o’clock. We dropped our home back off and let Curtis know that he could come and get it at anytime. We hung out in the truck for a couple of hours discussing what we were going to do today. Finally we decided to drive 30 miles west to Phillipsburg and see if we could find other pie flavors from the Village Pie Maker. We got there around noon and went to the first place which was a small grocery store. However, they didn’t have any different flavors so off to the other business which was a slaughter house / meat locker. They had all of the flavors so we ended up buying three pies, one blackberry, one cran apple walnut and one rhubarb pie. We also bought two thick sliced hickory smoked ham steaks. The weather was beautiful so we decided to walk through town and visit all the small shops. We found a small shop that still hand spins different textile materials, such as llama hair, sheep’s wool. They were not spinning anything today but they had a lot of neat items for sale. We didn’t find anything that we couldn’t live without but the conversation with the owner was very informative. After we left there we continued walking and talking to the different people in all the stores until my stomach was telling me it was time to eat something. We left there around 3:30 and headed back toward Smith Center. We stopped at a park west of town and decided to eat the remaining leftover taco soup. Instead of using the microwave I took out our Coleman stove and heated the soup up while Gina got everything else ready. We were the only people in the park so we just let Angel and Zoey run loose. They really enjoyed their freedom by running and playing.

Gina Setting The Table


She Realizes That I'm Taking Her Picture

(Nice & Quiet Little Park)

We finally decided to head over the Excel’s service center and do some laundry. Around 5:30 we walked over to the manufacturing plant to see if our home was brought back outside. It wasn’t outside and we started looking for Curtis since all the workers were gone. We found him and he said that he thought we were going to sleep in our truck. I told him that we could do that but that we didn’t prepare to sleep in it. Really we just needed to grab our coffee pot and clothes. Also Gina wanted to hook up our satellite so I grabbed the DirecTV receiver. We then took the truck over to the service center and got all hooked up. I then started to setup the satellite and then realized that our TV in the truck doesn’t have an HDMI connection. Oops ?? I cannot get back into our home so we decided to unhook the truck and go down to Alco which is like a really small (like real small) Wal-mart. I picked up a cheap audio / video cable and headed back to the service center. I started connecting the receiver up and could not get the TV to see the receiver. After about 30 minutes with no luck and it was almost nine o’clock at night I just gave up on trying. We finished up our laundry and Gina watched a little TV in the customer lounge until a little after ten o’clock. They leave the lounge and bathrooms open all night for everyone that is getting their RV repaired. Anyway we were getting tired so we just decided to call it a night.


Wednesday
October 21, 2009

I woke up a little after eight o’clock and put our coffee on. While it was brewing I walked over to the plant and went inside our home and grabbed an S-Video cable and walked back to the truck. I fixed Gina and I a cup of coffee and then connected the receiver to the TV using the S-video cable and within a minute Gina was watching DirecTV and enjoying her morning coffee. I then took Angel and Zoey outside and realized that right next to our electrical receptacle was a cable connection. Talk about feeling dumb. Oh well, Gina has her DirecTV and she’s happy. The wind started blowing and it started to rain around ten o’clock this morning. We knew the rain was coming which is why Gina wanted her DirecTV. She said she wouldn’t be able to handle sitting inside the truck with nothing to do. We both finally made it to the bathrooms and took a shower. We didn’t have anything to do today nor did we want to get out in the cold and rain. Around one o’clock Bryan stopped by our truck and offered us a car to use if we needed to go anywhere and that way we wouldn’t need to unhook our truck. That was very nice of him and I took him up on the offer. I must admit that since we arrived here at Excel they have treated us like family. Around 4:30 we were getting hungry and it was still very nasty outside so we decided to just go out and eat dinner. Being that Smith Center is a small town there is really not much to choose from so Pizza Hut will have to do. Since Pizza Hut is located right next to Alco she wanted to go in and look around. While Gina was shopping Bryan (President of Excel) found us and asked us if we wanted to have dinner with him tonight. We had to decline since we had just eaten. That is what I’m talking about. Excel is like one big family. We finally left Alco and headed to our truck for the night. Gina got the truck ready for sleeping while I took Angel and Zoey outside. We were both kicked back in bed watching TV until we lost reception. That’s not a good sign. I looked outside and everything seemed fine but apparently the wind must have moved the satellite dish. I tried for about five minutes to get it back. However, between the cold, wind, and rain it wasn’t happening tonight. Since we lost DirecTV I went back outside and connected cable to the truck. I finally got the cable working but trying to do things in bad weather can make a very simple job extremely difficult. After I got dried off I got in bed with Gina and we both watched TV for a little while. Not an exciting day since the weather turned really nasty today. They are forecasting snow for tomorrow. We are both ready for a little warmer weather.

Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.

A Wonderful Weekend

Saturday
October 17, 2009

We got up at seven o’clock this morning so we could tell Will & Wilda goodbye. They were heading toward Russell, Kansas for the weekend so Will could watch football all weekend. Before he left he needed air in his trailer tires so I pulled out my power tank and filled up his tires for him. They got on the road and then we got cleaned up and dressed and headed toward Minden, Nebraska. As we arrived in Minden the road was closed for a band parade. We decided to park the truck and watch all of these high school bands. We found out later that it was all part of a band festival / competition. None of the bands were huge but they all seemed to play and march really well.

Never Seen a Band Marching in a Triangle


Another Nice Band

After about an hour we decided to find the Pioneer Village.

Unique Saying Above The Entrance

We paid our admission fee and started looking at all the stuff. I posted a few pictures here but all of them are on my online photo album. I was not prepared for everything they had there. What I mean is that I could have spent at least two days there looking at everything but instead I ran real fast since we only had three hours before they closed.

Gina Posing by a Covered Wagon


Hard to Imagine Traveling West Loaded Down with Your Family Possessions


A Gypsy Wagon (this must have been the first RV)

Even had a Wood Stove Inside


One of the First Horseless Carriages


One of the First Electric Cars


An Original Cable Car


Here I Am Playing Conductor


Gina Admiring a One Room School House


A Replica of an Old Country Doctor's Office

(I had to include this for our Daughter Ashley)


Getting Your Hair Done Has Sure Changed


An Old Steam Driven Tractor


An Old Gasoline Powered Tractor


Our Picture in Front of Some Stained Glass Windows

(Some things never change like stain glass)

The museum is just amazing in that depicts our transition from the 1800’s to our current technologies. It included all forms of transportation: horse and buggy, stage coach, trains, cable cars, trolleys, jets and cars. It also included the evolution of farming and road construction equipment. It showed how kitchens & living rooms changed from the 1830’s to the 1980’s. I highly recommend this place as a must see item if you might be interested in how our country has evolved over the years. If there is a larger collection of cars in the United States then I have never heard about it. I don’t know for sure how many cars they have but I would guess there were at least 300 to 400 cars from all manufacturers. The cars range from the first ones in the early 1900’s all the way to the 1980’s. Very impressive is all I can say.


We left there and headed toward Fort Kearney State Park. We drove through the park looking for a site and finally settled on a site that backed up to one of the ponds.

Our Truck and Campsite

We were both starving so the first priority was get the Coleman stove out so Gina could start cooking taco soup. She had already decided before we left Smith Center today that was what she was cooking. The weather was absolutely gorgeous today with a high of 67 degrees. The forecast low for tonight is 39 degrees but the high for tomorrow is 71 degrees with clear skies. We enjoyed a great dinner and then kicked backed in bed and watched the movie “The Proposal”. We had planned on having a campfire but the wind was blowing and it was getting a little too cold for us outside. This is an ok campground but would be tight for big rigs. There are a few sites that could accommodate up to about 36 feet but most are sized for about 30 foot RV’s. It looks like there would be some good fishing since they have a lot of ponds. Gina fell asleep before the movie was over. We had a very nice day.

Sunday
October 18, 2009

We woke up around eight o’clock this morning. I started the coffee and somehow we both fell back asleep. We woke back up a little after nine when Thomas called us. We both talked to him for a few minutes while we drank our coffee. We finally got up out of bed and dressed. I was going to take a shower but I didn’t have any quarters and it was 25 cents a minute. At least the sink was free so we could at least brush our teeth. Our only agenda today was to tour “The Great Platte River Road Monument”, most people just call it the Kearney Archway. We finally put everything away and left the park around eleven o’clock headed toward the Archway.

The Archway Looking East


The Archway Looking West


The Archway Entrance

We didn’t really know what to expect but here is a picture of Gina and the man that greeted us when we entered.

This Guy Was A Hoot!!

Gina and I first went through the gift shop and found two t-shirts. One was a must have as it has a picture of a Nebraska RV with each item describe on it.

Now Those Were RV'ing Days????

From there we bought our admission tickets and received our headsets for the self guided tour. The tour was very impressive and has to be one of the best self guided tours we have taken. The tour depicts how Americans left the east and headed west beginning around 1850 and continued through the transportation era of our interstate system. Here are a few pictures. If you want to see more just go to our online photo album.

Entrance to the Displays


Very Well Done Replica


The Trip West Was Hard Considering 3 out 10 Died Along The Way


Another nice Replica


The Beginning of Tourism


Family Camping

Look in the Background and there is a Log Cabin mounted on Wheels

I'm Not Sure I Would Want To Do This


A Very Nice Quilt Commemorating 9/11

From there we took Angel and Zoey for a walk where they had a giant stagecoach and covered wagon.

Now That's A Big Stagecoach


An Extremely Large Covered Wagon

After we left there we drove toward Cabela’s. We walked around looking at everything and finally purchased a few fishing flies. It was getting late and I didn’t want to drive down these country roads in the dark (way too many dead deer on the side of the road) so we headed toward our home in Smith Center. We made it back at 6:30 and decided to eat leftover taco soup for dinner. We then kicked back for the evening and watched a little TV until around ten o’clock when we went to bed. We had another wonderful day and altogether a great weekend. We enjoyed camping out in our truck and it was definitely different from our home. However, we still enjoyed it and look forward to doing it some more.


Monday
October 19, 2009

I woke up early this morning just in case they might be able to work on our home today. I ran into Curtis and he said he would try to get started on our home today. However, he didn’t really think they would get started today. I left Gina sleeping while I enjoyed a cup of coffee since there was no need to move faster now. She finally got out of bed and I fixed her a cup of coffee. We didn’t have any plans today so we just kind of hung out. Around four o’clock we decided to drive the 12 miles to Kensington to buy another berry medley pie. However, when we got there we decided to go ahead and buy two of them since the previous one we had tasted so good. While we were there we decided to go ahead and place an order for one cran apple walnut pie and one rhubarb pie. On our way back home we stopped by the only grocery store in town and picked up a quart of vanilla ice cream to go with our pie. The first thing we did when we got inside was get the pie in the oven since it takes about 90 minutes to bake. While the pie was baking I spoke to Curtis and he said they would get started on our slide at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. Our dinner consisted of hot pie top with ice cream. It might not have been a healthy meal but it sure tasted good. I just don’t understand why the best tasting food is never good for you. However, you have to splurge every once and awhile. After our delicious dinner we watched a little more TV and did more of nothing until we headed off to bed. We’re not sure what we’ll do tomorrow but hopefully they'll get started on our home.

Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.