State Fair

In our Lincoln Home Junior Ranger activity books, there is a place where the prospective Junior Ranger can write a letter to Abraham Lincoln giving him advice. This evening I had two little girls turn in their books, and I had to write down what their letters said because they were so funny and random. One girl wrote: "Dear Mr. President: Maybe you should have your wife make a vase." (I have no idea where that came from, but it was cute.) The other girl wrote: "Dear Mr. Lincoln: You should start a club about being honest." Kids are so funny.


Well, it's that time of the year when the state fair begins! I am quite excited to actually live near Springfield--so close to the Illinois State Fair. The Illinois State Fair is legendary, and I am excited to go see the giant butter cow (supposedly this year's butter cow exhibit includes a butter sculpture of Abraham Lincoln). I have never been to the Illinois State Fair and am hoping that Greg and I can head over there either some evening or maybe next weekend (we're heading to Nauvoo to meet up with Sarah, Joel, and Eliza this weekend!). It sounds like there will be some legendary food at the fair too, including Reuben dogs, fried Key lime pie (Sarah would like that?), cherry Key limeade, and Alaskan king crab cakes. Mmmmm.

Lincoln Home Randomness

Here is our Lincoln Home 2009 staff photo. It was taken a few weeks ago, but I haven't had a chance to post it yet. I am, as usual, in the front row with the short people :-) We have about 50 staff members (not all of them were there the day of the picture). Twenty of us are in the Interpretation Division--so we do all of the history/visitor contact stuff; and about 30 others work in the Maintenance Division--so they keep all the buildings and grounds looking nice.

So, the Lincoln Home is pretty much the most interesting place I have ever worked. There is literally never a dull moment there. The other day a cat ran into the Lincoln Home. It was amazing. The door was only open for about 30 seconds while a tour group was going in, and this random cat walking down the street just bolted for the door, ran inside, and went straight for the Lincoln's ORIGINAL horse hair furniture! Luckily Ranger Rose caught it just before it leapt onto the sofa. My philosophy is that it is a descendant of the famous "Lincoln Cats" (not quite as famous as the Hemingway cats). Abraham Lincoln loved cats and used to always bring home stray kitties to feed (I wonder what Mary thought of this).

Yesterday I was taking a tour through the house, and I had just ushered the group down the stairs and into the kitchen. When I looked up and saw another group through the dining room, I almost gasped out loud--there was Abraham Lincoln. Well, it wasn't really Abraham Lincoln. It was one of the many ULI's we get (Unauthorized Lincoln Impersonators). Basically, tall men with dark hair and beards like to come walk around the site so that people give them weird looks and ask to have their picture taken with them. This guy looked pretty good--except for the fact that he was in a t-shirt and jeans. Lincoln never wore jeans.

I really do not enjoy the evenings when I have to close the park--because it means I'm in the Visitor Center from 5:00-7:00 p.m.--the time when we always run out of tour tickets. And people can be very nasty. The other night it was about 5:30 p.m., and a lady wanted to go see the house. I told her that we were booked until 6:30, and she got all huffy. She said, "That is much too long to wait. I'm leaving." And she stormed out. Well, about 15 minutes later, she came back in and said, "Well, I guess I'll wait a whole hour if I have to." Unfortunately, by that time I was out of tickets for the rest of the evening. As you can imagine, this news was not well received by the lady, and she kind of freaked out. She was really incredibly rude to me. It was the end of a long day, and my fuse was already running short, so I put on my angry ranger face and became very curt with her. I don't like mean people. But I do really like nice people. Yesterday I took the cutest little girl through the house. She was in a wheelchair and couldn't really communicate, except by smiling. And she was always smiling about everything. I think more people (including myself) need to be more like her. Just smile--it makes you (and those around you) feel better.

Nifty Fifty

Greg and I took a little road trip over to Iowa this weekend to celebrate his grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary! We are looking forward to celebrating our 50th anniversary someday--but first we'll celebrate our first anniversary in October :-) It was a lot of fun to see Grandpa and Grandma Gray and to celebrate such a wonderful milestone with them. We left Springfield after I finished work on Thursday evening, then drove five hours to Marshalltown, Iowa. Greg's mom and his aunt Linda were already there, so we all had a good time catching up on things that evening. On Friday we did some shopping for Grandpa and Grandma, and then Greg spent the afternoon installing a new toilet for them--which works very well. He certainly is handy! Greg's uncle Steve came on Friday evening, and we all had a delicious dinner together. On Saturday morning Greg's cousin Scott, his wife Amy, and their cute twin boys Evan and Austin came to join in on the fun. The boys especially enjoyed playing with Big Spike and Little Spike--whom Greg and I had brought along with us. Scott Fogarty is the one who supplies all of Greg's and my Cardinals tickets, so he is definitely one of my favorite people. The Fogartys are a really nice family. That afternoon we went out for a 50th anniversary lunch, and then Greg and I got back on the road to head home.

We wished that we could have stayed longer, but there's that pesky thing called work which required us to head home (and we were anxious to see Lily who stayed behind to take care of the house). We saw this beautiful sunset on the way home. The rolling green farm fields of Illinois really are pretty--especially right now during the height of the corn season.