The Great Pumpkin Patch

Today Greg and I did our favorite fall activity--we went to the Great Pumpkin Patch in Arthur, Illinois! This fun tradition began in 2007 when Mom and I first discovered the Pumpkin Patch while I was going to graduate school. She and I loved it! Greg and I didn't make it to the patch in 2008 because that was when we were getting married, but we have gone in 2009 and 2010. It is such a fun, fallish place. The weather was a little gray and rainy today, but it felt like fall, and we basically had the whole place to ourselves, so that was nice.

Here is something they have not had before--the Great Pumpkin Patch version of American Gothic. I have named this picture "Pumpkin Gothic."







Here is the Wall of Squash. Now that is a lot of squash!








And here is the pumpkin patch. Look how misty and fall-like it looks! We also saw a lot of cute baby animals and pumpkin displays.






Here we are picking out our pumpkins.

















And here is the result of our pumpkin/squash picking. I think Big Spike approves. What a fun day we had! While we were in Arthur, we stopped at the Homestead Bakery at the Great Pumpkin Patch where we stocked up on all of our fall necessities: delicious jams, pumpkin bread, pumpkin cookies, and fresh apple cider. And we, of course, stopped in Tuscola at our FAVORITE place to eat: Flesor's Candy Kitchen, home of the most delicious Reuben sandwich in the entire world. What a fun, fall day!

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

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A Visit from the Atkinsons

We have had SUCH a fun week! We had a wonderful visit from some of our favorite friends: Angie, Matt and Ben Atkinson from Gettysburg. We had a great time visiting them last year in Pennsylvania, and it was so fun to see them again. I met Matt and Angie when I worked in Natchez. Angie was my supervisor, and her husband Matt worked at Vicksburg. They have been wonderful friends ever since then. They rolled into town from Chicago on Monday evening, and we had a fun time eating pizza and watching football before bed. On Tuesday morning while Matt was doing some research at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Greg was at work, Angie, Ben, and I went to the Lincoln Home. Growing up with two parents who work at Gettysburg, Ben knows a lot about "Yanks," "Rebs," and "Abaham Yinken," as he says. He was pretty excited to see Yinken's house, but a potty emergency cut our house tour a little short :-)

A visit to a local playground was more to Ben's liking than the house tour. We had a fun time playing at the park for a while before heading to Cozy Dog Drive In for a yummy lunch of corn dogs, hot dogs, and ice cream. This was Angie's first time ever eating a corn dog! It was a big hit. She and Ben also liked the Route 66 ambiance. That afternoon I tried to keep the dogs quiet while Ben had his nap, and then we all met up for a delicious dinner at one of our favorite restaurants: D'Arcy's Pint.

On Wednesday we stopped at Lincoln's Tomb where Ben got to rub Abraham Lincoln's nose. He thought he was being so funny! :-)









We then went to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum while Matt was across the street at the library wrapping up some research. Ben thought it was fun that Tad Lincoln was about his same size. We even ran into a real woman portraying Mary Lincoln. Ben was a little scared of her, but after a minute he warmed up to her. He ended up asking her, "Where did you get your boys?" She smiled and said, "Well, the same place your mom got you." I suppose that will require some explanation at a later date.

That afternoon we all drove down to St. Louis for a Cardinals game. Angie, Matt and Ben are big baseball fans, just like us, so we had a great time. The Cardinals were playing the Mets, and during the Mets' batting practice, one of the ushers brought a ball that had been hit by one of the players and gave it to Ben. He was really excited and wanted to throw it back to the players on the field, but Angie told him it was a special ball that he needed to keep. We had a great game, and the Cardinals ended up winning thanks to a home run hit by David Freese late in the game. It was especially exciting since the Cardinals are a couple of games behind in the race for the playoffs--so every win helps! It was sad to say goodbye to the Atkinsons that evening, but Greg and I had to head back to Springfield for work on Thursday. Matt, Angie and Ben stayed in St. Louis that evening and flew back to Pennsylvania the next day. I don't like it when fun times come to an end, but we'll just look forward to the next time we can see the Atkinsons. We had so much fun together!

Welcome Fall!

After a hot, dry summer here in Springfield, we have welcomed the cooler, fall-like weather with open arms. As a fun way to celebrate the coming autumn season, Greg and I went to the Fall Festival at historic Clayville on Saturday. Clayville is a little settlement about 8 miles west of Springfield that was settled back in the 1820s. The centerpiece of the little village is the Broadwell Inn, this beautiful building that is supposedly the oldest brick structure in Sangamon County.

Even though the leaves haven't changed colors yet, it still felt very fall-ish around the village with the corn stalks and pumpkins around. These are some old cabins from the area that were moved to the site. The festival was a lot of fun and included Civil War re-enactors, craftsmen, black powder demonstrations, and other period-style crafts.

We had a great time welcoming fall!








One of our favorite things to see was the bee display. Even the bees around here love Lincoln! We were so impressed by the Lincoln honeycomb that we bought some honey from these people. It was a beautiful day and a fun event to attend!

Adventures in Keokuk

Yesterday Greg and I had some fun adventures going to the Keokuk, Iowa area. I wanted to check some land records for people who lived across the Mississippi River from Nauvoo in the 1840s, so we went to the Lee County Courthouse in Keokuk where all of the land deeds are housed. When we first went into the Recorder's office, the lady there said, "Well, we do have records going back that far, but you can't look at any of them. They are too fragile." So it didn't sound good--but luckily they ended up finding an index of the records that we could check. Unfortunately I didn't find what I was looking for, but I always enjoy a good hunt through old books. After our courthouse escapade, we ate at Mom's and my favorite restaurant in Keokuk: the 4th Street Cafe! It was, as always, delicious. I had some yummy ham and bean soup with cornbread and Greg had a hot roast beef sandwich. While we were eating lunch, a guy from the kitchen came out and asked us how our food was. We said it was great, and he said, "Yeah, I was surprised to hear that such a young couple was ordering this kind of food." What does that mean? :-) It made us laugh though.

After Keokuk, we were so close to Nauvoo that we decided to head up the road to see our favorite place in Illinois. It had been cloudy and dreary all day until we reached Nauvoo--then the sun finally came out. The flowers around the temple were so pretty!















After Nauvoo we swung down through Quincy where we stopped at a baseball card shop. Greg and I enjoy collecting sports cards, and we have just recently started putting some on eBay--which has worked out to be quite a booming business. We bought a box of football cards and pulled out this gold Mark Ingram rookie card. I said, "Oh, look how pretty and shiny it is!" But then Greg saw the number in the lower right-hand corner of the card and said, "It's a one-of-one card!" Sometimes they only make a certain number of a particular card which makes it very collectible. We have gotten cards numbered to 10 and even 5 before, but never a 1 of 1. So that means that this is the only card of its kind. I know it sounds crazy that just because they put a number on a card it makes it more valuable, but this is literally the most valuable card we have ever gotten. It was quite exciting, and we are going to put it right up on eBay. The last 1 of 1 Mark Ingram card on eBay sold for over $700, so we have high hopes! :-)

Anyway, we've been busy around here with work and church stuff and are really looking forward to a visit from our friends Matt and Angie next week! Matt and Angie and their son Ben live in Gettysburg. We had a great time visiting them last year and can't wait to see them!