Abilene

 For nine years, my good friend, Ann, has been making yearly visits to come see us.  I have reciprocated with coming to her wedding and stopping for brief visits (less than 15 minutes) as we drove west or east on I-70 on our way to or from Colorado.  However, during her last visit to home, when we learned of Eric's deployment and my grand journey starting to take shape, I realized I could pretty easily visit her new home in the country that she shares with her husband, Aaron, and dog, Festus.  Two beings that up until a month ago, my kids were not really aware, but now rank as two of their favorites of all time.

 The first night was a little difficult.  Frankly, the boys couldn't understand why we couldn't just get to Nana and L'Opa's house.  However, as soon as Molly met Festus, she was hooked.  She chased that dog around their house for hours.  Aaron commented that Festus took his morning nap as soon as they got into work the next morning.  Molly has this affect on dogs.

 Yet, by the next morning, after a brief tour of their land (and their barn...they have a barn!), the boys were warming up to the idea of spending a day in the country.  I had semi-promised that they'd get to see farm equipment...but, I had no idea how well the Strunks would deliver.  I don't even have pictures of some of the exciting things we did because my camera's battery died first thing in the morning.

 After a little walk on the grounds, we headed into town and visited the heritage museum.  The kids favorite parts were making phone calls to one another on a rotary phone.  I thought it was particularly great since Nana and L'Opa still have two working rotary phones.  They also got to ride an old carousel.  Which Molly refused to get off of.  That was awkward.  Luckily, we were the only ones there, so it wasn't too big of a deal to just let her have her meltdown.  Another highlight was that Will discovered he liked plain tacos.  As in just meat and cheese on a shell.  This was pretty big for my picky eater.

 And then we visited Aaron.  Aaron, the man who gets to drive real live tractors for a living.  He took us all for a ride in a huge tractor.  Again, just take my word for it.  He took the kids around the other farm equipment as well.  They were thrilled.  They even got to ride for a couple of miles in a semi-truck.  It was pretty cool.  After all of this excitement.  I was exhausted and Molly's night of revelry with Festus was taking its toll.  So we all went back to the farm to rest.  Where Molly and I promptly fell asleep.  When Aaron came home, Ann offered to go with the boys and my camera to visit the excavator he was borrowing to dig a giant hole in their fields.  Yeah, the boys got to dig a big hole.   And then Dom got to drive a truck...

 He was so excited when he came in to tell me about it.  And it is a memory he will keep for a long time if not forever.  Just the other night, Will was questioning why Eric was doing something as he was driving.  As we tend to do, Eric turned the question back on him.  At this, Will replied, "I don't know, I've never driven before"  And Dom immediately piped up from the very back "I have!".

 Eric, upon seeing some of the pictures, expressed concern over the safety of his children.  They didn't actually ride the ATV.  We all just had a really great time.  Ann and Aaron were so kind to rearrange their schedules to accommodate ours.

 I thought I would throw in this picture that Dom took to show I was present...though, I may have seen some of the activities a little on the later side.

 And here is Molly's new friend...FESTUS!!

She also discovered the doggy door.  That was fun.

We had such a nice stay in Abilene.  Ann made amazing pancakes in the morning.  We had a delicious lasagna the first night and grilled out the second.  The kids really like steak.  We also got the opportunity to watch some Christmas classics.  (And I think I won a game of cribbage...).  Anyway, I've told Eric that we'll need to make it a point to schedule at least a night through Abilene on our next trip through Kansas.   If only to see that his kids weren't ever in any real danger...sort of.