David and Nancy's Summer Tour

David Held  presented the program at Kiwanis this noon by showing pictures and telling of a trip he and Nancy took this summer to California and on up to the Canadian Rockies. He told of flying to San Diago where they boarded the Amsterdam, a Holland American Line Cruise ship. They visited the Zoo there and the highlights of other California cities as they worked their way up the coast. Dave is an excellent photographer and had wonderful pictures to document their travels. Their Cruise ship took them to Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada.

 In Vancouver they visited the Butchart Gardens among other sites. Their tour took them by train to Jasper, Lake Louise and to Banff. They rode on a very large "snow bus" that took them into the Glacier areas. In one of the later stops near Banff they rode a "sky lift" up to a mountain top resort. They left Banff in a bus that took them to Calgary for a flight home. Dave's photography was not only excellent buy he was able to interject video at certain points along with audio so we could hear the sound of the waterfalls, etc. It was a great show and obviously, a wonderful trip.

Enjoyed Looking Back

This picture was taken on May 31, 1999 at the Lincoln Airport as Ben, Julie and Carolyn were leaving for England. Julie had completed her 1st year at UN-L. It was an ideal time for them to travel. One of the pleasures in old age is in looking at pictures and rekindling memories of past times. My Journals add to this pleasure by providing another dimension. We had taken them to the airport and took care of Jack (Poodle) while they were gone. We took him along when we went up to North Dakota for Mel and Marilyn's 50 Wedding Anniversary. He slept in the car after hearing every noise in the room but we got along O.K.

This picture of me at the Golf course was taken on May 2, 1999. It shows a small Blue Spruce tree that I had planted the day before as a memorial to a dear friend. We had planted several seedlings in a nursery row when we had the farm and this is one that I brought into our back yard and nurtured it for a couple years. It is some 20' high today and located on the right side of the #4 fairway near the Yellow Tee Box.  We had also sold our restored '67 VW Beetle on the same afternoon that this picture was taken. I continued to give the tree some special treatment for several years  and even planted a Pine tree near this site.

Sadie's Birthday

Sadie celebrated her 4th birthday today. She received many nice gifts, blow out the candles on her cake, and, was able to share the excitement with family. In addition to her immediate family, the noon luncheon was enjoyed by 2 sets of Grandparents and 1 pair of Great Grandparents. John grilled hamburgers to go along with corn-on-the-cob, salad, deviled eggs, pickles, fruit and a  delicious chocolate birthday cake. She felt very entitled to wear  her "crown" all day. One of her gifts was a competitive ball game of tossing colored plastic balls into pockets. The balls were just the size that Jack enjoys throwing so he probably enjoyed the game more than Sadie. I'm sure the day will come when they will enjoy playing the game on a competitive basis but at this time, Jack just puts the balls in the pockets. Sadie is very protective of Jack, and they really get along very well with each other.

Old Directory from St. John

St. John Lutheran Church in Seward published a Directory in the fall of 1969 that we came across the other day and thoroughly enjoyed. It had been stored among some things that came to us from a departed Aunt. It was published in 1969, which was the mid-point year between when we moved from Seward in 1958 and returned in 1980. The Directory has over 80 pages of "family" pictures plus a membership list which includes the names of children. (The only names missing are those of the wives) We missed a whole generation during the 22 years we were gone and this Directory has been an a big help in filling in some of the gaps. Many of the children pictured in the Directory are now Grandparents. Elaine and I were both born and raised in Seward County. We also knew many people from my having worked for the USDA Soil Conservation Service and Elaine having worked in the Courthouse for the Extension Service.

This one page example includes pictures of two of my Kiwanis friends, neighbors , coffee buddies and a High School friend. We talk about "our circle of friends" and in reality, most of us have several "circles" with different organizations. The circles are expanded by knowledge of family connections. Our Seward Memorial Library is in the process of scanning old Seward County newspapers and making them available on their web site. It would seem that a Directory like this would also be a good candidate for being out on the cloud and accessable to all.

Naked Ladies

Our Surprise Lilies popped up out of the ground on Monday and are now blooming. These are interesting lilies that come up every spring from bulbs, have an abundant number of narrow leaves and die back after about 6 weeks. Then in early August they come up with stems growing several inches/day and bloom. The are natives of South Africa but were documented in Italy before 1750. Their technical name is Amaryllis belladonna. In addition to the common name of Surprise lilies, they are also called "Naked Ladies".  My Mother had them for years and always had fun with their name.

Jack counting money and My Computer Problem

I have had some computer problems so my post didn’t “take” yesterday. We went down to Olive Garden for Lunch today and on out to the Computer Hardware store where I got some help. One of the problems is that the curser arrow on my laptop seems to have a mind of its own. It is not very responsive to my "finger” movement across the pad below the keyboard. The technician suggested working lower on the pad or using a mouse. I’m afraid that  “getting old” may be a couple of the problems: the Apple Laptop and Me. He told me that my computer “system” is out of date but didn’t comment on me. Jack was at our house for a short time yesterday morning and I just happened to pull up his picture as the Tech. was helping me. I really appreciate those young guys that are so understanding of my problems (& ability), fix most of my problems, show me some new tricks, and then don’t charge me anything.

A Great Day

U.S. Senator Ben Sasse was is Seward this morning for a Town Hall meeting at the Civic Center Auditorium. The Harvard PhD is a native Nebraskan with experience in Washington D. C. at the Department of Health and Human Services during the Bush Administration. He served as President of Midland College at Fremont, NE prior to his election to the Senate. This was my first opportunity to see him, and I  was very favorably impressed. He received some publicity during the past few months for his reluctance to support any of the Republican Candidates for President. One of the attendees at this mornings meeting challenged him on his position of not supporting the Party's Nominee, and he made it clear that he was more concerned with working on the Country's problems than supporting any candidate. He holds a very important national security committee position in the Senate and recently returned from Afghanistan. He is using the Congressional Recess to learn of problems that constituents may have with federal agencies. His staff made note of problems with VA, USDA and other agencies that were brought to his attention. I consider him a very intelligent, non-professional politician.

Several of us left the Town Hall Meeting to walk to the Kiwanis meeting also held in the Civic Center. The program was presented by Dr. Van who showed beautiful pictures from a tour to Tanzania. He told of the tour company returning a good share of their profits to help with the conservation of the wildlife and to improve the lives of the natives.  A group of Kiwanians went directly down to the the Flag Project to install the little memory codes on each pole. A smart phone can read the code and get a story and picture on each of the flags. Marv has provided leadership on the flag project from the beginning, and Ken has headed up the "code" project after also being involved throughout. Being with a devoted group of Kiwanians after  hearing an impressive young Senator helps morale overcome much of the days depressing News.