Back From Iowa

Not a very clear picture, but trust me, these were SOOO good. Probably not a single bit of nutrition in these but they contain the Southern trinity (FLOUR, SUGAR, FAT) so you know they've gotta be good!

I kept seeing these at various bakeries so I think they are a regional thing. They are basically fried doughnut crescent with an outrageous pastry icing inside and hit with a dusting of powdered sugar. One of these and you were done!! I only had one this trip since that seemed to be all I could handle without needing an insulin adjustment at the hospital--and I'm not even diabetic...

While in Iowa, the boys and I headed down the street to West Branch,Iowa-- birthplace of Herbert Hoover and the sight of his presidential library. It was really pretty interesting. There is a small section of the town that was preserved that contains his birth home. Above is a picture of his birth home. Probably no more than a couple hundred feet of living space at the most!!

There is a statue of Isis on the grounds of the presidential museum that was presented to President Hoover by the children of Belgium for his relief and humanitarian efforts. We toured the museum and came away with a whole new perspective of President Hoover. He is often the scapegoat of the Depression era. But in reality, he had been warning of the fall long before it happened and nobody listened. There was a short film of some of the European citizens that were children at the time of the war that detailed how thankful they were to get "Hoover Rolls" and food in general after starving for so long.

There was also a traveling exhibit about Abraham Linclon at the presidential library so we got to see it too. Very interesting..

We got back to Kansas on Wednesday, but after driving that many hours, I have been pretty much down for the count. Instead of driving straight from my son's house in Iowa back to Haysville, I did a little detour to pick up a rigid heddle loom from a wonderful lady in Lawrence, Kansas, so the trip back home was extended a bit. More on that detour in a future post.

We spent a lot of the time in Iowa running around Iowa City/Coralville and Cedar Rapids. Of course I had to hit the Half Price books in Cedar Rapids since they seem to always have the best stash of knitting books. I hit gold again. I found copies of "Creative Weaving" AND " Creative Spinning" for $7 each, 2 WONDERFUL Jo Sharp pattern books for $7 (they are normally $27 each according to the publishers price, so I was really happy) and a couple other goodies. While I didn't stop at the Half Price Books in Clive, Iowa and Overland Park, KS like I usually do, I did make a stop at the Penzy's Spice store in Clive to pick up a couple of their cooking magazines and some spices. It gave Jeremy and I an opportunity to get out of the car to stretch our legs and take a mental break from the road.

We also spent an hour walking around Bass Pro Shops. Next time we are going to sidetrack to Cabella's also since the boys love both places. Since Kansas City is only 3 hours from us, we might have to ride up there sometime to just check them out. I bought a Garmin GPS for this trip and it was a life saver. There were only a couple quirks to it, but these can be dealt with since overall it was a really accurate tool.

This season promises to have a lot of travel and learning opportunities for our family.