April 1 - 16, 2021

April 1-16, 2021

April 1 saw us at another tennis match in Pittsburg, KS.  Tucker did well here taking 2nd place. It was much cooler here especially by mid to late afternoon.  Those spring games (baseball, tennis, track, etc.) can turn colder than some of the winter sports.  It always feels so nice and warm when we arrive, and in a couple of hours it feels like winter again.  

Tucker and Preston, his good friend and tennis partner in doubles today.

April 4 we enjoyed Easter Sunday Sunrise service at Steve and Cheryl Lewis' - a beautiful location overlooking the Neosho River, as we watched the sun come up.  We enjoyed our Pastor Jim's message.  Afterwards, we enjoyed a breakfast prepared by ladies in the church.  It was a beautiful morning remembering Jesus' resurrection.  We attended church later that morning.  After lunch we drove to Independence, KS to check out camping at Elk City State Park.  We are always looking for new places to visit, plus it might be a location for a future casual campout with our Escapees group.

April 5 - another walk in the park this morning, and it was even more beautiful after the rain yesterday.  

April 9 - We decided to take a drive to seek out an Eagle's nest near Oswego that we had heard about.  We were so blessed to see not only the dad but the mom and it appeared to be two small eaglets.  What a wonderful site!  From there we drove around in the Mined Pit Area northwest of Oswego.  It was a really beautiful area today as the trees were blooming beautifully, and storm clouds were building giving an entirely different look to the area as well.

Eagle Nest - we could see Dad, Mom and 2 Eaglets in the nest.

Mined Land Pits  Here are several pictures I took during our drive.  You can click on the link to read more about the pit areas.

Red buds were in full bloom - so pretty

One of the pits in the area - so pretty and serene this afternoon.

Trout pit.

Beautiful scenery across from the trout pit.

Open country road with clouds in the background.

Pretty grass

April 10 - We were up early this morning - 4:30am!  We were fortunate that 3 of our grandkids were participating in sports today in Wichita.  We like to see at least one of their games during the season.  Emerson's first soccer game was this morning.  She did such a good job, making a goal at the end of the game; so we were glad we were able to witness that in person.  

Emerson in the mint green hat and pink socks.

After her game, Dean and I stopped at McAlister's for lunch, then we stopped at Menard's to look around.  By the time we finished looking around there it was time to watch Roman play soccer.  

Roman blue shirt in bottom picture, in top picture blue with yellow/black socks.

We watched about 20 minutes of his game, then moved to the football field right behind the soccer field to watch Gideon play flag football.  Since we saw Roman play basketball a few weeks ago, we wanted to spend most of the time watching Gideon's game.  We enjoyed both of them.

Gideon is in the far right of these pictures.  I've decided after taking these pictures I need something I can zoom in to get better closeups.

April 12 - I took our printer and my chromebook to Best Buy in Joplin to see if they could help us figure out the problems of the two connecting.  I didn't think to bring our Mifi, so they could connect to it, so no solution to the problem.  

April 13 - We were in Parsons for another tennis match with Tucker.  This match didn't go as well but I think he still placed 3rd.  It's always fun to watch grandkids activities.

April 16 - We had planned to spend a few days in Branson last week, but with so many things going on we decided to cancel, which caused a bit of a problem.  We had our mail sent to General Delivery at Branson, so we got up early today to drive over to pick it up.  It had not arrived when we got there, so we stopped at Bob Evan's Restaurant for a quick breakfast.  We both had the biscuits and gravy.  They were really good.  We've wondered why we don't go there more often.   When we returned I picked Jaxson up at school.  It was fun spending time with him.  I had to stop in Oswego for awhile, and then I took him on to Altamont.  Dad and Sissy (Kamron) were both inside, so I was able to visit with all of them before I left.  Unfortunately, Jen doesn't get home until later in the day, so I didn't get a chance to see her.

They recently finished this "tunnel" under I-44 where 96 intersects with it.  

As we drove to the post office we had to stop at this intersection.  It looked a little funny with a truck facing us - as he was being towed.

I hope to have updates on our travels over the next couple of weeks within a day or two.