Visit home

We started out by driving 1500 miles and made really good time until we got to Missouri and ran into all the traffic and got into a traffic jam before we got to St. Louis. It took us 21 hours, we left Thursday morning and drove for 14 hours and then had 7 hours on Friday. One of my best friends Slade and his family came by to visit with us on Saturday and it was nice to get caught up with them because it had been about 9 years since we had seen each other. Then we spent alot of the day playing freeze tag with my nephews and nieces. Sunday we went to the DuQuoin State fair but didnt take the camera but we watched a rodeo and towards the end they put a ribbon on a bull and if you took it off you got a $100. We thought that bull would be older or more tame but when they opened the gate a bull with 2 or 3 ft horns on each side came busting out looking for someone to hit and the first guy he hit got flipped up in the air and did a complete flip then he took off and hit some more people and some jumped over the fence but nobody got the ribbon. It was alot of first for Shana she caught her first bass, bluegill, and catfish. She acutally caught a good sized bass and said that they were fun to catch along with the catfish even though they weren't very big they put up a fight. We also went down toward Shawneetown IL on the Ohio river and went to Cave in Rock where indians use to hideout there until the pirates ran them out and also they filmed a Davy Crockett movie there ( the one with Mike Fink and the river pirates). That was one of my favorites growing up. Then after that we went on a ferry ride across the Ohio river which Shana had never done. Once we were into Kentucky we went to Pattis Settlement and had lunch there. We got some good pics there and did some remote control boating. Then when we were almost home we stopped in Benton IL to show Shana where the last guy was hanged in IL. His name was Charlie Birger and he was a gangster in the local area. If anybody is intersted in knowing more about him they have a book called Bloody Williamson. Then on Thursday we got to go visit grandparents for a little while. Also a friend of mine threw a party for us Monday night but we forgot the camera but they grilled some food and had alot of people over and once everyone left we got to play cards with them which was nice. We didnt get to do everything we wanted to do but I guess that leaves something for next time. Oh and by the way mom I gained 4 pounds and Shana 3 but it was worth it. Thanks for everything.