May 17


Cowtown in Wichita, KS

Kara spent the day with us today and we drove into Wichita to Cowtown.....she took us out to lunch to Merle's, a long time restaurant and we all enjoyed a good meal complete with a juke box for the kids to pick music from.  While we were at lunch, Kara got a call from her 1/2 sister on her birth mom's side with the unfortunate news that her birth mom had passed away.  This was a call she has been expecting but it was still a sad for her to hear the news.  Lani, her birth mom, has been suffering from ALS or Lou Gehrigs disease and it has been an awful thing for Kara to see happen to her. 
At Cowtown, we experienced life in the 1870s by immersing ourselves in a sampling of the sights, sounds and activities common to a Midwestern cattle town.  We experienced the dramatic clash of Victorian ideals and economic realities as these competing forces strove to create an economically viable cattle town and a Victorian metropolis.

This is where the cattle would be driven from Texas, across the plains to Wichita where they were loaded onto railroad cars and transported to Missouri to be slaughtered for food.  We walked along the rails and stopped at the coral and loading gate as we made our way to the train depot and telegraph office. 



enjoying our sarsparilla

The kids played the old time piano and pretended to preach in the small church, toured many of the houses, saw a texas longhorn cow, percheron horses at the livery stable, sat in a stage coach, checked in with the local law enforcement, drank a cold sarsparilla at the saloon, witnessed a robbery and gun fight in the street, ducked into the jail, sheriffs office, general store, newspaper office, barbershop, carpenters workshop, undertakers, fur traders cabin, chuck wagon, prairie wagon full of furs, and the oldest house in Wichita.  All of the staff were in character and spoke to us as such.  The kids even got to try their hand at roping a steer!  We had a good ole time at Cowtown!!

Gracie sells me a line in the Miliners shop



hamming it up in the Milimers shop



meeting the LAW in town.....

Gracie got to pet one of the Percheron horses...

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Last night with Kara, Mark, Amanda and Kale.....Took some fun pics of the cousins.....

shairng the LOVE.....

My beautiful daughter.....

The kids played outside and I went with Kara to take some pics of Madison at Grafiti bridge.....Kara is a great photographer and wanted to do some of her magic on Madison.  She got some great shots.....came home and had chicken salad and leftover pasta.

checking out the pics of Mad

Mark really like Kara's new hat....

 

the kids have enjoyed getting to know Auntie Kara and Uncle Mark better

having fun sharing some laughs with Uncle Mark

We rejoined in our previous nights positions to finish watching Dancing with the Stars....the kids watched a movie together.  I don't want to leave.........