Fair Haven Campout

October 12 & 13 found us at the Fair Haven district camp-out, hosted by Darwin & Beth Fisher at Vernon & Donna Hirt's. We missed the Friday evening program discussing world hunger with visual examples of statistics because Annie & I listened to Gracia Burnham speak for Magdalene Ministries at the Pratt College.

The children actually slept in the motor home parked outside our front door Friday night and before daybreak Saturday morning, we cruised down south of Sawyer in time for separate men and women devotions on Psalm 146 (Still Hungry?) while the children slept. 

9 a.m. breakfast was served up...a kettle full of fire-cooked sausage gravy, biscuits, fresh fruit, and juice.

Sitting around the fire with full tummies we pondered on Christian contentment...thankful to have a cup (whether half full or half empty) with something in it!

Later on we formed a food ration line. Experiencing a scoop of grits for our daily meal.

Most of the afternoon was spent doing the Campfire Cook-off. 5 teams planned and cooked a main dish and dessert form identical base ingredients. Then we got to choose from a large pantry to add to our pork loin, pot pie noodles, tomatillos, mandarin oranges, Pepsi, pancake mix, sweet potato chips, and peppermints. The creativity and variety of food was amazing! (Seriously...oranges, tomatillos, & pasta together? Or sweet potatoes & peppermint?! ) Here is the panel of judges taste-testing the first group's finished product.

Shannon's team served up sweet & sour stir fry, pumpkin cakes with pepsi reduction cream, and  peppermint hot chocolate.

Annie's team prepared Awesome Aussie roo stew and Madagascar choco-mint puff.

I didn't get a snapshot of my team's dish: pork tacos with fresh mandarin tomatillo salsa and cherry chocolate cheese bake, but, check out how the people flocked to our table for a taste of the leftovers!

I couldn't even get a picture without hands digging in!

Meanwhile the children were divided into 2 teams building forts in the woods by the creek.

This is Riley's group's hideaway.

That evening hamburgers were served up for supper. All ages enjoyed!

My younger children still occasionally quote form the humorous skit we watched after supper about an American missionary preacher and his interpreter stumbling over his figurative language phrases. "Small animals begin to fall from the sky, I don't know why! You put the gun on the ground and you begin jumping on it, I don't know why!" (As in it's raining cats & dogs and you jump the gun.)

Sunday dinner preparations for grilled skewers by chef Brendon....Teriyaki or Mesquite.

Served with butter coated mixed vegetables and rice. Rolls and pie.

Here are just a few other camp-out scenes. It seems I tend to capture mostly food in my photos!

Matthew 25 "For I was an hungered..." 

Fill up my truck was the theme, and it was full Sunday afternoon! Even overflowing into the front seats with more coming to the Pratt Food Bank later.

We motored our 25 minutes home to Pratt in the early evening. 3 children sacked out by 6pm! It was a fun, tiring weekend.

Indian Summer Days

Saturday September 28th we drove south to Medicine Lodge and Indian Summer Days. Caroline and Cora have always notices inflatables and thought they looked sooo fun, so this day they were able to jump to their heart's content for a couple of hours! Riley and Shannon explored the 1950's safari themed Gun Room in an 1880's building on Main Street. Annie and I browsed through the local thrift shop. 

There was a couple of smalltown magic performers that did some goofy things. Riley learned from this man how to put a nail straight back into his nasal cavity and slowly pull back out as a slimy surprise joke. (Comment on this post if you've seen him do this! ;))

After a taco eating contest, there was a hay scramble for children 4 years old and younger. It actually was rather difficult for them to locate candy on the bottom! 

We all walked to the park to observe the Keeper of the Plains Pow Wow. The Indians were dancing a welcome dance with their drummers.

Later one Native American danced to a country song.

We watched the short parade and ate at the hot dog feed for supper. Then went to our first ranch rodeo. It was quite amusing to watch the ranchers lasso a cow and milk her into a bottle as fast as possible! They also corralled calves and rode bucking broncos!

And that was our experience at Indian Summer Days!

Meg in Mama's Dresses

This was a dress and pinafore my mom saved that I (the only girl) wore when I was a little girl. We brought it home from Ohio after cleaning closets this summer. Meg Elizabeth is 14 months here, just getting used to toddling around.

She wasn't comfortable with this little step into the shop. 2 inches is a big deal at her size!

There's something so sweet about little people!

Another day Caroline tried on this other outfit that I used to wear. It is supposed to be a dress with bloomers, but looks like shorts and top on Meg! She's a bit old for this one!

But still our Little Lovin' !

Wichita Zoo

Thursday morning, Sept 19, we got up before daylight to get our breakfast at Krispy Kreme before the 9:30am session at the zoo started. We were still a little late, so, walked through the North America part of the zoo until the next sessions of Wetland Magic and Menu Mania.

We also went through the jungle area and spotted colorful birds, bats, and fish.
Meg took a morning nap in the backpack carrier while we listened to the 3rd session about zoo careers.

We met our Medicine Lodge friends for a picnic lunch...

...then spent a lot of time watching the chimpanzees and orangutans. They both had little 2 year old apes that frolicked around the pen and with the adult primates. Flipping, swinging, picking, tumbling, poking, flopping. So amusing!

Then we walked through the Australia habitat and almost ran into a kookaburra perched on a low branch.

After the gorillas and Asia, we ended up in Africa. Riley wanted to see the exotic birds again and the girls wanted to see the funny apes another time, so one last peek before exiting the zoo.

It was a lovely fall day; nice to be out , and nice to see the animals up and moving around!