KidMACHINE In My Bug Machine

The best part about being on a 28 hour road trip is having a nerdy brother who just wants to sit and DJ for you the whole time (as if we couldn't get enough music at a four day music festival). If we had it our way, the world would never be not pulsing with some sort of beat. Even when you are in the mood for quiet, you want to hear your heart beat.

This is what Max came up with on the way from Amanda's: Coming from Omaha

Here is picture taken somewhere before Kansas City.

It's a Wendy's and Hotel which has closed up for the floodageddon 2011.

The sign on the marquee for the hotel read "gone fish'n":

 Smashed bugs on a bug:

Speaking of Kansas City --- the new temple is right off the freeway, and was a pleasant little surprise we didn't know we were going to get to see.

Beautiful Steamboat

So this is my second year back to Kansas City, and my second time visiting the arabia steamboat. I love this steamboat, out of all the things I have visited in all my little trips and holidays, on my mission, and even back in Europe, this museum competes for one of the coolest things I have ever seen. I love everything about it, and how the steamboat got to be here. I am jealous of the family that discovered the steamboat and the adventures that they've shared in digging it out and finding all this buried cargo. It's just so crazy and lucky for them. They found history perfectly preserved in the Missouri mud. I can't think of many things that would be funner than looking for buried treasure and then actually finding it.

The steamboat they found had a ginormous cargo full of merchandise for the little towns along the river. It went down without ever making a stop, the top part of the steamboat broke off and floated further down the river, but the cargo hold sunk and was never recovered. After a century and a half, the river course changed, leaving the boat buried in preserving mud in the middle of a farmers corn field. The boat was there till the rumor of a buried steamboat reached the ears of one of the coolest families ever, the Hawleys, who went out and started digging.

Here's just a few pictures I took of what they dug out:

keys, door knobs, hinges, tools

knives, forks, spoons

dishes, china, bottles, kettles, pots and pans

clothes pins

wooden matches

fruit

I don't know if anyone else finds this stuff exciting. I obviously can't get enough of it. I think I love it because it's just such a fun story, and I'm happy that someone got to experience it and then share it with the rest of us. I, for one, am grateful.

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The Best Afternoon

So I just got back from the Arabia Steamboat, and it was even better than how I imagined that it would be! I loved it! I love going to that type of stuff, and learning about history and letting my imagination run wild on what it would be like if I lived in a time era like that.

During the tour we watched a film about the men who dug out the boat twenty years ago... and at the end, the man himself was standing there to answer questions! How wonderful! And I asked if he tried the pickles that they dug out.

I encourage all of you readers to visit this steamboat!

PS. I may post some pictures soon of what I saw. But I think I lost the CD they were on!

Steamboat Arabia Plans

While I am in Kansas City I am making my team visit a museum dedicated to the Steamboat Arabia, which sank, and for some reason was covered in mud and rediscovered later. I don't know much about it, but I am sure I will learn the whole story while I am there. I am so excited, I can't even wait! I love historical stuff! I may even read Huckleberry Finn on the plane or something, there is a steamboat in that book right?

Here is a little quote that I grabbed from the museums website: Unbelievable treasures and fascinating history await. Explore our museum and learn how the handsome steamer Arabia prospered on the rivers, perished in 1856 and was finally rediscovered 132 years later, precious cargo intact. This exhibit, in Kansas City, Mo, is many things: history, ingenuity, tragedy, adventure, perseverance, preservation and a tribute to the pioneer spirit.
This is Life! Come explore!

So good.