Arkansas! and there is no place like home!

We were all so tired we didn't get on the road when we wanted to. But... better late than never. The plan was to meet up with an old high school buddy and my brother in a quaint little town near where I grew up called Heber Springs.

Entering Arkansas.

We were all struck by the mountain views. Especially after coming from the flat land of Oklahoma. The views in Arkansas were breath taking.

You know your in Arkansas cause everyone is a hog fan. Go Hoggs!

We had enough day light to go visit the Greers Ferry Dam. When I was in high school we all used to hang out at Greers Ferry all the time.

Here is the gang at the bottom of the dam.

Here is the Heslin's in front of the dam. And friend from high school's daughter.

Youngest daughter posing in front of the dam.

And of course we had to go to the other side! You can see the enormous amount of water the dam holds back.

Brother J wanted to get some shots.

Greers Ferry lake in the back ground.

We visited the Ozark Country Market where friend from high school bought me lots of Amish supplies. People don't realize how many Amish people live in Arkansas but actually there is a large population of Amish called Mennonites that live in this area. They sell baked goodies just like the ones in Pennsylvania. Later we went out to eat at Hensleys Catfish Barn. The food was very good. Smorgash board style. With all you can eat bars of food. Loads of catfish, chicken, frog legs, all things fried. And for desert there were all sorts of cobblers. Yum. and very filling. Then we went to the bowling alley to burn off some of those calories. It was a lot of fun.

Friend from high school enjoying some cat fish and frog legs.

The gang at the bowling alley.

Youngest daughter decided she wasn't such a bad bowler. But not at good as the little girl with us.

 We didn't sleep very good that night and with the thought of sleeping in our own beds... we were eager to get up and head home. So we didn't stick around long. But first we met brother J for breakfast and then went and checked out his job.

Brother J bright and early the next day.

We said good bye to Brother J in front of his work.

Rest stop on the way out of Arkansas.

This rest stop was so nice it made it hard to leave Arkansas. By the way that's the husband out there.

Heading home!

When we got back to Oklahoma we found Oldest daughter and baby back in the hospital. Baby had developed jaundice. Treatment for it is to put the baby in a tiny little tanning bed. After another week of sitting by her side under the lights she was finally released. And we were all pooped from running back and forth. Unfortunately it was time for us to be getting back to Florida. We had only one day to enjoy together where we helped look for a new house for baby and Oldest daughter and did some shopping. In Texas. We woke up early and went to Ihop for brunch and boy was it good. After eating hospital food. Hospital food is bad....Army hospital food is really strangely bad.

Grand baby in tanning bed.

On the way to IHOP  no more jaundice.  

Having a great brunch.

Kansas!

Since the baby was here and healthy we decided to take my sister back to Kansas where we visited with my Niece, her husband and kids.

Niece, Sister K, and me.

Playing wee in the entertainment room.

Little niece all passed out from the excitement.

We had a good time and played some wee bowling before heading back to Oklahoma.

More vacation. Only a few more post.

Finally the big day came yay! We went to the hospital to have the baby induced. Little did we know we would be there for 40 hours. There was a scare where we all thought she would have to have a c-section. But one of the nurses who was studying to be a mid wife took a chance at repositioning the baby in the birth canal and thirty minutes after that our little bundle joined the world.

The long wait! She was in a little pain here. Unless you looked at the monitor and saw she was in a lot of pain.

 Grandpa had the privlage of the first diaper change. But he had lots of experts helping. The Aunt and the Great Aunt helped out too.

First diaper change.

 After a long hard labor everyone was exhausted.

Official first photo!

The next day we drove my sister K back to Kansas.

We made it to Oklahoma!

We got to Oklahoma in the night. The next day Erica took us to the Wichita Mountains Wild life Refuge which was just outside of Lawton. She had heard that walking was good for baby's. I don't recommend walking on a mountain when your nine months pregnant. But Oldest daughter did. It was so amazing there the views and the wind was blowing and there were no other people any where. It was like a religious experience and it was the first day of Lent. What we didn't know was that in the middle of the wild life refuge is a holy city that way back in the 1920's and 1930's had over 40,000 worshipers coming to see their passion play.And in 1939 they had 225,000 people show up in the middle of the desert to see this play.  And that is where our exploration of the wild life refuge ended up. But just before we reached the Holy City our batteries for the camera died and my phone was still dead. So there are only a few pictures taken on Oldest daughters camera. But sadly, I don't have them. So these are the photo's from the refuge that we do have. Enjoy.

Grampa with his Grand dog. On the way to the mountains.

Beautiful pile of rocks! That are really big!

The buffalo are right next to the road. No fences.

More and more buffalo!

Some of the beautiful scenery.

We found a strange dam in the middle of no where. In this dry and desolate looking place.

Grandpa noticed a rock marker on the other side. And Oldest daughter thought she could make it across.

About this time I started worrying. What about flash floods, what if first daughter falls, what if a buffalo shows up, what about mountain lions? Oh, My we are going down into this river bed.

Even Youngest daughter was a little concerned. As she said "Really, down a cliff with a pregnant woman and two dogs."

At the bottom. You can see how windy it was by my hair.

And even though no one else was concerned about wild animals. I found several buffalo poops to prove I was right. They were mostly old petrified ones.

This was a really beautiful old tree at the bottom of the ravine. Youngest daughter just had to get a picture.

Marker stone was in site.

About this time I was complaining about my ham string which I pulled about a month ago.

But the view from the other side was amazing!

Here is the view of the car from the other side.

And having made it to the other side to find the marker rock and read what it had to say. We had a good laugh cause the plaque was missing.

Me with the rock. You can see Grandpa chasing after Older daughter who wanted to continue on hiking.

And Younger daughter with the wind in her hair. Maybe a Native American spirit had grabbed it.

I couldn't go on with my ham string as they decided to go look and see what was over the ridge. More openness.

Finally decided to turn back.

I found the perfect rock to bring back to Florida. Shortly after this I had to go barefoot. It helped my ham string.

We stopped at the bottom and took a break. This was a perfect little seating area.

We drove past the visitor center.

And past another fishing hole.

We entered a forested area. Well, what people in Oklahoma call trees anyway.

And in those trees......deer!

Soon we came upon an old homestead. Relax it was part of the park.

There was a well and we decided to pump some water for the dogs.

The trees in this area seemed enchanted. All gnarled oaks. It felt like eyes were on you.

And there were eyes on us, deer eyes.

We traveled on....

...and on.

We passed a cow who turned and stuck it's tongue out at us.

We saw buffalo....

after buffalo...

after buffalo!

We had to stop while one slowly crossed the road. Oldest daughter mentioned something about buffalo's charging at cars I think.

But this one mossied along.

We passed more cows.

The road went on like this for  a while.

Soon we came to a strange looking tower.

This was right out front of the Holy City

Image I stole from the Internet of the Holy City.

Just before arriving at the Holy City we saw parrie dogs everywhere but the camera batteries were dead. Youngest daughter and I stayed out side of the gates to the city as pets were not allowed. How ever the Jesus statue was out side the gates and the dogs seemed to want to hike up to it. So we did. And when I got there the dog was urging me to clime up onto the statue where I saw a sign that said this rock is from Mount Olive. So I reached up and touched the rock. I thought it was kind of neet I was collecting a rock to bring back to Florida from Oklahoma and some one way back when had collected a rock from Mt. Olive and brought it there.