Going Through Life One Blog Post at a Time
After walking over 15,000 steps, I decided to make some sweets tonight – Puppy Chow, Chocolate Rice Krispie Treats, and Banana Breakfast Cookies. Since Andy is off at a Cub Scout Committee Meeting, I think I will make myself a grilled cheese sandwich and then pizza for the kids. A nice glass of white wine will just top off my day!
After nearly six months of being a complete mess, we took about three hours today and organized our John Deere room (that is an indoor shed in the corner of our basement for those who don’t know the terminology). Everything is now put away and you can walk all around the room.
We have a decent pile of things that will be put out with the trash/recycling on Friday and we still have to dispose of 18 cans of paint and stain, but the room looks great and we actually have space for a larger freezer! Sweet!
We are finally getting around to hanging pictures in our bedroom. These two are framed and ready to be hung! Maybe soon our bedroom will stop echoing…
Today we ventured to Strataca, the Kansas Underground Salt Museum, before leaving for home.
Yes, the museum is in an active salt mine that is 650 feet below the surface. The trip down was a bit disconcerting as it was completely dark, but what a great experience for all of us. I tease Andy for picking up all those tourist brochures in the different hotels that we stay at, but it really does work out sometimes!
The museum is located in an area that was mined back in the 1950s and the year-round temperature is 70 degrees. It was very interesting to learn all about salt mining and the miners themselves. John was fascinated by the large machines that were (and are) used in the active mine.
The tour included a self-paced walking tour, a short train ride, and the “Dark Ride” with a tour guide. At one stop along the Dark Ride, it was amazing to see the pile of trash left over from the 1950s. I saw an old Campbell’s Soup Can and a calendar on the floor that you could still read quiet well.
It is customary to leave everything in the mine. This results in a lot of equipment laying around that is not in use anymore along with all kinds of other things like boxes that once held explosives, and, of course, the trash. The Dark Ride ended with a stop that allowed everyone to pick up their own piece of salt. The kids were very excited to get to do this and each picked out a few small pieces.
After visiting the gift shop to buy a magnet and then getting a “squished penny,” we left for home about 11:45. We decided to break up the drive a little by stopping about 90 minutes away in Emporia, Kansas, for lunch. We ate lunch at a local brewery, Radius Brewing Company, that I had found online. Of course, Andy and I had to try the beers so we shared a flight. The beers were quite good and the food was great!
We arrived home right about 6 pm. It was a great, short trip and we all had fun. If you ever get a chance to visit Hutchinson, do it! You will not be disappointed.
First, Happy Birthday Dad! We hope your day is great!
We spent the day at the Cosmosphere (http://cosmo.org/).
Who knew that this amazing museum was in the middle of Kansas? The things we saw today made me stop and think that I was truly looking at pieces of history. In addition to the Space Museum, the Cosmosphere has a Planetarium, Dome Theater, and Dr. Goddard’s Lab where they “blow stuff up” (or give a lesson about rockets). Also, a crew from the television show “Mysteries at the Museum” was filming there today. Laura was beyond excited about that because she loves that show! We talked to the two-person crew for a little bit as we were leaving the Cosmosphere. What a fun day!
We started the day at the museum portion of the Cosmosphere. Most people do not realize that if it were not for Nazi Germany, the United States might never have gone to the moon. The museum began with a display about the development of the rockets that were the precursor to the Saturn V rockets used in the Apollo space program. The story is both scary and sad, but looking at one of the real rockets made me actually speechless.
After wandering through the German portion of the museum and then into the Cold War portion, it really starts to come together for you that there was a space race. I am not old enough to have lived through most of it, but when you see the stories and the artifacts, it hits you. This is a real Soviet Sputnik satellite. It never flew in space, but it is one of the actual satellites.
We spent so much time in the first two portions of the museum, that we had to leave it to go to our scheduled Dome Theater show where we saw “Extreme Weather,” a National Geographic documentary on how weather shapes the environment on Earth. We followed that show with a trip to Dr. Goddard’s Lab where we all enjoyed watching the different science experiments. Then, it was on to a fast snack in the food court before our Planetarium show. We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering through the rest of the museum. I especially loved the Apollo portion of the museum. This is a real Apollo Lunar Module. It was used in training.
Next was a moon rock from the actual Apollo 11 landing. I could have looked at it all afternoon. This rock was once on the moon. The Moon. The smooth surface is because it was sliced into pieces for analysis. My mind was blown that I was looking at an actual moon rock.
The part of the museum that really made me speechless was the actual Apollo 13 Command Module – the Odyssey. The museum restored the Odyssey from 1995 to 1997 by finding and properly placing the 80,000 components that were housed in different storage facilities across the United States. Everyone has heard the stories or seen the movie, but when you look at the actual Odyssey and see the heat shield, it is amazing. Simply amazing.
We spent the rest of the day eating a nice dinner and playing in the hotel pool. We had originally planned to drive back to Kansas City tonight, but Andy discovered that there is a salt mine museum in Hutchinson also. Off to that tomorrow!
Why would we go to Hutchinson, Kansas, for a quick trip during Spring Break? Well, because we won tickets to the Cosmosphere (yes, there *is* a Space Museum in the middle of nowhere Kansas) from the Silent Auction at Ridgeway FunDay. So, we drove to Kansas today, had a nice dinner at Applebee’s, and spent the rest of the night in the hotel pool!
