Earlier this month my dad, Mark, Jared, and I were looking for somewhere to eat lunch. Jared had come to my parents house to help Mark replace a ceiling fan and fix a light, but when noon hit, it was time to eat. We had to run to town anyway so we decided to grab lunch when we headed to town. Jared asked if we’d eaten at Double D Cafe in Duenweg, MO. We said, No so it was on. That’s where we went.
On our way home from Metropolis, we decided to stop in Springfield at PFI Western Wear and from there we went on the hunt for the Cold Stone Creamery. I must say it’s a good thing this place wasn’t in town when I was going to college… I might have eaten here a few too many times… maybe. Maybe not….
Anyway, pictured above, I went for the Birthday Cake Ice Cream. Cake batter ice cream, rainbow sprinkles, brownie bites, and fudge. What’s not to love?!?!
Last week was the Lamar Fair. I pretty much grew up there during high school and college. In fact, from the time I was 15, I think I only missed 1 until I was too old to show there. That’s not to bad I don’t think. And I have lots of good memories from there… like the time that I got into a water fight. I’ll have you know I didn’t start it.
Okay, so the water fights at the Lamar fair… At the end of every livestock portion of the fair, there was typically a water fight. The officials tried to stop it, but it never happened, so then they banned it from being under the tents (yup we were under tents at the time, now they’re under a pavilion). So as long as the water fight stayed outside the tents, it was fair game. 2 friends and I had left to go get lunch. When we got back, Chelsea and I made a deal that if one of us got wet, the other would join in on the fight.
I took off running like mad because we both had kids hot on our tail, I dove into someone’s sheep pens head first while she got soaked. So I walked out the front of the tent and said hit me, which caused me to get hit with 4 different buckets of water from all directions. But then, the hunt was on. What do I mean? Oh Chelsea and I were out to get all our fellow sheep participants involved in the water fight. By the end of the water fight, I’m pretty sure that most all sheep participants we showed with were soaked, including our official leader. He was a parent, but we didn’t take mercy.
Those are the kind of stories I want my kids to have. Fun ones. Even though it sucked being soaked in jeans and boots, it was a lot of fun and something I wouldn’t trade. Luckily for me, I brought dry clothes to go home in. Poor Lexie, a fellow competitor we got soaked, she did not, so she had to ride home pants less or so her mom told us.
Abug is too little to show yet, but when I heard the Lamar Fair was going on, I asked the hubs if we could go up one night. The one thing about the Lamar fair is that they have rides as well as the animal portion of the fair. We always start out in the livestock barns because, well, that’s where I grew up. It’s always funny to me to see the kids who were her age when I was showing, now being at that showing age. It’s CRAZY!
Case in point… This kid right here was like 2-4 years old the last year I could show. Now he’s 17 year’s old I think someone told me earlier this summer.
After yacking with my friend Casey and his dad Randy for a while down in the sheep barns, and Casey and hubby ganging up on me more than once (by the way, I have multiple stories on Casey… we’ve been friends way to long), we decided to head up to the carnival portion of the fair.
Once upon a time I ran across a list of blogging prompts. One of the prompts was share the favorite room in your home, and why you love it. I immediately knew which room I would choose, I would choose the kitchen. And while that may be a bit of a stretch, here is my reasoning.
Growing up I had a love hate relationship with cooking. I loved to cook but I hated to wait for whatever it was I was cooking to finish because I was usually “starving” or at least so I thought at the time.
As I got older I started making a “hope” chest. You know what that is, right? A hope that you get married, except I wasn’t hoping I’d get married, I hoped I’d have my own kitchen. Everything I collected happened to be kitchen gadgets and utensils. When Food Network started up, I used to watch it religiously, trying to learn how to cook from the greats, Tyler Florence, Emeril Lagassee, Rachael Ray, Paula Deen… I wanted nothing more to do than to learn to be one of the greats when it came to the kitchen.
This past weekend at my house was… let’s just say interesting. We’ll leave it at that for now… But I woke up on Saturday morning and was hungry. Mark asked if wanted his sausage/tatortot thing and I told him I was thinking either waffles, pancakes, or biscuits and gravy. He chose Biscuits and Gravy. So I hopped out of bed and went and made biscuits and gravy… all from scratch.
A few years ago I set out to figure out how to make biscuits. I burned more batches than I care to share, until I found these. They are big, buttery, thick, flakey, everything you could want in a biscuit. While I was on my quest, a blog friend suggested to melt butter in a cast iron skillet and bake the biscuits in the melted butter in a warm cast iron skillet to get a nice crusty, buttery bottom, and since then my life has been forever changed.
1. A day in the life post – These are always fun because it allows people to get a feel for your day.
2. What’s in your Camera Bag – Sometimes this is helpful for other people. It allows them to get ideas for their own bag, especially if they are newer to photography.
3. What camera you use – I always love these. It allows me to see what other people use and I’m nosey like that. I devour camera reviews.
4. Speaking of Camera bag – What camera bag do you have and what features do you like?
5. Start a 365 project – It is time consuming but oh so worth it. I’m about to wrap up my second year of doing this. Yup, 2 years now. I think I’m going for a 3rd, but changing it up a bit. Either focusing solely on photos from my dSLR or maybe Black and White Photos. I haven’t decided yet.
6. Show some behind the scenes in setting up a picture – Not everyone knows what goes on behind the scenes of a photoshoot.
On our drive home Sunday, we made it as far as Poplar Bluff before needing fuel for the truck and our bellies. I did a quick search for restaurants, other than the Dairy Queen we ate at for lunch and the MacDonalds (aka McDonald’s… there’s a story there!). I came across the fact that Poplar Bluff had a Colton’s Steakhouse, so we decided to eat there.
If you’ve been to a Colton’s before, you know they serve you rolls before your meal. If you’ve never been, hey, they serve you rolls with your meal. And these rolls are so yummy! I could make a meal out of these rolls.
There’s a story, of a trip to Mermet… oh wait, that was last year’s theme song. There actually wasn’t a theme song this year… more of a quote… but I’m not putting that out there!
It’s the yearly trek to Mermet Springs over in Metropolis Illinois. Last year on our way we found an Italian Restaurant we wanted to eat at. Turns out we’d have had to wait for 4 hours. This year, we made reservations and trust me, it was worth it. Italian Grill on Broadway. After dinner we went down to the Ohio River shore which was like 8 blocks or so. The weather was perfect for an outing like this. And our friends John and Nelda met us for dinner and our walk to the shore.
Down at the shore there were all these murals on the wall giving the history of Paducah. I wish I’d have had time to read them all!
Saturday night we decided to cross the river to the other side… or at least go across the Ohio River from Metropolis to Paducah, KY. Same difference, right? After a day long diving at Mermet Springs, we were hungry. On Thursday night we saw this restaurant and decided on Saturday night to try it.
Hello, welcome to the guide on where to eat, or maybe not eat depending, in Metropolis, Illinois. Now Metropolis is the home of Superman, but I’m not sure if this is the actual town that the show/movie was filmed in… but it’s Metropolis, Illinois, none the less.
First off, El Tequila. After diving at Mermet Springs all day on Friday, we were trying to decide where to go for dinner. Mark and Jared asked Glenn, the owner of Mermet Springs for suggestions and he said El Tequila in Metropolis. If that’s a suggestion, of course we’ll take it! It had a 4 out of 5 stars on Trip advisor, so that’s good, right?
