Since the main reason for our trip was this wedding, I probably should add a few pictures of it! It was a glorious day for an outdoor wedding, and the family yard was the perfect venue. A very little light rain an hour or so before the wedding might have caused a bit of anxiety, but it cleared quickly and the air was just that more beautiful for having been washed!
Here Ryan escorts Laura, his mother-in-law-to-be-shortly, to her chair.
Then the adorable little ones…
And finally, Lonnie gets to walk his gorgeous daughter, Annie, down the aisle.
The service was done by both families.
Here some cousins posed after the wedding, and looked so good I have to include them.
A couple more good looking guests!
Younger sister Lyndi was looking pretty good too!
The weather and setting were scrumptious!
After formal pictures were taken, (That’s not this batch!) it was time for dinner.
Dinner was delicious, and the lighting superb.
A few toasts were given – a lot of fun!
Altogether a beautiful wedding – Here’s to you, Ryan and Annie! Happy Marriage!
The next day we drove to Fort Collins to see long-time friends Giny and Joe. We had a nice lunch, went for a bit of a walk, and just had fun hanging out. After dinner we got silly and watched “Galaxy Quest.” A comedy satire of all the Star Wars and Star Trek movies that is impossible to watch without laughing uproariously!
Then time to head home. First, charge up at Buc-ee’s in Loveland. We’ve stopped at a few Buc-ee’s in the motorhome, but never really went in. This place is huge! We walked around the perimeter; there are 260 gas pumps! And inside they have everything! We might have purchased a cinnamon pull-apart in addition to some fall decorations… once again, the car sent us a note that it was charged up enough for our next destination, long before we were done in the store.
The view of mountains made us glad we’d had at least a bit of time in Colorado’s beautiful mountains before we set out east across the plains.
Our next stop was in Sterling, Colorado. We didn’t want to stop for toooo long, but a potentially interesting museum beckoned.
It turns out the museum is very large, and really interesting! Here’s a brief description from their website:
The Museum is named after the Overland Trail stage route, a branch of the Oregon Trail. The Overland Trail followed the south bank of the South Platte River through northeastern Colorado. History suggests that the Overland Trail was America’s heaviest-traveled road, maybe even in the world, between 1862 and 1868. The Museum was opened in 1936 and was a project of the WPA. The original building (now the front lobby) is made from native rock and designed after the early trading forts.
Many unique collections are housed in several different buildings. There was no way we could see everything!
I liked this collection of old radios, and even a little TV.
The TV is a 1948 Admiral, with an original cost of $169.95. That 7 inch beauty was about $2,000 in today’s dollars. TV’s were first sold in the U.S. at the New York World’s Fair, in 1939, so this one was only 9 years into the TV age.
I’d never heard of Ginny dolls, so just having visited our friend Giny, these caught my eye. I guess Ginny dolls, and her trendy teen siblings, Jill and Jeff, were a big deal. You can find them for a couple hundred dollars online now! (Barbie was introduced in 1959, a couple of years after Jill and Jeff, and the competition was stiff… Vogue dropped these dolls soon after.)
An amazingly detailed doll house was on display. Even the interior rooms were furnished with incredible detail.
This Fischer Square Grand Piano was originally bought by Mr. & Mrs. Cheairs in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1865 (think Civil War time.) In 1878 they brought it by rail to Sidney, Nebraska, and then by wagon to their home in Old Sterling. Mrs. Cheairs gave music lessons, and it was said she would rock her baby’s cradle with one hand while conducting lessons with the other. Later the piano was used for barn dances on the T.A. Probst Ranch. (There is still a ranch by that name, who claims to have been in operation for five generations. Probably because they had so much fun at those barn dances!)
An old pump organ is also on display. My grandparents always had a pump organ, and when we were little kids, my sister, Lori, and I would enjoy pumping the foot pedals by hand, while grandma would play hymns.
There are many buildings on the property, and this one is rather strange. It looks like the facia of an old farmhouse applied to a house of shipping containers.
The rest of the buildings looked better suited to their period…
A school room:
A general store: This general store maximized their limited storage space by cleverly storing rope in the crawl space under the store. To purchase rope, it was pulled up through holes drilled in the floor!
We had fun at the museum, and maybe if we get back that way, we can check out the rest of it!
Sometimes we stop even if the car doesn’t need recharging – we do! Here’s a beautiful rest stop in Julesburg, Colorado. Gorgeous flowers in abundance, and some pretty pollinators too!
Our 1st road trip in an electric car was an awesome success! Yes, we stopped more often than we used to in the motorhome, and more than would be required in the Suburban. But the timing seemed great – every 2 or 3 hours, it’s a good idea to stop and walk a bit. The car was always ready to go before we were!
It’s great to see Giny and Joe! I’ve been enjoying Joe’s photography via Facebook. He’s so good at it! Years ago, their daughter turned up here in Switzerland. If I remember correctly, she’d been attending Bogenhofen and was touring around during vacation. She had her violin with her and played for us at a church function. In talking with her afterward, it came out who her parents are. What a delightful surprise that was!
The museum you visited reminds me of the Swiss open air museum, Ballenberg. They’ve bought old houses from all the different regions of Switzerland, disassembled them and transported them to this museum near Interlaken. There they’ve been reassembled and renovated to their original condition. Old trades are also demonstrated live. It’s a wonderful museum.
Again, great to hear from you! Fun story about Bethany!
We’ve been to that fabulous museum in Ballenberg. This prairie museum might be similar in concept, but nothing like it in size or magnificence! Or maybe I’ve just romanticized Swiss architecture and history over prairie life!