| |
Last weekend was my Grandfather's 80th birthday, and they had a great big bash up at his farm in Illinois. My mom went up a few days early, then my brother and I flew into St. Louis and rented a car to drive up and surprise him. We got to Payson the night before, helped pack some chairs and tables into the pick up trucks, and then headed back to the farm and walked around in the dark, looking at the stars.
In the morning, we spent a couple hours walking around the fields. There's soybeans, corn, cows, a couple of horses, and some miniature donkeys there, but most of the land is actually rented out to another farmer at this point. While we were walking, saw one deer as well as plenty of signs of more deer and raccoons, and we sat out by one of the ponds for a bit too. The farm is huge though - hundreds of acres - so once we got done with our walk, we went with our Uncle Bruce on the Mule (which is like a golf cart with 4WD) to see the back fields and woods.
In the afternoon, family and friends started driving in. Altogether, there must have been almost 200 people there. For the main course, they were frying up catfish, onion rings, and french fries, plus nearly everyone brought plenty of good food. We had tables, chairs, and a band set up in my Uncle Bruce's new barn, but there were tons of people all over the place. The festivities went on into the evening, and I got a nice bruise on my leg from kids throwing apples at each other.
Since I grew up in Florida, I've only been to the farm about four or
five times before, so it was great getting to see Grandpa and the rest
of the family and play with my cousin's son Hayden. Even my Aunt's
family from Albuquerque made the trek, and I've only seen them once or
twice before.
In the morning, Grandpa took us out-of-towners out to breakfast, and James and I packed up to head back to the airport. Mom took us out to see my cousin Linda's place on the way, which was pretty cool since they pretty much built their house on their own. Then after hanging out for an hour there, it was time for us to head back to the airport and fly home.
I took a lot of pictures and posted them online, so if you want, check out the full album.
|
| | Posted 8/9/2008 10:06 PM - 14 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
- recommend
  - recs0
- share
- email
 - sent0
|
