Iowa Travels

This is at the Floyd Gospel Sing that we played at in Floyd Iowa. It was a neat festival to play at that mostly had Southern Gospel music, with a few bluegrass and other type bands mixed in. We played on Friday and Saturday, except that on Friday night, when we arrived, it was raining hard enough that we had to play inside the church. We didn't mind that though because it gave it more of a cozy feeling, plus the were a very welcoming and attentive audience. I really appreciated how they freely talked of Jesus Christ, even the MC. That is getting less and less common even in Gospel festivals.
Well, you're probably wondering why I have a picture of a policeman and a guy that looks like a pastor; instead of a picture of a Southern Gospel band. If you look closely at the policeman you might recognize him; maybe his uniform or his stance? That is a Barney Fife impersonator! Ever seen the Andy Griffith Show from the 50s? Barney Fife was Andy Griffith's deputy from Mayberry. If you have seen the show than this is the guy that probably jumped out at you the most. He is hilarious! This impersonator from, I want to say Branson Missouri, does a great job! His actions, voice, and appearance are all just like Barney, that you have to look twice every time he speaks.



He also was a fabulous harmonica player, unlike the real Barney Fife. :) He played the Orange Blossom Special and was just ripping it up. He was playing so fast that it sounded like he was playing all sorts of notes at once! There were a few harmonicas handy so that he could do different octaves on the same song. When he finished, he was so amazing that he got a standing ovation from some of the crowd.

And no that other guy isn't a pastor, he was our friendly MC and did a nice job.

The festival was a really large festival; so big that I wasn't able to get all the people on our camera. I think someone said that it had a few thousand people as a guesstimate. It was bigger than Itasca, I know. Being that it was so big, we were blessed with very good amounts of Cd sales, and Tessa and I sold a really good amount of jewelry.

A different angle of the festival.

During sets we went to a nearby park to eat dinner and to recreate. They had beautiful scenery there, and plenty of ducks and geese. They also had a bridge that was under construction that we decided would be nice to take a walk on, so we climbed over the construction stuff and took a walk on the bridge. Later we found out from our hosts for the night that it was in the newspaper the night before that no one was supposed to walk on that bridge! Oops! I guess they were replacing a former bridge that had collapsed and they weren't finished with this one. At least no one saw us. :)

Lucas feeding the hungry ducks.

These geese were a little too friendly for me. :) They would follow me around even if I didn't have food!

Family Camp

Now I am going to switch gears and bring you to home school family camp near Lansing Iowa. We arrived on Sunday when camp started, and left on Wednesday, although the camp goes till Thursday. This family camp was hosted by some friends of ours, the Bontrager Family and the Wissmann family who we know as well. This was our second year, this time with Lucas and Dad. Last time it was just us girls, and Isaac couldn't come both times because of conflicting collage classes. As last year, it was a sweet time of fellowship with like minded families. We received good counseling from the Bontragers and Wissmanns that really encouraged us, and were able to spend quality time with our family and friends. We totally recommend this camp for conservative Christan homeschoolers like these families.

This is a weird photo of Mr. Wissmann who does most of the family sessions. He used to be a preacher so he does a great job getting the message across.

This is the Bontrager family who we first met at Itasca four years ago, and have gotten to know their family well over the past three years. They have a family of 12 and have a wonderful family band.

This is a really fun game that we play at family camp called the Super Mighty Noodle Scoop Challenge. It's kind of like Capture the Flag, except it has lots of different objects and slightly different rules. We had so much fun with this game that I think we are going to try to do it at our other family camps this year.

These these pictures of the Scoop Challenge were taken by this little friend of mine whose name is Margret.

They lined the girls and boys up differently so they could more even teams. Then the kept track of who was on what team by putting face paint of the color of your team on your face. For example I was counted off as blue so I was on the blue team and had blue strips painted on my face so that the opposing team would know weather or not they could tag me.

At camp they have different morning sessions for Mother-Daughter and Father-Son. At the sessions they do different activities. This is one of the activities that the guys did but we got to watch. They made their own potato guns, and then shot them off in a valley. Being a girl, I couldn't help but think what a waist of food it was :) It was very creative and noisy! =)

First you chose a good size potato,

shove it down the gun,

check to make sure everything is ready,

and watch it fly!!

Mr. Herrlinger shooting with his potato gun.

Our good friends the Herrlingers were able to make it to family camp this year except only half their family were actually able to come out of the lodging place because of chicken pox!

Lucas and Dad having a blast with their contraptions.

Some more of our friends, the Nobles (part of the family) who came from Missouri.

All of us girls watching and covering our ears.

A fun thing that they did for the girls was to get their hair done. Mine was done by Jessica (sister of Margret) who does hair for weddings.

Mom also was brave enough to have her hair done.

This is actually after all the sports of the day including volleyball, catch and throw, floor hockey, ultimate Frisbee, basket ball, tug of war and Mighty Noodle Challenge so my hair does not look the way it did when it was first finished. Mom wanted to get some shots anyway.

Lucas using his muscles in tug of war. (Mine are still sore :)

Here they're practicing for the big night games of speed volleyball that go on after the evening session and snack.

Volley ball photos are also curtesy of miss Margret. :)

This concludes my long post of the different things we did in Iowa. I hope y'all had a great week too!

- AnaLise