Iowa - Monday, May 28th

Monday was our last day in Iowa and we spent it hanging around Great Grandma Velda's house for the most part.  Not Daddy and Grandpa though.  The orange shirt twins were off to golf with Great Uncle Jeff and (cousin by marriage) Dan.

Emily and Nana worked on a puzzle in a princess book that Nana brought Emily...

while Everett ate.

Then, later in the morning, Emily did some work in the yard with Great Grandma Velda.

She pulled some weeds,

cleaned up the dead heads on the peonies,

found some salvageable peonies to take inside,

and pulled more weeds.

It was a special way to spend some time with Great Grandma Velda since she is a master gardener.

We also found this great nest...

in this wonderful tree that Great Grandma and Great Grandpa brought back from Escanaba, MI when they visited Nana and Grandpa there almost 40 years ago!  It was just a little sapling then.

Then I took a few moments to snap some pictures.  Like this one of the house that Nana grew up in! 

(I was actually standing in Great Grandma Velda's yard when I took it.  But, Great Grandpa Joe and Great Grandma Darby moved out of this house and down to Texas the same year that Great Grandma Velda and Great Grandpa Harold built their house across the street.  AND, Nana and Grandpa were already married.)
Then, I took a couple pictures of Great Grandma Velda's house...

before we went in to play around the inside during the afternoon.

Later, when Daddy and Grandpa got home, they got the pinball machine in the basement working!

Emily thought it was a ton of fun...

and delegated the order of everyone's turns.

I happen to love pinball.  :)

And Emily "rode Great Grandma's chair" back upstairs...

to hang out with Great Uncle Curt (Nana's little brother)...

and Great Aunt Kathy...

before we headed out to "downtown" Waukee.

It was there, on the town triangle, 

that we got some ice cream at the Ice Cream Shoppe.

 Then, before heading home, I made everyone pose in front of Great Grandma's old bank.

I also took a picture of the old grocery store (where Nana and Grandpa shopped growing up - you can see the doors and windows have been filled in and the new entrance is on the front)...

 and Nana and Grandpa's old school!

They weren't interested in posing in front of it for me.  ;)

And that was the end.  With nothing more to see, Everett sang Head,

Shoulders, Knees and Toes...

all of the way home.