Petra's Birthday - Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead

Our granddaughter, Petra, spent her birthday weekend with us which we considered a real honor. Her 9th birthday was actually on 9/11 and I am slow in getting this posting on the boards. In the photo below, the sleepy head is just getting started for the day on Saturday morning.

We had to do the gifts before anything else.

Dressed and ready for getting out and about.

We had lunch at the Elephant Bar Restaurant. She loved the jungle decor.

The first birthday cake of the day.

After lunch we visited the Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead in Overland Park, Kansas. We didn't know the place existed until one of our Denver relatives found it and visited with her daughter while here. It is a neat place built around the theme of a Kansas farm. There are all kinds of fun things to do as you will see in the coming photos. In addition to the petting zoo, they have various wild animals like owls, hawks, bobcats, etc. that could be found on the Kansas prairies. Most of the wild caged animals were ones that had been injured and would not survive in the wilds on their own.

Petra and Grandmother Sigrid.

Some of the citizens of the Farmstead.

Lots of opportunities to feed and pet the animals.

Petting not allowed here.

Or here.

Petra took the hay wagon ride.

Learning how it was done in the old days

A prairie school house.

Class is in session.

I hate to say it but these could be the same desks that I used when I started school. I used to love to flip the lid on the ink wells because it made noise and aggravated the person in front of me. My apologies to all those who sat in front of me back in the 1950's.

Grandma and Petra at work on the farm.

Learning another important farm chore.

Let's don't leave the Indians out.........they lived on the prairie alongside the farmers.

The fishing pond.

Off to the races.

The second cake of the day. Petra was tired by this time.

A very nice weekend.

Whiteman Air Force Base Air Show - 9/19/2010

Scott invited me to take in the Whiteman AFB Air Show with him on Sunday, 9/19 . He drove and treated me for lunch which made it a really special event. The day started cloudy, cool, and windy. Around noon, the sun burned away the haze just in time for the aerial show to begin. I haven't been to an air show for many years so I enjoyed the heck out of it. In the photo below, the A10 Warthogs (Thunderbolts) are lined up on the tarmac.

A large cargo plane.

Air Force tanker.

An old B-52........still awesome.

The air traffic control tower at Whiteman.

A B-1B supersonic bomber.

The cargo bay of the medium sized freighter. It is large but the C-5 is even bigger.

The bay can hold one Abrams tank or it can be fitted with seats for 165 soldiers.

A aircraft carrier based WWII naval fighter/bomber.

F-18 Hornets ready to go.

The Army Golden Knights parachute team's plane.

Another view of the B-52. If you enlarge the photo, you can see major wrinkles in the skin due to age and the stress of flight.

The B-52's massive landing gear.

The B-52 bomb bay area.

Scott posing in front of the Air Force's monster truck fashioned after the A-10.

Another view of an A-10........one of my favorite planes.

The business end of an A-10.

Impressive rear view of the B-1.

Scott in the bomb bay of the B-1..........as big as the B-52.

A B-26 bomber from WWII.

A P-51 Mustang.

The DC-3.........a Hall of Famer.

Japanese "Zero" fighter.

The B-2 Stealth Bomber.

Apache Attack helicopter.

Acrobatic Bi-plane was fun to watch.

Look carefully to see the "wing walker".

The Navy's prop driven acrobatic team.

An old Russian MIG-17 fighter taxis down the apron.

Fly over by the B-2.

The Air Force Thunderbirds (F-16's) await their show.

A Golden Knight parachuter with smoke trail.

Two Golden Knights streaking down together from 12,500 feet.

The two pull the rip cord and separate.

The Thunderbirds in formation.

An awesome show.

Below is a video of the airshow. Still photos don't do an air show justice. The video isn't great but it has its moments. I used Sigrid's little point and shoot camera instead of my Canon because hers had video capability and I didn't want to carry two cameras. Her camera doesn't have a view finder on it so you have to use the LCD screen to frame your photos. That is tough in bright sunlight and trying to follow fast airplanes with outstretched arms. Click on the Play Arrow to watch the video.

By the way, some people never learn a lesson. With the cloudy start to the day and with me wearing a hat and making it a point to stay in the shade...........I didn't think that the sun screen lotion that I brought with me would be necessary (remember Hawaii). I am almost done peeling 12 days later.

Passion Flower

Sigrid received seeds for the Passion Flower from her sister, Sonja, who lives near Frankfurt, Germany. Sigrid planted the seeds in a pot on our deck this spring and they are just now blooming. It is a pretty wild looking flower. It sure has lots of moving parts and those parts have religious symbolism associated with them.

Here is what we found on the web:

The Passion Flower with its various parts is seen as a symbols of Jesus' scourging, crowning with thorns and crucifixion.

This flower, a genus with numerous species, indigenous to the tropical Americas, is unique among the hundreds of old Christian flower symbols in that there is specific historical documentation of the time and place of its origin - the symbolism having been first perceived by the Mexican Augustinian friar, Emmanuel de Villegas, who reported it, with sketches, in Europe in 1610.

It is said that the test of the authenticity of the biblical Prophets was the enduring acceptance of their prophecies by the community. The same can be said of religious flower symbols, whatever their origin: if they achieve enduring acceptance, this signifies, as in the case of the Passion Flower,that they contain a certain "prophetic" unction which enriches the faith and devotion of the believers.

The endurance in religious oral tradition of the "galaxy" of flower symbols of Our Lady, and of her life and her mysteries from medieval times, as discovered and recorded for literate tradition by botanists and folklorists, bears testimony to their enriching prophetic unction, which we at Mary's Gardens propose for wider knowledge and appreciation.

The Passion Flower symbolism, as originally perceived, and then augmented, includes:

The spiraled tendrils- the lash of Christ's scourging
The central flower column - the pillar of the Scourging
The 72 radial filaments- the Crown of Thorns
The top 3 stigma - the 3 Nails
The lower 5 anthers - the 5 wounds
The Style- the Sponge used to moisten Christ's Lips with Vinegar
The leaves (some species) - the head of the Centurion's Spear
The red stains - Christ's Blood Drops
The Round Fruit- The World Christ came to save
The Fragrance- The Spices prepared by the Holy Women

This multiple symbolism of the Passion Flower combines a number of symbols found in flowers individually in the prior traditions of the rural countrysides of the Old World, from which the missionaries to the New World came.

The photo above is of the actual flower on our deck and it looks better than the one on the web site, even if I do say so myself.