It's A Small Town 4th of July!

I thought I would show everyone a pictorial of our local 4th of July parade. This is the first time in years that I've been to a parade in town. Mom and I went to see the kids because they were on the church float. We always have really good seats because my grandparents live right next to parking lot where all the floats line up which means we are right at the beginning of the parade route.

Everyone's getting ready for the parade in the parking lot by my grandmother's house.

There were planes and helicopters flying overhead...not sure why.

This is my brother's church's float. It is based on their Vacation Bible School theme.

One of the big draws for the parade was trying to get 100 clowns. I HATE clowns. They are not funny; they're scary. Am I the only person who's seen Stephen King's It?

Betsy Ross drove by. Notice the guy driving the truck is sticking his tongue out at me.

One of the local churches decided to show their patriotism by decorating their float as a deer/turkey stand... only in the Ozarks!

Right before this picture, Lady Liberty stuck her tongue out at me!
I told her it wasn't very Lady Liberty-like.

This clown scared me the most...and it came right up to me while I was holding my nephew. Scared me to death.

Laura Ingalls Wilder showed up.

Yes...it is exactly what it looks like.

For some reason, there are always people driving 4-wheelers...

Here's some patriotic people!

Ronald Regan, James Monroe and Honest Abe all came by.

Here is the cult/commune that lives down the road from me. They always walk in the parades.

This lady is dressed as Clara Barton, the founder of the Red Cross

Of course the horses always end the parade...and leave behind presents.

It was fun watching the parade, especially when you know most of the people in the parade. I had several float drivers who stuck their tongues out at me...one picked his nose for the camera. We were sitting in my great-grandmother's driveway right at the beginning of the parade and had my youngest nephew with us. Everybody threw candy at him, and he also got a fireman's hat and a wooden plane. He waved at everybody that went by; it was so cute. Now I can't wait for the next parade!

It's Hay Season!

Hay season is now in full swing around here. Everywhere you go you will see hay fields in some state of the haying process: newly cut, teddered, raked, baled or growing for the next cutting. My parents have spent all their time the last week or so working in the hay fields...mom especially.

I love driving down the road and seeing all the fields dotted with round bales. It's such a wonderful part of summer, human ingenuity and God's creation. I just love it.

This last week it has been too hot to drive around with your windows down, but normally I love doing that when driving by fields where people are out there cutting, teddering, raking and baling the hay...the smell is WONDERFUL!!! It's the smell of summer, of the country, of my childhood bulding forts in the hay barn among the square bales.

I just wanted to share with you a small portion of the small world around me. I'm hoping to be able to get out and get pictures of the various stages of the haying process during the next cutting. If I do, I will be sure to post them with explanations of each stage.

This Town is Closed

Okay...so the town isn't really closed, but sometimes it feels like it is slowly closing up shop one store at a time. I decided to do a little pictorial layout of some of the closed stores in town. It's amazing how many businesses go in and out every year. Of course, every once and a while, there is a new business that manages to make it past the first year or so. Ironically, someone built a new strip mall (with only four shopping spaces) on the outskirts of town and Subway moved right in. I'm hoping it will stick around...Blimpie didn't. I'm not sure why a store would move in to the new buildings when no one wants to set up shop in the other buildings.

By the way...I took these pictures as I was driving down main street, so they aren't the best quality, but you get the picture.

A guy I went to high school with tried to sell used cars here, but nobody bought them.

Yet another old gas station/auto garage. Every once in awhile there will be someone new open this place up, but it never lasts.

This corner store has been a lot of things. Video store (moved to new location), coffee house (failed), pizza parlor (moved to new location) and most recently a bakery that didn't make it through the first year.

I can't even remember what business this building most recently held.

This is a clothing store that just went out of business last winter after being around for as long as I can remember. I only went in there once, and I don't think many people shopped there. They are using it for storage right now. They still have another store in a neighboring town.

This was a gas station once and has also been an auto garage at various times.

This once was the main convenience store in town. Most people got their gas there and it was the only place to get a soda, etc. It started dying out after a chain convenience store (Casey's) came to town.

This was built to be the offices of the motel behind it, but most recently it was a tanning place. It closed up after the owner was found out to be an embezzler and went to jail. Not sure where I'm going to tan this year...

The space on the left held a barber shop forever, but they moved across the street to a larger building. The space on the right has been several things, but I mostly remember it as a realty place. I don't think anything has been in it for quite some time.

This is what happens to a town when the local business owners won't let a Wal-Mart come into town because they are afraid of it hurting business. As if everyone in town doesn't just drive the 20 miles to the next town that accepted the Wal-Mart. Our town was right off the junction of two major highways, but yet we are one of the smallest towns around due to bad choices by the people who used to be in charge. Our town had the potential to be the large town where everyone went to shop, but now that town is 25 miles down the road. And now look what's happening.

For more small town stories, check out On The Front Porch.