At long last, South Dakota

Two weeks ago we went on the 2010 SfS Prairie Book Tour. Susan started it early, and Sam and I joined her a couple of days later, after she'd had some very successful events at the South Dakota Festival of Books.

Sam has logged enough hours flying with us that I expect soon he'll get a free ticket. And he's seasoned--it couldn't be easier.

The same could be said of the first leg of the trip, and the longest, in Mitchell, SD. We stayed with Ruth and Paul and cousins Jon and Katie and had a whale of a time. The high point might have been when Sam announced to Katie that he loved her. :-) Both Jon and Katie were great with Sam, and took time out of their busy school schedules to hang out with him, which was so much fun to see. Katie continued the tradition of teaching him different high-five sequences. Last time the most sophisticated was "in the middle/cut the pickle". This time various other body parts got involved, with a non-deceptively simplistic rhyming scheme which I am pretty sure was original. "Up high/down low/in the shmarm pit/in the arm pit" was a probably everyone's favorite.

Aunt Ruth taught Sam a fun game. It is for the purpose of deceiving passersby, and goes like this:
Aunt Ruth: Guess what I am thinking of ?
Sam: A train?
A.R.: That's right! How did you guess?
Sam: Guess what I am thinking of!
A.R.: The sky?
Sam: Yes! Amazing!
...

Of course, they just agree with what the other says. Amazingly, it fools people for up to several minutes. :-)

While in Mitchell, birthplace of Susan, we took a trip to the nearby Alexandria, where Susan spent the first seven (?) years of her life, a tiny town with many good memories for her. This time we got to see Lake Hanson, an oblong lake outside of town with a little beach where Susan took swimming lessons. It being almost October, the beach was closed, but given the beautiful warm weather it was pleasant to visit. We also made the annual trip to the Corn Palace. In the off season it's really the Corn Gymnasium With Unusually Large Husk Wall Art, which turned out to be good--Sam was delighted to have a huge space in which to roam for a while.

And no trip is complete without a new Dinosaur pillow case from Aunt Ruth. Thanks, Aunt Ruth!

Following Mitchell we went to Brookings and stayed with Grandpa Gene overnight before heading to Minneapolis. While in Mitchell Gene took Susan and Sam to the new South Dakota Children's Museum. While it is somewhat smaller than the Strong Museum of Play, it is of the same high quality, and has some amazing exhibits, including huge animatronic dinosaurs, a giant Light Bright, an training machine for young milkers, a watery ball tracker, and many other amazing things.

It was great to see the SD family. Hopefully it won't be so long before the next visit!