OKC Friday - Antiques and Babysitting

Friday, August 29th we planned to have a day trip with Robin but did not want to venture too far due to possible Labor Day weekend traffic. A salesclerk at one of the Duncan antique stores highly recommended that we to go the Rink Gallery, an antique store in Bethany that is housed in a former ice skating rink. Frank and I thought this was a unique venue and the place was only 15 miles from Robin's house, mostly north and a bit west.

The store was quite extensive but most items were too large
for us to take back to California with us... thank goodness!

It was a pretty big place, mostly specializing in furniture. Since Robin is looking to furnish a room dedicated to her sewing, she was on the lookout for a specialized piece or two with character. Nothing caught her fancy this time but she will keep the place in mind and go back there. We had fun looking at how old things had been refurbished or discussing how old pieces could be spruced up and re-purposed. I enjoyed seeing how the tastes of my grown daughter had evolved. I bought this padded laptop case that was just too cute to pass up. It is a tongue-in-cheek melding of the old and the new.

There are no ⌘ keys or .com or .net short cut keys on this keyboard.
And, hey! It is missing a whole row of function keys.
But QWERTY lives on.

We got a set of blocks for Autumn and a miniature red flyer wagon that she was already using by that afternoon to haul around her Rainbow Brite and Patty-O-Green dolls. Sorry, she moved too fast for me to get a picture of her doing that. Instead I found some pictures online of the dolls that were like Robin's as a little girl. Robin's dolls are in great shape. Just a bit of a thick paste of water with baking soda cleaned up their faces like sparkling new. Autumn loves them just like here mom did! It warms my heart.

Rainbow Brite and her sprite Twink is on the left.
Patty-O-Green and her sprite Lucky is on the right.

That evening Jeremy and Robin had a wedding to attend so we babysat. Autumn's caterwauling and extreme fussing at her parents' departure was quite a show that lasted 30 seconds at the most. Then Autumn was quite content to do some puzzles with me and read some books. In a bit, Frank took Autumn outside and read to her on the swing on the front porch. She really likes her kitties. And a book about them? Even better!

Hi, Grandma. Look! Grandpa is reading to me.

Then they went for tricycle ride. I stayed in because the local edition of Insectia had apparently broadcast that there was a new humanoid food source in the neighborhood and the winged and crawling critters were homing in on me! Autumn is wearing a ruffled skirt that I had brought out with me for her to grow into for next year. She took one look at the skirt and pulled that three-inches-too-big elastic waistband on immediately over whatever she was wearing at the time. The neighbors got to see the price tag as well since there was no opportunity to remove it once she was in motion. I think those lilac, turquoise, and pink color genes are linked to the X chromosome in little girls. Perhaps to both X chromosomes in Autumn's case!

Autumn is off for a tour of the neighborhood with Grandpa.

Of course a gal has to have her color coordinated sunglasses!

Once they returned, Frank texted me that they were in the backyard. I joined them for a brief spell to photograph the action. Autumn played peek-a-boo with Grandpa, climbed up the ladder and went down her slide, and glided a bit on her swings.

"Peek-a boo Grandpa! Can you see me now?"

Frank is quite pleased and yet still cautious with the level of Autumn's gymnastic skills.

"Whee!" Autumn loves the slide.

Frank pauses for a photo, interrupting, for a brief moment, his serious task of pushing.

After all that outdoor activity we brought Autumn in to watch a DVD and quiet down before bath and bed. We could not figure out how to work the TV set-up. Although we selected the correct TV input and could get the DVD to play, we could not for the life of us, select the play option on the DVD menu. We tried and tried to use the remote for the TV or the DVD player. It looked something like one of these – long, thin, and rectangular.

Sample remotes. Jeremy and Robin's looked similar to one of these.

Autumn was very good and did not whine about her show not starting. In fact she kept trying to help by coming to me and handing me the X-box controller.  I said, "No, Sweetie. Thank you, but that is for Daddy's video games." The X-box controller looks like this. Not at all like a DVD or TV remote.

A typical X-box controller. Why would you need two joysticks to start a DVD?

By now Zazu, the bird from The Lion King, is just about driving me crazy demanding over and over and over and over again, in an annoying, squawking, bird voice tinged with a tone of disgust, that I make a selection already. It is time to give up and text the parents for help.

"It is time, please, to make a selection..."

Jeremy talked me through it. Well, it is the X-box controller that needs to be used. And you press the green A button for play. Now isn't that obvious? Twenty-two-month old Autumn knew the right controller. My mistake was in not asking her if she also knew the correct button to press. Oh, and the blue X is for exit. Of course.

Autumn was as good as gold during the show and afterward climbed upstairs willingly to enjoy her bath. She picked out her own pajamas and we put them on her. I darkened her room. Then I
       a) rocked her and watched her eyelids droop
       b) sang to her and felt her relax in my arms
       c) placed her gingerly in her crib
       d) picked her up again when she cried
I repeated a) through d) multiple times. I finally succeeded in getting her to sleep after standing beside her crib with my hand on her back and singing progressively more and more softly. I was eventually able to back out of the room on tip toe while still whispering a song. I plopped my butt on the couch barely a half hour before her mom and dad returned home. Whew! Parenthood is for the young. Perhaps the title of this post instead of Antiques and Babysitting should more appropriately have been Antiques Babysitting.

Pink Panther skills help when retreating from a sleeping toddler.

OKC Thursday - Duncan Shops and Museums

Thursday, August 28th with Jeremy in Texas, Robin at work, and Autumn in daycare, Frank and I went to Duncan a 1 hour and 15 minutes long drive ~70 miles southwest of Robin's house. The downtown Main Street has a quaint feel to it with all the brick store fronts. Inlaid in the sidewalks are plaques noting the history of the various buildings in addition to some editorial comments.

The drive is just right, long enough to feel like you are on an outing,
short enough to be over before you are bored
with just the right mix of highway and country roads.

Frank and I enjoyed the three story antique mall, just one of several antique stores downtown.
We had lunch at the tea room of another antique store farther down Main Street.

This is typical of one of the inlaid history plaques.

Unlike my previous visit to Duncan where I bought and had to transport home two ceramic canister sets, I was much more restrained this time.  I bought a whistling watermelon tea kettle for our kitchen and a school bus metal bank for Alex. They were not breakable and really did not take up much suitcase space. Since they were both hollow I packed stuff in them for the trip home. Here are photos of them both.

The whistle on the tea kettle sounds like a train so Frank should like that.
The coin slot on the bank is in the center of the removable lid.

I like the store Distinctive Decor in Duncan. They have upscale china and eclectic home decor items from Italy, England, etc. in an unlikely town such as Duncan, OK. Their website is extensive and they are pretty pricey, but it costs nothing to look and it's still fun to visit a brick and mortar store with a collection of unique items you usually only see on the web. In this store I just had to snap a picture of this Mouse on a Motorcycle bookend. My kids loved the book of that title by Beverly Cleary and there were several TV specials that aired when they were little. The photo is a bit blurry but when I posted it I noticed the book in the foreground. How appropriate! I bought neither the heavy bookends that weigh over 8 lbs and cost over $80 nor the Grandpa book. But they are available on Amazon, so if I feel really deprived ...

Saw these bookends in Distinctive Decor, a shop I like in downtown Duncan, OK

You can find just about anything on Amazon! The mouse's cute helmet is made out of walnut wood.

Here are also a couple examples of the dishes and make-up bags that caught my eye on display in the store. The dishes are from Italy and Portugal and the bags are from London. I am not one to buy something just because of a label or a name but I am surprised to find such elaborate items, displayed in such an obscure town, in a state so focused on a football rivalry between the bright orange clad OSU Cowboys and the red clad OU Sooners. I get annoyed when people think that the state my daughter chose to live in is just full of uneducated hicks, a stereotype promoted by the Steinbeck novel Grapes of Wrath. And yet I cannot be too judgmental. My surprise that this store exists in a tiny Oklahoma town reveals a bit of prejudice I did not quite realize I might harbor.

The rooster plates are Vietri Galletto Dinnerware from Italy and
the botanical plates are Juliska Field of Flowers from Portugal.
I am not name dropping. I never heard of these brands. I just like the dishes

These zippered bags really look like they can stare you down. They are made in London by Catseye.
I do not wear enough makeup to fill one. Pity. They are cute!

After our downtown Duncan exploration, Frank and I headed out for an historic train depot housing just minutes from the Main Street that is home to an over 100 year old steam locomotive. The first passenger train from the Rock Island Rail Line arrived in Duncan in 1892 and the traffic the rail line brought helped develop the town. The large locomotive on display, called the Rock Island #905, was built in 1910 and is in the process of being restored. There was a gargantuan effort in April of 2011 to move it to where it rests now in Fuqua Park. We were lucky enough to drop in when the head volunteer was there and he gave us a personal tour of the upgrades being made on the locomotive and the background of its move to that particular location from a spot nearer the highway. An extensive website, http://www.rockisland905.com/, details the trials, tribulations, and challenges of that move and a history of the rail line and the locomotive. It was much better to hear it all from a personal guide thrilled to have an avid audience.

Duncan was able to flourish largely due to the presence of the railroad.

This historic depot is visible from US highway 81
and is less than a mile from downtown Duncan.

The Rock Island Steam Locomotive #905 is undergoing restoration. The overlying sheet metal
has been removed in order to expose and dispose of the asbestos insulation around its boiler.

Frank poses next to a caboose on a section of rail adjacent to Rock Island Steam Locomotive #905.

Inside the caboose, Franks sits next to the conductor
who wears a uniform typical of the dress for that period of time.

Our next stop for the day was the Chisholm Trail Heritage Center, 1.6 miles away. The Chisholm Trail was the path taken when cowhands drove cattle from Texas north to the Kansas railheads. Outside the heritage center a stone walkway wends its way around the building with markers labeling towns passed while traveling along the trail. The endpoints of the replica trail are marked with bronze plaques and the Kansas end of the trail has a large bronze sculpture.

A stone walkway illustrating the Chisholm Trail with the towns along it
is marked at either end by commemorative bronze plaques

At the Kansas end of the trail is an impressive bronze sculpture of horses with mounted cowboys,
longhorn steer, cattle dogs, and a horse drawn covered chuck wagon.

From the southernmost point of the trail at Donna, TX to the northernmost point of the trail at Abilene, KS is over 950 miles. Duncan, Oklahoma is about midway on the trail. It could take as long as 100 days where cowboys were paid $1 a day to move the cattle to the northern railheads. The excursion was fraught with dangers of stampedes, drowning, and a hot relentless sun, with sporadic horrendous thunder and lightning storms. The monotonous food menu was bacon, bean, and biscuits, daily. 

If you look closely you can see my reflection in the panhandle of Texas
as I take this photo of the Chisholm Trail map display.

Once inside the heritage center there were movie presentations, an audio-animatronic demonstration of life along the drive, and interactive displays where you could be the trail boss. You made decisions such as the best way to stop a stampede, ford a river, negotiate with Indians, prevent rustlers, and eventually you'd find out how successful you'd been at getting your herd to trail's end. Frank and I tried roping a long horn. Frank succeeded but I did not.

Frank's lassoing skills were pretty good and he roped a longhorn from horseback.

My roping skills were inferior but I was good at comforting this steer who had been lassoed.

At the day's closure of the heritage center, we drove back north to Robin's home in Oklahoma City. We drove though torrential rain for short stretches and clear skies for other stretches. Such is the  fickleness of Oklahoma weather. Calling Robin we learned she had nothing but a drizzle at her house. Jeremy had arrived back from teaching his session in Texas. We stopped at a local grocery store and brought home fried chicken and mashed potatoes for dinner.

After dinner, we snuggled on the couch, read to Autumn, and watched The Lion King with her. It had been a good day.

Hakuna Matata. No worries!