Finally Feeling Like Vacation

Well, the yellow flower mystery is solved! I started asking around and at first I was told it was Canola (the flowers that Canola Oil comes from), but then later I was told that it's just WEEDS! So I looked up the Canola flower just to be sure, and it doesn't look like the flower in my photo, so weeds it is! At least they're pretty ones!

The rain and thunder and lightning continued all night, and into the morning, but it didn't stop us from anything. We went to Lincoln's Boyhood Home Memorial just outside Dale, Indiana, where Abraham Lincoln and his family lived after they moved from Kentucky. Abe lived there from about the time he was 7 until around 21. Sadly, his mother died when he was 9, from Milk Poisoning, caused from drinking milk from a cow that had eaten some sort of poison plant. They lived in a tiny, one room cabin, with a loft upstairs where the kids slept - pretty tight quarters!

This photo shows the actual size and location of the original cabin . . .

And this is a reconstruction of the cabin and the Lincoln farm . . .

Despite the rain, there was a huge crowd at the memorial because they were releasing a new penny to commemorate Lincoln's 200th birthday. We didn't even attempt to get one because the line went on forever. We'll just have to wait until we see one in circulation!

After we finished touring the memorial, we got back on the road and headed East again on Hwy 64, passing more beautiful green farmlands and rolling hills. The rain was following us, really heavy at times, and we drove in and out of it all day long. It has been raining consistently for the last two weeks in Indiana, and the fields are so drenched that the farmers aren't able to plant their crops, which is not good.

The state of Indiana isn't very wide in the southernmost part where we are, and it didn't take long to drive across it, over the Ohio River and into Kentucky, heading towards Louisville. We transitioned to Hwy 71, and then to Hwy 75 North just before we reached the Ohio border. In Ohio we finally drove out of the rain and into sunny blue skies with white fleecy clouds.

We drove right through Cincinnati without stopping, then past Dayton and on up to Troy where my cousin, Ron Minnich lives. This is another cousin that I found because of my family history research and I was really looking forward to meeting him and his wife. We will be staying with them for a few days, and he is going to take us around and show us the area. I'm looking forward to seeing where my Mom spent the first six or seven years of her life, and even though it may sound sad, I am also anxious to see the gravesites of my grandparents and great-grandparents . . . I'm finally starting to feel like we're on vacation!