Campsite

The tent, along the Upper Iowa River in Kendallville.

Bobby operates the gas stove.

Dad breaks camp.

My apologies for the abbreviated description yesterday. I had to get Dan to band practice, so I was unable to linger. This is a big week for the band - tonight is a big show at the football game where they play with the jr. high bands, and tomorrow is Valleyfest, a big marching band competition for 20-some high schools from around the state. Valley, the host, doesn't compete, but they put on a big show at the end of the day.

We had conferences for Dan yesterday. He's doing well in his classes, which is impressive considering how busy he is with marching band. Of course his best grades are in his music classes, but he's doing well in the others.

When writing about Iowa's little Bohemia yesterday, I wanted to note something. Peggy had linked to an Ellis Island historical immigrant database. As far as I know, my Kristan forebears arrived in the 1840s and 1850s, so they wouldn't be on the Ellis database, but of course I searched Kristan on it. There were quite a few Kristans, but as you'll see if you follow the link, they seem to be from Austria, Hungary and Bohemia, and even Russia. There are even Italian Kristans. I always thought Kristans were from Northwest Germany. I'll have to ask the old relatives. Maybe there's an extra reason my sister married a Hungarian boy.