Travels with Grandparents: Kentucky 2011

Here they are, the three senior Muffins all lined up in the backseat of the rental van. The occasion? An outing to Kentucky, with lunch in Indiana. In this shot, they are in Indiana, just before lunch.

And here we have Lydia, also in Indiana, contemplating a cookie that Grandfather made while he was in Nevada.

The bag in Grandfather's hand shows where we stopped for lunch; the hardware store shows the name of the Indiana town we were in.

After a stop at an Indiana gas station to refuel the van and get some ice cream, we made our way to Kentucky. First stop: a rest area. Here's Mom there.

On the way in, Mom noticed some red bud flower trees:

Amanda also had fun checking out flowers; here she is with a dandelion:


Jared and Curtis had fun collecting acorns:

Lydia enjoyed spending time with Grandmother and being out of her car seat:

Despite the kids' love for the rest area, which to them was a giant park, we did actually go somewhere in Kentucky: the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington. Here's Amanda by the first horse we saw. Like the other horses we met, it liked her hat.

Here are Grandmother and Grandfather bringing the boys to go see the champion horses.

We saw four champion horses during our visit, Mr. Muscleman, Funny Cide, Cigar, and Da Hoss. Funny Cide gets to be on the blog because he won the Kentucky Derby on the day Mom and Dad got married, May 3, 2003.

Mom thought it was pretty cool seeing the champion horses, but the boys we're quite as thrilled.

Soon enough, though, the little show ended and we were off wandering the park. We saw this very large horse:

And we saw and got to pet this not-as-large horse. The horse is Emma, a six-year-old Haflinger. Considering Emma's somewhat smaller size, Mom wondered if "Haflinger" was related to "Halfling," but it turns out the name is based on the place in Europe where the breed originated. The lady holding the horse had something in common with Amanda, aside from an affinity for horses: her first name.

Here's Lydia contemplating life while looking around the breeds barn, where they keep the horses they use to show off different breeds. Note, though, that the stalls are only part time dwellings. The park also has lots of pastures where the horses get grazing time.

Here's a friendly horse we found in the breeds barn. He humored the kids by letting them feed him straws they picked up from the edge of his stall.

Back outside, we found a much smaller horse:

Here's the horse again, with Curtis and the fence for size reference:

Also at the park are a couple of museums. This picture is from the International Museum of the Horse, which is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution.

Here's a view looking into the park that shows the setup of pastures and buildings; imagine this scene repeated a few dozen times. Mom got this picture our way to the other museum, the American Saddlebred Museum.

The kids' favorite part of the museum were the giant rocking horses. Here's Jared:

Mom found something fun, too: a little William Shatner shrine. (Yes, Mom is a Trekkie.)

Finally, it was time to go. We had a good time and felt that we got our money's worth, especially since there was no admission charge for kids six and under, which all of Mom's kids were. Here's Lydia with Grandmother on our way back to the car.