Today ROCKS

is the title for what we did yesterday.

Yesterday we took a road trip. Brett took the day off and asked the children what they wanted to do. Caleb suggested that we go to Rockford, Iowa to the Fossil and Prairie Center and Park Preserve. There is a quarry there where we were able to look for fossils. Caleb headed down into the rocks right away with Eli right on his tail. The rest of us took a little time, but we made it.

We found corals, brachiopods, bryozoans, crinoids, gastropods, pelecypods, and cephalopods. We used this guide to help us. It was a beautiful day to be outside digging in the dirt and playing in the water at the bottom of the HOLE.

When we were finished playing in the dirt, we decided to go to the building to "learn" something. After that, we decided to head to Mason City and find some place to eat. We pulled into town, drove around down town, and parked the car by the chamber of commerce and a park. We walked into the visitor information center and started looking through some of the brochures that were there. We decided that we wanted to try Buffalo Wild Wings. The only problem was that there were no addresses in the brochures. We looked in several, and then we saw a phone book. We grabbed the book, found the address, looked at the map in the front of the book, and were on our way.

We got to the restaurant and ordered wings, ribs, chicken tenders, and a BBQ chicken sandwich. We decided that if we were to go again, and it is likely, we would probably stick to the wings. It took us 1 1/2 hours to get to the rock quarry, and then after dinner, it took 50 minutes to get home.

At home, Eli made brownies and Brett & Eli went out to buy ice cream so we could have brownies a la mode after FHE.

All in all, it was a fun day.