A visit from Uncle Jojo

Well, it wouldn't be spring in the South without daffodils (or at least it wouldn't be a spring teaser blog without me posting a picture of said daffodils), so here it is!  We've had another fairly quiet, if busy month. 

We managed to sneak out before a late February snowstorm and get up to Tulsa, Oklahoma to take in a Gordon Lightfoot concert and see a few art museums.  The big event in March was the visit by my brother John (or Uncle Jojo, to the kids).  When John landed at the Little Rock airport, he landed to fairly warm temperatures--and a few inches of snow on the ground, which had fallen just a couple days before!  We had less snow (more sleet) in Monticello that particular event, and the return of spring quickly melted the frozen precipitation.  John was staying with us for a long weekend, so I took the following Monday off, and John and I toured parts of southern Arkansas, including Lakeport Plantation, an antebellum cotton plantation about an hour south of Monticello:

We had a really nice tour of this impressive home--below, John learns about the cistern (the large brick structure that stored rainwater for the home's use):

We also added to the adventure with a visit to Miss Rhoda's for some of her famous hot tamales:

Well, Miss Rhoda's building doesn't look like much, but she makes very good tamales, and really good pies, too.  Below, Miss Rhoda sat down with us for our lunch and told us a tale or two (those are miniature pecan pies):

After lunch, I took John up to the Rowher Relocation Camp memorial.  This was one of two sites in Arkansas where American citizens of Japanese descent were interred during World War II, and is about a half-hour east of Monticello.  The larger monuments pictured below are tributes to the many Japanese-Americans who served with distinction in the US military while their family members remained interred:

You may have noticed a lot of wet pictures in this blog; it has been quite a rainy spring.  Below is a picture of the Saline River just west of Monticello in flood stage (the green object in the center of the picture is a sign for the boat launch, now well below the water):

With the rains being so frequent, we haven't done a lot of outdoor activities so far this spring.  We have done some local traveling, and stopped by the crumbling remnants of this old plantation storefront (the abandoned home is in the background) on our way to Little Rock one day:

Below, Stephen enjoys sitting in an over-sized novelty chair at our favorite antique store:

We also had a chance to take the kids to a performance by the Pine Bluff Symphony Orchestra, who play a couple times each year on the University of Arkansas-Monticello campus:

Spring break was largely a "wash-out", with more rain and both Hope and I have to work a fair amount of the time.  We did get to Hot Springs for a cool, damp day which included a visit to a science museum and their new elevated walkway:

Note that in the picture above, the rope mesh is suspended about 30 feet above the ground!  Below, Kenny shows off some of his food prep prowess--that is a salmon burger (grilled by me on a Friday to observe Lent), topped by sauteed onions and peppers (by Kenny) and slices of onion-garlic gouda and cranberry mustard (a better tasting combination than it sounds):

Below, Kenny helps wash some historic artifacts while Beth and Stephen play in the background:

April and May promise to be as busy as March--hard to believe we're this far into 2015 already!