McPherson Scottish Festival

One of the things on my Kansas bucket list is attending the McPherson Scottish Festival. I was finally able to this year.  My roommate and I drove up for part of Saturday and enjoyed wandering around the festivities. 
We watched some Highland games, a sheep dog demonstration, and Irish dancing.  Listened to music, enjoyed some Scottish food, and talked to people in the clan booths.  My clan was not represented by my roommate's was and we got invited to go with them in 2014 to Scotland and Ireland.

 The midday ceremony was the Parade of Tartans and a massed pipe and drum band.  I enjoyed talking to this little old man at his booth.  His clan's slogan is "fierce when roused." 

This man was in the booth next door and came over to give us a hard time too.  Liz liked his pants.  He pointed at us during the parade.

Baltimore

I flew to Baltimore for the weekend to meet my honorary niece for the first time.  Little Miss Chloe is 2 months old.  She's the daughter of one of my friends from college.  She's an adorable little tiny doll.

It was my first time to Maryland - another state!  We went to Inner Harbor in downtown Baltimore on Saturday.  Toured the USS Constellation.

It was a good trip even though I had a 12 hour delay getting home due to weather and missed connections. It was great to get to meet Chloe!

Kansas City Zoo

I went home for Labor Day weekend.  JT had wanted to go to the zoo all summer but it had just been too hot.  So I had asked Sharon a few weeks ago if we could do it when I came up.  It was a cooler day than we had been having (in the 90s) but it was still hot & humid.  We had fun anyway.
Mom, Sharon, JT, Sam & I all went.  It was Sam's first trip to the zoo.

Aunt Jennifer was instructed to take pictures of some of the animals like the tigers. JT's in the blue hat.

We also pet sheep and rode the carousel.



Sam was such a good boy. He had to be so hot but he didn't fuss at all.

We saw Grandma's favorite - elephants.

JT and I rode the new sky ride (think ski lift) over the African animals.  At first he was a little scared but by the middle he said the ride was going to be too short.

Sam and his mommy at home again.  Such a cute boy!