My Old Kentucky Home

You may not know that Ryan was born in Kentucky. We recently took a trip to see his birthplace and let him reconnect with his roots. His mom had a high school reunion, so she was heading out anyhow and it worked out great for us to meet her there and have her show us around. After going back and forth we decided not to take Luke with us. Grandma Benson was kind enough to watch him for us while we took off for a couple of days. I like to call our trip a baby-moon... I think we need to make it a tradition. While my mom was dealing with a Pukey Lukey (literally, sorry mom!) we were having a great time in the green state of Kentucky!

We had a lot to see. After dropping Rhonda off at her friends house, Ryan and I headed straight for the races! No kidding. We wanted to see Churchill Downs. We were lucky enough to get a beautiful day and there were actually races going on that day. We decided to try our hand at playing the ponies. We allotted ourselves $20. It took us a couple of races to get the hang of placing the $2 bet on the right horse. My first couple came in DEAD last.

It wasn't crowded and so we got to go down right by the track and watch the horses come across the line. I have to admit it was really cool. We got to see where they saddle up the horses before the race and watch them ride out to the track.


We actually got to see Calvin Borel race on a couple of horses. Warming up for the Belmont Stakes is what we assume. In the end we won back most of our money when realized you could bet on a horse to win, show, or place (come in the top three). I think we left with $15 of the $20 we allotted. Pretty successful for a couple of rookies.

The next day we got the history tour of Rhonda's childhood homes. First stop in Elizabethtown was the cannon ball.

If you can see the black dot way up on the wall (where the arrow is pointing), it is a cannonball that stuck in the building during the civil war. Still there however many years later it is a must see! It was fun to get the tour of Radcliffe and see the house where the famous BBQ sauce was created and made by Grandpa Hammers. Next we went to Bowling Green to visit Uncle Dan. It was good to see him, we haven't seen him in a while. We went from there to Morgantown. This is where Grandma Ernie was buried. We got to go to the cemetary and see her headstone.

It looks really good. We were reminded how much we love her and miss her. We saw where she and Grandpa Hammers were married. There is a house called the Hammers House that is a historic site maintained by Great Aunt Nyla.

We had a good visit with her and she showed us a lot of history in that house. This is where Rhonda was born. It was really fun to learn all that family history.

Back in Louisville we saw the house Ryan lived in as a child and visited some family friends, the Montegues. We also saw the hospital where he was born. We couldn't leave without hitting the Louisville slugger factory. (No pun intended!)

That was pretty cool. I never knew so much went into the making of a bat. We got to hold and swing Micky Mantle's bat among other baseball greats. The mini-bat give away at the end of the tour was just the icing on the cake.

On our way back to Bowling Green we stopped by Mammoth Caves and took a tour. I wish I could say that we took the 6 hour crawling tour to the underground rivers but my belly is starting to poke out. Jr. and I were not up for tight spaces. The cave is HUGE and the tour was cool. Pictures kind of all look the same and don't do the cave justice.

It is one of those... you had to be there things.

We got a taste of southern foods: Fried Okra, Fried Green tomatoes, Derby Pie, Hot Browns, Hush Puppies, White Castle burgers and Waffle House waffles to name a few. We are pleased to report the mullet trend is alive and well.

(I had always assumed it was a dying art... not so!)

We enjoyed Kentucky so much Ryan is thinking about getting his MBA from University of Louisville.

After a couple of days we were both getting anxious to back to Luke. On the last day I couldn't think about him too much without tearing up. Can you blame me?

We were glad to be home and finally starting to catch up on everything we missed. Big thanks goes out to Pete and Heidi for taking care of our recently Hydro-seeded lawn and house, Mom, Micheal, Matthew & Tamy for watching Luke and Biscuit for us and last but definitely not least Rhonda for being a great tour guide and great traveling companion. Hope our next baby-moon is just as fun.