Runza!

When my sister and I were small, we took several road trips to Lincoln, NE, where my dad's grandmother lived. We would visit the Lincoln Museum of Science and History where the life-sized Wooly Mammoth watched over the entrance and scared the 80s cuffed shorts off my sister and I. My dad would spin us nauseous on the playground accoutrement only found in Lincoln – until an accidental discovery somewhere in the South Dakota Badlands. We slept in the cool basement with its terrifying laundry/storage room and its bathroom with the stacks of old National Geographics (all of which I went through, for the pictures) and its bar where Karley and I sat counting out the drink stirrers we would ogle and wish were ours. I would climb the huge tree in my great-grandmother's fenceless backyard full of flowers and Midwest vegetable gardens and pretend I could sing – cooing the same song over and over and over (Rich Mullins, no less). And we would go to Runza's, where my dad would eat his most-beloved fast-food and my sister and I, although it wasn't our favorite, would eat with glee to get another Runza beach ball to blow up and play with. We had amassed quite the collection by the time each trip was over.

Here's to Lincoln road trips, yellow squash, ancient wax historical scenes, blue jean purses, my mom's amazing ability to make any road trip fly by, and my dad's love of the little things.