Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park

*Written on 6/15, delayed in posting because of lack of internet connection.

Yesterday we spent the first half of the day in Farmington, MO, where we had stayed at a hotel to treat ourselves for Flag Day. I was ready for a little break from the RV and we were all ready for some pool and hot tub time. Since my dad was in town the night before, Chris and I were able to sneak away to watch the late showing of Jurassic World at the theater that was practically in the parking lot of the hotel. I had so much fun!

In the morning we hit up the hotel breakfast. Many of you have probably been doing the make-your-own-waffle wrong. Let me help you with a hotel waffle tutorial. This method was patented by our friend Pat and demonstrated here by Chris:

First, you make your waffle per usual. Pick up no fewer than three packets of “butter” and an extra plate. Put the butter packets on top of the waffle, and use the second plate to cover. Let sit for about a minute, and then open the hot butter packets and saturate your waffle with it. It’s the healthy way to breakfast!

Then we went for a swim before checking out. Three girls who were there graciously offered August their princess kickboard, and he had a blast. As you can see, Chris’ bicycling tan is coming in very nicely. How mutant is he going to look in 5 weeks?!

Then the little guy was an asset in taking the luggage cart out to the car.














We spent the second half of the day at Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park. I honestly had no idea what a shut-in was before we went there, but I had heard it was a great park. A helpful sign educated me on the matter.

The Shut-Ins were actually pretty cool, I’ve never seen anything quite like it. The rock formations are a sight to see, and the water is very swimmable. We saw lots of families take a picnic and spend the day there.

It would be especially good for older kids I think. Some brave folks were jumping off of the tallest rocks into the pools. I will never be that brave, so we stuck to the easier area. August liked putting his feet in.

I made spaghetti with homemade sauce for dinner, with Caesar salad and garlic bread. I was sure I had packed a bag of spaghetti we had in our pantry at home, only to find as my sauce was simmering that we had no noodles. The camp store usually has them, but happened to be sold out. It’s pretty humbling to drive 10 miles each way to buy a dollar of noodles. I wasn’t about to let my sauce go to waste though!

After dinner August was watching Daddy do some bike maintenance and decided maybe his tricycle could use a tune-up as well. Priceless!