A Stop in Arkansas on the Way Home

On our way home we stopped in Locksburg, Arkansas to visit with Melinda Mize Hooper, a friend of mine from the military. In fact, she is the only person I have kept in touch with from my military experience and we have had the good fortune to get together several times since our time in service. She was my battle buddy during AIT in Ft Rucker, AL. She now is a Professional Bass Fisherwoman and is one the road almost constantly doing tournaments. We were lucky to catch her at home. Below is a picture of Melinda with her husband Mike in their home.
We spent a day just hanging out at the house and swimming in their pool, but then the next day we went to Murphreesboro, AR where there is a diamond field. They have a nice little mine-themed waterplayground that we played and swam at until it closed, and then we spent the rest of our time hunting for diamonds. Below is me playing the prospector.
Mckayla and Lyla kept wigging people out by finding cool rocks and yelling "Look at the Diamond! I found a diamond!" It was funny. There were a lot of cool rocks to be found. It was sad to see a lot of people driving themselves mad in the field. People who come every day hunting for diamonds. It looked as addicting as gambling, and just as dangerous. There were people who had hauled in all sorts of equiptment and were certain that "today is the day."
Below is a picture of Melinda with Jaxon in the field. I couldn't come close to explaining the whole diamond field thing. They had a record of all of the diamonds that had been found there, and pictures of the big ones. Some sort of geological explanation of how volcanic activity had pushed lots of diamonds to the surface a long time ago, or something like that. Anyways, it was fun even though I can't imagine doing that for more than an hour or so. The field may look small, but it looks huge when you are hunting for something that could be smaller than your pinkynail. It really is the luck of the draw with diamond digging.
We should've all just stuck to eating the dirt like Jaxon. That's the nice thing about binky's, if you put it in he won't eat anything he shouldn't, like rocks or diamonds :)

We came home on Monday and the girls have been playing with friends and actively trying to destroy the house I had perfectly set up non-stop. But we are glad to be home. Just 2 more weeks until Jake comes to make our home complete again!!! The countdown begins!