LAST DAY IN BRANSON

We waited around for our mail today, took a last walk down by the lake, and then had lunch at Andy Williams' Moon River. He had a deal for Veterans-buy one steak sandwich and get the other one free. They were good. We ate in the bar where you can see some of his gold records.

The restaurant is across from his theater.

At age 82, he's doing two shows today, eight a week, and this is the last week.

After lunch, we got the Christmas decorations out of the basement and I finished addressing the cards, which are about ready to mail. Tomorrow, we'll hit the road and make our way to Arizona!

UPDATE FROM BRANSON

I'm a bit behind on the blog, mainly because I had a bout of gout, and hobbled around for a week or so. Not fun, but it's over, so on with life. Before it happened, we had a flat tire on the jeep, and now have 4 new tires.

That day we ate at Lambert's-the restaurant where they throw the rolls at you and bring the pots from the kitchen around to give you extra food-they call them "pass arounds". It's a fun place.

We made it to Russ' home in Omaha for Thanksgiving/Christmas. Dan ran in the Turkey Trot on Thursday morning, came in first, and got a t-shirt.

The food was great, and of course, we ate too much.

Of course, there were many laughs and a lot of silliness.

Russ seemed to like his shirt.

We also had a couple of those "passages" in life since Jake brought his friend, Kenzie, over to the house for the Wii bowling tournament, and Jake now has his license. I guess we're getting older!

ANDY WILLIAMS

Last night we spent with Mr. Christmas, Andy Williams. We saw him three years ago and I think he was even better this year. He'll be 82 in two weeks, and has more energy and is sharper than I am. (Okay, so I admit it probably wouldn't take much to beat me!) He can still belt out a song like a young man. His theater is lovely inside and out. Here's the entrance.

Here's part of the yard.

Even the stage had a beautiful curtain, similar to Currier and Ives.

I sat in a unique place, near the lighting and sound booth-I'll share my view. It was interesting to watch.

The winter scene was lovely, but hard to capture a pcture.

Here's Andy with the girls.

Even closer.

It was even better than I expected-both Cassandre and Andy sang two of my favorite songs-the Ave Maria and Mary, Did You Know. Really nice! I imagine you can tell that my age is showing-I never missed a Perry Como or Andy Williams TV show. Things were a lot different years ago-clean humor and lovely voices. I had every Andy Williams album and I wore them out. It was nice to see the old fart's still kicking-maybe there's hope for the rest of us "oldies but goodies"!

SUNDAY WITH CASSANDRE

After grieving the loss of the Hawkeyes on Saturday, we needed church on Sunday. We already had tickets to see Cassandre on Sunday afternoon, but were delighted to have her sing in church. They advertise that she has the voice of an angel, and they're telling the truth! She's also a lovely young lady who is married to one of the Haygoods.

It's amazing that she can pretend to be her Aunt Irma and look more like Dolly Parton. She sure enjoys the part.

We were in the first row, so the lights were bright.

The first part of the show, she sang all different types of music and the second half was Christmas music. Here's Aunt Irma again-she came down and sang to Don.

There were two blind men beside me-I felt sorry for them that they couldn't see how pretty she is. They did enjoy her voice! So did we!

SDC LIGHTS AND PARADE

Silver Dollar City is known for having 4 million Christmas lights. We didn't count them, but I'll bet they're right!

Every 15 minutes, the large tree puts on a light show with many different colors and patterns.

Twice a night they have a light parade-here are a few floats.

Each float is led up the street by a person holding a light for the driver to follow.

This one has a snowman that spins in the globe.

It's a great place for children and "kids at heart" and certainly gets you in the mood for the holidays!

SILVER DOLLAR CITY

We spent the rest of Thursday at Silver Dollar City enjoying the shows and craftsman and Christmas buffet. Our favorite show was A Christmas Carol-the singing was beautiful and the acting was great-even Scrooge was enjoyable!

The Christmas Story was also done very well.

If you're looking for a Santa, we found a great one in one of the shops-of course, you'd need a large space and a lot of money!

It's always fun watching the craftsman make their creations. Here's a glass bliwer and a candy maker.



It's a fun place!

YAKOV

Last Thursday morning, we spent a delightful two hours, laughing, at Yakov's wonderful humor about Russia and the U.S. I'm sure you'll remember his favorite phrase, "What a country!" He has a very nice theater on top of one of the mountains.

Most of the show was about Christmas, but my favorite part was when Yakov pretended to be the President. He was hilarious!

During the intermission, he posed for pictures. Don walked up to get a close-up, and I didn't look at the pictures until I put them on the computer. I was surprised to see the two gals from Texas that we talked to at Silver Dollar City on Wednesday morning. Mulert was his usual alert self-he didn't even recognize them!

Everyone was surprised when the dancing snowman took off his head and it was Yakov.

After the show, he goes out in the lobby and signs autographs. I took this picture because it shows an example of his beautiful artwork. I ended up buying a sweatshirt of this one. His creations are all over the place, and worth taking time to see. Notice-each one has a little hanging seat on it in the right hand lower corner with the artist signing it.

A trip to the bathroom held one last laugh. In each stall is a self portrait-you can pull the little curtain if you don't want him to watch! What a guy!