Walk #14: Found an Old, Dark House on the Way to the Brandeis-Millard House

Address: 500 South 38 Street

Information: Brandeis-Millard House

Lunch: Bento Box #2

Destination Review: Can you guess the historical significance of this house? (Hint: It involves a well-known department store and an Omaha suburb, respectively.)

I had to park down the street from it, and on the way to the landmark house, I discovered this disturbing structure, surrounded by a rusted fence.

I’m not exactly saying this place must be haunted, but let’s just say I won’t be going to any will-readings in it anytime soon, especially during a thunderstorm.

OK, this is the house that is the landmark. The trees kind of obscure it in the picture, but it is a very beautiful house. I must say that whoever owns it now is taking very good care of the property. There was much to see and photograph in the yard.

The house itself has many beautiful features, including a delightful gold mailbox.

This window hints that the house is probably just as beautiful on the inside.

The Walk: Seriously, there was no friggin’ place to park in this neighborhood, so I had to park way down the street from the house, requiring a several block walk to get to it. Thanks, Gold Coast Neighborhood, for tricking me into walking. (I said I’d walk; I didn’t say I have to like it.)

The Lunch: I used my own recipe for chicken salad, so that was good. I used the same recipe for sesame steamed green beans as Walk #5, so those were good, too. I love potatoes (must be the German in me), so the roasted potatoes were great. The crackers were good with the chicken salad. I didn’t like the pear at all; it got discarded after the first bite. Didn’t eat much of the strawberries, either. But I enjoyed the chocolate covered cashews. Had to eat lunch in my car again, but a big bin of art supplies provided a handy in-car table.

Lunch Ingredient Deals:

Chopped Walnuts: A package of Pear’s Chopped Walnuts was found at Dollar Tree for a buck.

Cooked Chicken: Kroger Canned Chicken Breast was on sale for $1 at Baker’s.

Green Beans: Got ‘em for 98¢ at Baker’s.

Pear: Got a D’Anjou Pear for 99¢ at Fresh Thyme.

Red Potatoes: These were 43¢ at Hy-Vee minus 10¢ in Fuel Saver rewards minus a 10¢ MobiSave rebate, making them 23¢

Art Project: Embellished Frame

Walk #13: Even the Garage at the Bradford-Pettis House Has a Tower

Address: 400 South 39th Street

Information: Bradford-Pettis House

Lunch: Bento Box #1

Destination Review: This is a big old house in the Gold Coast neighborhood. It has been converted to apartments. It has quite interesting windows and I got a lot of pictures of them.

There was also a door that went to nowhere.

Out back, there was an interesting-looking outbuilding with a tower. If I had a garage, I would want it to have a tower.

There was also a bundle of logs made into a teepee-like arrangement, and a delightful children’s play area. If I was a kid living here, I would have a lot of fun here.

The Walk: I went around the block to get my steps in. It must have been uneventful, because I don't really remember it and didn’t take any pictures along the way.

The Lunch: There was a cute little picnic table in the play area that I wanted to sit on, but it was kid-sized, so I couldn’t.

So I ended up sitting on top of another similar picnic table near the block table, and having my lunch with the blocks.

Did I once say hummus makes everything taste better? Hummus makes everything taste better, except for fruit, perhaps. The sandwich was pretty good and the edamame was OK. Hummus was great with veggies and pretzels. The fruit was sweeter than usual and that made it better than usual. And the chocolate covered cashews were a nice treat. I forgot to get out the hard boiled egg, so I ate it later for a snack.

Lunch Ingredient Deals:

Cucumber: On sale for 89¢ at Baker’s. Subtract a 25¢ Allrecipes rebate and it was 64¢.

Eggs: Eggs were on sale at Hy-Vee for 39¢ a dozen, plus you got a penny per gallon in Fuel Saver Rewards. My gas fill-ups are about 10 gallons, so I multiply the Fuel Saver credit by 10 to figure my deals. So minus 10¢ makes the dozen 29¢, but there was also a 15¢ MobiSave rebate on eggs, which ultimately made them 14¢.

Pretzels: A big bag of Kroger Pretzels was on sale at Baker's for $1.

Art Project: Embellished Frame

Walk #12: Lots to See at Boys Town

Address: 14100 Crawford Street

Information: Boys Town

Lunch: Bento Box #7

OK, there was lots to see here. I started out at the Hall of History.

Even before going in, I discovered a pretty little walkway with a fountain to take pictures of.

Inside the Hall of History, a very nice guide, when finding out that I was an art therapist, took me to a room where there were some delightful artworks made by some of the kids at Boys Town. Here’s only a small sample.

The Hall was a full-blown museum of the history of Boys Town, so there was a lot of great old stuff in it.

Including a touching sculpture of a homeless boy living in a box.

The Walk: I asked the guide where I could buy a cold drink, and she showed me on a map how I could get to the visitor’s center, which sells food and drink. It was all the way over on the other side of the campus, so that was my walk. The temperature was in the 90s, so it was exhausting, but I did get to see a lot of the campus that way.

At the Visitor’s Center, I got to see the World’s Largest Ball of Stamps.

They had lots of stamps and stamp collecting stuff in this area, including little pots of stamps that you could buy individually, a penny a stamp, on the honor system by depositing your pennies in a slot. While I was getting out my pennies, I dropped one on the floor. I decided to just leave it there, thinking a child might find it and use it to buy a stamp. This idea appealed to me so much I got out some more pennies and scattered them on the floor for kids to find to buy stamps with.

I must confess that on the walk back, I accepted a ride from a nice staff member who stopped and offered. But I did walk all the way out there.

The Lunch: I had lunch in the dining room of the Visitor’s Center. They had just closed the cafeteria, but they didn’t mind me having my packed lunch in the dining room, and I was able to buy a drink from a vending machine there.

Ranch dressing made the carrots and cucumbers taste better. Blueberries were OK. I like tortellini a lot, so that was yummy. Banana chips were OK, but I didn’t eat all of them.

Lunch Ingredient Deals:

Banana Chips: Got a bag of these for a buck at Dollar Tree.

Cucumber: Got one for 50¢ at Fresh Thyme. Minus a 25¢ Allrecipes rebate and minus a 10¢ MobiSave rebate, it was 15¢.

Marinara Sauce: Prego was on sale at Walgreens for 2 for $4, plus a buy one get one free promotion. I had 2 $1 off 1 coupons from the little Smartsource blinking light coupon dispenser you find on some store shelves, so that meant I got 2 bottles for free.

Art Project: Embellished Frame

Walk #11: Going by the Blackstone Hotel

Address: 302 South 36th Street

Information: Blackstone Hotel

Lunch: Bento Box #3

Destination Review: This one brings back childhood memories. The church my family went to when I was a kid, First Presbyterian, is just down the street from this destination.

We went there every Sunday, and every Sunday after church, we would drive down Farnham Street and go right by the Blackstone Hotel.

It has changed little from my childhood, still a bastion of elegance, though now it is an office building, rather than a hotel. I got some great pictures of its elegance from inside the lobby.

I also got pictures of some old vintage photographs of the hotel that were on the walls.

The Walk: My first order of business was to find a place to buy a cold drink to go with my lunch. It was raining and there was none nearby that I could see. So I walked in the rain to the Mutual of Omaha building, where I found a lunchroom for the employees that sold food and drink. I had my lunch at one of the tables there. That worked out well, because by the time I left it had stopped raining. I got the pictures above on the walk back to the Blackstone.

The Lunch: Cream cheese makes celery taste lots better. I just wasn’t fond of the peanut butter banana roll-ups. I packs the strawberries and blueberries in a container, but somehow forget to put them in my lunch bag. The cherry tomatoes were OK; the kind I get a Aldi are nice and sweet. The dark chocolate covered cashews were yummy:

Lunch Ingredient Deals:

Banana: That’s Smart Bananas were 49¢ lb. at Hy-Vee. One was 11¢.

Art Project: Embellished Frame