Dinner with the Heitz clan

On a wonderful trip with the Midwest Travel Bloggers we saw many things that Charles City, Iowa has to offer, along with some of the rural sites. Randy Heitz, the Regional Manager for the Iowa Farm Bureau, set up some great places for us to see and do to learn about farming in the area.  But best of all, besides showing us the rural side of life, the Heitz clan opened up their home and offered a wonderful meal to the four of us that came to this beautiful part of the county to learn and blog about.

Randy and his wife Marilyn were there with their son Alex and his wife Roshni who he met in Nepal.  They offered us two wonderful soup selections, a great salad, bread and apple cake, all in a dining room setting in the lovely Heitz house.

Outside Randy has what my late father would call, “a real farm” with chickens, cats galore, a horse and more.  Randy talked Sara Broers and I into reaching under a laying hen and pulling out an egg.  I was amazed how very warm the egg was.  The hen didn’t peck me, which was my real worry!

If my territorial Tom Cat Shadow, was not so, well, territorial, Randy might have found a kitty or two missing when I hit the road towards home later that day.  Cats of all colors, short hair, long hair dotted the farm with one curious dog.

On this farm, Randy even has the bell from the one room school house where his grandmother attended school.

The beauty of the country side and the interesting things that this group of travel bloggers learned is important and will be shared among us, but what really came home to me was the kindness of the locals, and a family, the Heitz family, that doesn’t know us from Adam, and their willlingness to open up their homes and hearts to us.

Farmer’s wife, Becky Meyers took the time to cart us around, Lorraine Winterink opened up her beautiful Red Cedar Lodge for us to stay. Justin DeVore shared information about the area and many others took the time to share. We were even news in the local paper, news to us!

Hats off to Charles City for a great tour, and thanks to the Heitz family for a lunch extrodinaire!