2011 Happenings

1 Jan. '11 - Well, the New Year started right off.  Chuck and I have been staying in Room 1 for the winter because our stable room has no heater and is sooo cold.  (My fingers are freezing just writing this.)  We had a couple in Room 6 who came for their New Year's Eve get-away with some friends.  At 2:33am, I heard somebody in Room 6 (directly above us) go toward the bathroom, or the bedroom door.  We can hear the floorboards creak when somebody is walking around up there.  Right behind the big creaks came some little, light, quick creaks like a child following behind an adult.  There were no children staying in that room with the couple.  In a few minutes, the big creaks went from the bathroom / door area, back to the bed with the little creaks following right behind.  A few minutes later, I heard the little creaks coming down the stairs and they ran back and forth outside our bedroom door a few times.  Sometimes they paused right outside the door and I could hear shuffling sounds, then the running would begin again.  Then the footsteps went back up the stairs and all was quiet.  I guess one ghost child was having a New Year's Eve party too.

12 Jan. '11 - Chuck and I have been staying in Room 1 for the winter and so far not much has happened.  Most nights we hear the 11 year old ghost boy named Johnny playing in the room with papers rattling and shuffling, tapping sounds, popping sounds and a few footstep sounds in the hallway outside our door.  Last night there was a loud bang in the hallway like something hard hit the floor, but we looked and could not account for the sound. 

16 Jan. '11 - Last night was a busy one for the children.  Even before we went to bed, Chuck and I heard thumping sounds coming from the foyer hallway.  I looked to make sure it wasn't a cat, but all the cats were in the Keeping room (the name we call our living room area), and were accounted for.  The thumping and knocking sounds went on all night long.  At 2:23am, I heard a very loud bang.  Chuck jumped, so I knew he heard it too although he doesn't remember it.  It sounded like children running and banging and thumping up and down the staircase, in the foyer hallway, and in the upstairs hallway and Room 6 (over our heads).  This morning I could not find anything out of place to account for the big bang.

21 Jan. '11 - Yesterday, Chuck and I finished packing away the Christmas decorations and took the boxes back up to the attic on the third floor.  During one of our trips, we were on the second floor landing when I heard a girl say "Dad".  It sounded like Jinni when she is looking for Chuck, like "Daa-aad".  But Jinni was at school and the guests had not checked in yet, so we were the only people here.  I thought it was Amanda imitating Jinni's voice, so we both said Hi and invited her to help carry boxes.  But that was all there was, so I guess she did not want to help.  Tonight I got a call from the three men who did an investigation here in December.  See the 2010 Happenings for 16 Dec.  "Alex" said they got alot of good EVPs.  At one point they asked who was there and Harold said "Mary is".  Then a woman's voice says "I am.  Third level.  Upstairs."    In Room 4, one of the men mentioned that he needed to get some sleep.  Then a child's voice says "Can't sleep with me."  In Room 6 they asked who had pulled on the covers the night before and a man's voice says "Could be Purdy.  Purdy."  (Purdy was our dog who died in 2008.)   In Room 5 they got a woman humming.  One of the men made a comment and a woman agrees with him with an "Uh-huh".   When the men ask the woman to say her name she says "I don't want to."  An older woman says "I want you to hear me."  The men are going to send us a copy of the EVPs so we can see if we can hear anything else.  If I do, I'll add them here.

31 Jan. '11 - Last Friday night was pretty busy.  We heard alot of walking around noises in the hallway outside our bedroom door.  It went on for hours.  At one point I heard a loud thump out there and I looked to see if something had been knocked over, but could not account for the noise.  Early in the morning, 5:05am, I heard very heavy footsteps running down the hallway on the second floor.  At first I thought it was Jinni getting ready for school.  But when I listened to the monitor, I could hear her breathing in her room, so I know it was not her.  All the guests said they were not up at that time.  Last night, the lady sleeping in the big bed in Room 5 felt somebody grab her foot and then felt a pat on her back.  She thought her husband had touched her, but when she rolled over she saw he was asleep facing the other way, so it could not have been him.

10 Feb. '11 - Chuck and I have heard some interesting knocking sounds in our room (Room 1) lately.  There was knocking sounds on the bed headboard last Saturday.  And yesterday, when I was in the bathroom, I heard two knocks on the bathroom door.  Thinking it was Chuck, I said to come in.  But he did not come in so I opened the door and he was asleep in the bed.  So it wasn't him.  Right after that, he went into the bathroom and I sat down at the computer to answer emails.  I heard three knocks on the bathroom door.  Chuck was in the shower, so I know it was not him.  And I know it was not me.  Last night, there was two more knocks on the bathroom door when I was in there getting ready for bed.  I said "Hi" to Harold, and it has not happened again today.  I just received an email from Rich Newman who now has a book published about Haunted Inns.  It's called The Ghost Hunter's Field Guide and is for sale through Amazon.com.  We are one of the featured chapters.  Here is the link: http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Hunters-Field-Guide-Experience/dp/0738720887/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297369060&sr=8-1

13 Feb. '11 - Last night was the first really busy night of the year.  We had a Valentine's Weekend dinner and "Newly-wed" style game.  It was a lot of fun.  After the game, the guests wanted to know about the spirits here so Chuck gave a quick summary and showed our evidence on the computer.  Then, some of the people wanted to see the pendulum demonstrated.  We talked to Curtis and he really liked one of the ladies because she has red hair like his.  One of the couples took the pendulum to their room to talk to Curtis there.  They also used the "Ghost Radar" app on their Ipad.  One interesting thing they told me about was that they asked Curtis if he knew it was Valentine's Day and he answered "no".  Then the "Ghost Radar" on the Ipad said "January".  They looked at the calendar on the wall, and indeed, it still had the January sheet showing.  I guess I missed that room when I was changing them all to February.  During the night, in Room 4, the wife had tucked the covers under her so that she was rolled up in the blanket.  She felt the blanket being pulled out from under her.  She thought it was her husband, but he was facing the other way.  Then she saw the blanket was being pulled up over his shoulder, but neither she nor he was doing it.  She lay down again with her hand hanging off the edge of the mattress, and pretty soon she felt a tugging on her hand, but she did  not see anything there to explain the tugging feeling.  In Room 7, the husband woke up because he heard something and he saw a column of fog or mist at the foot of the bed, and he realized the column was so dense,  he could not see the bathroom door through it.  He said it lasted a minute or so and then faded away.  He also heard children giggling in the hallway and wondered why the parents did not put them to bed.  But there were no children guests.  In the Caboose, the couple had been playing with the train whistle and then, later, they heard the whistle but neither of them had done it.  In Room 6, when the couple were straightening the room, the husband turned to walk across the room when he saw a gray cat run out from under the bed and across in front of him.  He nearly tripped trying not to step on it.  But when they looked for the cat, there was none in there.  In our room,  I heard a knock on the headboard at 2:28am.  It sounded like a knuckle on wood.  When Chuck and I  were making breakfast, Chuck saw a gray cat run across the dining room toward the bay window.  Thinking maybe Misty had escaped from the Keeping Room, we looked and found her asleep on our bed in the back bedroom.  So two people saw Josephine this morning.

14 Feb. '11 - The sisters who stayed in Room 5 last night had a busy night.  They brought a little "word box" and we asked Harold to act as the technician.  Several new names came through, but the most prevalent was Pete.  We talked to Pete quite a bit and found out that he was 16 years old when he was in a car accident in St. Louis in 1940.  He said he was a passenger in a Buick and he was not sure what exactly happened.  He came here to the Inn through the Gate with Fred.  But apparently, Fred did not stay like Pete did.  Pete says he likes to watch sports on TV with Chuck.  During the night, one sister had her pillow pulled on and felt a tingling like a small electrical shock.  The other sister had invited the ghost dogs to come and sleep on her bed with her and during the night she felt a heavy weight on her feet.  The weight slowly moved up her legs and up onto her body and then up to her shoulder and then left.  She thought it was a very interesting feeling.  The sisters did some EVPs and in one they hear a man laughing.  And later, they hear "Dee, Dee, Dee", which is the name of one of the women.  At one point, when they were in Room 5, they found their door closed and locked when neither of them had done it.  They had been going in and out of the room and had not been closing the door.  They were glad the door was locked with them in it rather than being locked out of it!

20 Feb. '11 - This morning, about 7am, I was in bed in Room 1 and I heard a woman say "Hello".  Chuck was in the bathroom so he didn't hear it.  There was a woman staying in Room 6, so I assumed it was her saying hello to Jinni who was already up.  But when I asked the woman if she had met Jinni in the hallway or said hello to her, she said she was still in bed at 7am and did not talk to anybody until breakfast.  There were no other women here, so I wonder who it was.  Chris Moon is coming this coming weekend for his 25th GHU class here, so we'll ask who said it during the TttD (Telephone to the Dead)  sessions.

23 Feb. '11 - A couple of interesting things have happened in the past two days.  First, on Monday night, starting about 9pm, Chuck and I were watching TV in Room 1 when we began to hear thumping and creaking sounds in the foyer hallway outside the bedroom door.  At one point our doorknob rattled.  At 10:15pm, the dinger bell in the hallway rang.  Thinking it was our guest looking for us, Chuck checked the hallway, but there was nobody there.  Jinni had gone to bed about 8:30pm and our guest said she was asleep by 9, so it was neither one of them making all the noise.  Then, this morning, I heard the dining room / foyer door open and close loudly.  It slammed so hard it rattled our bedroom door.  Thinking it was Jinni getting ready for school, I looked at the alarm clock but it was only 5:22am, so I know it was not Jinni as she gets up at 6:30.  Our guest said she did not get up until 7.   Then, just now, (10 pm) the dining room / foyer door just opened and closed again.  Chuck and I are in Room 1 and we both heard the door open and slam shut.   We found Tiger in the foyer like he just came through the door.  Even if he pushed the door open, it would not have slammed shut again.  Besides, the doorknob rattles and makes a very distinctive sound when it is turned and we both heard the doorknob rattle.  I wonder if Amanda let him out.  She has admitted to doing that before.  I think the spirits are getting stirred up with Chris coming soon.

25 Feb. '11 - Chuck and I were in the kitchen this afternoon getting some lunch and Chuck made a comment about the three inches of snow we got overnight.  It was predicted that we were going to get ten inches, but only got three.  Right after he commented on the snow, I heard a man say "What the heck?"  I knew it was not Chuck because he does not talk like that.  I think it was Curtis.  Maybe he just now noticed the snow after the nice early spring weather we were having this past week.  Last night, I was sitting in the dining room and kept seeing black shadows darting around the room.  There was also a little child shadow that kept coming out of the parlor into the dining room and then zooming back in.  And when I was in the kitchen making supper, I saw the shadow of a man standing in the doorway, but when I looked up, he zoomed back into the dining room.  I wonder if the spirits are all keyed up about Chris coming.

28 Feb. '11 - What a busy weekend we had!  Chris Moon came for his 25th Ghost Hunt University weekend here.  We were quite full, despite the winter weather.   On Saturday night, during the Ghost Box session, we talked to Harold and Curtis and it was indeed Curtis who I heard in the kitchen on Feb. 26.  We did not get very many questions answered because Lewis Mason was on a mission to bring in a mass number of earthbound souls to talk to Chris on the Box so he could cross them over to the Light.  Lewis said he had 805 souls ready to go.  The air in the room was very electric and heavy.  Paulette, Chris, Kristin, and I were all  affected by it.  They did finally go to the light, but it took alot out of Chris and we had to shut it down.  On Sunday night, the same thing happened again with more than 1000 souls heading to the Light.  Six of the souls changed their minds at the last second and decided not to go.  One, Peter, took alot of energy from Chris to tell his story.  Peter said he had been hit over the head with a large flower pot by his girlfriend.  The shards of the pot cut the artery on his neck and with his dying strength, he strangled her.  Now he is afraid to go to the Light because he killed her.  He kept saying it was an accident and he was so sorry, but he still would not go.  Some of the people in the room had Ghost Radar going on their phones at the time and they all said 'Peter' and 'sorry' and 'accident'.  It was very interesting.  I talked to a Tena who would not go till she got her turn to talk on the box.  Chris talked to her and she just wanted to say hi and to have her turn.  I got the impression she was a little "Nellie Olson" and was stomping her foot and shaking her fists and demanding her turn!  Then she went on.  Later, a Bob came by to say hi and thank you, and then he moved on too.  During the night on Saturday, several people heard children running and giggling in the hallway and saw orbs zooming through their rooms.  The lady in Room 7 had her covers pulled and her calf was touched.  She said it felt very cold.   Paulette, in Room 6, was visited by a young man spirit named Daniel.  (She's been visited by Daniel here before.)  Daniel told Paulette to stop worrying and go to sleep, he would stand guard over her and not let anything bother her.  She said she went right to sleep and had the best sleep she's had in a long time.  During Sunday's TttD session she talked to Daniel and thanked him for watching over her.  She asked Daniel to watch over me in the days to come so the spirits don't bother me like they did after November's sessions.  He said he would, and so far I have not been bothered like before.  On Sunday night, not much happened except that at 3am, the front door opened and slammed shut very hard.  It really rattled the walls and windows!  Almost everybody in the building was awakened by the BOOM!! it made.  Everybody said they heard it but did not do it.  Something funny was that our cat Fluffy had gotten out of the back room and was following the guests around.  He went upstairs with Chris and sat in on one of the private sessions in Room 5.  Chris said Fluffy was going crazy chasing something only Fluffy could see around and around the room.  Under chairs, over the bed, around his feet, and even into the waste basket.  Fluffy was jumping and batting and trying his hardest to catch what ever it was he was chasing, all during the 30 minute box session.  As soon as the box was turned off, Fluffy flopped down and went right to sleep, he was that worn out from his chase.  Anybody who's met Fluffy knows he is the most laid back cat you will ever meet.  And for him to get that excited about anything for that long is just not in his personality.   I wonder if Harold or one of the children was having some fun with Fluffy.  To read the transcripts of the "Box" sessions, click here.

1 March '11 - Good news!   Volume 2 of the Ghostly Happenings Book series is now available at the Mason House Inn for $5.  This book is ,essentially, a printed form of Joy's Journal in booklet form.  This Journal and the book are an account of true happenings at the Mason House Inn as reported to Joy by the guests and also Joy's and Chuck's own actual experiences. 

12 March '11 - We received this picture from Chris Moon.  A woman named Kris Bronson took it during the last GHU TttD session on Sunday, Feb. 27.    It was taken in Room 5, looking into the mirror.  You can see Chris Moon, who was sitting at the little vanity table in front of the mirror, and I am in a chair behind Chris.  At this point, I was feeling very dizzy and my energy was being taken.  It always feels like a pulling from the top of my head.  This picture caught the energy being pulled from my head.  Wow!  What a picture!   Thank you, Kris! 

13 March '11 - The guest who stayed in Room 4 the last couple of nights reported that on Saturday morning he heard a loud knocking on his door, but when he looked there was nobody there.  That was at 4:12am.  And then, soon after that, he heard a woman in Room 5 say "Good Morning!".  He assumed there were people in that room, but he was the only guest up on the second floor that night......there was nobody in Room 5.

19 March '11 - This evening I saw Josephine.  It's been a while since she's been seen.  I was sewing in the dining room and watching TV when I saw a grey cat run from the dining room / foyer doorway, across the dining room, and into the kitchen.  We had locked all the cats in the keeping room earlier in the day because a ghost hunting group had arrived and we did not want them to get false readings from the cats wandering around.  My first thought was that Misty had gotten out, but when I went to look for her, I found her asleep in the keeping room.  It must have been Josephine. 

2 April '11 - Here's another photo for your perusal.  It was taken by a guest named Nichole who was walking around outside and taking pictures here and there.  She took this one of the General Store building and when she was reviewing her pictures, found more than she expected.  The white lines above the animal are the drainage pipe in the culvert next to the road, and there's only one pipe, so it is obvious that she moved the camera, but the pipe is blurred vertically and the animal is moving horizontally.  Hmm.  Also, why aren't the eyes blurred too?  Interesting, no?

      After being rather quiet around here lately, things are getting interesting again.  Last Friday morning, Chuck had left early for a doctor appointment and shortly after he left, I felt somebody sit on the bed on his side.  Then it lay down, I thought maybe Chuck had come back or I had dreamed that he left, but when I looked there was nobody there.  So I lay back down again and in a short time I felt whoever was laying there sit up and then get up and I heard him go into the bathroom.  But I could still feel a heaviness down by my feet and I thought Smokey had gotten into the room and was on the bed.  But again I looked and there was nothing there.  Must have been Curtis and Josephine trying out the new mattress.  Then, yesterday, Chuck and I were in Room 1, waiting for our guests to arrive.  We both heard several people talking in the foyer and I looked but there was nobody there.  Not even any cars in town or anybody walking around outside.  Then, this morning, while making breakfast, I heard somebody say "Help, help".  It was coming from the dining room, but there was nobody in there.  Jinni wasn't home, Chuck was in the bedroom, and the guests were in Room 3, so I know it was none of them.  Our guests are fascinated by the 'animal' picture and are going to try to get a picture of a cat outside tonight so we can compare the two photos.  (Still haven't been able to get a picture of a cat outside at night.)

4 April '11 - There was a bunch of teenagers and a mom who stayed in Room 3 the last few days.  They invited Harold and Curtis to come over and play in their room.  Several things happened, including: walking sounds in the room when everybody was in bed, heavy breathing sounds that could not be accounted for, the bed was shaking, the light was swinging, there were knocking sounds on the walls and window, and the water in the bathroom turned on and off.  The woman felt a cat jump on the bed and lay down, but there was nothing there.  One girl got poked on her shoulder, but when she looked, nobody was close enough to touch her.  Several of them heard a woman's voice in the next room, talking loudly, but there were no guests in that room that night.  ( Rooms 2 and 3 are not considered "haunted", however, if invited, Harold says they will go over and visit the rooms, but they don't inhabit them.)

21 April '11 - Last weekend there were 16 women here having a Mother / Daughter / Sister / Niece get-together.  They stayed in the rooms on the second floor of the Main House.  Things that happened to them include: One lady in Room 5 woke up and found her blankets all tucked in around the bed.  All the other women said they did not do it.  Also in Room 5, they found the door locked when none of them had done it.  In Room 6, one lady was touched on the cheek but nobody was near enough to her to touch her.

     Chuck and I just got back from Texas where we were visiting our son, Jeremy, and his growing family.  One of the things that happened there was that we went down to Corpus Christi to tour the USS Lexington, a retired aircraft carrier Navy ship.  Nothing extraordinary happened until we got to the Chapel area.  Chuck, Jeremy, and I went into the Chapel and I felt a presence but I did not see anything except a man wearing dark blue sitting in one of the pews, looking forward, like he was waiting for a service to start.  For some reason I thought it was Jeremy because he had gone in ahead of me.  I thought he was waiting for us to catch up so he sat down in a pew.  Just then, Jeremy spoke from behind me and it startled me because I thought he was sitting in the pew.  So I looked again and there was nobody in the pew and nobody else with us in the room.  And I know nobody had left the room because we were standing by the door.  I told Chuck that I had seen somebody in the pew and now he was gone and maybe it had been a spirit.  Just then, I felt the presence very close to me and a man was saying "Where is everybody?  Where is everybody?" over and over.  I think he realized I had seen him and he was trying to get some help.  The emotion was very strong.  He was very agitated and confused and it affected me strongly.  Chuck told him that he needed to go to the light and everything would be explained to him.  Chuck said he could feel the air was very heavy and full of electricity and after he said to go to the light, the air was not so heavy feeling.  On the way out, Chuck commented to a docent that some of the sailors were still hanging around.  The docent said that many people had told him that.  Well, maybe now there is one less.

25 April '11 - This past weekend we had a couple who stayed in Room 5.  They did not know the haunted history of the place.  At breakfast they commented that the husband kept hearing a dog in the room.  The wife did not.  I wonder if it was Lady again, she seems to like that room.  The man who stayed in Room 4 did know the haunted history and has stayed here several times.  He usually has something happen and was disappointed when nothing did.  But then, after breakfast, he went up to pack and a cat zoomed into his room when he opened the door.  Thinking it was Misty, he looked and looked for her but could not find any cat in the room anywhere.  Then he was excited that he had seen Josephine and he was happy again.

2 May '11 - There were four ladies staying in Room 5 for four nights.  They brought their quilting and sewing machines and set up in the dining room and sewed to their hearts delight.  They reported a few experiences.  On the first night here, the lady sleeping in the twin bed by the door said she heard children running up and down the staircase and giggling.  There was a woman trying to shush the children and telling them to be quiet.  Later, there was a man and a woman having a conversation somewhere nearby.  They were speaking English, but she could not quite make out what they were saying.  The ladies knew they were the only people up on the second floor, so she was very excited that she heard the spirits.  The mother and daughter sharing the big bed heard tapping sounds on the ceiling, walls and headboard.  They knew it was Harold, so they said 'Hi'.   Nothing happened on the second and third nights, but then on the morning after the fourth night, the mother in the big bed woke to find herself covered with a blanket that had not been on the bed when she went to sleep.  All the other ladies said it was not them that had covered her.  I guess Mary is taking care of guests again.  All in all, the ladies said they had a great time, got alot of sewing done, and were thrilled to have met our friendly ghosts. 

12 May '11 - Chuck and I have moved back into our 'stable' bedroom/office.  It's about 60 degrees in here, but we need Room 1 for our guests this weekend.  The first night it was very quiet....no Johnny, no noise of any kind.  The second night, Harold found us.  I was awakened at 2:33am by a very loud thump on our headboard, followed by a loud knock on our TV.  I said "Hi, Harold.  You found us."  And then all was quiet again.

17 May '11 - This past weekend was a GHU with Chris Moon.  Some of the guests checked in early on Friday and stayed three nights.  At Saturday breakfast, the lady staying in Room 6 said her legs were tucked in, very tightly, four times during the night.  She was in the twin bed by the door.  She said it felt like hands on either side of her legs, tucking the blankets around and under her legs.  It was too tight and she kicked her legs to loosen them a little.  But a little later it happened again.  Four times she had just her legs tucked in.  She thought it was very strange.  We thought maybe Mary was doing the tucking because she has admitted to tucking people before.  During the TttD sessions on Saturday night, we learned that it was not Mary but someone else who had done the tucking.  The ladies in Room 4 heard the children running and playing in the hallway.  And, about 4am, they heard some people talking loudly.  The lady in Room 6 also heard the loud talking.  She said she got up to look to see what was going on, but everything was dark and quiet.  But when she went back to her room, she could hear the talking.  The people in Room 5 reported hearing a tapping sound that went around the room.  At first they thought it was the baseboard heater (which does make a metallic ticking sound when heating up), but then it tapped on the headboard of the bed and they knew it was Harold.  During Saturday night, about 1:30am, there was a loud BANG! sound outside of Room 3.  The lady in that room sat straight up in bed and looked at the clock.  One of the ladies in Room 8 heard it also, but the people in Room 4 did not.  (Those are the rooms with windows toward that side of the house.)  We asked Harold during that night's TttD session and he said it was a residual sound from the exodus of souls that night.  Sort of a delayed sonic boom.  He said it was lucky nobody got hurt, then he laughed.  On Sunday morning, the ladies in Room 8 reported that Josephine had jumped on the bed.  She walked around and around and then settled down on one lady's legs.  But when she looked, there was nothing there.  The people in Room 4 said they heard tapping in the hallway and also a sound like china rattling.  One of the ladies in Room 7 had put her earrings on her suitcase, but in the morning they were not there.  Chuck suggested she go up to the room and politely insist they be returned.  She did that and then returned to breakfast.  In a little while she went up and looked and found one earring on the little table.  She thanked Amanda and asked for the other one also.  After breakfast when she went up to the room to pack up, she found the second earring on her bed.  During the Sunday night TttD session, we asked who had taken the earrings and Amanda first blamed it on Anna, but then admitted it.  We thanked her for returning them.  On Sunday night, Paulette had an interesting encounter.  She woke up about 3am, smelling cigar smoke.  Next to her bed was a man dressed like a fur-trapper from the 1800s, he was smoking a cigar.  Then Daniel, Paulette's protector, appeared next to the trapper and very politely told the man he needed to leave.  They both slowly disappeared.  Paulette went back to sleep.  The three ladies in Room 7 had come to the class hoping to talk to their little brother who died when he was two years old.  They did talk to him on the TttD and were very happy.  On Monday morning, Aurora was watching TV and made a comment about a little boy on the TV.  She said he looked just like the little boy who was "following those three ladies around" on Sunday.   To read the TttD transcripts, click here.

21 May '11 - Last night I was sitting in the dining room watching TV, and I kept hearing noises coming from the foyer.  Since I knew we had no guests in the Main House,  I thought there was a cat in there running around, so I opened the door and looked around.  No cat.  So I took stock of the cats and accounted for them all in the Keeping Room and outside, then I went back to watching TV.  (I like Criminal Minds.)   In about 10 minutes, I heard the rustling sounds again.  It would get close to the door and then run back toward the front door.  Then it would rustle papers and rattle the bell and start all over again.  Probably the children playing.  About 10pm, I went to bed and found  Chuck watching baseball on the bedroom TV.  He asked if all the cats were accounted for because he kept hearing noises coming from the area of the room that used to be Jinni's old room.  (We use that area for storage and file cabinets now, but the cats like to climb up into the window to look out.)  I checked the area and there were no cats in the room.  (Besides, I'd already accounted for them all.)  After we turned out the lights, there was loud rattling and bumping and creaking sounds coming from the area.  The children sure were busy last night.

28 May '11 - The ladies who stayed in Room 5 on Thursday night brought their own little "Ghost Box" and talked to Harold.  Earlier in the day, I had seen a man dressed all in navy blue, standing outside beside our mailbox.  One second he was there and two seconds later he was gone.  I told the ladies about it and they asked Harold if he knew who it was.  Harold said it was Terry and that Terry wanted to come in but Harold would not let him.  The ladies also talked to Amanda and asked her to turn their flashlight off and on, and she did it.  Last night, four ladies who are psychics and mediums stayed in Room 6 and they were able to send three earthbound spirits to the light.  They said one spirit kept asking her to open the bar, he wanted a drink.  She told him to go to the light and everything he wanted would be taken care of.  We have had guests before who have mentioned smelling a waft of whiskey pass by them.  I wonder if it was the same one.

30 May '11 - The four ladies who stayed in Room 6 last night said it was a quiet night even though they had invited Harold and Amanda to play in the room.  During breakfast, the lady staying in Room 8 was listening intently.  She did not know about the spirits and had spent a very quiet and peaceful night.  She asked what kind of things tend to happen in Room 8, but I suggested she wait till the next morning because she was staying another night and we did not want to plant suggestions in her head to scare her.  She agreed with that and seemed to be okay with the information she was getting from the other guests.  In the early afternoon, she came in and told me she was going to take a nap.  I was quietly doing laundry on the second floor and I could hear her lightly snoring in Room 8.  About an hour later, Chuck and I were in the dining room and we heard a loud thumping coming down the stairs.  It was the lady from Room 8 exiting the building as fast as her suitcase could go!  She looked very frazzled and disheveled.  She announced that she was not going to stay another night and left in a hurry.  Chuck and I were so stunned that we did not even go after her to find out what had happened to make her leave so fast.  I guess she found out what kind of things go on in her room.  I wonder if Michael Brown got in bed with her.  She accused us of witchcraft, but we don't do witchcraft, it's just proof of life after death.  Who better than a Christian should believe in life after death?  (By the way, we're Lutheran, not Wiccan.)

2 June '11 - Something really weird just happened in our bed room.   Just before Chuck and I got up this morning, we both heard a cat scratching the carpet under our bed.  It was quite loud.  It sounded like a cat sharpening it's claws and went on for a few seconds then quit.  But no cat came out from under the bed and we kept waiting for a cat to come and jump on the bed, but no cat did.  I looked to see who was under the bed, but there was no cat under there.  I went out and found all the cats in the house, no cat was in the room with us.  Was Josephine under the bed scratching the carpet?  Wow.  That was really weird.  Harold says he's not always aware of the boot sounds he makes.  Maybe it's the same with cat scratching sounds.

5 June '11 - The four ladies who stayed in Room 6 last night had some interesting experiences.  When they were sitting on the bed, no one was sitting on the corner, but they saw and felt it go down like somebody sat there.  The girl closest to the corner fell over from the movement of the bed.  Then she felt a slap on her back but no one was near her.  Later, when they were doing an EVP, one lady felt her leg getting really cold and then she felt somebody touch her calf.  When she looked down, she could see her pant leg being pulled on.   A man who was in that same room the night before said he was awakened early in the morning with a feeling that he was being watched.  He was sleeping with his back toward the room and his back was ice cold.  He said he felt paralyzed and could not move but all his hairs were standing straight up.  After a while he warmed up and the feeling went away and he went back to sleep.

12 June '11 - The ladies who stayed in Room 7 this past weekend did not want any spirit visitations in their room so I asked Harold and all the spirits to stay out of the room.  They complied and the ladies had a very quiet and happy weekend.  At the same time, the ladies who stayed in Room 5 did want activity and they asked Harold and Amanda to come 'play' in their room.  They put a brooch on the vanity table and told Amanda she could have it.  During the night, even though the brooch was not taken, there was a lot of moving shadow activity going on in that corner. 

20 June '11 - There were some teenaged boys who stayed in Room 5 this weekend who were on their very first ghost hunt.  They said they got a dizzy feeling and a ringing in the ears when standing in front of the large mirror.  We told them about the vortex behind it and that made sense.  They went up to the cemetery and got lots of orbs in their photos.  At first they thought it was bugs so they deliberately took pictures of bugs, but they did not look the same.  They took pictures of dust, not the same.  They came back to the Inn and did some EVPs but got no answers.  So they determined that the place is not haunted.  I guess they are the experts.  At the same time, there were four ladies staying in Room 6 who got lots of EVP answers on their recorders.  One said "Talks too much."  They got lots of orbs in the room and determined that the place is definitely haunted, or atleast inhabited.  Haunted sounds so negative and scary.  They said it is not scary but fun.  I guess the boys were looking for scary.  Sorry.

28 June '11 - The father and son ghost hunting team who stayed in Room 5 Sunday night had some good EVPs.  In Room 6 they got a boy saying "Save me".  They got some other good EVPs in another building in town too, but the owners of that building don't want people to know it's inhabited, so I can't tell you what building it is.  But they got a man's voice saying "(sigh) Finally!"  and "Why can't you leave me alone."   During the night, the son was sleeping in the twin bed by the door.  He said he heard people talking and doors closing and footsteps in the hallway around midnight.  He just thought it was the other guests, until he found out there were no other guests.......  That freaked him out a bit.  They were going to stay a second night, but when they got an EMF reading of 700 in the middle of the big bed, and all their hairs were standing on end, they decided not to stay.  I guess they thought it was scary enough.  After the men left, Chuck and I went up to the room and saw the bed messed up.  I used my pendulum to ask Harold what happened.  He said that three girls had messed the bed and were sitting on it.  Amanda and Anna were two of the girls, but I could not determine the third girl's name.  He said it was funny and they were laughing.

3 July '11 - There were some ladies who stayed in Room 6 last night and they got some really good EVPs.  They had a checker board set up and got some children giggling and saying 'Checkers' and 'Tic Tac Toe' and 'Jump me'.  They went out on the bridge and got a man saying 'Turn around'.  They got a man saying 'I'll be in the blue room'.  That would be Room 8.  They got a child saying 'Stolen cookies.  Yeah, I did it.'  And a girl says 'Consumption.  Keep away.'  (This was a Tuberculosis hospital for a while in 1913.)  Those are some amazing EVPs.

16 July '11 - It's been rather quiet lately.  Even when people ask for activity in their room, nothing happens.  I asked Harold about it and he said 'They were boring.'  ( I have a hint for "Ghost Hopers".....don't be boring.  The spirits get their energy from your energy.)   Friday night, the ladies in Room 7 said they had checked in and put their bags in the room and then went for a walk.  When they got back, they found the potpourri bowl had been dumped onto the chair.  They thought that was weird but did not consider it ghostly activity, but they could not explain it either.  Then, last night, same room, the lady said she was laying in the big bed when she heard somebody come in the room and lay down on the twin bed.  She said it sounded so real she had to get up and look to be sure and found nobody in the bed.  So she went to sleep and had a very vivid dream about going into the wrong bedroom and finding somebody in the bed she thought was hers.  She said she never dreams so vividly.  I told her the story about Mr. Knapp who found somebody in the bed he thought was his.  The man in the bed thought Mr. Knapp was robbing him and he stabbed Mr. Knapp to death.  This story is associated with Room 7.  Maybe Mr. Knapp was the one in the room and he's still trying to get into bed.

26 July '11 - The eight guests we had Saturday night have been here many times before, so Chuck and I let them do an investigation without us being here.  They wanted to see if the ghosts would guard the place.  They said that immediately they felt watched and unwanted.  They had their "Ghost Radar" apps going and were getting words like 'Forgotten', 'Guests', 'Mary', 'Frank', and 'Casey'.  I don't know who Casey is.  Forgotten guests......like we forgot somebody was coming.  That's funny.  The group first went around and did an initial sweep of the place and found a light on in Room 6.  I know for a fact that all the lights were off up there when we left.  One lady used the bathroom in Room 5 and the door swung open on her.  Nobody was there.  After that, they went to the toidy in groups to make sure the door did not open.  They got a couple of good EVPs.  In Room 8 they said there was eight of them and asked how many spirits were in the room with them and a voice says "Eight".  During the night, they heard shuffling sounds in the hallway and walking around sounds up on the third floor.  One lady went up the stairs to the third floor to make sure nobody was up there, but then she got the word 'Blood' on her Ghost Radar.  She went no further and came back down.  I told her about David being killed up there and that might be what the 'Blood' was about.   Some of the people got touched and their hair played with.  One young man kept seeing moving shadows and one time he saw a person, not in their group, walk from Room 4 to the hallway bathroom, about four steps worth.  That really surprised him.  The group said they had a good time, but missed my breakfast.   Chris Moon is coming in a few weeks, we'll have to ask Harold who Casey is and if it bothered them having the group here without us.

28 July '11 - The spirits liked playing with the doors last night.  The couple who stayed in Room 7 last night checked in about 5pm.  Right after that, Jinni and I were in the dining room and we heard the doors on the second floor opening and closing and opening and closing.  We thought it was our guests looking through the other rooms so we did not think anything about it.  About 5:30, the guests left for dinner.  About 8:30pm, I heard more door opening and closing sounds.  Jinni had already gone to bed so I knew it was not her.  Chuck was in the office, so it wasn't him.   I looked outside to see if the guest's car was back and it was not outside anywhere.  About 9pm, I went to bed.  Chuck and I were asleep by 10pm.  This morning at breakfast, the guests said they checked in and took a nap.  They heard the other bedroom doors on the second floor opening and closing but thought it was me.   (It wasn't me.)  They went to dinner and then spelunked around the cemetery until a little after 9pm.  (I told them about hearing the doors a little before 9.  It was not them.)   The wife went to bed about 10 and went right to sleep.  The husband could not sleep so he went looking around the other bedrooms taking pictures.  He got a very interesting shadow in Room 5 that looks like a cat sitting by the warming stove.  Then he went back to bed and read till midnight.  Soon after he turned off the light, he saw 3 or 4 tiny little balls of light zooming around the room.  It was hard to count them because they were zooming so fast here and there, then they left.  Right after that, he was dozing off when he felt somebody heavy sit on the edge of the bed.  It pulled the edge of the bed down so far that he felt like he was going to fall off.  That startled him and he had a little trouble getting to sleep after that.  About 5am, he was awakened by the sound of doors opening and closing and opening and closing.  He thought it was me or Jinni getting up.   But Jinni did not get up till 7am and I did not get up till 7:30.  I wonder what their fascination with the doors was.

31 July '11 - There was a group here last night doing some ghost hunting.  They talked to Curtis, Markie, and Amanda on their pendulum.  They invited them to come play in the bedrooms.  During an EVP session in the hallway, one man saw somebody walk into his bedroom (Room 7).  But the whole group was in the hallway, so who walked into the room?  He went and looked and nobody was in there.  Later he saw a small, bright light float from Room 4 into the hallway bathroom.  One of the ladies had night vision glasses and she saw several tiny bright lights zooming around in Room 5.  About 2am, the big bed in Room 4 and the twin bed in Room 5 (which is directly on the other side of the wall), were both shaken, surprising the sleepers within.  The children had been invited to jump on the beds, and I guess they did.  At about 3am, the lamp on the dresser in Room 6 turned on by itself.  (This is the same lamp that was found on by the July 26 group.)  The lady sleeping in the room woke up enough to notice the lamp was on but went back to sleep and when she woke up later, the lamp was off again.  She tried to make the lamp turn on by jiggling it and trying to set the switch so it would not take much to turn on, but she could not make it do it.  I tried later and could not recreate it either.   About midnight, one of the ladies came downstairs to the dining room to make coffee, but she heard several loud knocks that seemed to be coming from the coffee hutch, so she ran back upstairs and did not make the coffee.  She thought Harold did not want her messing with my coffee pots.

17 Aug. '11 - We had a Ghost Hunting University (GHU) class with Chris Moon here this past weekend.  There was plenty of activity in all the rooms.  During the classes, people were being touch "like a hand on my shoulder" and one lady's necklace was played with.  During Saturday night, Room 7 had the most activity.  One lady put her necklace on the dresser and in the morning she found the chain had two knots tied in it.  Another lady said her legs had been sat on with a weight heavier than a cat but not as heavy as a person.  We found out later that it had been Purdy, our ghost dog.  Another lady in Room 7 and one in Room 4 reported having a pressure on the chest like a hand pushing them into the bed.  Harold said it was the children fooling around.  Room 4 also had a bed shaking and heard children giggling in the room.  The ladies in Room 6 did some EVPs and got some good responses, also their lamp was flashing in response to their questions.  The lady in Room 1 reported being visited by Bart and Harold.  On Sunday, the young man staying in Room 4 did some EVPs and got alot of good responses.  He had stayed here in June with a friend and did not get any evidence and had declared us not haunted.  He has since changed his mind.  The lady staying in Room 8 heard a man say "help".  Later we learned it was Stephen McGee and he was one of the earthbounds wanting help to cross to the Light.  During the Telephone to the Dead sessions, we talked to Harold and Amanda about the activities during the night.  There was a large group of earthbound spirits waiting to cross over and they kept interfering with our ability to talk to the spirits here.  But when they finally did go, 1800 of them, it was pretty fast.  A few stopped at the Box and said their name and some told how they died.  It's like they want to tell their story before they go.  One lady said she'd been shot in the chest.  Another said she'd been electrocuted and she grabbed Chris' arm and he got a burn on his arm.   As people were leaving on Monday morning, Chuck and I were talking to the lady who had stayed in Room 1.  I looked outside and saw a man in his early twenties standing by her car.  He was wearing a white T-shirt.  He was there, and then he was gone.  I told the lady about it and she said it was Louis, her spirit guide.  I guess he likes to dress like James Dean.   To read the transcripts, click here.

25 Aug. '11 - I was talking on the phone to Cindi this afternoon and when she mentioned some trouble her husband was having, I heard a man in the telephone say "Oh no!"  Cindi said on her end it sounded like I had a 'call waiting' signal, so she didn't hear it.  It was probably Harold or Curtis listening in.

26 Aug. '11 - This morning, very early, I heard rustling sounds coming from the corner of our room.  There was the sound of rustling papers.  Then there were footsteps that came from the corner toward the bed.  They turned and went toward the foot of the bed, then the bathroom door creaked like it does when it is closing.  At that point I thought it was Chuck coming back from the bathroom so I felt his side of the bed and he was asleep beside me.   The footsteps went around the foot of the bed and rattled the desk chair and then up Chuck's side of the bed where it rattled the closet door and then it stopped.  It was very dark and I could not see anything (besides being totally blind without my glasses) and I did not look at the clock to see what time it was, but I'm thinking it was about 3 or 4 AM.

29 Aug. '11 - The people staying in Room 6 last night heard children playing in their bathroom, so they sprinkled a little pile of baby powder on the floor in there to see if it would get messed up.  They did not notice any difference in the pile this morning.  However, the people staying in Room 5 found little, tiny footprints in powder coming out of their bathroom door.  (Room 5 has a dark carpet so it was noticeable.)  Originally, Room 5's bathroom and Room 6's bathroom were the hallway into Room 5.  So for the children to be going through 6's bathroom and 5's bathroom to get into Room 5 is historically correct!  Also, the lady in Room 5 told me that the first time they stayed here, a couple years ago, she had gotten up to use the bathroom about 5am, and when she got back into bed, she felt a cat jump onto the bed.  She said it turned around and around and kneaded some, and then settled down by her knee.  She could feel the weight of it and the vibration from purring.  She thought one of my cats, probably Misty from how heavy it was, had gotten in the room during the night.  So she reached down to pet Misty, but nothing was there.  She's been coming back several times a year ever since then, hoping to have Josephine on her bed again.  They also said that on Friday night they heard what sounded like a bowling ball being dropped on the floor over their heads.  It was so loud they ran out into the hallway to see if anybody else heard it.  The people in Room 6 said they heard it too.  But after looking around on the third floor, I could not account for the sound.

5 Sept. '11 - This past weekend was a busy one.  The couple in Room 4 reported that on Friday night they felt their covers being tugged on.  And the ladies in Room 6 said they heard alot of knocking sounds on the walls and ceiling.  The light on the ceiling was blinking to yes and no questions.  I think Harold likes them.  On Saturday morning, Chuck and I were making beds and we came across an earthbound spirit who was following Chuck around.  Anna (a spirit who I can hear) came to me and said his name was Gerald and he was waiting for "the man" to come and help him cross to the light.  He thought Chuck was "the man".  Anna said 'he's not the man, the man is bald'.  That's funny because our friend Doug shaves his head and he was indeed coming that night.   When Doug did arrive that night, he brought his new "Frank's Box" and crossed 64 waiting earthbounds, including Gerald.  During Saturday night, the ladies in Room 6 again had alot of knocking sounds on the walls and ceiling.  On Sunday morning we talked on the "Box" to Harold who said it was him doing the knocking and he does like the ladies.  He said it Mary who tugged on the covers in Room 4.  She said she was trying to tuck them in.  The people in Room 5 said they had been out on the bridge during the evening and they heard a banging sound that seemed to be coming from the iron trusses over their head.  It sounded like somebody was knocking on the iron beams with a rock.  They were the only people on the bridge and they could not see anything up there to account for the sound.

12 Sept. '11 - The Ghost Venture Crew was here last weekend filming for their new show which is starting in 2012.  Watch for it! :)  They were not sure when our episode will be showing, but they'll let us know and then I'll let you know.  Anyway, they filmed on Friday and Saturday nights and got lots of evidence on camera and recorders, and tons of personal experiences.  I think Harold and Anna liked them.  They had their hair played with and clothes pulled and heard footsteps and shuffling noises as they went from room to room.  At one point, one girl was playing with a toy car in the parlor and she invited Morris to come play with her.  On the night vision camera, a little orb enters the room and circles her head and then zooms down to the toy.  In two still photos, captured by a static camera taking pictures at 3 second intervals, the little alarm clock on a desk moves a little bit with nobody touching it.  On Friday night, one of the ladies went into the dining room to collect the camera in there and she saw a shadow man sitting at one of the dining room tables.  She got a very distinct feeling of "Get out.  Get out now!"  She collected her camera and left.  I told her about James VanGannen and how a lot of people have picked up on that feeling.  But it is his last thought before he was killed, it is not targeted at us.  That's cool that she picked up on that and saw him sitting there.

13 Sept. '11 - The people last night had something super duper weird.  They turned on their voice recorder and left it on the dresser in Room 5 and left the room and went up to the cemeteries.  They were gone about 2 hours from 11pm to 1am.  When they got back they listened to the recorder.  You can hear them leaving the room and giggling about not being able to lock the door with the key.  Then it gets quiet.  About a minute later, a man sings, very low and slowly, the song "Crazy" by Patsy Kline.  It's an oldies from the 50s or so.  It sounded like a record being played very slow.  The funny thing was the piano accompaniment was slow but not distorted.  The piano sounded far away but the man sounded like he was singing right into the mic.  It was very very weird.  Then there is nothing until the people come back to the room.  I have never heard anything so eerie and weird.  Unfortunately it was on a reel to reel recorder and we can't get a wave file from it.  The guest said it was a new tape, he took it out of the cellophane just before putting it in the recorder.  And if there was something on the tape it would have been erased because it was recording the whole time.  They also had their covers pulled on and they found their cookies stacked one on top the other in a column inside the cookie jar. They knew it was not like that before they left because they had talked about taking the cookies with them and leaving a cookie crumb trail through the cemetery.  When they get back, the cookies are in a stack.  That's funny.

20 Sept. '11 - Josephine has been busy lately.  She has visited my bed 3 times in the last 4 days.  One was just this afternoon when I was napping.  She jumped on the bed by my foot and walked over my feet and up by my knee.  She kneaded the pillow I had under my knees.  Then she settled down by my right calf and was purring.  Chuck took a picture and there is a small orb right where she was.  Last night she visited the people in Room 1.  The lady was allergic to cats and was very careful to not let Misty in the room.  (Misty tried really hard to get in and snuggle with her.)  But then she felt a cat jump on the bed in the middle of the night and it walked around and settled down by her knee.  She asked her husband to throw the cat out of the room, but when he looked, there was nothing there.  She was really surprised because it felt so real.  She said she did not believe in ghosts before, now she does!

4 Oct. '11 - Yesterday, while waiting for guests to arrive for breakfast, I was in the dining room watching TV.  I heard a woman in the foyer say "Is there anyone in there?"  But she had a southern accent......'there' was pronounced like 'they-a'.  I knew our guest did not have an accent, so I thought maybe somebody had come in off the street and was looking around.  I went into the foyer, but I found the front door locked and nobody was around.  Then, last night, Chuck got up to go to the bathroom and I heard him rustling around but I did not get up.  This morning he told me that while in the bathroom, he heard footsteps outside the bathroom door and he thought it was me wanting in.  But I never got up.  Maybe Herma was wanting in.

10 Oct. '11 - This weekend we had a lady staying in Room 6 who has seen ghosts in other places like I do.  She did not know the history of the place and did not know about the ghosts because her friends had picked us and made the reservation without telling her.  Friday night, she heard footsteps above her room, but thought it was other guests in the third floor rooms.....until she found out there are no guests in the third floor rooms.  There is just the attic above Room 6.  On Saturday night, she got up to go to the bathroom about 3am.  As she rounded the corner toward the bathroom, she saw a young woman in a long, lacey, light blue dress who walked from her bathroom and through the room and then through the wall.  The lady said she was a little stunned that someone was in her bathroom, but we told her that used to be a hallway, so it made sense.  We think it was Patricia because she shows herself in a blue dress.  On Sunday night, the lady was awakened by her husband who had gotten up, but then got back in bed.  Just as she closed her eyes, she heard a child say "Mom?"   "Mom?".  She opened her eyes to look, but there was nothing in the room she could see.  The ladies staying in Room 5 had gone around town to do EVPs and they got a man saying "Don't go in there."  And a woman who said "He's got  a gun!"   And another man who said "Let's scare them."  They thought that was funny.

12 Oct. '11 - Last night there were four ladies in Room 5 who come here often.  D was walking around with a recorder and got EVPs like "There you are."  And when she asked if Markie was in Room 1, she got "I and Joy are in here."  (I was not in there.)  In the parlor she got "What are you doing?"   "That goes on the coffee table, over here."  "Let's have a party."  and "What would the band play?"     They had set up a checker board in Room 5 and then moved a piece.  Then they said "Harold, it's your turn."  and wait to see if he will move a piece.  He hasn't ever moved one, but they always try.  This time, they left the room to go walk around town and when they got back, a piece had been moved.  I wish they'd had a camera filming at the time.

14 Oct. '11 - A couple little things happened last night.  The couple staying in Room 5 decided to try separate beds.  The husband slept in "Julia's bed" in the twin bed by the wall.  Julia does not like men using 'her' bed and sometimes shakes the bed to scare them out.  So he slept there and said nothing happened.  The wife slept in the big bed and she reported that a cat jumped up on the bed and curled up against her back.  She was happy to be visited by Josephine.  The husband was sad that he missed it.  In Room 7, the lady was sitting in the rocking chair, reading, and after about half an hour, the standing lamp next to the chair fell over on top of her.  She was not hurt, just surprised.  Chuck and I tried to recreate it by bumping the lamp with the chair and we could not get it to fall over sideways.  I'm not sure this was 'paranormal' but it was certainly not-normal.

24 Oct. '11 - Yesterday, I was standing in our bathroom and I could see the door to our bedroom.  There was a man standing in the doorway wearing a light colored shirt.  In my quick glance I thought it was Chuck coming into the bedroom.  But then I realized that Chuck was already in the bedroom, laying on the bed watching TV.  I wonder if it was Curtis standing there.  Right now I am at the computer in the bedroom, transcribing the Telephone to the Dead sessions from last August.  While I am typing, I keep seeing a movement over my shoulder in the doorway.  At one point I saw the man again, very quickly.  There is alot of rattling and shuffling sounds coming from that direction.  I think they hear Chris' voice on the recorder and think maybe he is here.  The couple who stayed in Room 5 this past weekend heard alot of thumping and bumping coming from directly over their room.  They thought it was Jinni, but her room is not over Room 5 and she would not be up at 2am anyway.  I told them that was Mary's room and they were thrilled to have heard her.     FYI:    We have been contacted by the group that films the "Haunted in ...." series for the Travel Channel.  They want to come and film for the "Haunted in Iowa, 2" episode some time this winter.  We are so excited!

25 Oct. '11 - The couple who stayed in Room 5 last night did an investigation with night vision cameras and recorders placed strategically all over the place.  When the young man did an EVP in Room 6, he said the rocking chair started to rock very slowly.  Too bad his camera was not pointed at the chair at the time.  But they called and told me they got some good EVPs.  In one EVP there are some people carrying on a conversation in French or some language that is not English.  That's very interesting.  In another EVP, a girl asks "Do you like music?  There's a piano over there."   In the morning, they found one of their cameras had been tipped over at about 6am or so.  Videos from various cameras show that nobody entered or exited the room where the camera was.  Other cameras and recorders had been turned off about 4:30am.  Videos show that nobody was near them at the time they were turned off, the batteries were still okay and there was still lots of memory left. 

30 Oct. '11 - We did the first of our Ghost Stories Dinners for this year.  (The second one for this year will be next Saturday.)  There were 19 people who enjoyed the dinner and program.  Miss Harvey took this picture during Chuck's presentation and got 7 orbs listening to his stories.  (I made arrows to the 5 brightest.)  During the night, several people had experiences.  The lady in Room 8 heard footsteps outside the bedroom door.  She said it went on all night long, as if somebody wanted to come in but didn't.  (She had asked the spirits to stay out of the room.)  In Room 1, they heard knocks on the walls and a loud thump in the bathroom and saw an unexplainable bright light in the room.  It was there and then it was gone.  The wife said it felt like somebody crawled into bed behind her and put an arm over her waist.  She said it was ice cold.  When she asked it to leave, it did.  When Chris Moon comes in two weeks we'll ask who that was.  In Room 4, the man had his feet played with when he was in bed.  In Room 5, about 6am, they were awakened by the sound of something heavy landing on the table and then dragging across it.  But when they looked, there was nothing there.  In Room 7, the ladies had brought a DVD player to make background noise for them while they slept.  In the morning it had been turned off.  She said it never turns itself off, it always plays all night in a loop and she has to turn it off in the morning, but this morning it was already turned off.  Who keeps turning the devices off and why?  Another question for Harold when Chris comes.

6 Nov. '11 - We had our second Ghost Stories Dinner last night.  During Chuck's presentation, the people at the east table kept feeling pockets of cold air moving around them.  At one point, I saw a small golden orb slowly float from the table top to the floor and then zoom into the parlor.  Several ladies reported having their hair played with.  One lady said her necklace was being played with.  After the program, one of the ladies offered to lead a ghost hunt up to the cemetery and around the house.  It was rather cold and windy up at the cemetery, so any orb pictures were probably dust in the air.  But here at the house, they did EVPs in some of the rooms and many people got good orb pictures of Harold and Amanda.  Another person had brought along some dowsing rods and the group talked to Harold and Markie with them.  During the night, some of the people heard the children running in the hallway.  The girls in Room 6 heard Harold's tapping on the wall.  Jinni reported that 'That Cat' (Josephine) and Amanda had jumped on her bed to wake her up this morning.  Amanda was worried that Jinni had overslept and missed school.  (It was Day Light Savings "Turn the clocks back an hour" and Amanda thought Jinni had overslept.)  That is funny that they notice things like that.

14 Nov. '11 - Chris Moon was here this weekend for his Ghost Hunter University (GHU) sessions.  On Friday night, the lady in Room 6 said the bed was shaking and Josephine jumped on the bed and snuggled for a while.  The lady in Room 8 got locked out of her room when she had not even closed the door.  On Saturday night,  the lady in Room 8 got locked in her room when she had not locked the door.  The ladies in Room 6 had Harold tapping on the walls all night, and one lady had her feet played with.  During the TttD sessions, we learned that it was the children shaking the bed in Room 6 and Harold said it was not him locking and unlocking the doors, but he would not say who did it.  It was also the children who have been turning off the devices in October.  They thought the people were done with them and had forgotten to turn them off.  It was a teen aged Carver who got into bed with the lady in Room 1, but he wouldn't explain why.  On Sunday's session, Lewis Mason had collected many very bad people who had not been to the Light yet, to send to the Light.   However, these were the worst of the worst when they were alive and they had been avoiding the Light for a very long time and they were not willing to go now.  Tyler said he was not going to be party to such a forced crossing and Lewis finally consented to let them go.  12 of them finally agreed to go, the rest went back to where they had been before.  (Going to the Light is voluntary, free will, and they cannot be 'cattle prodded' through against their will.  In essence they have put themselves in their own hell, separated from God.  But I guess they thought that was preferable to judgment.)   One girl, Maggie, tried to tell me her story before going and I would not let her talk to me.  So she went over to K, another sensitive, and told her how she'd been raped and then had died in childbirth in the Inn.  After she had told her story, she went willingly to the Light.  The man who had raped her was one of the bad spirits who did not want to go to the Light and we told him he could not be here and he left.  During the night on Sunday, one of the ladies in Room 5 had her covers pulled up.  She was awake when it happened but she was not frightened.  There was tapping on the walls in some of the rooms and Josephine jumped on the bed in Room 7.  One lady was outside the Greef General store and trying to make a decision and she asked Harold for a sign, suddenly the little Open / Closed sign from the wall fell at her feet.  I guess that was a SIGN!!  To read the transcripts from the TttD sessions, click here.

18 Nov. '11 - Lots of activity going on lately.  Chuck and I have moved into Room 1 for the winter.  Our  "old horse stable" room is way too cold.  The very first night we spent in there, last Thursday, I heard footsteps walking back and forth at the end of the bed.  At first I thought Chuck was up walking around, but then I felt him next to me.  I was going to wake him up but then the footsteps stopped and I waited for them to start again before waking him, but they did not do it again.  I looked at the clock and it was 2:11am.  About 4am, I heard a cat scratching on the carpet and thought Misty was in the room.  She likes to scratch on the carpet.  I wondered why she had not jumped on the bed with us.  When I got up to make breakfast, I found no cats in the room.  The door was closed and all the cats were accounted for in the Keeping Room.  Does Josephine like to scratch the carpet too?  On Wednesday, the crew from Calhoun County Paranormal Investigations (CCPI) were here to film an episode of Haunted Iowa 2.   We have not heard from them what evidence they found, but I know that when they were setting up their cameras, one man had his clothes pulled and another had his hair played with.  I'll let you know when it will be shown and which channel as soon as I find out.  Last night, when Chuck and I were talking in the foyer, I saw a small black shadow on the second floor landing.  It moved across the top of the staircase from Room 6 area to Room 4.  At first I thought Smokey was up there, but we found her on our bed.  Later, when I was checking in some guests, I was crossing the second floor landing and looked down into the foyer and saw the top of a child's blond head.  He was headed toward the dining room.  But the dining room door never opened, (it makes a very distinctive sound), and when I went downstairs, there was nobody around.  During the night, the lady in Room 5 said she felt three thumps on the bottom of the mattress, right in the middle of her back.  She turned on her side and felt three more thumps.  She looked under the bed and could find no explanation.  The people in the Caboose said the alarm clock rang at midnight when it had not even been set to ring.  She had to turn it on to turn it off.  This has happened before in other rooms, but not the caboose. 

19 Nov. '11 - Last night we heard alot of walking-around sounds coming from Room 6 above us.  At about 2:08am, I heard the floor boards creaking up there, like somebody walked from the bed area to the bathroom and then back again but the water in the bathroom did not run.  At 3:09am, it did it again and again at 4:11am.  I asked the lady in the room if she was up during the night and she said she went to bed at midnight and did not get up again until 7am.  She said she heard the sounds in the room at 2am, and looked but did not see anything.  After that, she heard it but did not look.

27 Nov. '11 - This past weekend we had a Paranormal Studies class here for an overnight ghost hunt.  They stayed up very late investigating and only got about 3 hours of sleep.  I have not heard what EVPs they recorded yet.  During an EVP session in the Parlor, one lady heard music playing but nobody else did.  They hope they got it on a recording.  During the night one young man also heard music in the parlor.  Several people had their hair played with.  The people in Room 8 reported that it felt like a cat jumped on the bed, but when they looked there was nothing there.  Josephine likes Room 8.   The lady staying in Room 1 woke up with her covers all tucked into the mattress.  I guess Mary is still taking care of people.

11 Dec. '11 - Another Paranormal Studies class (same teacher, different school) came for an overnight ghost hunt.  This group did not have as many personal experiences as the last group.  But they did get some good EVPs.  One lady could see the spirits and she was telling us how Julia wants makeup and brushes on her vanity table and the doctor wants his books off Julia's vanity and to put them with his other medical instruments.  We will move the books and see if we can find Julia some antique makeup items.  The lady also said she saw a Civil War soldier on the bridge who was earthbound and very confused.  He did not want to leave his post on the bridge, but was very lost.  Harold was called on to help the soldier to the Light, which he did.  Later, the teacher sent me some EVPs taken on the bridge at the time and they got things like " He's lost."  and "He just wants his unit." and "It's a mess."   When he left with Harold, the EVP got "He's going." 

18 Dec. '11 - We bought an EMF detector and put in on a little table in Room 1.  We hear footsteps going across the room at the foot of the bed sometimes and I thought it would be fun to see if we could actually detect the EMF.  The first three night, nothing happened.  Then, last night it beeped about 11pm, and again about half an hour later.  After that it was quiet.  This morning I found the 9 volt battery in it was completely drained.  In the Caboose Cottage, there was a family with two very energetic little boys.  This morning, one of the boys said that one of our cats was out in the caboose with them.  But when the parents went to put the cat outside, they could not find the cat.  Only the one boy saw it and he kept insisting that it was on the bed then gone and then on the bed and then gone again.  He said it was gray with white stripes.  I showed him Tiger and he said it was like Tiger but without the white chest.  Must have been Josephine.  The boy said it could not have been a ghost cat because he does not believe in ghosts.  I said, that's okay, they believe in you. 

26 Dec. '11 - We went up to Kristin and Dan's house for Christmas and Cindi and her family all came too.  Chuck invited all the spirits who wanted to come to follow along.  During the day we took several pictures and they all had orbs in them.  We recognized Harold and Amanda in several.  In this picture, I had felt somebody playing with my hair.  Chuck snapped this picture that shows a large green orb over my head.  In the corner are four more orbs, clustered together.

31 Dec. '11 - Here we are at the end of another exciting year.  It's been pretty quiet around here lately, though.  A guest was here who invited Harold and the children to go to Disneyland with her over Christmas vacation.  Ever since then, it has been really quiet.  Chuck and I got out the pendulum and asked for Harold....no answer.  Curtis?....no answer.   Anna?.....no answer.   Markie?......no answer.    Mary?....yes.  Mary is here.  Mary does not leave.  We asked her if any of the afore mentioned spirits were here and she said no.  We asked if she was the only spirit left and she said no.  Well, Frank is still here.  And some of the others, but the list was too long to ask all the names.  But the most active ones are enjoying themselves at Disneyland, I guess.  Sure hope they come back when they are done.

    So have a blessed New Year, everybody.  Come see us sometime.  God's blessings to you all!

To read the 2012 Happenings, click here

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