Fort Worth Stockyards Pennies...

On Saturday, my family and I went out to the Fort Worth Stockyards to get some pressed pennies!  The first machine we went to was at the Longhorn General Store, located in the old train station.  There were supposed to be four, but one was marked as broken (the Don't Mess With Texas penny - but I already have that one anyway!).  The store said they usually carried Penny Collector Books, but were out and waiting on their next shipment.  We'll have to check back and get one another time!

My little brother & me!

We happened to be there during the time they do the daily cattle drive down the middle of the street!

Cowboys driving the cattle!

Moo!

Then we went to the Coliseum.  It was closed, but the lady at the gift shop let us through the doors and right around the corner was the machine.  We got four from there!

Coliseum pennies!

After that, we drove over to the National Cowgirl Museum & Hall of Fame and got three more pennies, from their electric press.

Cowgirl pennies!

In a little less than an hour, I got 10 pennies to add to my collection!

Michigan Vacation 2012

My family and I took a trip from Texas to Michigan to visit my grandparents this summer.  We made it a point to visit as many penny machines as we could find!  During our road trip, we got pennies from Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri and Arkansas - I filled up an entire Michigan Penny Collector book and had even more!

Michigan - 
We visited Ludington State Park to get pennies and a medallion, but the Big Sable Point Lighthouse did not have the medallions.  We got 4 pennies, though.

Pennies at the state park.

 While in Ludington, we were happy to find that a lady that worked at the Lake Michigan Car Ferry (The SS Badger) would go up and get us the pennies, they're located on the actual boat and we couldn't go up there unless we paid for a ferry trip!
My family and I got to ride the Dunes at Mac Wood's Dune Rides in Mears.  We also found a machine there (hadn't even planned that one!), with 3 pennies.  We also bought the Michigan Penny Collector book there too.

Surprise penny machine at the Dunes!

 We visited the Dutch Village in Holland, Michigan and found the penny machine in the Wooden Shoe Shop.  My brother and I really wanted a pair of clogs, but we just got the 4 pennies instead.

The shoes were cool!

Pentwater, Mi is a neat little tourist town and the penny machine is located at the Cosmic Candy Company... they had all kinds of fun candy and fancy popcorn.  My whole family had a great time in that store! They had 4 pennies.

Pennies, Candy and Popcorn!

And we went out to a little town called Bitely, since they have a penny machine!  There wasn't much else in that little town, other than the Up North Gift Company.  3 pennies there.

Indiana -
On our way home we stopped at two Travel Plazas in Portage, Indiana.  Both places had 4 pennies available and only one was a duplicate, so we got 7 pennies there.

Rest stop pennies.

Illinois - 
Rockome Gardens in Arcola, IL was a really neat place.  We didn't have much time to really get to look around, but the nice people let us in for free to just get the pennies.  They had one there, and the machine was an electric press (we didn't crank it).

Electric machine at the Amish stop?

We stayed next to and ate at 17th Street BBQ in Marion, IL... and they have their own penny machine!  The food was really good too!  Got 4 pennies there.

Mmm, BBQ pennies!

 Then we took a little side trip to Makanda, Il, but the little Boardwalk there was all closed up and we couldn't get the pennies.  BUT, my mom left a note and an envelope with quarters, pennies and postage under their door in hopes that someone would find it and send us pennies.  Just over a week later, we received an envelope with 4 pennies from Makanda!!!

We can SEE the penny machine, but can't get to it!

Missouri - 
We stopped at Boomland in Charleston, MO for drinks and 3 more pennies!

BOOM pennies!

 Unfortunately we got to Lambert's Cafe too early, they weren't opened yet and we couldn't wait around long enough, so we weren't able to get the pennies there this time.  Or eat their "throwed rolls."

Arkansas - 
Our last stop was at Brown's Country Store in Benton, AR for one more penny before we got home!

Arkansas penny!

It was a fun trip and I was glad to come home with so many new pennies to add to my collection!

San Antonio Started It All

I was on vacation last year (April 2011) with my parents and grandparents in San Antonio, Texas, and as a souvenir I wanted a "smooshed" penny from the machine at Sea World.  We all decided that pressed pennies would make a great collection!  My mom liked them because they didn't cost a lot, and don't take up a lot of space.  So, we went around the rest of our trip trying to find all the machines we could find!  I left San Antonio with 11 pressed pennies (from Sea World, The Alamo and Natural Bridge Caverns).

We found a very helpful website, www.pennycollector.com, that has a list of places that you can get pressed pennies!  And we we were able to find lots of machines around our home in the Dallas-Fort Worth area!  And there are still many more places to visit for pennies!

I have pennies from The Fort Worth Museum of Science and History when I went with my grandparents.  My dad took me to Legoland, as well as Great Wolf Lodge (just for pennies, we didn't get to stay or play), Outdoor World/Bass Pro Shop and The Rainforest Cafe all in Grapevine, TX.  I have 19 from Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington.  I got 4 from the Dallas World Aquarium on a homeschool group field trip. 

My mom gave me an old one she had from when she was a kid, it's from The San Jacinto Monument in San Antonio.  A friend of my parents' named Jaime was nice and sent me some from Red Rocks, Pike's Peak and Roswell! My Great Aunt Laura sent me one from Michigan Adventure Theme Park.

I can't wait to go out and find more to add to my collection!