Carlton Candidate For Judge.

Carthage attorney Steve Carlton has announced he will seek the Republican nomination for the position of Jasper County Associate Circuit Judge, Division VI.

Carlton and his wife, Kay, are the parents of three children, Nicole, a college freshman, Brad, a high school sophomore, and Sam, a second grader.

Carlton is a graduate of Joplin’s McAuley Regional High School and Missouri Southern State College. He earned his law degree at the University of Arkansas.

Following law school graduation he was a law clerk for Judge James Prewitt at the Missouri Court of Appeals in Springfield. He has been in private practice in Carthage for the past 22 years.

Carlton has been involved in many civic organizations, including past President and Treasurer of the Jasper County Bar Association, past board member of the Carthage United Way and Family YMCA. He is currently the Board Chairman of St. John’s Regional Medical Center, a member and past president of the Missouri Southern State College Board of Regents and a member of the Arvest Bank Board.

A good rain storm was most often considered a good sign in the rural community where I grew up. As long as the rain didn’t come durin’ harvest or when the hay was on the ground, it always seemed to perk up the farmers.

‘Course the farm kids I went to school with got some relief from workin’ the fields with a rain, so they got a little perk themselves. But, the soggy ground would sometimes lie in wait for the uninitiated.

A tractor is a strange machine. It’s capability of pull large loads is of little assistance when that power pulls the rear wheels into that mud hole you were warned not to approach. And when ya have ta walk back to the homestead and retrieve the farmer, the "I told you..." speech follows for years to come.

This is some fact, but mostly,

Just Jake Talkin’.

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Carthage Printing Services

PRIME TIME WITH KIDS

by Donna Erickson

At our house, there’s a kitchen drawer overflowing with plastic containers that spill out every time we jam it closed. It started as the "Tupperware drawer," but evolved into a catch-all of margarine tubs and our latest collectible, a four-ounce cream cheese container from our local bagel shop.

Over the holidays, we used the handy storage units for leftovers. But it didn’t take long before frustration reached the boiling point when searching for the last bit of Grandma’s Swedish rice pudding only to find glutenous brown gravy under a lid labeled honey walnut cream cheese.

Now that the leftovers are gone, thank goodness, the drawer is jammed tight again. Sorting through the chaos, my son discovered lids outnumbered containers 3-1. But their usefulness isn’t over yet. Here is a clever idea for transforming plastic lids into sturdy stencils for fun indoor art activities.

On the underside of a lid, use a marker to draw a simple outline of a shape such as a square, triangle or circle. Keep it simple. Help your child cut out the shape with scissors, or an adult may use an X-acto knife. Cut off the rim, if you wish.

To use the stencil, tape the lid to a sheet of paper, dip a piece of sponge into poster paint and dab lightly inside the cutout space. Lift the stencil. Because the stencils are plastic, they may be washed and used over again. Here are some stencil art ideas:

• Make a heart stencil and print Valentine cards and placemats.

• Place the stencils over pictures in old magazines, trace the shape onto the pictures, then cut out the paper shapes. Glue shapes on construction paper to create "recycle" collages.

• For children learning the alphabet, make a set of lids with one letter per lid. Trace and color the letters on paper to practice their ABC’s. Spell simple words. Stencil your address and let your kids practice saying it.