Posted November 05, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
For most people, curling is a sport they tune into during the Olympics when one of the other major ones is not on screen. For others, it is their hobby. For Jacob Pitzenberger, it is one of several hobbies Pitzenberger grew up in Mason City and graduated from Iowa State
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Posted October 01, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Geocaching is a hobby that can be enjoyed by people of all ages and skill levels. It is a real-life treasure hunt that can be played across the globe. Using GPS or a smartphone, participants search for geocaches in various locations. You could find the cache in a tree, behind
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Posted September 03, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Brian Hogan is the owner and a barber at Franklin Barbershop in Beaverdale. After a day of cutting hair, he returns home to his video bunker — a space filled from head to toe with movies, posters and more. Before we could talk about that collection, Hogan mentioned some puppets
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Posted August 06, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
What do most people do with old wood? Toss it into the wood chipper? Take it to the dump? Burn it? Or leave it in a pile for someone else to deal with? When Ryan François encounters scrap wood, particularly old-growth wood, he sees an opportunity. François grew up on
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Posted July 02, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Trading card games take a variety of forms. Some of you may have seen or opened a pack of Pokémon cards. Others may have seen a few seconds of Yu-Gi-Oh on TV while channel surfing. Jeffrey Darus’ affinity for card games has allowed him to give back to his local
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Posted June 04, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
For many children, their first experience with a train set would be something along the lines of Thomas the Tank engine and his group of pals. This is not the case for John and Judy Moller. In the basement of their former home lies the imagined world by John. John
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Posted April 30, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Capoeira is defined as an Afro-Brazilian martial art that combines elements of dance, acrobatics, music and spirituality. The combination may sound too good to be true. But, for Juan Loruido, it is his hobby and passion. He originally came across the art form while at Huntington Beach with a group
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Posted April 02, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Dan Fessler’s love for arcade games started in his hometown of Clear Lake. He enjoyed games like The Simpsons Arcade Game, Cruis’n USA, and various shooting games for a specific reason. “I would get like 75 cents, so I would play three games. My brother said, play Centipede. It’s a
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Posted March 05, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
If you’re a musician in a band or attend live music in the Des Moines metro, you have likely encountered Bryan Mehmen. Mehmen is “that guy” — a bandana-clad rocker, often dressed in a black T-shirt located in front of the stage, dancing and singing to the driving beat. Booze
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Posted February 05, 2025in Collections & Hobbies
Packs of trading cards might not come with a stick of gum anymore, but the allure to grab a pack off the shelf, place a bid online, or go to a card convention is still alive and well when it comes to collecting trading cards. Just ask Brian Eikenberry. Eikenberry
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