Timpanogos Cave

The day was cool, school was out, and dad was home. We decided to tackle the mountain: a 1 1/2 mile hike up 1000 feet of mountain to the cave.

The smaller one started out enthusiastic at the beginning, complete with walking stick.



About halfway up the walking stick became a pulling stick. Yay for dads to pull kids up mountains!


All along the trail there were various warning signs:

I thought this shirt was very appropriate for this particular day's work. Check out the tough guy expression.

Note to mom: It's not cool to smile if you're a boy over the age of 11 1/2.

Good to know.

See the red line behind this cute girl. These lines denoted the danger zones where rock falls frequently happen. We were instructed NOT to stop and take pictures while in the red zones.

So of course we had to. But at least she is watching for falling rock! So that makes it okay, right?

Near the top we were thrilled to arrive at this historic stone building. Why, you ask?

After 1 1/2 miles and 1000 feet, combined with the implied threat of "LAST CHANCE" for bathrooms - who wouldn't take advantage of the opportunity to relieve oneself in a cool place like this?

My oldest was particularly relieved.

Get it? Relieved? hee hee!

Well at least they got it! Sheesh Nathan. Get a sense of humor already!

The cave was amazing, but my camera phone wouldn't do it justice, so you'll just have to go see it for yourselves. My favorite part is always the place where they turn off all the lights and it's pitch black and my eyes bulge out trying to pick up any trace of light. Except this time I was a little chapped because there was a kid with light-up shoes who kept shuffling around and RUINED the moment. SMACK. At least it was dark so no one saw who hit him.

It wasn't me!

Why artichokes and houseguests do not mix

• Because small children are freaked out by the scary looking alien vegetable sitting on Aunt Lisa's counter and run crying to their mothers, who give you nasty looks for the rest of the evening.
  
• With extended family staying at two different houses in town, you never know exactly how many people will be eating any particular meal you prepare, so you cook a few extra.
• Artichoke preparation time is too inflexible to be compatible with activity schedules in constant flux.
  
• Artichokes are intended to be placidly savored, not wolfed down prior to racing off to get good seats in order to hear the wonderful inspiring words uttered by a grown man who calls himself 'Bronco'.
• Weary, car-lagged travelers ignore all the rules of proper mealtimes and aren't hungry when they arrive for dinner.
• Artichokes are a delicacy that country bumpkins from Idaho don't appreciate.
• At a buck apiece (which is cheap for artichokes, but still), it's hard to throw them away, so you end up eating the extras yourself (since lovely leftovers artichokes do not make).
• Woman was not meant to consume that much artichoke sauce in one evening. At least this woman wain't (wasn't + ain't).

Labor Day, revisited.

So this was our Labor Day:

• After some drama and yelling, we decided to go see Kung Fu Panda at the Buck-Fifty theater, and we would all be thankful for it, by gum!
• We planned to go to the first showing at 12:30 so that Karianne could spent a couple of hours with Tim before he had to work at 5pm.
• Susan was late getting back from marching in the parade, so we missed the first matinee, which put the pinch on Karianne's plans.
• We decided to try for the 4:25 showing instead, so that Karianne could see Tim before the movie. (Are we accomodating parents, or what?)
• Alas, Tim was busy all afternoon (with some lame excuse about a leaking roof) and so our flexibility was for nothing, darn it.
• Nathan was annoyed that we had changed the schedule for Karianne's sake, thus causing his TV show viewing to be interrupted when it was time to leave for the movie.
• When we arrived at the theater, we were chagrined to find that all showings were sold out. Who knew that all of Provo would think going to a movie on a rainy holiday was a good idea and that they would also have the brains to buy their tickets online the day before?
• In an attempt to salvage the outing, we stopped for shakes, a banana split, and a dipped cone.
• Due to fate, a vengeful god, or just plain bad luck, Nathan's dipped cone was delayed for over 35 minutes due to employee error.
• Nathan growled and stomped to the other side of the restaurant, where he punched and kicked the booth seat while the rest of us ate our ice cream.
  
• Two small toddlers began to play hide-and-scream mere feet away from our table.
• Nathan's cone finally arrived, and we all sat and waited while he ate it on the other side of the restaurant.
• I laid my head down on the table and gave in to the urge to laugh hysterically until tears squeezed from my tightly closed eyelids.
• My husband whispered that the padded van was on its way and we'd better leave now unless I wanted to wear a strait jacket to bed tonight.
  
• We drove home and stopped to rent WaterHorse from Blockbuster, where Tim works, much to Karianne's delight.
• Once at home, I served a nutritious dinner of popcorn and candy bars to go along with the movie. My mothering skills are unsurpassed, I know.

I decided that I can't wait for the next Holiday. Ain't family togetherness great?

Do I get a Holiday too?

I have decided that I am against Holidays. And this is why:

Husbands get a day off from work. Kids get a day off from school. And I get a day off from, what exactly? Solitude? A quiet house that stays clean? Getting to do what I want instead of being on call to five people?

To me, a holiday means there are more people in the house eating, making noise, quarreling, and otherwise making work for me than there would otherwise be. Now that all my kids are in school full time, Holidays are a pain in the rear end.

But I'm not bitter about it, or anything.

And please don't try to make me feel better or solve it or try to talk me out of it. I'm just sayin'.

That is all.

PayDay

So yesterday afternoon I walked into the kitchen, and my 14-year old was doing the dishes. It thrilled me that she was doing her job without me having to remind her. And then I realized something that propelled my already happy heart into the stratosphere: dishes were not her responsibility this week. She did them just because she noticed that they needed doing.

Surely this dream is too good to be true... but please, please don't wake me up!

Thanks, Susan! You RAWK.

Eyes

It's a question my kids get a lot: where did you get your blue eyes?


My instructions to them were to reply sweetly, "They came with my head."


Okay, so I'm snarky. I probably should feel bad about that. Sometimes I try. A little.


To review high-school biology:

When you have a blue-eyed daddy,

And a blue-eyed momma,

You get blue eyed kids.

That is all.

We love to hike, oh how we love to hike

It was a beautiful autumn day last Saturday; sunny, with light breezes and mild temperatures. A perfect day for hiking the Y.

Yes. That Y. Makes me kind of tired just looking at it.

Twenty years ago last month, Tom and I hiked the Y for our first "official" date. I'll tell you the story sometime. Twenty years seems like a long time to know someone, doesn't it? That's more than half my lifetime.

Everyone is always so cheerful at the trailhead, full of excitement for the adventure ahead. Fools--all of them.

You may notice the absence of Megan in these photos. That's because she elected to play with her cousins over hiking the Y with us. Smart girl.

Guys, the Y is UP the trail. Get moving.

A much needed rest, to enjoy the view. The Marriott Center is on the far left.

Yeah, that little white flat box thing. Waaaay down there.

Finally, after much huffing and puffing, perseverance, and whining on my part, we made it to the top. What looks so white and crisp and smooth from the valley floor is a bit underwhelming up close. Notice that the paint has chipped away from the rock/cement mixture at the bottom of this pic.

Look at the chillins, so proud of themselves. And with good reason. They remained cheerful and energetic through the whole hike. Unlike their mother, who transformed into a whiny baby before the first switchback.

They basked in their conquest of the mountain, and celebrated by tossing pebbles down the Y, with the occasional chocolate chip added in when mom wasn't looking. Extensive experiments show that pebbles bounce farther than chocolate chips. You might want to file that little factoid away for future reference.

Back at the bottom, Karianne and Nathan reclining on the roof of the privy. I hope they didn't do any peeping down the skylight while I was in there.

And finally, a picturesque sunset across the lake to top off a perfect afternoon. Let's do this again sometime. After I'm dead would be good.

Yellowstone Post #2

After seeing all those buffalo, we arrived at the geysers. Which is an understatement. While Yellowstone is famous for Old Faithful, there are hundreds of other geysers and hot springs in geyser basin. Our first stop had a variety of things to see, but most overwhelming was the smell that greeted us as we approached the steaming pools: sulphur! Yuck.

Here is miss Megan posing next to the first of many colorful hot spring pools.

One of my favorite things was this pool of white mud that was boiling! Watch the video to see (and possibly get motion sickness).



At this particular stop, we were lucky to coincide with a busload of Japanese tourists. So while this geyser video is nothing special in and of itself, the dialogue in the background is funny. Imagine yourself being jostled by short pushy people rushing past you along the narrow boardwalk, then suddenly stopping in front of you to take pictures of one another in front of EVERY geyser. Repeat. It was rather amusing. Sort of.

Then we were off to the Granddaddy of them all: Old Faithful. I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that this is the best photo we got... since we arrived right at the tail end of an eruption. How far did we drive to see this?

We started off down the boardwalk to see more sights, and saw another bison grazing languidly next to the steaming base of Old Faithful.


While waiting for Old Faithful to build up steam again, we walked geyser loop, looking for other interesting things to photograph. In the upper left is Castle Geyser, but it's pretty obvious that my kids are the main subject of this particular shot.


I don't remember the name of this pool... but isn't it pretty? How interesting to think that that hole leads down deep into the earth.


Susan and Nathan engage in a little drama over the binculars. Ah, the joys of family life.



In this short, Karianne shares her most profound thoughts about this spunky little geyser pool, while Susan tortures Megan in the background.



We spent over two hours waiting for Grand Geyser to go off. It is reportedly taller and more impressive than Old Faithful, but goes off less often. It's next door buddy, Turban Geyser, would tease us about ever 20 minutes with an underwhelming display.



Someone in the crowd suggested that we offer a sacrifice to the geyser to induce it to erupt. Karianne and Susan offered up their little sister.

After annoying the gathered crowd for over two hours, we became hungry and tired, and left for the long drive back to our hotel. The big bison herd was just finishing their road crossing as we approached, which meant that we didn't have to sit and wait for them. Thanks, guys.

Next.... Day two.

Yellowstone Post #1

Finally, after being home for 3 1/2 days, I'm ready to blog about our trip. I don't know what it is about traveling, but it always takes me a few days to recover. I guess I'm getting old. No need to comment on that factoid, please.

Not having been to Yellowstone National Park for about 25 years, I didn't remember much. My parents took me for a day trip, and all I remembered about it were the mud pots and the colored pools. Oh and a chipmunk eating a cheeto like corn on the cob. Pretty pathetic, huh? So, I wisely ask Tom if he wouldn't be in charge of our sightseeing itinerary.

Obviously, Yellowstone is famous for its geysers, particularly Old Faithful. That was our first destination.

We had a hotel in West Yellowstone, Montana, and entered the park through the West gate. It wasn't long until we saw a small herd of buffalo. We stopped and took more photos than necessary, because we didn't realize how ubiquitous bison are in Yellowstone. We saw at least three more herds, each larger in size than the previous one, before we got to geyser basin.

Awwww! Isn't that calf cute? The cow is shedding her winter fur, hence the spring frumpy look.

A pair of cows with calves. I wouldn't want to get too close to those horns, would you?

Notice the exceptionally happy looks on these faces? That's because we're only one hour into our first day. We're not exhausted yet.

This was taken on the road to geyser basin. There were at least 100 animals + calves in this herd.

A little side trip to see beautiful Firehole Falls. I absolutely love waterfalls.

And a bonus! A pair of elk cows and their calves were grazing downstream from the falls.

Ok - that's enough for today. I'm gonna break it up into short posts instead of one gargantuan thing that nobody wants to read. Tomorrow - the geysers!

Degrees of B.S.

I earned my B.S. degree in fertilizer in the mid 90's, when I had my first "real" garden. I went to the home improvement center and bought composted steer manure in 1 cu.ft. bags for 69 cents each.

Then in the late nineties, I discovered that compost could be purchased by the yard, if one had a pickup truck to haul it in. I begged my home teacher for the use of his rusty old Chevy, and began work on my M.S. (More of Same) in Manure Management. Soon thereafter we acquired a trusty little Ford Ranger pickup truck, and I was happily hauling my own manure -- from local farmers and the county composting facility.

This year, I needed more than a couple of yards of compost. It was time to get serious. Monday afternoon I achieved my PhD (piled higher and deeper) in bovine excrement. I bought some compost--fifteen beautiful black yards of composted dairy manure. It was delivered in a big dump truck, and made a mountainous pile on the sidewalk.


For FHE, Tom was on lesson and I was on activity. Our lesson was about the value of family work, and the activity was shoveling manure. We had some wonderful family togetherness while we shoveled, wheelbarrowed, and generally spread crap all over the place. It was so sublime, at one point I got a tear in my eye. It's possible it could have been caused by my son's "accidentally" pitching a shovelful of manure at my head. I can't really be sure.

As the sun set and my happy worker dwarves (sarcasm here) skipped off to their reward of ice cream with 'chocolate' dust (I told you you should have washed your hands first!), I stood gazing at the still rather substantial pile -- we'd barely made a dent -- and worried aloud that someone might come by in the night and steal from my beloved manure mountain. I was actually considering setting up a tent to guard my black gold from marauding neighbors when my husband lovingly reminded me that few people place as much value in a pile of dung as I do.

And sure enough, this morning, it was all still there.

Psychic Susan

My second daughter, Susan, is turning thirteen this month. This child has an interesting gift: she has an extra sense of things unseen. It was particularly noticeable when she was small. As an infant, she was very tuned in to my thoughts, it seemed. Sometimes I would wake up briefly in the middle of the night; if I went back to sleep quickly, all was quiet. But if I even thought about Susan, almost immediately she would cry out. This happened over and over and over until I finally learned to think of anything but her during my brief nocturnal wakings. If I was successful, she slept on. If I slipped and even thought of not thinking about her, she woke up. It was very strange -- and sometimes frustrating, to have a child that could seemingly read my mind.

As Susan grew, it became apparent that she was very sensitive physically as well. She had the most sensitive skin, and had more diaper rashes than any of my other babies. She was very sensitive to the temperature of food, bathwater, and weather. She would wrinkle her nose at the faintest smell that even my pregnant nose didn't detect, and most foods were too strong tasting for her particular palate. Her emotions were also sensitive; as a little girl, she seemed to vacillate between bitter disappointment and ecstatic euphoria at the flip of a switch. In Susan's world, when life was good, it was very very good, but when it was bad, it was horrid. To be honest, I worried about her more than a little; if she was this temperamental as a four year old, what would the teenage years be like?

As she got older, she continued to demonstrate her uncanny ability to see beyond what most others could. Her older sister soon learned that it was no fun to play Memory with Susan, because not only was Susan's visual memory formidable, but she would often guess matches from cards that had not yet been turned over. When I mediated disputes with the "pick a number between 1 and 100 method" Susan would win much more often than her share, many times guessing the exact number I was thinking of! I must admit that there were a few times that I cheated and changed the number after she guessed, to try to make it a little more fair for the other kids. (Sorry Susan)

I am happy to report that as Susan has grown, that she has developed much more self-control than she had at the age of four. :) Poised to enter her teenage years, she is a beautiful, intelligent, talented young lady with a really fun sense of humor, and has an entertaining knack for silly song lyrics and clever quips that keep us laughing. She is known among her peers as a very kind and loyal friend, with an independence of will that leads her to do what she thinks is right irregardless of what "the crowd" says.

Now on the brink of womanhood, Susan continues to exhibit an unusual level of awareness for things unseen, including a valuable sensitivity to the Holy Ghost. On the surface, she is often quite placid, and usually keeps her own counsel, but I believe that underneath that calm exterior is a young lady that thinks and feels things very deeply. It has been fascinating to watch her grow up and begin to mature into such an amazing person. I am enjoying every minute of it.

Susan, I love you very much. You are an important part of our family, and I am very honored to be your mother.