Cabin Fever

For the past few years, I've wanted a cabin. Well, I haven't just wanted a cabin, I've WANTED a cabin. Try as I might, I haven't been able to shake this . . . compulsion. In trying to determine why the idea of a cabin is so attractive, I've wondered if it springs from having too many things to do and too many responsibilities that I can't get rid of OR some kind of personal boundary problem OR my not managing my life properly so that when I have a break, it does not suffice OR . . . something else entirely. I've also wondered whether somewhere in my subconscious the cabin I long for is a place where my children don't argue with one another and don't argue with their parents; where my household members are always cheerful, willing helpers; where I don't get calls from people asking me to do things I don't really want to do; where clothes wash themselves and find their own drawers and closets, where junk picks itself up and puts itself away and the place is self-cleaning (self-vacuuming, self-dusting, self-moping, self-scrubbing, etc.); and where we have some kind of food replicator where food cooks itself. Nice cabin, huh? If you see this place for sale, let me know.

Random thoughts on the passing scene

My disclaimer: usually I try to have about equal parts pictures and text but sometimes I don't, and this is one of those times. I haven't blogged much lately. Besides finding it difficult to get my share of computer time (I'm saving my pennies for a computer!!!!!!!), events and obligations have been "herding" me along day to day. I have felt I have had to have a "triage" mentality--determining which person or task required immediate attention and, once that was handled, going to the next.

The people who have lived in the Tri-cities my whole life I think of as "Old Timers." It really isn't an age designation; it is a designation that the person has lived here since my first recollection, since the town had about 300 folks and back in the day when we knew most everyone "in these here parts." One of those Old Timers (DVG) passed away about two weeks ago. He is also a second cousin. Throughout his funeral, I kept thinking over and over, "I've known him all my life." It is sad to see the "adults of my youth" passing away. We're all the poorer for it and I will miss him. And it is sad knowing "we're next."

I've posted pictures of "Tom's" house--the post was a draft and when I posted it, it posted before the entry about L's swim meet, so if you're interested, you'll have to scroll down. That project has taken about twenty hours of my time lately, partially because of a stop-work order we received from the city primarily about an electricity issue (all resolved now and the electricity is hooked back up). There is more for me to do this week to move things along. I am in excited anticipation for the outside of the house to be finished this summer. I'll post more pictures, as I said, when the stucco is on.

My brother J and his wife C and children (A,M, R, C, & R) were here, off and on for the past week. I really wish we lived closer to one another but I don't see that happening. My kids love to be with the cousins. I had not known they would be staying until Saturday. I thought they were leaving Thursday and I was the sole female adult taking the young women to our Stake Youth Conference for Friday and Saturday. I was very sad about leaving without saying good-bye in person and that I had to leave while they were still here.

My cousin JS called me a couple of weeks ago about the two of us putting together a G family potluck dinner for local family members. We scheduled it so J & family could be here. It seems that the only times the extended G family gets together now is for funerals so it was nice to have a non-funeral reason to meet.

As I mentioned, I took five young women to the Stake Youth Conference this weekend, one of whom was my own daughter L. The location of the conference was the girls' camp area on Kolob. The girls who went from our ward are such good girls and so well behaved that I had a very simple job--just be there. They paired up with friends in the stake who were also good kids. They attended all the activities and enjoyed themselves. While I have to say I was not eager to go, I had a nice time and I even found time to read a book here and there. :-) At one of the workshops on Friday, we had forty minutes of dance instruction--things like a couple of line dances, the Macarana (sp?), the Hokey Pokey, the Bunny Hop (too much shakes when I hop so I sat that one out) and the Hamster Dance. For those of you who might not know, at one point in the Hamster Dance you squat down and touch the ground in one count and jump back up (well, really you are to touch the ground in front and behind you in rapid succession and jump back up but I felt good just being able to squat down and touch the ground once in the amount of time allowed). While my group did the zip line, I did the dance class a second time. I woke up Saturday being stiff when I walked and I have stiffened up from there. Today, when I first get up from a seated position, I'm walking a bit like Frankenstein. I'm sure all of my faithful blog readers wish there had been a video of my dancing! Alas there was not. I also slept in my van Friday night. I have had visions of sleeping in my van and being very comfortable. The reality was different--the back of the van wasn't quite long enough. I came home sleep-deprived but my young women said girls and leaders who slept in the community center snored all night long so I guess I came out OK. Because the stake required that the ward have just one leader per vehicle of youth, there were a lot of leaders there without anyone else from their ward (I'm speaking only of the women--who knows about the men). So I made some new acquaintances, saw other acquaintances and had some nice conversations. I thought the whole event went really well and I was glad we went.

A week ago Saturday, my mother had a bad fall while closing the blinds at the same exact location in her building where she had her last fall that also necessitated a trip to the ER. My sister and I took Mom to the ER that Saturday (we were there from about 10 p.m. until about 3:30 a.m.) and had to take her back on that Sunday. As far as I can perceive (because Mom's self-reports are unreliable), Mom's worst injuries occurred on her face. The ER doctor on Saturday said the CAT scan (she had two--one of her eye and one of her head) showed that the bony area below the eye socket "was in pieces" and there was a skull fracture from Mom's eye socket out toward her ear (but it "wasn't moving"--whatever that means--so she was allowed to go back to her apartment). Her eye was bashed and bloody. It was the eye that necessitated her second trip to the ER and a follow-up visit to the eye doctor on Wednesday. Her eye checked out OK, thankfully. "They" had also taken x-rays of her chest and right arm but those checked out OK. She doesn't seem to have the same level of complaints about this fall that she had about her fall about six weeks ago (she's fallen about six times since Christmas and she did have one fall between this recent fall and her last "ER" fall about six weeks ago). Her face, of course, has been swelled and discolored as has her eye. Every day since the fall her eye and face have looked better and better. I plan to see her today and see how she's been while I was away at youth conference.

My kids have all had morning commitments that have kept me driving back and forth to one of the Tri-cities for most of the mornings this past week. Of course, L has swim team. J is taking swim lessons--last week and this coming week (and passing off his scout swimming merit badge). T is driving in the driver's ed car. All these things happen at different points around town and all at 8 a.m. They all end at different times. B and I have had to divide up to shuttle everyone around. This is not to mention the occasional piano lesson or other obligation thrown in there.

If you've noticed, we've been too busy to do our Summer Science day trips the past two weeks. I feel bad about that but it couldn't really be helped.

In all my rushing around, I've been packing around a book to read in the waiting time that inevitably arises. I've found that where I would normally be irritated about waiting so much, I look forward to waiting when I know I can read my book. :-) I've been reading the The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series. I had read the first volume probably two months ago, and although I liked the book, I wasn't really motivated to read beyond that one (and it hadn't merited mention in my blog). However, recently, I found myself at the library with little time to look for books but needing some "waiting" reading, so I grabbed several of the subsequent volumes of that series. I've been hooked. The subsequent books are better than volume one (which I liked enough). These are fairly thin books and can be read fairly rapidly. Once in a very great while, I enjoy a book so much that I want to own a copy of the book. That is high praise. Once in an even greater while, I would like to re-read a book--I almost never want to re-read even my favorite books. That is highest praise. I would like to own this entire series of books and I would like to re-read these books.

My sister and I had a nice visit with our childhood friend ABA this past week. Our friend was here from out of town. Visits like these always remind me that it takes a long time to make an "old friend." We could just pick up where we left off last time we saw one another.

After a meds doctor's appointment two weeks ago, I had lunch with another old friend TGZ. We realized we had not visited together in nearly a year. Lots had transpired in our lives this past year (including the loss of her wonderful mother whom I love) and a lunch "hour" seemed hardly long enough.

I've probably forgotten other highlights of the past few weeks or have left some things out on purpose :-) but this post gives a glimpse into our recent state of affairs. The next few weeks look just as hectic. We have girls' camp in about ten days.

L's first swim meet

Saturday was L's first swim meet. It was in Fredonia. As you can see, our view of the pool left something to be desired and most of the photos were like this. L is the swimmer most visible in this shot. She felt good about the swim meet and she competed in about five or six events.

The day was overcast and pleasant for sitting outside for four hours watching swimmers.

This is a video of one of her races. She is in Lane 5.

I have decided that there has to be some balance between filming an event and watching an event. At one point L said, "Mom, how did I do?" I had to answer, "I don't know. I was busy filming so I didn't really SEE the race."

More Photos of Tom's

This shows some changes to "Tom's house" next to my mother's house in one of the Tri-cities.

It is actually farther along than this and I'll post more later. This is where we stopped because we had to get the power lines out of the way of the carport.

I'll post a few more pictures of Tom's in a few weeks, once the roof is finished and the cement and stucco are done.

Our Second Summer Science Trip

For our family "Summer Science Trip" this week, we went to the other side of the AZ Strip (it is a huge place).  We went to Mt. Trumball, Mt. Logan and that area.  We had a nice time.

This is J on pooch duty.

This is L, camera in hand.

J & B are getting their lunches out while L and I took some pictures.

T is eating his big lunch--bread and butter (prepared and packed by T himself).

I can see I didn't put enough of myself behind the tree.

I found a few more wild flowers on this trip.  B thinks this might be another penstemon. 

We think this is some kind of Four o'clock.

A little floral sunshine.

Here are some great hieroglyphics we saw (there were other markings besides these but this picture is representative of the site).

Now we need to plan our trip for next week.

Vistas of Globe Mallow

Here are the promised pictures of the meadows of globe mallow on the Arizona Strip. 

Somehow it was more vivid in person. Maybe something gets lost in the upload to this blog. 

There were a lot of meadows like this, particularly the higher up we went into the mountains.

Here is a deer sizing us up.

Here is another meadow, globe mallow as far as the eye can see.

This picture's deep colors show how the place really looked, and how vivid the orange was against the blackened trees. 

I thought the orange was particularly striking against the standing trees that were dead and blackened from fire.  

In fact, if you just looked at the trees and didn't know they were conifers, you might think it was just winter and they'd lost their leaves. 

But then you see the sea of orange flowers, and in this case also white flowers and green grasses, and you would know it is spring and you then know that the trees are dead.

There were a couple of miles of this surreal view.

Here's to nature's beauty!

Arizona Strip in bloom

Last week, we went for a drive on the Arizona Strip.  It was really in bloom.  I took photos of the flowers until my camera battery died!  I wanted to share some of my flower pictures with you. 

I wish I knew the names of these flowers. 

B and the kids were good sports about stopping so often so I could photograph yet another flower!

This bush was prettier in person.  Its subtle blooms don't translate as well in a photograph.

I think this is a wild rose.

We had a nice picnic at the Black Rock fire lookout station.

This is a bit "twiggy" but there are still flowers on it!

There were areas like this where there were just "carpets" of flowers!

This is a Sego Lily.

This plant reminded me of lavender.

I think this is globe mallow and I will post more photos of that at another time.  There were big "plots" of globe mallow all over.

It takes some convincing to get our teens into the truck with the folks.  As long as B says we're going, then we're going. 

I think these are penstemon.

Maybe these are globe mallow again.

We are going to try doing these day excursions through out the summer.

There are still a lot of places to see all around us.

During the summers of fourth and fifth grades (or just fourth?), the principal loaded us on a school bus and showed us the ghost towns and historical places in the area.

They were called Summer Science Trips.  I loved them.  

I don't think teachers think that kind of thing is important anymore--to know the area where you live.  I doubt my kids have been to even 10% of the places in the area--well, they've been where I've taken them but I'm talking about visiting places on school field trips.

I think this is globe mallow again but in the higher elevations, it was very lush.

So, that is the plan.  Pack up the kids about once a week and go see things.

We'll see if that works out.  We'll see if we can keep that momentum throughout the summer.  A lot hinges on B being around to go.

There are a lot of places to see.  We're going back to the Arizona Stip tomorrow.  This time we're headed to Mt. Trumball and environs.

This is another wild rose.

We'll see what tomorrow brings.  Happy trails to us and to you, too.

Oquirrh Temple Trip

We just arrived home from our YM/YW trip (up and back in one day) to see the Oquirrh Temple open house. (These are my kids in front of the temple.) There were 28 of us--four vehicles full of kids. I'm thankful it went off OK because I was in charge of the activity.

I think this may be my fourth temple open house (St. George remodel open house about 1974, West Jordan, Las Vegas and Oquirrh temples). I thought the decor was very beautiful. It was not what I was expecting and different from what I've seen in some other temples. For instance, today my first counselor had pointed to a chair in one of the rooms and whispered to me, "Funky chair!" There were natural wood doors, door frames and other molding. There was marble on most of the floors. There seemed to be more framed art than I recall from other temples. The chandeliers were amazing! I loved the frosted glass with little diamond clear spots in it. It was smaller than I anticipated. I thought the temple floor plan was very well thought out for traffic flow.

I was completely taken with the planned community surrounding the temple--Daybreak. Several months ago, I'd read about that community in one of my magazines that I subscribed to (before it went out of business) but I hadn't known it was right around the Oquirrh Temple. I could have taken the day to just look around that community. I loved it. I'm a nut for architecture and design. Other than the fact that the lots are city lots (B would prefer some acreage), we'd have to shovel snow and live with snow, and the kids don't want to move anywhere, I was ready to move (you remember that I'm always wanting to move somewhere and this is today's "somewhere").  Here are a few of the houses L managed to photograph as we left town.