Granite
I thought this would be the perfect week to write about one of my favorite childhood memories: camping with my family at Granite Campground and Hot springs in Wyoming. We are going there again in a few days with my family, and I haven’t been in over four years. I am very excited, and I thought it would be fun to post some old Granite photo’s this week, and then do a post next week with new photos from granite.
Okay, get ready for a huge post sorry. I just love Granite so much I couldn’t limit myself. This is mostly done for the benefit of myself and my family members so feel free to skip this one and will do a regular post later this week of what we did this weekend.
Every summer my family would prepare for my favorite time of the year next to Christmas. Each year we got to spend five days camping at Granite Campground in Wyoming. People always ask me where it is, and the closest city to Granite is Jackson Hole, but even that is about an hour away. Granite isn’t one of those campgrounds you can see from a busy highway. It’s about twenty minutes up a lonely highway that runs along the Hoback river, then another six miles up a dirt road that runs along Granite creek. Once you get there, you are pretty much in the middle of nowhere.

I loved the weeks and days just before we went to Granite. My mom had a whole list of things that needed to be done. One of my favorites was cleaning out the camper. Nancy and I would help my mom wipe out drawers, and wash the utensils but mostly we would play and pretend we were already on our way. My mom would spend the whole week before making cookies and cakes that we would take to Granite for treats and deserts, and then a few days before, we would go grocery shopping for Granite. The cart would be piled higher that usual with food and treats for the trip, and the one thing I was always excited about, because we hardly ever got it, was: soda pop. My favorite was “Sprite” and I was so excited to know that I would get to drink pop anytime I wanted for the whole time I was at Granite! Soon the day arrived and my mom would keep us busy and entertained by loading the camper. I was just happy to be doing anything that would get us on the road sooner. Finally the camper was loaded on the truck and all the kids would get in the only space left in the camper, the bed above the cab of the truck. Then it was a waiting game sometimes up to an hour before we would finally get going, there always seemed to be something that would go wrong a break light on the camper wouldn’t work or someone forgot to fill up the water, or my mom forgot something on her list. But finally we would be on our way! The bed had a big window that faced the front of the truck and we would always fight who would get to be in front of it. It wasn’t until Nancy and I were older that we finally got our turn in front of it, instead we had to make do with our little side windows. Now a day people wouldn’t dream of letting their kids ride in a camper, I can’t imagine what would have happened to us if we had gotten in a wreck. But somehow we managed to all stay safe. Secretly I was terrified of the camper falling off the truck and tumbling down one of the many mountain roads we would drive on. Sometimes, I would get so scared I would have to close the curtain on my side so I couldn’t see and just try and fall asleep. Here is a picture of our camper. My brother Greg is the one farthest back, then Lisa Dinsdale, Me, Nancy, and Lisa's Friend:

Once we finally arrived at the campground there was always so much to do and see. First we had to set up tents and arrange sleeping bags. Once the camper was unloaded from the truck my dad would be off to find firewood for the week, and we would help my mom set up camp. Once we were finally settled it was off the visit the creek. The creek could be quite rough and deep in places but by the campground it widened out and had lots of shallow places to wade in. Almost everyday when it got to hot in the campground we would head off to the creek to cool off. There were always lots of fun things to do at the creek besides playing in the water. We would pick flowers, find snail shells, and if we were lucky we even would find a friendly water snake or bullfrog to take back to camp. The creek bottoms were full of willow trees, and we would always beg my dad to make us whistles. Finally, after a lot of begging he would walk down with us to find the perfect willow branch to carve into a whistle. It had to be just the right thickness, strait, and no knots. It seemed like forever before he would find the right one. Once he did, he would cut it off a little longer that whistle size, make notches for the air to come out, and then he would tap on it for a long time to get the bark to separate from the limb. The bark had to come off in one piece for the whistle to work. Once he got the bark off, he carved the inside of the whistle and slid the bark back on. And then we had our willow whistles. I am sure it was quite noisy after we all got our whistles, no wonder he would wait so long to go down and make them. I didn't have a picture of the creek but here is a picture of the campground area. I just love it because there are so many trees. In this picture Shaun is having a water fight with some of my nieces and nephews:

The next morning we would get up and go to the pool. It was about a mile away from the campground up a rough road that dead ended about a quarter of a mile before the pool. The pool is owned by the forest service and is a very rustic looking pool somewhat carved out of the side of the mountain and fed by a hot spring. There were no bathrooms and only a very roughly build log cabin to change in. Often moose would come to visit the salt lick just below the pool. And at least once a year we would have Mother Nature come to visit us in the pool in the form of a water snake or a bat. We loved the pool best of anything else at Granite; we would swim almost every day and sometimes twice a day. We loved to play on the painted boulders that jutted out into the pool and sit by the waterfall where the hot springs poured into the pool. At one time there was even a diving board to jump off of, until someone died from hitting their head on the bottom. Then we had to just have fun jumping off the sides. Moss also grew on the bottom of one section of the pool, it sounds gross but it actually was one of my favorite parts of the pool, you could dive down and carve pictures or your name in the moss. It was fun to see what other people had carved. One of my very favorite things to do was to just sit and look at the amazing view you had of the creek and the mountains from the pool. Here is a picture of the pool. Its just a random shot but it gives a good view of how the pool just kind of juts out of the side of the mountain:

As if all those things aren’t enough to make Granite the best place in the world to go camping. It also has some really magnificent falls. The falls are situated almost exactly halfway between the campground and the pool. And we would often stop on our way up to the pool to see the falls. The creek is really rough and rugged in that spot and the falls are no exception. You can walk right up to the base of the falls, and even walk out onto a log that has been there ever since I can remember, about half way into the stream. It makes for really cool pictures, but is a bit of an adrenaline rush. There is also a trail that leads to the top of the falls. It’s a beautiful view but not for the faint of heart. When we got older we would tube from the base of the falls down to the campground it was a fun ride but a little scary at times. Here is a picture of Granite Falls. You can see the big log I was talking about in the background. In the picture is my Niece April, my nephew Nick and next to him my Niece Joy:

My parents had Kayaks. The good old fiberglass kind, but not so sophisticated as the ones you see the professional kayakers in now. We usually would take one day to drive down to the Snake river to watch my oldest brother and his friends go down the river in them. One really memorable experience happened to me while watching them go down the river. We had all gone to a place where you can hike down the side of the mountain and watch the rafters and the kayakers go over the biggest rapid on the river called Lunch Counter. I was too little to walk down the trail by myself. It was a super steep trail that ended at some very rough water. My oldest sister Laura who was probably around 16 at the time volunteered to carry me down. We hadn’t gone very far when she lost her footing, and we both started tumbling down the mountain. I remember seeing the water below and thinking I was going to die. No matter how hard we tried Laura and I could not stop, we kept grabbing onto grass and weeds, but it was so steep and gravely that the weeds and grass would just pull out. I remember saying a little prayer that somehow we would be able to stop, and just then we saw a tree in front of us with a branch low enough for me to reach up and grab onto. Laura saw the tree too, and told me that when we passed under to reach up and hold on with all my might. We did and we were able to stop. I still remember clutching to that branch with one hand while my dad and a family friend came down to rescue us. We were both pretty scraped up. It may not have been as dramatic as my little 5 or 6 year old brain made it out to be. But I do remember feeling strongly that my Heavenly Father had been watching out for me and my sister that day.
When I was about 8 we traded our kayaks in for a raft. We spent many summer days going down the snake river in that raft. Usually one whole day of Granite was dedicated to rafting. While other families spent their Saturday afternoons on a lake behind a speedboat, I spent mine on a river. Here is a picture of us on the river in the early years. My dad is in the front in the yellow life jacket, my mom is right behind him and you can just see mine and my sisters heads in the front seat in the front:

And finally Granite would have never been Granite without the Dinsdales. They were my parents best friends, and when I was younger, and before everyone started getting married, and grandkids started coming, we all went to Granite together. We usually got two campsites right next to each other and shared everything from campfires to meals. The Dad, Darwin Dinsdale, was my favorite. He always seemed to be happy and joking. He knew lots of silly campfire songs (he must have been in the scouts a long time). At night we would all gather around the campfire to roast marshmallows and we would beg Darwin to sing us a song. I still find those songs popping into my head sometimes, and if my girls are really lucky I will sing one to them. I just wish I could remember all the words. I managed to find the lyrics to two of my favorites by googling them. Isn’t the internet an amazing thing!

The Thing
As I was walking on the beach one bright and sunny day,
I saw a great big wooden box a floating in the bay.
I pulled it in and opened it up and much to my surprise. . . .
Oh! I discovered a (clap, clap, clap) right before my eyes!
Oh! I discovered a (clap, clap, clap) right before my eyes!

I picked it up and ran to town as happy as a king.
I took it to a guy I knew who'd buy most anything.
But this is what he hollerd at me as I walked in his shop,
"Oh! Get out of here with that (clap, clap, clap) before I call the
cop!" "Oh! Get out of here with that (clap, clap, clap) before I call the cop!"
I turned around and got right out a running for my life.

And then I thought I'd take it home and give it to my wife.
But this is what she hollered at me as I walked through the door,
"Oh! Get out of here with that (clap, clap, clap) and don't come
back no more! "Oh! Get out of here with that (clap, clap, clap) and don't come back no more!

I wandered all around the town until I chanced to meet.
A hobo who was looking for a handout on the street.
He said he'd take most any old thing he was a desperate man.
But when I showed him the (clap, clap, clap) he turned around and
ran! But when I showed him the (clap, clap, clap) he turned around and
ran!

I wandered on for many years a victim of my fate
Until at last I came across St.Peter at the gate.
But as I tried to take it inside He told me where to go,
"Get out of here with that (clap,clap,clap) and take it down
below!" "Get out of here with that (clap,clap,clap) and take it down
below!"

The moral of this story is if you're out on the beach,
And you should see a great, big box and it's within your reach,
Don't ever stop and open it up. That's my advice to you,
For you'll never get rid of the (clap, clap, clap)
No matter what you do! For you'll never get rid of the (clap, clap, clap)
No matter what you do!

The Quartermaster's Song

There are snakes, snakes, snakes Big as garden rakes,At the store! At the store! There are snakes, snakes, snakes, Big as garden rakes, at the Quartermaster's store.
Chorus: My eyes are dim I can-not see. I have not got my specs with me. I have not got my specs with me.
There are mice, mice, miceRunning though the rice,At the store! At the store! There are mice, mice, mice, Running through the rice, at the Quartermaster's store.
Chorus
Continue with each of the following:

3. lice - living on the mice.

4. rats - big as alley cats.

5. roaches - big as football coaches

6. watches - big as sasquaches

7. snakes - big as garden rakes

8. bears - but no one really cares

9. beavers - with little meat cleavers

10. foxes - stuffed in little boxes

This is a picture of Darwin and Deanna Dinsdales. This was taken just a few years ago, my parents still try and go up to Granite with them every once and awhile:

Happy Independence Day!!!!

Or days, as it was in our case. I kind of like it when the 4th falls on a Sunday, it spreads the celebration out further. We had a fun one here is what we did:

We got up at 5:30 in the morning on Saturday to go watch the balloon fest in Provo. Only 3 of the 30 balloons got to launch because of the wind conditions, but it was fun watching them blow the balloons up.


After the balloon fest, we went to my brother Mikes house. Jenny made us a great breakfast, and afterward the girls had fun playing in their fountain.

We took it easy for the rest of the day. That night we had a little BBQ with just our family. Shaun grilled some awesome steaks we got from Costco, and I made french fries and strawberry pie. When it finally got late enough, we threw a bunch of blankets and cushions in the back of Shaun's truck, and headed to Thanksgiving Point to watch the fireworks. I'm sure it wasn't as impressive as the Stadium of fire, but we had fun watching them from our comfy seats in the back of the truck, instead of some hard bleachers.

While we waited for the fireworks to start, we enjoyed natures fireworks. What a beautiful sunset!

On Sunday we invited a few of our neighbors over, and lit our pack of fireworks we got from Costco.

This is how Sydnie watched most of the fireworks.

I had been promising the girls I would sleep out with them for the last few nights, but the weather would not cooperate. After the fireworks on Sunday, the weather looked good, so we set out our sleeping bags on some pads on the lawn. We had fun watching for shooting stars and satellites. We also had fun locating some planets and constellations. Quite different from when I was a kid, I brought my lap top out and found this cool website http://skyandtelescope.com/. You could type in your location and it would show you a map of the sky in your area. We were able to located several planets, stars, and constellations.

Happy 4th of July! We had a great one, I plan on posting about this tommorro, when I have the rest of the pictures together. So for now enjoy my Childhood memory post.

Memory #4
Horses

My best friend when I was little was Krista Thomas. She lived a couple houses down, we both had pastures in our back yards. My Family used our pasture very practically, and raised a couple calves each year for meat for our family. Krista’s family had horses. We would beg and beg our parents for a horse, but every time the response was, “horses are too expensive and we don’t have a barn.” Luckily we were able to ride Krista’s horses just about anytime we wanted, and many summers were spent daily on a horse’s back.

I wish I had some pictures of us riding horses but there are none to be found so I included some stock photos of horses that look a lot like the ones we used to ride. The one on the top looks like "Lady" and the one on the bottom looks a lot like "Patches". Now just try to imagine three little girls riding on the back with no saddle, cut off shorts, and barefeet and the pictures will be complete.

I really don’t remember how old we were when we first started riding horses, I do know we were probably not as old as we should have been. We started out by just going out and looking at the horses, feeding them grass and oats. Then we got a little braver, and would go out to the field and try to round up the horses so we could sit on their backs. Once we finally chased the horses into the corral, we would tie them to the fence, crawl up the fence, and onto the horses backs. We spent hours pretending to ride them, and dreaming about when we really could.
The next step was field riding. I’m not sure we were suppose to, because it seemed like Krista was always looking over her shoulder when we did it. We would corner the horses in the corral, put on their bridals, and ride the horses bareback around the pasture. Luckily, Krista owned about the most gentle horses around, they were short too, so the fall was never that far, (and we fell plenty of times). When we were young, Krista always rode a young and a little more spirited horse called Patches, and I rode a very old and gentle horse called Lady.
Finally at about the age of 8 or 9 we were given the okay to take them out on the road. We were quite the sight: cut off shorts, no shoes, and we almost always rode bareback. At first we were only allowed to ride Lady so the three of us: Krista, me, and my sister Nancy would all climb on one horse. Poor Nancy, she was the littlest and lowest in pecking order and always had to ride on the back. She had a very bumpy ride on the horse’s rear end, and would often just slide right off the back, occasionally taking me with her. Our most common destination was the town square that also had an arena in one corner of it. There we would gallop around and pretend we were rodeo queens. If we were lucky an old cowboy named Tom Shirtliff would show up on his horse, and then we were in for a real treat. His horse was the smartest horse we had ever seen. We loved to watch him perform tricks with his horse.
Eventually we were able to take two horses out. I would ride on one and Krista the other with Nancy riding behind on one or the other. Occasionally, we would get all fancy and put saddles on the horses. Those naughty horses would puff their stomachs out, so even when it seemed we had cinched the saddles down tight, after a block or two down the road the saddles would be falling off to one side or the other. On one very memorable occasion my horse got spooked and took off with me on it. My saddle started to slip to the side. I was so busy trying to stay on the horse, that I couldn’t do anything to get control of the horse. As we ran over a patch of grass, I decided my best option was to bail off the horse while I had a soft spot to land on. I bailed, and the horse kept running, now with the saddle practically all the way under it. I think we stuck to bare back riding for awhile after that.
Other memorable horse stories were: once we made homemade bridles for our horses. We thought we were so smart. We found some extra bits in the barn and fashioned the rest of the bridle out of twine used to bail hay. They seemed to work fine at first, we arrived at our destination, tied our horses up and started to play. Our knots must have been horrible because when we got back the only thing left of the horses were their bits and a tangle of twine. We were so scared that the horses had run off and we would never find them. We ran home to get help, and there were our horses patiently waiting to be let back into the gate of their pasture. Naughty horses!!!As you can imagine I didn’t play much with dolls or play dress up very often. Even when we weren’t riding horses our play was centered around horses. We had horse figurines we loved to play with, our Barbies were always riding horses, and more often than not we were horses. Needless to say I can do a really good horse whinny.

Weekend in Idaho

We went to Idaho this weekend. We had fun seeing family, some of them we hadn't seen since Christmas. First we went to the extended Huls Family Reunion, it was nice to visit with Shaun's Aunts and Uncles and see Great Grandma Huls. After that we went to my parents house the girls had fun on her water slide and slip and slide. Even Lu Lu had some fun getting to know her dog cousin Harley. It was fun to watch them play, neither dog had ever had the chance to play with another dog. It took them a while to get used to each other, but after that they wore each other out chasing each other. Sunday we went to a double baby blessing. Two of Shaun's sisters had baby girls in May. They are both darling little girls and will never be lacking in clothes or accessories. I remember I was a little the same way with Kaylee, now Sydnie is lucky if she gets out of her pajamas before nap time. As always the girls had so much fun seeing their grandparents and playing with cousins.

I was lazy and didn't get my camera out as much as I should have. But I did manage to get a few
shots after the baby blessing:


My girls with their new cousins: London on the left, and Macey on the right.


Morgan and Kaylee getting twisted on the swing by Grandpa Huls


Sydnie and Grandpa Huls

Childhood Memory # 3

Three Ringed Circus
I was going to dedicate this post to memories of our trampoline, but when I started to remember things about our trampoline, it made me think of a few other things we used to do for fun in our back yard. We didn't actually have a circus in our back yard, but this title seemed to fit considering some of things we did for fun back there.

Ring #1: The Trampoline
We were the first kids in our neighborhood to get a trampoline. We had kids from who knows where lined up around that thing waiting for a turn to get on it. There were three rules, no shoes, only three kids on at a time, and you had to have a signed permission slip. My mom had a whole cupboard full of signed permission slips, and I remember being really annoyed that I had to wait my turn to jump on my own trampoline. Just a funny side note: one of my best friend’s mom would not sign a permission slip, she thought trampolines were too dangerous. So, when the rest of us wanted to jump on the trampoline, we would haul out my moms small exercise trampoline, and she would pretend like she was having fun jumping on it, while the rest of us had real fun on the big trampoline. After the excitement died down and other people started getting trampolines, we finally had it to ourselves. We figured out some really fun games to play. We of course played the usual crack the egg and dodge ball, but we had a special trampoline that led us to invent some unique games that other people couldn’t play. Our trampoline was round and stitched together in three pieces leading to some nasty trampoline burns, but the lines it created in our tramp made for some fun games. Here is a picture of our “tramp” with its unique stitching.

One game was called “sharks”, the shark would be in the middle section and the two outer sections were safe and we would jump across the middle section trying not to get touched by the shark. One of the best things we would do on our tramp was put the sprinkler underneath it to cool ourselves off in the summer. We had railroad tracks that ran behind our pasture; there was a freight train that ran those tracks everyday. Whenever we would hear the train coming, we would stop whatever we were doing, even if we were inside, and go on the trampoline and jump the “snake” as we called it. I don’t know how or why this started and why we thought it was so fun. We also had many slumber parties on the trampoline. We lived out in the country, so you could see the stars really well. I loved to look up at the night sky. We saw many shooting stars, one so close that it had a rainbow tail behind it. We would watch satellites zoom by, and try to find constellations, and even made up a few of our own. There is just something about stars that make you think about God, and I spent many nights falling asleep trying to take it all in.

Ring #2 Stilts

The next act in our circus was stilts. I forgot to mention this invention in my last memory, but my dad made us several sets of stilts. I don’t have any pictures of them, but I found this funny Norman Rockwell picture that looks a lot like the stilts my dad made:

The smallest of the set of stilts was just a foot of the ground, then there were several more sets that got increasingly bigger, until the tallest that was about six feet off the ground. I remember watching my older brother walk on the tallest set, and wish I was brave enough to do it. So, I started with the smallest set, and when I got comfortable, I moved to a taller set, until I finally got brave enough to try the tallest set. They were tricky because you had to balance them up against the trampoline to get started, then climb up on them, and finally hold your breath as you took your first step. I was always afraid of falling back down onto the bars of our trampoline. The first 20 tries were pretty unsuccessful, just a couple shaky steps before letting go and jumping down. After a lot of practice, I was finally able to make it across the yard, and then able to walk circles around the yard. I still haven’t a clue what prompted my dad to make those things, but they sure were fun, and I bet not many people can include stilt walking in their resume.

Ring # 3 Barrel Walking
To complete our little backyard circus, we happened to have a couple fifty-five gallon metal drums in our backyard, every once and awhile we would tip them over and try to balance on them. Pretty soon we figured out you could walk on them, and make them roll. We would have contests to see who could get the farthest without falling. We also would try walking two at a time. That always ended in giggling and falling after only a few feet. Whenever we did our barrel rolling tricks, I thought of my great grandpa John Thomas Thornton he had a traveling skating exhibition. He was a professional roller skater (must be where I get my moves) and he had an act he did on a barrel while on his skates, and another act where he roller skated on stilts (Maybe this is where the my dad’s stilt idea came from). I included a picture of him just for fun.

My Great Grandpa John Thomas Thornton posing for some pictures in his skates.

Yearly Photo Shoot With the Girls

This Saturday I spent a couple hours curling hair then drove to Thanksgiving Point to take some pictures. I was really happy with the setting, but I wish I got there about an hour earlier. It was about 8:00P.M. when I finally got there, and it was just a little dark. I was tempted to go out again this week and if it wasn't for all the hair curling I probably would have. But with some creative editing I salvaged a few good ones, I tried a new photo editing technique I just kind of stumbled upon while trying to figure something else out. I like it, it gives kind of a retro look. Family photos are scheduled for next week. Wish me luck!

P.S. I finally figured out how to make your photos bigger on your blog! I would tell you here, but it is way to complicated. I shouldn't say that, once you change the HTML code it is actually very easy. I looked up how by googling it, then of course as always, I had to make my own little adjustments. If you wan't to know how call or e-mail me.

This pose was one of my favorites, you should have seen how many shots I had to take to get one with all of them looking at the camera and smiling. Sydnie was just being a tease and doing all kinds of naughty poses, Brianne won't look at the camera to save her life, but Kaylee just poses and smiles till her cheeks are ready to fall off.

P.S. you can't make wide pictures bigger just long pictures. The wide ones are already as wide as they can be and you just end up cutting off part of the picture.

This is another rare shot with them all smiling. I loved this fence and got some great shots by it.

I love this shot of Sydnie I just wish she would have been smiling instead of smirking. She was being such a little monkey that night.

This is my all time favorite of all the pictures I took that night. Such a sweet picture. It was one of the rare ones that looked good even unedited.

Brianne is so camera shy. She has been since the time she was born. But I do get some sweet little looks out of her sometimes.

I love this one too. She is already a beauty at only 6.


Sydnie and Brianne are tough to get one good shot out of them but Kaylee loves the camera. However, she has gotten such a fake smile lately that it is hard to find one of her with a cute natural smile.


I like this close up of Kaylee too, but the photo editing technique I used on Briannes and Sydnies photos didn't translate as well on Kaylee I think it is the color of her dress, it is cute but too dark for this technique. Oh well I still like it anyway.

Happy Fathers Day

So I thought I would kill two birds with one stone this week. Post a childhood memory, and say Happy Fathers Day to my dad. I chose to write this week on memories surrounding my house, mostly because, as I mention in my last memory, my dad is full of inventions, and when I talk about memories of my house, I can't help but talk about all the fun and interesting things my dad made for our house.

My House

I was one of those rare people who lived in the same house from the time I was born until I graduated from high school. Since I was one of the youngest in my family, my parents had already done all the moving around before I was born, and settled down to this house a year or two before I was born. I loved my house, it was big enough, but not too big. We had a big yard and a pasture. There was plenty of room outside to explore and let our imaginations run wild.

This is a picture of our house from the front. My mom always kept everything nice and neat and always had beautiful flowers planted all around our house.

Here is a view looking out the back door. This is obviously in early spring so everything is pretty barren. As I mentioned before, we had a large yard with a HUGE garden, yes that whole dirt patch in the back is all garden! The front part had fruit trees and it is where we grew pumpkin and squash, and decorative gourds. It also had a root cellar, that you can't really see. It was basically a hole in the ground with a little wooden door. We kept potatoes and carrots in it over the winter. It was super scary, but if you were brave enough, you could usually catch a few frogs down there.

The back garden was where all the major action happened: Peas, beans, carrots, corn, potatoes, tomatoes, melons cucumbers, strawberry's and raspberries were the usual produce back there. Here is a picture of me and a friend and my nephew nick podding a mountain of peas from our garden this would have been just one of many pickings and only a third of what there was to pod because Nancy and my brother Greg would have had their own piles:

Having a garden was great most of the time. Just about anytime during the summer there was something fun ready to eat. You could almost always find some raspberries or strawberries to eat and in the early summer there were fresh peas. We liked to eat them out of the pod or sometimes, pod and all, if the peas were little enough. The bad thing about having a garden was the weeding. Every week my sister and I had to go out and hoe and hand weed 7 rows each and as you can see they were not short rows. We would often race to see who could get done the fastest. It usually ended in tears, with one or the other accusing of cheating or not weeding good enough. I always was so glad when the plants got big enough the weeding got alot easier because the weeds couldn't compete with the big plants. But big plants led to the other drawback, Harvest time, there was raspberries to pick, peas to pod, and beans to snap. My mom was really into canning, so when the peas or beans were ready we would be stuck down in our basement for what seemed like hours podding or snapping. She would get huge bushel baskets full and divide them between my sister and I and we would pod or snap till our fingers were green and sore. One time Nancy and I really wanted to go out and play, so we came up with a great plan: we podded about half of the peas, and then shoved the rest under the podded shells in the garbage. My mom was no dummy, she saw our half full bowls of peas, and found our not so cleverly hidden peas in the garbage. I don't think we got to play that day.

Inventions
My dad was an electrical engineer who worked at the governments nuclear testing facility, but I think he was an inventor at heart. Our house and yard were full of his creations. He was also inventing things to help people, he made a stand for my grandma's easy chair, so she could get in and out of it easier with her bad knees. He invented an electronic device to amplify someone talking, my grandpa had a disease that made it so he could only talk in mumbled whispers so it was to help him communicate easier. He also helped my brother invent some equipment for his bottled water factory. Around our house he invented: a weight machine, rowing machine, an art table for me, It had a top that could be lowered flat like a desk or raised up like an easel. We even had a solar collector that took up a big portion of the back of our house, it collected solar energy and heated the water in our house (that is when it was sunny, the rest of the time we had a standard gas or electric water heater), and lastly his greenhouses: the earliest one was on the back of our house, it was very tall and had a door you could walk into, inside were climbing tomatoes, lettuce, cauliflower and cucumbers. Later on he made greenhouses that were portable. thet were long domes out of PVC and plastic, they had sophisticated watering systems and people were always stopping and asking about them. I think he ended up even making a few for people.

The most memorable of all his inventions were the following: In addition to the awsome swimming pool that I already told you about, we had a really cool playhouse, which he salvaged from an old shack/farmhouse on the property next to ours. They were going to tear it down, but my dad saved it and moved it to our back yard. He put new siding on it and a new roof. Then one half was used as a storage shed and the other half was our playhouse. We loved that thing and spent hours out there decorating. At one point he even let us paint the walls, and we got the old carpet from our house when my mom got new. We thought we could probablly live out there despite the fact there was no water or electricity.

This last invention was definitely a family favorite, and I have to say I think we all miss it a bit. Since it wouldn't fit into the new house they had to say goodbye to our table my dad invented. I even helped him make it. I remember it was a surprise for my mom and I helped him sand the legs on the benches and watched him attach legs to the table. As you can see from the picture below it was a round table, it had curved padded benches that went all around, and the best part was in the middle. I wish I could have found a better picture, but if you look closely you can see in the middle is a huge round table that spun. My mom would just set food on it then you could spin it to whatever food you needed. It was also great for games, you would just set the game board in the middle, and then you could turn it to move your guy, instead of asking someone else to do it for you. Another fun trick we learned, and I'm sure my dad did not intend it to be used for this, was you could sit in the middle of it and get spun like a merry go round, that was lots of fun, but I'm sure we got in lots of trouble, whenever we got caught doing it.

This is the best picture I could find of the table in my limited picture stash. I think this of a little birthday party my mom threw for me from left to right. Tiffany, Me, DeNiece, Krista, and Nancy.

This is the only other picture I have of the table, I threw this one in because it shows the benches I helped my dad make. Don't you love my awesome pegged pants? This was at a family New Years Eve party. In the background are an assortment of inlaws, my sister Janet, and nieces and nephews.

Weekend Fun

I didn't want to do two separate posts so I threw this one in too. We have been lucky enough to have some visitors this weekend and last weekend. And Shaun's yummy strawberry pie to go with both. Last weekend Shaun's brother Josh came with his wife Jenny and their two kids Braden and Tyler. We tried to go cray fishing, but everything was so flooded that it didn't work out. Later they came for pie and rock band. The girls had fun playing with their cousins.

This weekend my sister Laura and my niece Alexis came to stay. Alexis is getting so tall! She is just two years older than Kaylee but already taller than me. Sydnie thought she was the greatest thing ever and followed her around all day. I didn't get any pictures, but my brother Mike and his wife Jenny came over too, and we had a marshmallow roast and more strawberry pie. Laura had come to go to the Utah Valley home show. It was fun to have her stay.

Sydnie enjoying the pie, mostly the whipped cream. While Josh and Shaun get rock band set up in the background.

I wish I had a better picture of the whole crew but at least I sort of got Braden in this one. You can just see him enjoying his pie (sort of, "well I really don't like this pie, aunt Jenn") on the end.