Yeah!!!

I graduated from college 14 years ago, (then add getting my Masters in the middle of that) I JUST MADE MY FINAL PAYMENT ON MY STUDENT LOANS! WOOHOO!

Camping Camping Camping

So we were hanging out, trying to figure out where we wanted to go this weekend. Upon rare occasion, all 3 animals decided to go see Scott! We decided to up the Stillwater River. (Go HERE for more of Scott's pics!)

First, I'd like to show you around our cute little camper. Here is the cooking area.
This is the cleaning area (with running hot water!).

Here is the reading/dining area. There is a nice window on the side, then the top part of the camper that pops up is also windows, so there is a lot of light and headroom for my 6'3 husband.
And finally, this is the sleeping area. It's queen size, extends over the cab and has lots of room...good thing because Gus Bob usually sleeps with us too! How else would he protect us?
So off we drive. I've already blogged about another time we camped in this area, but this time we took a couple side jaunts, just in case roads were open. We saw lots of deer and turkeys. Here are some mountain sheep. You wouldn't know they are on the tailings of a platinum/chromium mine. We took off this ride and gradually drove up 1000 feet.
Here is looking down on the mine. The "water" on the right is actually toxic waste.

Okay, so obviously, we are on a pretty interesting road. It winds up the side of the mountains. We heard there was a new campground up here some where, so we drove...

things became a tiny bit more interesting, but we kept on driving!

We finally had to make a decision. The roads weren't getting any less interesting..only more snowy. With a camper on and no "getting-unstuck stuff", we decided to head back down. Bummeroozski! I am looking forward to continuing this drive!
So we headed back down and to the trailhead campground, which was also still closed. We parked at the gate and decided to take a walk down the river. Nice country, huh?

Nice company, too!
There was a makeshift trail on the highwater mark of the river. I spotted that big rock with driftwood stuck on it from the force of previous spring melts.


You can see the mark about 2/3 of the way up the rock where the water flows after the snow up high melts.
More river shots. By this time, we were rock bopping as all there were an the shore were big rocks, no more trail! We bopped around the rocks for a couple of hours.
We walked for a while, Scott took more shots and I just enjoyed the sound of the water. White noise is the ultimate! Eventually, we decided to climb up on the shore to head back, thinking it would be faster. Here's what we got to walk on for the first bit back! Big ol' boulder field, obviously pushed down by glacier ice.

Eventually the trail mellowed out to trees and an actual forest floor.

Here is a trunk of a large pine tree. I took this so you can look at the rings and appreciate the size/age ratio of our trees. We don't get much precipitation so the trees grow very slow. We know this by how close the rings are. Each ring is one year of growth.


So we got back to the camper and headed down the mountain to camp at a fishing access site. This one was quite peaceful, right by the river.


The water looked like a pool, so relaxing.
What a calming spot.

The robin sure enjoyed herself, just outside our camp. The only downside was...


we didn't get to see the bear which was close obviously close by!

It's 70 degrees today

and will be through Wednesday! We had a great time camping, I'll blog about it in a day or two. Here's one of Scott's pics of Gus and I on our walk down the Stillwater River.

Have a great week!

It's Friday, 12:30:29 AM

and I can't get to sleep. I keep thinking about how to do this and that for our next concert.

It's rainy and snowy and we're going camping this weekend. Sure do love our camper so we can still have adventures. I've got the Greek pasta salad made, bought the brats and buns, etc... Costco loved us tonight!

My yellow tulips are about ready to open.

How's that for random thoughts?

Oh yeah...I'm officially off caffeine...10 days now, and my heart has quit having those spasm thingys.

Have a fabulous Friday, ya'll.

Copy naughty tt,

from CHUCK'S blog.

Foods I love:

Chicken Caesar salad...

blueberry pie...

and stew (among many other things!)

Movies I love are:

Ahh, click HERE to see some highlights!

Places I love to visit:

Anywhere adventurous, such as Moab, with my husband...
Any place nostalgic, such as this used second hand music store Vel and I visited in Tucson...
Most of all...memory lane... (this is my dad and his twin, Darrel) in 1929-31.
Thank you, San, for your original idea of posting pics with a tag you had. It's much more interesting because we are such visual creatures! Thanks Chuck for doing that on your blog, too! Thanks, (everyone in advance) for doing this too! :o)

Taco Tuesday!

How long ago was that commercial on? Tuesdays, since then, will always be Taco Tuesday for me...and for those of you familiar with Taco Bell!

Tonight I will go have dinner with my daughter, Megs and that's about all on my agenda!

What's new with you?

This weekend,

we went to Powell to see our friends, Scott and Justine. They are great folks we met through radioparadise.com. We went to see this fun group!

They sing in 4 part harmony songs of the old and sound almost like Sons of the Pioneers. One plays the accordian (known as the belly steinway), the fiddle, rhythm guitar and upright bass. They were tight and perfectly in tune. They started with "Cool Water" and of course, I started crying. So many songs I remember my dad and uncle Worth and Bill and all play and sing to...or all those old songs we used to listen to on the vinyl! Riders in the Sky are quite entertaining and of fine quality! (Of course, I forgot to bring my camera!) They have been performing for over 30 years! Last night was their 5548th concert! They also recorded "Woody's Song" from Toy Story! If you just let their web page run, you can enjoy some of their songs and humor. They also run "Cowboy Radio" on NPR.

We drove home through a snow storm. Justine had given me some perennials from her garden, but it isn't quite the right weather out right now!


Here are the plants I have started in the house. The TALL ones are sunflowers. The others are herbs, perennials and Kenny's marigolds. I still have 2 or 3 more weeks before these get planted.
Here are the tulips I planted last fall. They are up and blooming in the snow! I'm not sure what the plant is coming up in front of them!

In the back, just to the right of the trash-b-qer is where I'm planting mom's herb garden. The sage is up. I have chives from Justine to go there!
Here is the new flower bed I made. There used to be hops growing here. We took them out and those tulips came up...no buds, but maybe next year! I haven't decided on what should go here, yet.
And to the left, you can see mom's irises. They are doing great! So is this little tree! So is the little robin hiding under it from the snow!

April 17th, 1975

33 years ago, today, my Uncle Howard was killed in a car accident. He and his buddy were headed to our place in Pinedale (from Salt Lake) then up to Hulett with my dad to hunt turkeys. He didn't make it to our place. I remember it like it was yesterday. It's the first and only time I saw my father weep.

These pics were taken in 1972, aren't they just great? Howard is in the orange shirt on top with his mom and dad and aunt and uncle, all of which are gone.

I was in 5th grade when he died. I was young but ohh, I loved my uncle howard. These are the things I remember:
- he was a very lucky card player. he would get 1000 aces (in pinnochle) often! I think he inherited that luck from gramma rubye!
-he always had the coolest cars.
-he loved the song "Sun Down"
-he called Jim Wise "Jim Dumb"
-he looked like my dad and was really fun to be around.

I believe he was born in 1947. He was young, and vibrant and left a little girl, Brenda.

I can't think of any way to end this post.

Childhood Favorites

Here's ONE.

Here's ANOTHER.

This one is good, too.

And HERE.

Remember THIS one? Here are the lyrics as you listen:

Day into night she's with me
How sweet is her warm embrace
Safe in the scent of jasmine
So safe in her gold and lace

Mornings I find, she's left me
So cold so alone, but aware
I try to escape, she finds me
Oh run though I may, shes there, there, there, there, there...

Luck is a lady whose smile is as cold as a stone
She'll bring you things, many things you might never have known
But when your die is cast shell have the final laugh at you
She'll lock you in a duel, where you come out the fool

Beware of the queen of spades
Her black widow's curse might find you yet
Beware of a love that you will regret
Her love means only your death

Day into night she's with me
Turn of a card, she's there
The first time is free, you know
But from now on, pay me, me, me, me, me...

Beware of the queen of spades
Her black widows curse might find you yet
Beware of a love that you will regret
Her love means only your death

Mmmm, yeah. So...
What are some of yours?

Our next concert is

May 12th, not even a month to prepare! It's a "pops" concert, so we are all picking out songs together.
Here's what we are doing:
7th grade:
Enter in singing Lion Sleeps Tonight (a capella with b-box in the middle)
Lean On Me
Imagine
Solo: Tears in Heaven
Trio: Will I (from Rent)
Why Can't We Be Friends (kids are writing their own verses)

8th grade:
Drift Away
I Can't Help Falling In Love
Old TIme Rock and ROll
Ain't No Mountain High Enough
Good Riddance (Time of our Life)

Swing Choir:
Build Me Up Buttercup (Girls)
Let it Be/Yesterday
I NEED A COOL SUGGESTION FOR THE BOYS!

Still in the planning...there may be some editing...

Tuesday...

Feeling like a Monday.

"Meandering"

according to dictionary.com:

"To move aimlessly and idly without fixed direction: See Synonyms at wander."

"Circuitous windings or sinuosities, as of a stream or path."

"A circuitous journey or excursion; ramble. "

This weekend, Scott and I jumped in our cute little camper early Saturday morning. Everything was packed the night before so we could get to our destination camping spot...Castle Butte. We packed our day packs with our water bladders and were ready to get to the top of this place and see the petroglyphs Scott's father told us about. What a gorgeous day!
Well...we got to the spot and carefully checked the map. After the bacon was cooked, we realized that we were trespassing. Okay, we thought, we can drive across the road and see if there is a good place on the BLM land or the State land to camp.

Nope. Nothing interesting. We decided to just wing it and drive until we found a good spot. And when one begins to wander, there are always cool things to appreciate!

Here's an old homestead. So nostalgic. Think of all the hard labor and hard memories accompanying this place.
We were stopped to check the map and up comes this mighty fine horse! Check out the make-shift fence post! You use what you have.

Ahhh, this was a high point! Wild turkey season is going on right now and lucky for this bunch of birds, they were on private land! We stopped and listened to them gobble.

Funny how they don't use their wings. They went running up the hill. You can see why they are called a herd!


Scott noticed a strange sound coming from the tires...and sure enough, the rear left tire was almost flat!




Scott parked on a road between 2 fields (and strangely enough, only 2 vehicles passed the WHOLE TIME we were there!) He crawled under the camper to release the spare.
In no time at all, he had the flat off and the spare on, no anger, no rage, no metal belts poking his hand (and you know all the other parts of THAT story, Vel!) Nice to be married to a man that doesn't lose his temper!


And here is the great treasure we found while putting the jack back...a TEE! A naughty TT!
Okay, onward bound to try to find a place to camp! We had left at 9 in the morning and it's about 1 or 2 at this point. We drove through a ranch that grows long horn steers. This one kept walking closer to us like he was the boss or something.

Here's another boss monster!

This dude looks like no other I've ever seen! Cross between red and black cow. Usually they are one color or the other, not this one! Strange things you see when you are meandering around the country side!

We FINALLY got to a town...Hysham. It was triangle shaped. 2 sides were completely surrounded by farm fields, the other by the railroad. It was named after a cattleman and I think the population is around 300.

By this time, we were wanting to be out of the meandering mode and into the camping mode! We actually drove to 3 river access/fishing/camping spots and ICK. Lots of people, loud and trash in the spots. So we thought to heck with it and headed for a spot we've launched our boat from a couple of times. After 9 hours of driving 175 miles (mostly dirt roads) we circled around and landed next to the Yellowstone only 20 miles away from home!

It was nice and peaceful. Gus enjoyed the water and we enjoyed resting and the river. The sound of geese and turkeys were almost non-stop. We meandered to a great spot...

even allowing us to set up a private place to take care of business.