Christmas in the Desert

We had quite a group for Christmas in the desert this year. Shay and Travis had not been to the little house in Wikieup for at least ten years. They both brought their families. Travis and his family left Christmas Eve and Shay and his family stayed until the day after Christmas.

There is nothing like the holidays with grandkids around. We had half of our grandkids with us. These two families haven't spent much time together by themselves, so the cousins had a good time getting to know each other better.

Emily (Shay's third) just loved little Josh (Travis's youngest), along with everyone else. Who can resist a 2-year-old!

Sean got a B-B gun for his birthday in September. He was doing some target shooting with his dad and Grampa.

These pictures remind me so much of the first time we went to Wikieup with our six kids and my sister Lorrie and her two kids in 1988. They love to roam the desert.

There was not quite as much wildlife to see in December as there was in March when we used to always come. In fact, on our very first walk in the desert 20 years ago, Travis had Mom's shotgun and killed a snake the very first day on a walk like this one.

Shay and Heidi brought their early Christmas gift. Terry tried to keep up with him on "Little Red," but couldn't do it!

They were a big hit with the kids. Travis' boys Nathan and Josh are ready to go. I think the older kids made a permanent rut in the circle they road in front of the house.

The solar electricity held out even though the batteries are not carrying a full charge this year. There was enough for the kids to have some quiet time before bed to watch a movie. It's fun to see Nicholas and Josh with cousin Tyson,

and Marissa with cousins Spencer and Nathan.

The kids came running one day and told us they had found a big spider. It ended up being a 3-4 inch tarantula! He was trapped in a 5-gallon bucked buried in the ground to protect the opening to a septic tank down from the house. It reared up on it's hind legs when we put a stick in the bucket to help him escape.

When Mom and Dad first moved to Wikieup, they grew a "wine tree." Of course, that was one of the first rules with the B-B gun, second to not shooting any one's eye out, to not shoot the bottles on the wine tree. But, as you can see, rules must be made to be broken.

We figured that the bottles would be too much of a temptation for the "mighty hunters." At least no one got their eye shot out.

After Travis and his family left on Christmas Eve, we went to Burro Creek. The first time we went there, many years ago, we actually saw some wild burros. We looked really hard for them, but didn't see any. It was pretty muddy down by the river.

This is Terry and Shay's family sitting on the stone stairway on the way to the Creek. It seemed to be a natural "Kodak moment" spot.

After getting back from the creek, everyone spent time cleaning the mud off of their shoes.

Terry and Sean are in front of the Cactus Garden at the Burro Creek Campground. They have a little pamphlet that tells all of the names of the cacti. This is where our family learned the names (I know, 20 years ago!)

Well, after counting down the days, Christmas morning finally got here and it looked like Santa found us. We were a little worried, being out in the middle of the desert!

The kids were excited about checking out their stockings. And, the empty plate of cookies and carrots proved that Santa and his reindeer were really here!

Terry is relaxing in his new chair. He also got some float tube waders. I took pictures but he wouldn't let me post them on the BLOG. He said I could if I would also include a picture of me in my new nightie, then I could post his picture. That ain't gonna happen! So, kids, I will send you some private pictures. Thanks to all of you for the things you gave us. It was great!

Before Shay's family left, they had to have their picture taken in front of our "picture postcard" cactus.

We had a great Christmas. We want to thank the daughter-in-laws for putting up with a few inconveniences (namely the outhouse). They were good sports and we hope the grandkids made some wonderful Wikieup memories.

December in Wikieup

We finally are on our way South. We stayed at my uncle's home (Terry & Nancy Imlay) for a night in Plain City, Ut. We were going to stay a couple of days, but a big storm was coming in, so we only spent the night and then headed for St. George.

We stayed three nights in St. George. We went to Beaver Dam and saw my Dad's brother, Dan and Joyce Fisher. They used to spend part of the winter in Wikieup, but now have a winter home in Beaver Dam. They took us to lunch and then to his grandson, Jared's home. It was really nice. The next day we went and ate dinner at my High School friend's (Ruth and John Lunt) home and they took us to a Christmas nativity scene show where there were over 300 nativity scenes set up in an LDS Church building. It was really something to see.

We decided to go play card bingo at the clubhouse at the campground one night. We met two couples from Horsehoe Bend who were on their way south! Then when we went to church the next day, Terry met a brother-in-law of Don Fluckiger. His wife was Don's sister. I met a "Howard" whose husband was from the Rexburg area where Terry's dad was raised. We decided that we were probably related and she told me that most of the Howards were buried in Woodruff cemetery and not the Chester Cemetery, where we had looked earlier. It sure is a small world!

We were a little worried about the little house on the desert in Wikieup because in September someone broke into it. We knew that they had stollen a couple of air conditions and had left the door open for a couple of weeks before some friends went in and closed them for us and patched the holes where the air conditioners were. We were afraid about varmints getting into the house.

When we got there, we found that they had also taken our little microwave and a big aluminum ladder. The worse thing was, they had stripped all of the wiring for the solar panels. I guess they wanted the copper wire. We ended up having to go into Kingman and buy all new wiring, and then with a few calls to my brother, Dave, we got it all wired back.

Terry sent me up on the roof of the porch to wire the solar panels because the sun had baked the old wires (for the past 14 years). It was a little scary, but Terry guided me through it.

We were really glad to find no varmints in the house--not even very much sign of any ever being there. We had left a lot of poison around before we left last year. But, as Terry was wiriing in the solar battery box, we heard some crunching going on under a little wooden step on the porch. Sure enough, when we raised the step, there was a pack rat. Terry grabbed a piece of lath and stabbed him! He is a great hunter! Other than that, we haven't seen anything else but a friendly lizzard and a hummingbird around the house.

We have been having mostly nice weather. It gets pretty cold if the wind blows. But, it has been nice enough to have a few meals out on the picnic table.

We are now busy getting things ready for Christmas. Shay and Travis and their families will be here with us during the holidays. I am scubbing, mopping, washing bedding, and sanitizing everything, especially the outhouse. Some of them are not too used to anything but modern conveniences. We are hoping they all have a good time, anyway.

The Month of November

We spent most of the month of November still in Jill and Dan's driveway. We had a chance to go to Chester Idaho where Terry's dad was born. There is no town, just a little community. We found the cemetery, but only one "Howard" grave. We didn't recognize the name, but he could be related. It was fun just driving around that community and imagining Terry's dad growing up there.

We got to watch Sean (Shay's son) play some football. We went to his last game and the boys all got a trophy. I think his team got second place. His coach called him "Lightning Sean" because he is so fast.

All of the family came out to support him, except Marissa. She has a hard time getting up early on Saturday mornings!

Both Sarah's and Ryan's families came to Jill's for Thanksgiving. She had a housefull. Terry thought it was pretty nice that we could just run away out to our own little "house" in the driveway to have a little quiet time!

Jill had lots of help in the kitchen making pies with Kamber and Jenna. Jenna and Kamber are good helpers!

Here is the "adults" table.

And here is the "kids" table. Good food, good company, good time!

The kids had fun playing together. This is Chaz, Jenna, and Ryley. Chaz and Ryley are Ryan' s and Jenna is Sarah's.

Sarah brought along some projects. She is giving Jill a Levi quilt for Christmas, so she brought all of the blocks cut out and Jill and I helped put it together!

That's a good way to get Jill's gift done, just have her help!

The Saturday after Thanksgiving, we went to the school where Dan teached in Rexburg and played in the gym. The adults played PIG.

It looks like Terry and Dan tied!

And then everyone joined in on Freeze! We were really trying to get some of the energy used up from the kids!

Terry had a little project that he needed help with. We told the boys that if emptying our sewer was the worst thing they every have to do for us, they can consider themselves lucky!

We ended up going back to Emmett the Monday after Thanksgiving. I had a leg/back problem the whole time we were in Rexburg. So we went back to Emmett to make sure I wasn't going to have to have surgery or anything.

It was good to be back in Emmett. It was nice seeing everyone again and we got to watch Wesley Ryan's son) play a basketball game. I am sure he is going to be a star some day!

He had a great cheering section!

The Month of October

Well, we made it back to Emmett. We were there for only a week, which went by very fast. it was good to see friends and family again. Lorrie is taking such good care of our house for us. We sure appreciate her.

We did make time to get together with our good friend, the Walkers,
the Thomas',
and the Manwarings. We had a great dinner around their outdoor firepit.
It seemed kind of sad that we probably won't see them again for about a year. That is one of the drawbacks about having a traveling home, we don't make it back to our permanent home very often.

We got to Rexburg on the 8th of October and Terry and our son Shay left the 9th to go deer hunting. The picture above shows the "mighty hunters" and their "trophies." We were just excited that they each got one. Then on the weekend, Jill's husband Dan went back with them and he got one about the same size. The next week we went to Shay's and cut and packaged all three of them. We made hamburger out of all of ours except the tender backstrap steaks. We will make jerky out of all of the hamburger. We are so excited to be able to to that. We have two dehydrators between us and lots of spices. I think we ended up with about 26 pounds of hamburger that will make about 15 pounds of jerky!

While the guys were hunting, Jill and the kids and I went to Utah to Sarah's and canned pears. It was lots of fun and the cousins had fun playing together.
Sarah's husband, Ryan, was a good sport and entertained the kids and cooked for us!
Jenna and Kamber are such little girls. They tried a couple of times to get the boys to play dress up or other things with them, but the boys refused.
They spent lots of time playing games on the computer and
playing video games on the TV.
JT is really good to amuse himself. All he needs is an empty box!

In October, Terry's brother Ron who lives in Emmett, needed to have some surgery. Terry went home to be there for that and I stayed because we had committed to Shay and Heidi that we would watch their kids for the weekend so they could go hunting and try to fill Heidi's tag (but they didn't get anything.) I had lots of fun being with Shay's kids.

Marissa and I played dominoes and then everyone came in and we tried to make a domino train that would fall down. We didn't have too much luck with the curves so we finally made one that was just straight lines and it worked really well.
We had fun carving jack-o-lanterns. They all did a good job.
We got to help Jill's family carve pumpkins, too. They turned out pretty scary. It was fun being around family at Halloween time. That night we stayed at the Condo and handed out treats to all of the little goblins while Jill and Dan took the kids around the neighborhood trick-or-treating.

The Weather has been unseasonably good all the month of October, even though all of the Church members have been praying for moisture! It has been fun being close to Jill's and Shay's families. We have been able to go to their football games and dance classes and some of their other activities. It is fun to have grandkids come knocking on our door to visit all of the time. I think we could kind of get used to this. The time is going by really fast.

Camp Hosts at McCormick - We are done!

The "fire ban" is lifted! We finally got to build fires. It was nice to see fires going around the Park in the evenings. We had to loan out our barbecue and our electric fry pan several times when campers would come, not knowing they couldn't use briquettes or build fires, and that is all they had to cook with. We got to have several wiener and marshmallow roasts before we left.

The previous camp host planted several tomato bushes before he left. We sure enjoyed the tomatoes. He planted big ones and cherry tomatoes also. They were a real treat!

If there were ripe tomatoes when some of the Park crew came in, we shared. But, we ended up with the biggest part of them. I will miss having fresh tomatoes off of the vine.

Since we retired, we haven't gone to Church in the same place for very long. Terry thought he would be off the hook for having to give a talk in Church. Well, we stayed just long enough in McCormick and going to the little branch in Halfway, Oregon, to have to speak the week before we left. They are very friendly people and we really enjoyed getting to know them.

Last Saturday, two days before we left McCormick, we took our pontoon boat home. It had rained all the night before. When we got up that morning, there was snow on all of the mountains around us. Terry let me turn on the furnace for the first time!

When we came back from Emmett that day, we saw the wild turkeys. There aren't too many times that you travel from Cambridge to Hell's Canyon that you don't see any turkeys--that is until turkey season opens They seem to know when to hide.

We also saw our first mountain sheep up close. We had seen one other one, but it was quite a ways away up on the mountain ridge above the dam. This one was hanging out along the road as we came down off of Brownlee Dam. Other campers had told us one was there, but we hadn't seen it. It has a tracking collar on it and was pretty scroungy looking. I get confused (Terry says that is not unusual) because the goats look like sheep and the sheep look like goats.

This is a picture of the park coming down from the top of the dam. It is a little blurry because we are moving in the truck.

They planted flowers and built a little fence by the restrooms at McCormick this year. When we got there, only part of the flowers were doing very well. But after lots of care, they finally exploded! That was usually the last thing we did in the evenings is go water the flowers. Lots of campers commented on how nice they looked.

This is Steve, one of the head maintenance guys over McCormick and Woodhead Parks. He usually did the lawn mowing and anything else that needed done. When it was hot, they started early in the mornings and when he showed up at the park, lots of times we were still in bed. Even when they started work later, towards the end of the summer, we were sometimes still in bed. We told them we were "retired" so we got to sleep in! Steve was the guy we called if there was any trouble. It seemed like most of the trouble happened on his days off, but he was always there for us. He is a retired police office so he could handle anything!

Susie was a maintenance person. She had to put up with all of the guys and always accused them of assigning her to "restroom duty." When she would come with Steve to mow the lawns, he would tell her, "Go ahead and get the restrooms, Susie. I'll start on the lawns!" But, the restrooms sure got cleaned good when she did them. It was lots of fun visiting and getting to know her.

Terry, another head maintenance guy, came with Steve to do the restrooms the last day we were at the Park. I think that at least the mirrors got cleaned that day! Terry and his wife also own and run a bed and breakfast at Oxbow.

It was a pretty dreary day the morning we left. It kind of matched our mood. It was a lot of fun being Camp Hosts. We worked with great people and met a lot of really nice people. We hope that we get to do it again sometime. They fed us a great dinner of all-you-could-eat giant prawns. I could only eat four, but I think Terry had at least ten! And then they even gave us a gift certificate for Home Depot.

We got back to Emmett in time to attend a funeral of a good friend. He was our age and died suddenly of a heart attack. You never know! We are so glad that we have the opportunity to live our dream and feel very fortunate to have good health and be able to do the things we want.

We are headed to eastern Idaho after we stay here in Emmett for a week. We will stay in Jill's parking lot in Rexburg. Terry is going hunting with Shay. Jill and Dan just moved into a house in Rexburg and I think she has a few projects for her Dad to do while we stay there until after Thanksgiving. Jill and I are going to Dugway Army Base where Sarah and Ryan live, fairly close to Tooele, Utah, to can pears. Thanks for reading out blog and sharing all of our adventures so far.