GETTING CLOSE TO THE PARK

Ponds Resort (about 40 miles from Yellowstone)

Sunday, August 1, 1926
Dear Girls:
We’re just about ready to leave for the park. It was surely cold last night. We’re getting up so much higher. We had a tube fixed for a tire in Idaho Falls yesterday morning and it was nearly 9:30 when we left. Then we didn’t drive as fast as we had been before and went to see the great Snake River Falls and took off about an hour. But it was well worth it. It was wonderful and picturesque. I’m surely missing you, Shirley Jean. I must stop for lack of room. Wish you were here, Love, Shirley

[The photo above I posted previously. Near the top right you can distinguish the family viewing the spectacular "Snake River Falls." Mike says he thinks they may be located near St. Anthony. He said he went there in the '60s and has a view very much like this one amongst his slides. (Slides -- an obsolete photo medium of questionable use even during the era. Mike's trays are well-organized and I still cringe at the thought of searching for a certain photo.)

And the photo to the right is of my aunt, Ethel Dobson Robinson, and her 6-week-old baby, Shirley Jean Robinson Johnson, lovingly nicknamed S.J. by the family. Aunt Ethel, Aunt Myrtle, and Shirley Jean stayed at the farm while other family took a road trip to Yellowstone. I discovered Shirley Jean was born in June 1925 so was actually a year old in 1926. Note the wonderful wicker rocker in the photo. Aunt Myrtle threw it on the burn pile in the '60s, along with some other wonderful things.]

RASPBERRY BUSHES

Because our raspberry bushes look better than ever before, we decided this year we should protect them from the deer. Our neighbor tells us that any fence will deter the deer. In other words, a fancy fence is not necessary and apparently they aren't assertive toward fences. So this morning we drove some fence stakes and pulled remnants of fencing around the most promising bed. We didn’t have enough fencing for the other bed, so we simply caged the best bushes [see photo right].

This photo of the border on the south side of the house shows an old spyria bush that was at one time Ina's pride and joy. Many family photos were taken with this bush as the backdrop. I believe the poppies are also a remnant of old times. Ina had peonies in the yard but in later years my dad removed them to make mowing easier. Ease of mowing is still a consideration.

CLOTHESLINE RULES

I received an email forward relating to a topic we discussed last fall – the clothesline – and setting forth some basic rules:
1. Wash the clothesline before hanging any clothes. [I do that only at the beginning of the season or if I see there is a need.]
2. Be orderly – hang the whites with whites and hang them first. [Who knew? It makes sense to hang the jeans first; it takes them longest to dry.]
3. Hang shirts by the tail – never by the shoulders. [That’s to avoid obvious clothespin marks. I occasionally break this rule when hanging stretchy knits – like pajama tops.]
4. Wash day is Monday. Never wash on the weekend – especially not Sunday. [Some rules are made to be broken.]
5. Hang the sheets and towels on the outside so that your undies are hidden in the middle. [I don’t worry about that here, but I think it’s a good rule if hanging clothes where they can be observed.]
6. Hang clothes out even in winter – clothes will freeze dry. [In winter or rainy weather I move to a wooden rack purchased at Wal-mart and dry clothes by the fire. It’s been my experience that hanging clothes outside on a chilly day just increases my work because they don’t get dry.]
7. Always gather the clothespins when taking down dry clothes because it’s tacky to leave pins on the line. [It’s more than that! Leaving the pins on the line causes them to deteriorate, turn dark, and then leave tracks on your clothes. My mother was specific and strict about this rule.]
8. Be efficient. If possible line the clothes up so that each item shares a pin with the next washed item. [This is to conserve line space as well as clothespins. It’s a good idea unless the day is cool. On a cool day items dry better if fabric isn’t layered.]
9. Clothes should be off the line before dinner time, neatly folded in the clothes basket and ready to be ironed. [On a busy day this rule can be difficult to meet. At any rate, it is not good to leave them out overnight. Birds fly and bugs land.]
10. Ironing – a subject that little affects me.

An all-time important rule not mentioned (whoever wrote these rules wasn’t an expert) is to smooth the clothes as much as possible and make sure there are no tucks or wrinkles. If you don’t iron, the clothes are fairly smooth; if you do iron, it makes your job easier.]

Included in this forward was a lengthy poem setting forth nostalgic ideas about the clothesline, the premise being that neighbors knew a lot about one another when they hung their laundry on clotheslines. For instance, you knew by the laundry:
-- Who had had company – fancy sheets, towels, table linen
-- When the new baby had arrived

-- The ages of any children in the home

-- If someone was sick (extra bed linen, pajamas, robes, etc.)
-- When folks were on vacation (This alone would probably keep some folks from hanging clothes today.)
-- And dingy laundry and haphazard hanging said something about the quality of your housekeeping and hence your character.

It doesn’t mention that neighbors met and visited (gossiped) while hanging out the clothes – and that wasn’t a bad thing. We knew each other better and maybe that gave us better social awareness and social skills. Our modern conveniences – our dryers, air conditioners, televisions, etc.—together with our work schedules -- have shut us away from one another.

[The photos show today's laundry on the line while Mike rests in the welcome sunshine. Maybe you can see the mud under the line. I had to take care to stand on the little tufts of grass in order to hang the clothes. And for Nellie fans, here's a photo of her by the bramble bush.]

HOW ARE YOU COPING WITH RISING PRICES?

Mike and I went out to dinner at a local eatery the other night. I ordered a “grilled avocado sandwich” priced at $7.45, which I thought was reasonable. When it came, I found a family joke popping to mind: “Is that all I git?” The sandwich (which I thought was tasty, by the way) seemed rather small. It was accompanied only by a pickle slice, which made the plate look even barer. It needed some chips, a bed of lettuce – something – to make the meal look appealing. A friend shared his fries with me; if he hadn't, I would have left the restaurant hungry.

The news is depressing: rising gas and grocery prices. I’m wondering how people – and that means your family -- are coping with the cost of everyday travel and groceries. If you’ve been doing the best you can to economize all along, the task of cutting back even more is daunting. If you're single or if there are just the two of you, maybe it doesn't matter so much. But if you have a growing family, you are surely concerned.

As conservative as we are, Mike and I have always agreed that groceries come first and while we practice economy, we don’t scrimp on our food. (The children may not remember it this way. You know how kids are.) When I was a housewife with little children, I clipped coupons and for several years enjoyed refunding. I considered it a hobby as well as my effort to economize. Making a game of the shopping brought a new dimension of interest to an activity that was otherwise drudgery. When I went to work, I largely gave that up as “not worth my time.” But now that rising grocery prices are evident and I once again have the time, I am watching for coupons, refunds, and rebates. Niece Debbie has tuned me in to what’s available online.

Beyond couponing, there are other things I can do -- if I want to -- that will make a difference. I can forego that expensive side dish mix, those bag salads, snack crackers, chips, and treats. Even if I resolve to buy what I want despite rising costs, the day comes when I rebel. ($1.99 a pound for zucchini? I don’t think so.) I can keep my meal plan simple. I can limit trips to the store, thereby economizing on transportation costs. And here's a "biggy" for me -- make sure food is not wasted.

What do you think? Are rising prices cramping your style? Have you made changes in your shopping and driving habits?

"IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT . . . "

No kidding! In the middle of the night a ferocious wind came up and it poured rain. The wind continued longer than the rain. Nellie whined at the door until she gained the reassurance of her master that she really should stay in her doghouse. This morning we listened to KRLC for a while and heard that it was snowing on the Palouse. Good thing school is out or Auntie Chris would be teaching until July! It was also spitting a few flakes here at 40 degrees. I spent a little while reading my Great-Grandfather Dickson's diary of 1897 when he lived here on Russell Ridge as a homesteader. It was a cold spring that year, too. He mentioned snow on June 17 -- also significant frosts during the month of June.

We rode the 4-wheeler over to the cemetery yesterday. Mike checked out a cache he has hidden there just to be sure it's dry and okay. It was. I checked out the family monuments. Grandma Lucy's is tipping badly and we will see about repairing it. I also discovered that Aunt Bernice, Uncle Earle's wife, was born in November of 1900, so she was 25 the summer they went to yellowstone. I remember her as old; she died when she was my age now. That storm we could see to the south was suddenly a storm right where we were. We flew back to the farm, stopping occasionally under shelter to wait for Nellie.

The day seemed made for meatloaf, so that's what we're having with sides of broccoli and mashed potatoes and an impossible coconut pie for dessert.

MAKING TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS

Hello from the homestead! And hello from my new laptop. It took Mike 90 minutes to install the wireless router on the old computer we use here. Then he hit the "Easy Button." I was able to connect immediately -- so I must be getting better at finding my way around the system. Nevertheless, it seems strange to have such technology in this old place. I'm sitting at the diningroom table, just feet from where the old crank phone sat on the wall.

I can surely understand why some of my friends and family have become disenchanted with hunting for this blogspot. There's a fine line between being open to everyone and being open to no one. I thought for a while that I wasn't going to find it myself! Then it said I needed to enable cookies and Java Script. But when I couldn't figure out how to do that, it took pity on me and let me log in anyway.

Anyway, here we are. It was raining in Lewiston when we left. The road seemed dry here but the ground is wet. It was 52 when we pulled in at 10:15 but it's 64 now. Mike is sitting in front of the fire reading Aunt Ethel's history of the Gilbert country.

GEOCACHE OUTING

I don’t see it anywhere.

It isn’t here either.

Aha! I found it. Nellie helped.

Fake rock – they tried to trick me!