Fiasco

I couldn't resist telling this story that my friend Eloise shared with me. A few weeks ago Eloise went to the wedding of her husband's relative. The bride and groom had been shacking up for a while and then decided to get married.

The wedding was supposed to begin at 7:00 p.m., but by 7:30 the guests were still waiting. The flowers, which had been ordered the morning of the wedding, had not yet arrived.

The mother of the groom put the time everyone spent waiting to good use though. She had a hurried and whispered conference with each member of her side of the family adjuring them NOT to eat any of the wedding cake because the woman who made it lived in a filthy house with over 20 animals.

The cake wasn't too appetizing anyway because it had been made the morning of the wedding. Like the florist, the baker must have got her order at the last minute. The cake was supposed a be an ornate one with multiple tiers. But the cake maker had not frozen the cake for the decorating job. So the frosting was smeared all over the cake and littered with cake crumbs. Their were little blobs all over the cake that were supposed to be flowers.

Since the wedding started late, it ended late. It was raining and the sun was setting. The bride and groom wanted pictures. Guests were hungry and freezing in the dark and the rain. Every so often, the guests went into the building to warm up. Most of the guests left before the reception started.

The next morning Eloise got word that the groom was furious with his family for not staying to help with the clean-up after the reception. The groom's mother asked him, "Did you ask anyone to help you clean up?" "Well, no." he replied, "I just thought they would!"

Don't you want to be a mouse in a corner to see what their first Thanksgiving Dinner is like?

Hike to Cabin Lake

Vacation in Hermione's backyard

Cedar Forest

It felt like a cathedral.

Kootenai Falls
No swimming but the water was the most beautiful blue-green color and the falls were breath taking.

Libby Dam

We had fun! We went sightseeing to the Libby Dam, Kootenai Falls, and Ross Creek Cedars. We walked across a swinging bridge across the raging river. We went hiking two and a half miles up hill around fourteen switchbacks to a mountain lake where I attempted to catch a fish. (Try using a fly rod with a 15 mile an hour wind blowing toward you and see how far you get.) We ate out and we biked across two bridges to a fabulous city park along a huge river. Kristy's town knows how to construct a park!

Popcorn

With the start of the NFL pre-season games, I started reminiscing about a big silver popcorn bowl, and an old, beat up blanket on the living room floor. It occurred to me as I thought about the popcorn parties, that we inadvertently trained our kids to like sports. Wilbur would come home from a day at work. He would take a hot bath because he was out in the cold weather all day long “playing in the mud,” in his words. Then, he would pop the popcorn. I would tell the kids to spread out a blanket. The reason for the blanket was to protect the living room carpet. I don’t know if the blanket really did offer protection, but it made me feel better about chowing down popcorn in the living room. In the fall we would watch the Pittsburg Steelers playing the Dallas cowboys or whoever else was playing that week. Or after November, the Lakers would be playing the Celtics while we all crammed popcorn into our mouths. That popcorn must have sent the subliminal message to the kids that sports were gooooood.

Football and basketball were our sports of choice. We never watched baseball: partly because, in my never-to-be-humble opinion, baseball is twenty minutes of action stretched over four hours, and partly because the baseball season is in the summer. Popcorn popping in the summer was rare. When the kids were young, Wilbur’s summmer hours were from “can see to can’t see.” He wasn’t around very often to pop popcorn, and he doesn’t seem to like baseball as much as basketball and football. For the rest of the family, the cool evening was a great time to lounge outside on the patio or read a book out loud that we checked out of the library.

With the first NFL game, though, the popcorn popper would start. I would have liked to post some pictures of the family crowded around the popcorn bowl. It's funny how we didn't always take pictures of the normal, everyday thingas we did. Popcorn popping and eating on a game night happened often and was delicious.

Glacier Without All the People

We went camping this week to an absolutely beautiful place. I would tell you where, but I swore an oath of secrecy. It was like Glacier Park without all the people. I was sick that neither of my cameras were working, but a friend took some pictures. Being in the middle of such incredible beauty does something for the soul.

We were annoyed by rain but had some beautiful weather too. Wilbur and I tried a hike we saw on the map. The area was so lush and green and had so much grass that Wilbur's eyes were streaming and his nose stuffed up alarmingly. We had to turn back before an emergency situation developed. We are thinking about coming back some September when the grass seed has settled down.

Awesome

I would blog about the family gathering together in July, but there is too much to say. Floating the river was the activity that I enjoyed the most. Seeing everyone was AWESOME!