Greetings from Down Under...

we left at 9:45 p.m. on Thursday and landed right into 5:20 a.m. on Saturday. To my friends in the states...tomorrow is looking really good! But I am sure it is warmer than here! No photos as I only have an iPad I borrowed from work. *LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*VISIT WINTER*FINALLY SEEING DAUGHTER #2*

Winter Downunder

Counting down til winter begins for me!

30 Years Ago

Thirty years ago in August we attended our friend's wedding. The Captain was a groomsman. It was dreadfully hot in the church and at the reception in the cul-de-sac afterwards. So hot that I took off my nylons and threw them in the trash.

Yesterday, their son (who happens to be 6'9",) got married in an outdoor wedding. It was lovely, they were beautiful- and it was dreadfully hot. See a pattern building? Their yard was decorated beautifully...our friend missed her calling as a party planner because it couldn't have been more lovely. Good food, laughter, friends from college...but the heat! Thankfully we were staying in a guest house of other friends from college who live nearby so we did not have to make the 2 1/2 hour drive home. We were able to go back to a swimming pool and chill.

The bride- she was lovely- all 5'2" of her.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*HERE'S TO A LONG

AND HAPPY MARRIAGE*

I always listen to the radio in the morning. I hear the results of baseball games, Tour de France, the weather, and traffic so I can give those reports to Daughter #1 before she takes off for work. Imagine my horror to hear about the shootings in Colorado last night.

My son loves to go to midnight viewings. Was he there? He wouldn't go to Denver to see it would he? It would be playing in the Springs if he went...right? There's always that fear as a parent. And my heart aches for all those parents, family and friends who had to go through something so tragic.

BIG Foot is fine. He had school yesterday and then hiked with friends. He didn't know Batman was opening at midnight...and was safe in bed miles away from Aurora.

It is just so hard to fathom why someone would do this.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*PRAYERS TO COLORADO*

It was funny then...

and still is now. At our 2:30 a.m. rest, we sat gazing at the stars with our headlamps off. 11 of us were sprinkled around a few logs and rocks as we rested, or attempted to get a few minutes of sleep. Suddenly, one young guy who had been lying behind a big downed tree, jumped up and yelled, "JESUS CHRIST!!!!" I thought he might have been bitten by something, or scared by a bear...or zombies or... or other assorted things that ran through my mind in the brief second between the shout and when he turned on his headlamp. He saw us all illuminated, he said, "Oh. You're still here. I can go back to sleep."

He thought we all hit the trail and left him asleep behind the log...and he had no idea where we were. I am sure I would have panicked in the same way had I thought I was left on an unknown trail in the dark.

Another comment, mainly due to fatigue, was our decent down the cables. I mentioned the woman pictured in my last post had a difficult time on the cables. It seriously took her 45 minutes or more to climb. We all took photos at the top and she and her husband decided to make the descent a good hour before us. We walked to the other side of the dome, took silly photos doing handstands and holding banners and relishing our triumph. Out of our small group I decided to go first and made my way past the first two boards when Daughter #1 and her friend began. We had the dome to ourselves since we hiked all night and now others were beginning their ascent so we had to carefully pass those coming up. When our friend looked down, he saw the woman and her husband maybe 1/2 way down and he said, "Joe! You're coming back up??"  He had expected them to be at the bottom waiting for us, but they were still only part way down, and the only logical explaination was that they were coming back up. 

...okay, I know, you had to be there. But if I don't blog it here I will forget.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*LAUGH AT YOURSELF*AND OTHERS*

Not the nap I was expecting...

Yesterday, just as I finished my post after my bike ride, and Daughter #1 was leaving to climb Half Dome in Yosemite, I learned that they had an extra pass!! This was at 3:30 and they were leaving at 4! I had just ridden 62 miles...but I felt good and it is SO hard to get a pass to climb I just couldn't pass it up!

So I jumped out of my bike clothes, threw together what I thought I might need and we drove 4 hours to Yosemite....but first we stopped for pizza. There were 11 of us altogether. At 10:30 p.m. we left the parking lot and began our ascent. It was about 80 degrees out and not what I had expected. It was 8.3 miles to the dome. If you haven't seen Half Dome in person you may have seen it in Ansel Adams photographs....it is SPECTACULAR!

Minus the snow of course today of course!

We hiked using our headlamps. Around 2:30 a.m.we stopped for a 30 minutes for a mini catnap/rest. Then we ate and drank and made it to Half Dome as the sun was about to rise.

Before arriving at the dome there are 800 "stairs" that go straight up. THEN the cables. I had no idea they were so.....straight up! The photo does not do this justice....it is a 50% grade! 2/10's of a  mile of cables.

Upon seeing the cables I thought I was not going to be able to do them. If you slip, you die! There is nothing to catch you, you just slide down the slick granite face to the bottom....some 2000 feet. The woman in the photo was part of our group...she took a very long time to get up the cables but she did it!

 I gave it a try and actually with the rubber gardening gloves I was able to keep hold. My fear was going down....but that would have to wait until after sunrise and photos...

Coming down the cables was easier than I thought....once I got over the fear of plummeting to my death! I seriously can't believe the National Park system allows this climb. Last year several people died falling from Half Dome, but all because they tried to climb in wet or snowy weather when the rock was slick and they didn't have special climbing shoes. There were also a few suicides in the past few years.

We took a different trail on the way out...it was longer and I was fading. I was now 32 hours without sleep....aside from the ten or so minutes after 2:30 a.m. stop. The final miles were hard...it was crowded and hot...and I was fuzzy headed and had to stop and eat some Shot Blocks and drink water.

Total in 24 hours...biked 100K and hiked with elevation climb 26 K.

Now I will go to sleep for the night.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*CLIMB HALF DOME*

100 Kilometers...

The Captain and I just rode that in Bike for Breath that benefits the Lung Association...it always sounds much more impressive than saying 62 miles.

The weather was perfect...foggy where the big hills were and sunny on the flats...and after fighting a bit of a headwind, the last mile or so had a tailwind. And this event always has the best lunches afterwards.

Now I may take a nap.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*I DIDN'T TAKE A CELL

 PHONE PHOTO BUT I WILL HAVE AN EVENT

 PHOTO NEXT WEEK*

What I do with composition books...

Home/School Journals!

Each Friday I prepare a form that looks like this:

_________________________


__________________________________,

"This week in kindergarten I ......."
(a paragraph about the week...assemblies, special projects, count down to the 100th day, etc.) And it always ends with a question like...did you celebrate the 100th day of school when you were in kindergarten?

___________________________________

The kids write the date on the first line, "Dear" Mom, Dad or someone else who lives in their house that is old enough to read and write on the second line. The final line is for, "Love, ______" They glue the form onto the left page of the journal and take it home.

The parent's job is to write a letter on the opposite page- and read it back to their child. About 50% of the parents take it serious. Those who do end up with a wonderful keepsake at the end of the year. Those who are fluent in another language besides English respond in their first language. After all, the journal is not for me, but a keepsake.

Several years back, I had a student whose parent was elderly. The parent wrote wonderful responses and told of days in school when there was one elementary school in our town. The summer following, the parent passed away. Those stories in the journal, even if they had been told to the student would most likely not be remembered by that five year old. The other parent expressed how happy they were to have those stories for their kid.

Since I have not done this with first graders, I am thinking that after winter break the students will be able to write the journal letter on their own. The first part of kindergarten is Hell trying to get the journal entries completed. There's a lot of explaining and re-explaining and erasing and and it takes A LOT of patience. After a month or two what once took 20+ minutes to complete then takes about 5 minutes or less for those who get right to work.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*WRITE AN OLD FASHIONED LETTER*

Teachers!!

Teachers supplies have taken over my living room!
What the stores don't do anymore...put the Back-to-School stuff in their fliers....so...you have to keep going to the store until you find what you want on sale...so if you are a teacher and need this stuff:

Michael's- 15% off to teachers now
Target- Crayola Markers 99 cents, Fiskar scissors 2 for $3, Crayola colored pencils 99 cents, folders 15 cents
Toys R US- Buy one Crayola crayon or marker and get 2 free.

Yesterday I stocked up on all of that stuff. Now to get to Walmart for glue sticks and composition books. I have 25 kids now, up from 20 so that 10-25 cents per item adds up.

This was the scene from last year...


This year I will move it to my classroom before I go down under.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*SHOP THE SALES*

Remember those black buttons?

Well they bloomed while we were gone...but Daughter #1 sent me pictures...and there they are. I came home to find wilty, shriveled up flowers...but they were awesome!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*WATCH THE ALL STAR GAME TONIGHT*GO NATIONAL LEAGUE*

Tour de Donut

The Captain and I got up at the crack of 05:20 to get on the road to American Fork. Good thing we got there early because the Captain had a flat - a slow leak from our 37 mile Rails to Trails ride yesterday....

...so he got a new tube installed for free by a pro who was set up to help out. Then we checked in, got our numbers on our backs and our timing chips on our  helmets and got our bikes out of the car....and waited for the ride to begin.

Tour de Donut is 21 miles long. It is three, 7 mile loops. The catch is, every 7 miles you have the opportunity to eat donuts...and each donut eaten takes 3 minutes off your time. (I am not a true teacher at heart because I DO NOT LIKE DONUTS!) But the ride was fun...and I choked down 6 glazed donuts which were warming in the sun- and probably cost me more time trying to choke them down than I gained in time. I rode my Iron Horse bike so that was a disadvantage for time- but still, I rode 18 MPH the majority of the ride...and I was honest in recording my donuts eaten- and others were not....that was a bummer because we passed a lot of riders and I should have placed in my age group. The ride was fun, and I won't have the opportunity to ride in this again, but seriously, is it worth lying to place?

I decided that Tour de Chocodile or Tour de Chips A-Hoy cookie would be better...where I could eat something I wouldn't gag on :)

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*RIDE-EAT-RIDE*



Emu?

So the Captain and I rode our bikes 12 miles up the old Lincoln Hwy- the old main highway which is now Interstate 80. It was all uphill heading towards Evanston, Wyoming. The historical societies have done a wonderful job posting signs with information about the history of the area. On the way home we were bucking a headwind...I had my head down wishing I were closer to home when I heard the Captain say, "Is that an ostrich?"

I looked up to find a BIG bird crossing the highway about 100 yards ahead! Then it went down in the grassy area and hunted for food. Where this bird came from is a mystery...this area gets way below zero in winter and in the 100's lately. And there are no homes up that canyon...there's a few areas where sheep are summering at higher elevations and some dry farms but this are is otherwise wilderness.

I took a few pictures with my cell phone but it was too far away to see well. We told everyone about it when we returned and we got some funny looks....sure it wasn't just a large crane?

No- this was an emu...3 1/2 to 4 feet tall.

Then this morning I was hiking the dog down to the river and neighbor came by on a 4 wheeler asking if I had seen the emu when I was at the post office yesterday. Turns out the bird was on the tracks...when a train was coming and they couldn't get it to move. So much for the emu in the ghost town.

LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*TRACK AN EMU*

Happy Birthday America!

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HAVE A WONDERFUL 4TH OF JULY!

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*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*FREEDOM ISN'T FREE*

More on where I am...

I once lived in a ghost town...
Echo, Utah is considered a ghost town and is listed in HERE
It is in Summit County, at the junction of I-84 and I-80. Here's the description:

This town was started in 1854 as a stage coach stop. In 1860 the pony express also built a station here. In 1868 the Railroad built here and the towns population grew. During the 1929 depression many people moved away. Most the old buildings are gone, a few people still live here.

Brigham Young also lived there with many of his wives- when the town was hopping there was a lane named after each wife. The old church house still stands along with the hotel- which very few people know about. The hotel was purchased by Captain America's grandparents, and moved onto the lane near the church house and converted into their home! The school house is still standing and is being restored. The cemetery above the church house has markers from the early 1800's and is where the Captain's grandparents and some ancestors rest. The Captain's mom still has a ranch there and the house I helped build...and the farm I learned to drive tractors on.

The outhouse to the church house still stands:
Mining was the top industry in the late 1800's and early 1900's:

The train still comes through Echo all day and night...but it doesn't stop for coal. The last Amtrak went through in 1984- we all went out to wave to the last train.

The saloon and hotel. This is the original photo....

...when the Captain's dad was about 8 years old his mom sent him to the store....on his way there he passed the saloon...and on the pool table lay a dead man with a knife still in him! Granddad was so spooked he crossed the street when he ran back home.

Right behind the buildings in that photo lies Captain America's parent's fields and the access road that I walk, run and bike on.

(My Kiwi daughter got to experience her second +6. earthquake last night in New Zealand. I certainly hope the quakes stop for the next few months because I have lived through my share of +6's!)

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*
LAUGH HARDER*KNOW YOUR HISTORY*NOTHING LIKE
LIVING IN A GHOST TOWN*

Here is where I am...

Where am I? I am in Utah. I have posted in the past about this adventurous place...so I will pull up those old posts. This is Coalville, Utah, 6 miles from where I lived.....today's post is about:

 Summit County Mercantile in Coalville, Utah:

Opening Day 1908

The original hardwood floor...the floor Captain America's great grandparents walked on and Captain America's grandparents toddled on as babies....and Captain America's parents walked on as babies...and bought candies and ice creams and then rode on the 1932 farm truck's tailgate all the way home.


Not many stores have antlers and hides on the walls....
....along with the fruits and veggies...and an awesome meat counter.....
.....and boots and hats and Levis and gear.....horse bridles and tack......

....and where you can put your order on a tab and get billed at the end of the month.....the employee/owners know you, and your grandparents, and your uncles and aunts and your dog and horse....and until a few years back every item had a price written on it in black crayon and was added up at the counter with an adding machine! Then your groceries and supplies are packed in a cardboard box and loaded into your truck. HOW'S THAT FOR SERVICE?

*WELCOME TO UTAH....TURN YOUR CLOCKS BACK 100 YEARS*

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*SHOP AT THE SUMMIT*

I am here...

and we are both loving it!

The bridge in front of her goes over the river...which is running very fast right now because the reservoir is being drained...she went for a wade but I could tell she wanted to swim.

The house I helped build is only 1 mile up that road- or actually driveway.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*ENJOY A HIKE*