God's Country

We truly are blessed to live in such a beautiful area.

This is the view from a piece of pastureland that Glenn's family owns. It looks down onto the Salmon River.
We took my brother, Tony, and his family out for a four-wheeler ride and enjoyed the beautiful summer weather (finally!) over the 4th of July Weekend.

Just how many bodies can you pile onto a four-wheeler, anyway?!

Two of my favorite guys.

Our girls and Tony's girls are like peas in a pod when they get together. They pair off and leave Morgan in the dust. Luckily, Morgan is quite fond of his Uncle Tony and Tony's a good sport about pal-ing around with his nephew.

Duck!

So, very last minute (which is standard around here), we decided to join in a parade on Saturday. We rode on a float for Glenn's employer, Idaho Forest Group. We sat on paper-wrapped units of lumber on a semi trailer. It turned out we were the only participants aside from the company CFO who organized it. We all had a great time throwing well over 600 pieces of candy.It was a little tricky, because it's a pretty long parade route and there were LOTS of spectators so you wanted to be sure your candy lasted. Also, you want to throw it out close to the kids without actually hitting anyone with it. Harder than it sounds! Glenn gets the award for best throwing arm. He doesn't realize his own strength. He was throwing a Milk Duds box to one boy and pelted him in the forehead. It looked like it hurt, but he gave Glenn the thumbs-up so it was all good. They he hit one little boy in the head with a chocolate bar and he cried. Glenn felt bad. I teased him anyway.

At the end of the parade route, the driver had to get back to where we started. He was probably only going about 25 miles an hour, but it felt faster than that up on that lumber. Ellea was paranoid that we were all going to fall off. I'm happy to report that no one did.

Can I get a Lift? --Reposted

What is with blogspot.com not posting my pictures??! Sorry about that. Trying again. . . .

So, after the fun concert with Mark Chestnut and Mark Wills, we were loading up to go home when we spotting this interesting contraption.......

Some brilliant (and cheap) individual who lives by the rodeo grounds where the concert was held, put together this delightful seating-device. They took two forklifts, put a platform on each with a lawn chair and lifted it up. You can see they placed a ladder on one side for easy access. My friend Tara and I had a good laugh about it and she immediately insisted we climb aboard to check it out. I'm such a rule follower, that I hesitated. "What if they come outside and yell at us?" I wanted to know. "So what?!" was the reply. That was good enough for me.

You could definitely see the stage from this vantage point, but the singers must've looked like ants. What was the point? Whatever--it made Tara and I giggle, so I'm glad they did it!

Country in the Country

Glenn and I went to an outdoor concert Friday night. They somehow managed to book two big-name country singers for little ol' Grangeville, Idaho--Mark Will and Mark Chestnut. And the tickets were only $20!! You never see concert tickets that cheap any more.In the above picture, it's Mark Chestnut on the left and Mark Wills on the right. The "two Marks" sang for almost 2 hours. It was fabulous. We sang along on almost every song. Glenn and I even danced to the classic Mark Wills song called "I do." It was cheesy, but I like cheesy!

We brought our lawn chairs and sat within 100 feet of the stage. We could've sat closer, if we'd gotten there earlier, but we were close enough. I was able to walk right up to the stage and take these pictures. Way cool. Mark Chestnut was a big star when Glenn and I were in college. It's so weird seeing someone like this in our small-town USA. The format was just the two singers and three back-up singers with guitars. No drums, no dancing around the stage. Very casual and informal. I was so sad when the concert was over.

The best part was the kids stayed home and put themselves to bed (again!). I could get used to this.

The Blind Leading the Blind

Morgan is taking his first 4-H project this year. He's a Clover Bud which means that he's not old enough to do all the projects and that he gets a participation ribbon rather than a 1st, 2nd or 3rd place ribbons. He's taking our dog, Zoe. She's one year old and knows very little about walking on a leash. We went to a practice session with the woman who will be the judge at the dog show at the Idaho County Fair. Thankfully, we have until August for the real show. Morgan and Zoe need some practice.

As you can see, Morgan is really leaning into his efforts to get Zoe to follow him. It was only the second time she'd been around so many other dogs and people while expected to sit, heel, lie down, etc. They did VERY well, considering. They seemed to get the hang of it.

Nicole is also taking dog 4-H this year (along with three other projects!). She took my Schnauzer, Zip as a Clover Bud when she was 8 and again when she was 9. She took a couple of years off and is back at it this year. Surprisingly, Zip does very well for her. At home he yaps at everything and everyone, but after a few minutes, he seems to settle down at the dog events. Mostly. He still makes his presence known now and then, but it's an improvement. With him, you take what you can get!

Annie Up

I played Indian Poker for the first time. That's probably not a politically correct name, but is there another? I'll have to look into that. For now, we'll just call if Indian Poker. Grandma and Morgan played also. I think Ellea won. I know I didn't.
There was some discussion about what you say when you're bidding. The girls were convinced that you say "Annie up" which I found amusing. As per usual, they think I know nothing and doubted me greatly when I argued it was actually "ante up." I don't know much about poker, but I know that much! Why is it they never believe that I know what I'm talking about?