Aerial Adventure...

 Three of the kids got to go for a flight last weekend!

Getting all buckled up, and puke bags ready just in case!

 Sunshine and my dad up front.

Headed toward the runway.

Fly away home...

An aerial shot of our place!  You can see the bees in the lower right corner.  You can also see the large garden area behind the house too.

The hay ranch, I've made many fond childhood memories here.  We used to ride the horses from our house up here as often as we could.  It was a long ride, but worth it.

The area I grew up.  North Fork of McKay Creek.

South Fork of McKay Creek in the upper section of the picture, North Fork in the lower section.  

It's a wonderful place to grow up!

Hope you enjoyed the aerial tour!

Snake Warning....Ornery Alert...

It is well known I have a bit of an ornery streak....well actually, I've even been told it is a mile wide ornery streak.  I can't help it, I am pretty sure it is in my DNA.  One day, when driving home from a day at my parents place we saw a large bull snake, and it just so happened it's coloring was pretty similar to the rattle snakes in this area.  So I skidded to a stop, got out and scooped up that dead snake and hauled it home. Mwhahaha....my plan was underway.  The kids were a little freaked out that this normally laid-back momma would dare to do such a thing....they were about to learn more about their mother's ornery streak than they'd ever known before.

It was a pretty large snake at about 3 feet long so it was going to be an impressive prank for sure.  All the way home I plotted and planned ways to use this snake to impart increased heart rates and elicit screams of freight.  Hee Hee

I had a plan.  I wanted it to look natural, you know believable.  So I carefully posed it and positioned it as if it was just coming out from the step area of the front porch....I purposely hid his tail because when you are scared it is a rattler the first thing you look at is the tail.

Scary huh?  You should have heard me giggling the whole time!

Does his head look realistically lifted from the ground?  Can you tell he's been run over?

Check out that toothpick holding up his head.  I put a lot of work into making him look realistic in order to have the best effect for my plan.

So now you think it looks so obvious it is a set up....but you have to remember that first glance fear....the one where your heart jumps into your throat...then your bladder gets misaligned and you come dangerously close to wetting yourself....ya that is what I was going for. 

Well Mr. Wonderful came home, he had his lunch box in hand as he shut his pick-up door after a long day of work.  He sauntered around to step into the yard from the parking area and he stopped right in his tracks.....we have eye contact!  He startled then hollered something along the lines of "Hey!  You guys aren't going to believe this!"  Then he catches sight of the 5 heads in the window peeking out the blinds at him.....his frame relaxes and he starts to shake his head and laugh at our antics.  He is such a good sport.

Later that night we set the snake in the street in front of our house...then we all sat on the front porch visiting while we waited for the neighborhood walkers.  It was awesome!  We'd hear shrieks and screams and gasps...then they'd alert us to the danger in the street.  We could barely keep a straight face!  We even had one little kid on a bike run it over by accident.  You should have see it, he let out a scream once his brain registered what he just ran over, he began to wobble and swoop from side to side and both legs out to brace for a wreak, but he was able to recover and looped back to take a closer look.  It really was funny.  It made for a really fun evening for us all.  We even "helped" people by giving them something really interesting to see on their boring old walk around the neighborhood.  They had a story to tell when they got home right?  Plus, getting the heart rate up is a good thing for exercise right?

My Forest Friends...

I'd like to share with you today about my cute little forest friends. We have a special relationship, really we do. I'll tell you about it but you have to promise not to laugh at me. Deal? Ok here we go....

We were camping near Anthony Lakes in our big wall tent with the nice warm woodstove. Thankfully we brought the stove because even in mid summer it gets really cold at night up there! Anyway we were all sleeping that first night we were camping and I was awoke by something. The strange part was I could feel something had went across my face, whatever it was had claws or scratchy something because I could still feel the sting that something had been on my face!

When the realization that something had been on my face and actually made a sensation that stayed with me even after I woke up was quite scary. Thoughts of giant spiders or cougar claws started to come to surface. What? Don't laugh, nothing is rational in the middle of the night with just canvas between you and the night!

My first reaction was to wake Mr Wonderful up. He stirred, but I could tell he wasn't fully awake. "Honey! You awake?" All I got was a mumble mumble noise from him. "Honey! Something just ran across my face!" I said. He wokes a little more "What?" "Yes, something ran across my face!" Then I heart it. I said "Shhh, do you hear that?" He says "No, what?" "It's still in here!!!" I could hear it scurrying around the tent on the tarp floor! He said "Must have been a chipmunk".

I heard it jump on Munchkin's cot and run around her sleeping bag, then she started to squirm in her sleep.....(I think it went into her sleeping bag for a bit) then I heard it plop back onto the tent floor! Mind your our dog is sound asleep in the tent during all of this. Lazy dog, supposed to be protecting us.

Anyway, I begged Mr Wonderful to save the day, I mean night, and get it. He replies "What am I going to do, shoot it in the tent? It will be fine just leave it alone." I can't believe he just said that! "What? I can't sleep knowing something could shimmy in my sleeping bag or claw my eyes out at night! Not to mention the children!" I thought to myself how I was sure he'd feel differently if he had had his face ran across instead of me. Just as I was prepared to remind him of his duty to protect his family, the noises were gone. The chipmunk had left the tent.

My Forest Enemy

Would you believe I have two stories about assaults from chipmunks? I can hardly believe it myself.

It was my first hunting season shortly after Mr. Wonderful and I were married. I was completely new to hunting. Not only had I walked what felt like a million miles that day, but I had to carry this really heavy gun. It just didn't feel comfortable any way I held it. I tried carrying it by the sling but Mr Wonderful said I wouldn't be ready to shoot if we saw one, plus it dug into my shoulder anyway. I tried switching hands but pretty soon both arms felt 2" longer than normal from carrying that darn gun. I was ready for a rest but I didn't want to stop hunting either. So Mr Wonderful decided I should rest under this huge tree in a clearing. He would loop around the surrounding area and see if he could push some elk out into the opening for me. How chivalrous.

There I was, sitting under this big tree, minding my own business when I hear a very angry chipmunk chattering overhead! Great, now he is telling all his forest friends including the elk I am here under this tree. For quite a while this went on and I could hear that chipmunk climbing around in the tree overhead and little pieces of bark would flitter down from the upper branches. The chipmunk was getting lower in the tree and lower and finally it came out onto a branch just above me and chattered loudly for me to leave his domain. I was not going to be bossed around by some chipmunk. We actually had an exchange of angry words let me tell you! It was a verbal fight.

As a new hunter I knew I was supposed to stay put so I wouldn't end up lost.....like a small child I obeyed. I just tried to ignore the forest siren telling on my location every time it chattered it's warnings at me.

I don't think the chipmunk could relate to my desire to not get lost. He was angry as ever and not backing down in the fight! Then I felt it, the wet drops showering down onto me, into my hair, and on my coat. That chipmunk peed on me! I could not believe this had happened to me. I felt so assaulted! Then you will never guess.....he pooped on me too! Several times in the matter of a minute!

By this time I am trying to find the little sucker in the tree with my rifle scope but of course he is buried in thick branches and I can never get my cross hairs on him.....which makes him a very lucky chipmunk I might add.

Needless to say there never were any elk that came withing view of me.....one because of the siren in the tree I am sure and two if there had been any elk I am pretty sure I was busy aiming the rifle in the tree and never would have seen them anyway!

Oh course when I told my horrific story of chipmunk assault and his warfare tactics to Mr. Wonderful he laughed so hard he had tears in his eyes. When we got back to camp he told everyone all about it. To this day he still tells my story all the time!

Well I have declared war against these little guys. What? They started it not me!

Younger Years Cooking...

Is everyone enjoying our story so far? Just curious. I admit I am having fun but I also feel like it is such a personal thing that it is kinda hard to put out there too. Hopefully you guys are getting some good laughs out of the deal. I know it has me reminscing and loving the walk down memory lane. It has us carrying on more dialog from our past then we have in a while too. Mr Wonderful enjoys talking about most of those times too.


Today he told me for the first time ever that once before we were dating that he had eaten up at the house (the shop where the guys worked was not far from our house) and that I had made mac and cheese and my Dad had kept everyone working late that night and he felt bad sending them home so far from town so late without feeding them. Just so happened I had made a large batch of this Mac & Cheese and Mr Wonderful initially thought, "yuck I don't really like Mac & Cheese but gosh I hate to turn them down" meanwhile as I am hearing this story I was pretty sure it was not about the food, he probably wanted to see me even though at the time he was still playing Mr Uninterested. Don't you agree?


Anyway he did come with a couple other workers for this late dinner and he said it actually was the best Mac and Cheese he'd had because it was homemade. He said that was when he figured out I was a good cook, I was probably 15 at the time. Interesting huh?


Problem is I have no recollection of this said dinner or making Mac and Cheese. Although I did cook ALOT during that time in my life because my Mom was going thru chemo and I did a lot of those sort of things for a long time. I drove for her most days because the chemo affected her eyesight and energy. Anyway I wish I could remember this dinner.


He told me this story with great detail. Why can't I remember it?


Speaking of my early years cooking, wanna hear something truely embarassing? My brother had just gotten married and they had stopped by to visit so I had to quickly get something in the oven for dinner for everyone. Our family had this great meatloaf recipe with shredded potatoes, shredded carrots, some egg to hold it together with some seasonings and of course the burger, then on top a yummy sweet ketchup sauce. So I did have all the ingredients for it. I started shredding those potatoes and carrots, I added everything, I pressed it into the pan, I smeared on the yummy topping and got it baking. Ahhh now I could relax and enjoy the visiting and evening.



Well soon it was time for serving, we are all seated around the table ready to dig in, we have our side salads, we have our meatloaf, and we all start digging in. We are all dished up and finished praying when my SIL says to me...."um did you forget something?" I am like "What?" I had yet to taste my meatloaf you see. Turns out I forgot to add the burger to the "meat" loaf! How embarassing, it was bad too, it was inedible, it was a crying shame all the work and time waiting for dinner and no meat? Ya I am not sure I will ever live down the night I made meatloaf and forgot the meat.

On This Day 13 Years Ago.....

I was nervous, I was giddy, I was impatient, all this for the rumbling arrival of a blue chevy pick-up, and a handsome Mr Wonderful driving it. It was our very first date! He finally agreed to go on a date. I can't spoil any chapters from High School to Housewife but I wanted to celebrate this special occasion with you all. It is really hard to believe that 13 years ago this all truely started.....now we have a great relationship, 4 great kids, a house and a whole beautiful life together! How time flies, seems like yesterday I was riding my horses and contemplating how to get his attention.

Coming soon... High School to Housewife......Why Doesn't He See Me That Way?

Ornery Brother Runs Over Little Sister....

It was a snowy cold day when several of my friends and I were trudging thru the snow, hoping to catch a few sledding runs on the hill behind our house. Now beings this is a large hill, we usually hitch a ride on our 4-wheeler Ornery Brother was driving at the time....only he was behind us since we decided to get a head start. He thought it would be funny to scare us by driving up behind us fast as if to run us over. Only problem was that the snow was about 1 ft deep and that made it really hard to run in......picture that deer in the headlights look. My friends went one way, I went the other. Turns out I should have followed the pack.

Before I knew it I was being tumbled under the 4-wheeler and left for roadkill....ok not really but it sure felt like it. No, really I did get run over but they didn't leave me for dead. Everyone flocked around me to make sure I was ok, Oh the glorious attention, and while it did hurt pretty bad I decided to embellish my condition for the benefit of Ornery Brother whom I was really mad at for running me over. I led on that my legs were not working properly and that he needed to carry me to the house (several hundred yards away which I decided was part of his punishment). He did just that, After a few hours of rest and pampering I was just about as good as new.

Now the part that I should probably confess is that when there is 12" of snow on the ground and the fact that I was bundled up or sledding so really most of the impact is pretty much absorbed and it doesn't hurt all that bad to be run over by the 4-wheeler. I was not about to let on to that little lucky fact though, afterall, I was the youngest and I was pretty sure the world should revolve around me occasionally, even though it didn't very often.;)

Gotta give him credit for that long walk back home. I am sure I was pretty heavy especially as I went all limp like I was passed out, you'll remember I mentioned how hard it was to walk in that deep snow? I feel a little bad about that insistance of him carrying me but I am pretty sure it was worth it at the time. "Um, Ya Ornery Brother? I'm sorry!"

Never Try to Jump a Barbed Wire Fence....

No matter what people tell you, don't try to jump a barbed wire fence. It won't end well, trust me on this one.

We had been swimming at our favorite spot in our creek and when we were done we had to cross a fence....now we only had swimming suits on so this fence was scarey. Normally we would step up on one or two wires up from the bottom and swing a leg over until you got a good foot hold on the other side of the fence on same wire up from the bottom and then let loose with the first foot and swing it on over and off you go. (In doing this slick trick you run the risk of some slight puncture wounds from the wire barbs in the general region of the crotch!)

So on this particular day, only having our swimming clothes on, we thought it neccessary to find another way to get accross our fence. There was a large boulder near the fenceline it was about 2ft in diameter and my brother suggest we try jumping from that boulder clean over the fence......he did it and made it over fine.....then I was the little sister scared to jump, about to pee my pants with fear I would injure myself....(you know the annoying sister, full of mistrust, the one that won't do what you ask so you can get on with it already!) so I stood there on the rock whinning, fussing, and scared.

He finally talked me into just jumping, it would be fine......so I did it! I jumped and put all my might into it........and yet I shouldn't have! I ended up getting tangled in the barbed wire fence and getting a sizable cut along the back of my leg. It wasn't too deep, just a really nasty scratch with gaping width........well ok it really was a cut and it was about 3.5" long (but since then it has grown along with me and it about 5" long)......funny thing is, after it healed it looked like a run in a pair pantyhose down the back of my calf.

There seems to be a trend here....ornery brothers, bad advice, dangerous fences, and this........"Mom, He tried to kill me!" Yes, I was a tattler, especially when it came to Ornery Brother. Wanna know what he said to me after realizing I had injured myself? "Shhhh, don't tell Mom, you'll be fine really see? It is just a little blood, we can say the cat scratched you right?....Oh crap it's worse than I though! We better get you home!"

I was the youngest of 4 kids. I have a sister 12 years older than me, a brother about 8 years older than me, and another brother (Ornery Brother) who is about 4 years older than me. Right now I am picking on Ornery Brother a lot but soon I will share more from the rest of the gang too.....I just like to spread it around alittle.....oh and thank goodness they don't have a blog they are sharing all their experiences with about me on right? Wait maybe I better check....well in any case they probably have much more exciting tales to tell than stories about a pesky little sister right?.......right?

I was innocent, I was tortured, I was the youngest, I wear my scars proudly!

Treasure stealin', money grubbin', Ornrey Brother...

Thought you might enjoy another Ornery Brother story. Now I decided ornery was the only word to describe my brother, but then I did not know how to spell it...I mean to me it sounded like onry, or awnry, or ownry...or well you get the point right? So I looked thru the dictionary on all the spellings I could think of and never came up with one....so I had to actually go online butcher the spelling in a search like this "how to spell awnry" and finally found several people who seemed to think it is spelled "ornery"....I mean who would have guessed? Anyway now that we have that little dilema out of the way I can write my story.....there is just no other word to describe my brother at this age, so I had to have the right spelling.


Anyway, Ornery Brother, age about 12 at the time, thought it would be really fun to burry treasure/time capsules. Of course me at the age of 7 or 8 thought this also would be really fun. We gathered cards, we gathered special momentos, we gathered pictures, we wrote little stories to ourselves etc. Then I got my $. I put real paper money in there....like I said I don't often have $ so it was a huge deal. I think it was at least $10 (probably some B-Day money).


So we each buried our seperate large pickle jars full of "treasure" and stood back and dusted our hands against our pant legs (sorry Mom). I said "That was fun,....now what?" He said "Now we wait a few years and then remind each other. Then we'll go dig them up and laugh about all the cool stuff we buried." "Oh that sounds like fun." I said.

I waited a whole 2 days before I decided I really needed my money for something (remember how I was born with no patience bone?) and it seemed such a waste to let it sit in a jar in the dirt.....so I secretly went to dig it up....I dug and dug until I finally found my jar.......I opened the jar and searched all around,....no money! "What the?" I cried, thinking some ground monster probably eats money....but how'd it get thru the glass? Well maybe it has magic powers right? Anyway I asked Ornery Brother about it and he acted shocked and concerned and even offered to help me riffle around in the jar to be sure. Nope not there......hmmmm. We shrug our shoulders and go about life........later I got to thinking "wait a minute!"....Ornery Brother is the only other one who knew I burried it there...."wait just a gosh darn minute!"......."Moooom, He stole my money!!!!!"

He was ornery like that.


Disclaimer: The above ornery character eventually turned out to be an upstanding, caring citizen, with a barely visible mean streak....at least now he has his own kids and wife to torture instead of me.

Electrifying Childhood Experience......

I was about 7 years old when we had just recently gotten home from town. We all had our nice clothes on, and I was flitting about the carport area. I remember having 2 quarters in my hand.  I was so proud that I had these 2 quarters because I did not often get money. I had been petting the horses across the fence, because they had come up to the corral fence to greet us. After petting their muzzles I decided to walk along some stacked rock.....now right next to this stacked rock is also an electric fence....I was balancing and tiptoeing and balancing and ZAP! I accidently grabbed the electric fence to catch my balance (I showed blond tendencies at a very young age). Anyway when I touched the electric fence my quarters in my other hand went airborne ...a loooooooong ways. I found one of them right away but continued to search for the other. Now my brother just happened to be lurking around.....namely my ornery (I had to look that spelling up) brother. Ornery Bother had a mean streak, he liked to pinch our cats' ears......don't ask, no one knows why. So here I was searching for these quarters and crying and really upset.

Ornery Brother had watched this whole thing and had been overcome with laughter...something about my braids even standing on end...I don't know, but he happened to see my quarters fly and offered to come help me look for them.  Turns out we never did find the second quarter, I cold not figure out why. We looked, and looked, and looked some more. It often bugged me years later when I would walk by that area. Recently, in my adult life, I was telling this very story about that missing quarter and Ornery Brother could not stop looking like he was going to explode with laughter......finally he fessed up that he knew where that missing quarter went.  After all this time he finally decided to tell me?  Does he have any idea how much energy went into figuring out where my lost quarter could have went? I mean what kind of brother would see his sister crying and in shock (literally, ok not literally in the medical sense of the word, but ....oh well you know what I mean!) and he decides to take advantage of her and steal her quarter? Makes me want to yell "Moooooom!!!! I am telling Mom what you did! Mooom!"

Apologies to my Mom......

I just realized something that I did as a teen and only now do I realize the deapth of dispair I caused. Here is the story..........

When I was a teen I was really into horse showing, I had trained my own horse from the time I was 11 and had become pretty good at competing. Mom loved photography and she really wanted to get those action shots and have a telephoto to zoom into the action more.

So my mom had been scrimping and saving and yearning over a SLR camera.....oh it hurts so bad I can't hardly stand to tell this story........she finally saved enough and bought herself a Canon Rebel...oh it was a sweet, smooth, clicking machine. She had a sweet telephoto lens for capturing those killer shots accross the show ring at horse shows of her sweet talented daughter (read: me).

After one of the first horse shows she took it to I was unloading the horse trailer and I had the trailer parked in front of our house. We had a large 4 horse trailer and there was a ton to be unloaded, the tack room portion of the trailer had to be emptied and one of the things in that tack room area was Mom's camera bag. I started my work of unloading after a long day of horseshowing. I set things out, I got to work, I slaved away, I packed those saddles, I wiped my brow, I folded and organized horse blankets, saddle blankets and clothes......I was on a roll. I went to the back and started scooping manure.....ya lovely job but somebody has to do it.....I decided to be be EXTRA dutiful.....I figured why not hose this thing out and get it sparklin' clean......ya sure why not?.....so I got the hose and started spraying...then I noticed that the water was running towards the tack room area. I thought to myself "That would not be good if that went under the tack room wall so I better turn this trailer around so the water will run out, quick!" I quickly ran to the truck and expertly towed the trailer to the turn around up the road a few hundred yards....on my way back down to the original parking spot I saw it.....the distinct look of a camera bag in the road along with a few other things that had previously been unloaded......gulp.....then it hit me I MAY have actually RUN OVER Mom's brand new camera.....gulp.......you can only imagine the words going thru my head?...panic, fear for my life......then I was thinking "Maybe not, right? I mean I could have missed it right?"

Upon closer inspection of course I had not been so lucky.....my heart sank.....I had to go tell Mom what had happened......imagine screaming with crying and hysterics.......OK really I don't remeber ALL of it because I think I may have blocked it out.

Thank goodness I "think" she had it insured or something because she eventually did get another one. So with this I feel the true impact of my actions, only today as I drool over a fabulous SLR camera. I think I need to call my Mommy......

School Bus Goes "180"

All this winter weather had me thinking about fun, slippery adventures in the past. I specifically remember growing up a certain bus ride that was rather hair raising. You see we had to ride the bus about 15 miles to school. We had a great bus driver whom I was very close to. She was an older lady and she was friendly and kind......she was a good driver too. On this particularly slick day the roads were packed snow and just deep enough no gravel was exposed for traction.....we approached a 90 degree turn in the road and went around it like normal only somehow we were now seemingly floating......spining and facing all the wrong ways...it was confusing and fast and it was over before we knew it, we did slightly hit a bank along the road but stayed in motion the entire time. When we "came to" and realized we were still moving but in the opposite direction it was amazing my dear sweet laid back bus driver never stopped she just drove right on out of that spin! Of course we did have to stop and turn around to get headed back in the correct direction to actually GET to school but imagine the nerves of steel she had to have had to just drive right on outta that wild ride......she's my hero!

Can you imagine being a bystander to that? Makes me laugh so hard thinking about how all us kids' eyes had to have been HUGE and confused and I am sure the bus driver's knuckles were white and also had matching bugged out eyes. The really amazing part is that this county gravel road was roughly 30 ft wide and the bus was probably exactly 29.5ft long!!!! There was not even any damage to the bus at all......it was really pretty sad we were hoping there was horrid damage to back up the tale we had just endured and therefore give us credibility with our non-bus riding peers...no such luck. Also it would have been really cool to have a replacement bus since riding the same bus every day of your life can get so dull. Imagine counting the same rivets in the ceiling or staring at the same dirty rubber flooring. It can get really old so it is super exciting when there is a new set or rivets to count or a newer rubber floor to dirty up! Ahh the simple days.....sometimes I do wish a big yellow bus would stop in front of MY house and take my 4 darlings for a nice 7 hour break. Imagine what I could do during all that time.......oh dream is over......back to thoughts of lesson planning and the ever challenging adventure of teaching Spud Man to read.

My childhood horse Dixie.......

So here are some basics on my childhood......I am the youngest of 4 children. My parents are still married after many years. Anyway I grew up on a ranch, with horses, cats, and dogs all about. I loved riding my horse Dixie, she was the most amazing horse EVER, if I was being stupid and oh I don't know riding backwards bareback and goofing off, she'd buck you off and then stand there and wait as if to say "straighten up and get back on"......she was a babysitter really, cranky as all get out but a wonderful horse. She knew all my secrets and she listened to all my problems and dried all my tears.......I could run like the wind on her and I loved her dearly. She was tragically hurt in a cattle guard when I was 16yr old and I think part of me died that day when I had to make the decision to put her down because her injuries were just too deep. It was one of the hardest things I have ever had to live thru, she helped me thru so many things in my young life and when she died suddenly I had no way of coping with life anymore......she WAS my childhood.

I can still remember her speckled quivering muzzle as she laid there in the middle of our county road cattle guard, we were both in shock. I just did not want her to suffer anymore, I wanted her pain to be over.......I had to say my final goodbyes fast....... but how do you say goodbye to your everything? How do you thank her for all the hours of rides, and the tender sneezes while grazing, all the sunsets on horseback, all the wild rides thru the trees, and the tender nudges of her soft but prickly muzzle when I cried....that same muzzle I was looking at in her last minutes alive? I left before they actually gave her the shot I could simply not watch her die like that. My Dad burried her under a tree not far from our house and placed a HUGE boulder over her grave. I still go there sometimes and it still hurts on some kind of deep level I can't explain.

Now Dixie was nothing spectacular in the looks department, she was an uptight appaloosa mare that had a cranky PMS problem all the time (she was spayed and evidently was stuck in cranky mode) she had horrible skin and was allergic to everything, her main was so unruly and stiff it almost always had to be shaved off (think mohawk), she was still beautiful to me though. She was elegant in a strange kind of way, she was ladylike in her manerisms, she was THE BOSS around the barnyard. There were many forms to her crankiness......when saddling her she'd purposfully try to step on your foot....she really hated being cinched up, or when hearding cattle she'd reach out and take a chomp out of one of the cows just because she could.

Good old Dixie......there may be more from our story to come you never know...........Maybe I will go searching for a pic of her so I can show you my childhood horse. I think I am done tearing up for a while though.