food, crochet, merriment
right this minute~
Enchanted places for wood sprites…
the ability to improvise…
learning to properly pucker…
magical combinations…
impromptu button festivals…
Sugar-sweet–orange on purpose–tomatoes…
early mornings in our lovely valley…
a bit of fowl reading–ha ha…
the return to hat–and pumpkin season…
getting all the pieces to finally fit.
in eight easy steps.
First, make sure you have their attention.
Next, act very, very sweet.
Be patient…
kind…
and persevering.
No matter how difficult it may seem…
be brave…forge ahead…and I promise…
you, my love…
will win.
On our little windy journey–Grammy found that a few new hats were in order. Luckily the crochet hook and cotton works very nicely on the drive with no car sickness…it’s a miracle, I tell you.
Wheat colored, ribbed with a stripe for Beckham.
Lacey pink picot point for Lily—don’t you love the pony tail holes?
And the same, Lacy Picot in cream for the little lady.
Ahh…busy fingers.
What a lovely way to feather the nest.
Seems like all the days have started or ended exactly like this. Can’t you just hear the Beatles singing, “The Long and Winding Road.”
Well I can…and it’s beautiful.
We did get a cute little guidance truck to tell us how to maneuver the road construction. They must not have known that we’re from UTAH MAN! The road construction capitol of the universe–and we are detour savvy.
It was a nice gesture though.
Then, all of a sudden these hills started popping up, from out of nowhere. We were entering South Dakota!
Did you know that South Dakota has real, live buffalo hidden away in their hills? I had no clue! Where did I get the idea that they were extinct? Oh no—they have been simply kicking back in SD all these years!
I must be out of the endangered species loop. Can I just tell you–these dudes are ENORMOUS!
Suddenly, the hills turned into bigger hills…small mountains even.
Which was a good thing because where we’re going needs to be a big, BIG mountain.
And it did not disappoint. In fact, Mt. Rushmore was positively breathtaking. I wish I could show you up close how cool this place is. President Roosevelt even looks like he has glasses on. It was amazing.
We had to take the token “stand HERE and snap your picture” shot–you know–for posterity. See all that rubble at the base of the Presidents? There’s a really great film you can watch in the museum that told us that the rubble is from all the dynamite they used to carve this out of the rock.
In fact, they said that 90% of the actual carving was done with dynamite. How does that work? The rest of course, was done and finished and smoothed out with chisels by men hanging down in swing type things. Those guys were soooo brave. Another thing I learned is that the fellow who made it–with 4oo other workers–died before it was finished. They actually had plans for the collars and lapels of Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln–not just Mr. Washington.
The history was positively fascinating.
The ice cream was glorious.
The company was wonderful.
We’ll remember this place–the “Shrine of Democracy” at Mt. Rushmore, for the rest of our lives.
No huge plans for today. Just kinda hangin’ out…
taking it easy…
entertaining the short folks.
However–you can only be locked up in a hotel room with 3 toddlers for so long before you need to find a big, huge park for them to run in.
So we did.
One with tons of very friendly squirrels…
who liked the peanuts we tossed…a lot.
I don’t think I’ve actually seen a squirrel up close before. Chipmunk–yes. Prairie dog–yes. Squirrel–not so much. I’m sure we have squirrels in Utah–but they must be invisible, because I’ve never seen one.
It even had a fountain for toe dipping—but it wasn’t enough to just get our feet wet. So we went back…
changed our duds…
and jumped in the pool!
Some of us were very brave.
Some of us were very chilly.
Some of us were too dang cute.
And some of us were just too tired.
Warm. Wet. Healthy. Happy.
Heaven indeed.