Homemade Goodness

We’re an ice cream family. Growing up we’d eat it every night, and if my husband would have his way we still would! But with the little guy’s dairy allergy we don’t have it around much and have begun to experiment with non-dairy ice cream. When we were married, almost 8 years ago, we were given a homemade ice cream maker which has since sat in my old bedroom at my parent’s house until this past week. I’m sure the person who gifted it to us never thought it would come in handy for us to learn to make all types of flavor combinations of non-diary ice cream.

We started simple with vanilla soy ice cream. And it was good, until we made the chocolate coconut ice cream with Ghiradelli cocoa and rich coconut milk. I think I’ve found my new vice. It was creamy, and chocolaty, and mm’ mm’ good. So the ice cream maker has made it’s way into the car for the trip back to Seattle. I have a list of flavors I want to try to recreate without the dairy: salted caramel, mint chocolate chip, strawberry, chocolate fudge, and some sort of granola-ish chunky ice cream. I’m open for other flavor ideas if you have one, and we might even make it and bring it over to share with you!

Some Photos...

Baby girl with her 98 year old grandma. It's always amazing to me to see the young with the old.

My son's impression of me.

The pool!

Trying to pull the hay bale and becoming his own spectacle at the fair.

Muscatine County Fair

Heat Index: 100+ Humidity: 85-90% Sweat Index: 100%

It was a day that began with a shower. A needless one, since as soon as we stepped out the door we were coated in sweat. We forged on through the swampy air, the dusty roads and arrived at the county fair. If you didn’t grow up in a farm county or town or family, you probably don’t quite understand the importance of the county fair. It’s where 4-H kids, yes I was one of those, brought projects they had worked on all year to be judged or animals they had raised to be looked over and appraised. There are rides to ride, greasy, wonderful food to eat, and attractions at the grandstand. A queen is named, dancers perform, and those who want can share their hidden talent for all to appreciate. And there’s the Zipper, a huge, delapidated amusement ride, was where we proved our fearlessness and compared how many times our ‘safe’ little cage flipped us head over heels. It is a spectacle. Growing up in the town where the county fair is held brought its own excitement. New people in town, a buzz surrounding the week, and it's all our little town can handle to try not to completely shut down and spend all our time and money at the fair.

So I took my children to the fair, a place flush with nostalgia. It was Kids’ Day which meant our 4 year old could get an armband and ride as many rides as he wanted for 5 hours, at a low cost of $15 this seemed like the best way to pass the afternoon. And it was worth every cent. He went on the cars, the dragon rollercoaster, the spinning strawberries, the flying elephants, the flying airplanes, and the ferris wheel...twice. We recruited Grandma and Grandpa and went on the rides again and again until at one point late in the afternoon I watched him going around and around on the car ride only to see him dozing off at the wheel. I knew we had hit our limit so I took my exhausted little boy and girl home with a glass of lemonade. We hit the pool, the plastic blowup one that is, in my parents yard to cool off and wash the sweat off once again before crashing in bed.

Thinking I had not suffered enough heat and humidity the day before, I decided it would be fun to go to the fair again the next day to see the animal barns. It felt cooler, really it did, until we got to the fairgrounds and suddenly the temparture rose ten degrees. That’s what happens when you live a long time in a place where there is no air conditioning. When you are in an hot place you forget that inside a house is cooler because of a/c, not because it is actually a cooler day outside. So, dressed in jeans, we trudged and sweated our way to the animal barns. Disappointed by the selection, we moved on to the next building with a fan, where we spent the remainder of the whole hour we were at the fair watching the little guy trying with all his might to pull a huge bale of hay up by a rope and pulley system. He pulled and pulled, then climbed up and hung on the rope with all his weight. Of course, we know it won’t budge, but he kept trying until he finally relented that he, in fact, could not lift it.

You’re probably wondering what our little girl did this whole time. Well, she sat in the stroller and sweated, a lot. She nursed, a lot, to make up for the sweat. And sometime in the middle of all this, she learned to walk. Yep, she has accomplished upright mobility, and she’s so proud of herself as are we.

Remembering

So, after a week of bumming around Iowa with us, my husband has returned to the Northwest to continue working. It's hard to believe that we are already to this point of our journey, it seemed so far off when we started out and here we are, almost August and soon we will all be back around Seattle settling into our little campsite.

I'm staying with my folks, but I'm suddenly in the role of the single mother, not a moment to rest with barely time to think. Baby girl noticed her dad's leaving and got extra clingy, and the little man expressed his sadness many times. So, today we went online and chatted via Skype, which is a video chat. The sweetest moment a parent can experience happened today as we opened the Skype and called Nate. Once his face popped up on the screen baby girl started hollering ‘dada!, dada!’ and clapping her hands. I’m not sure where she thought he had gone, but seeing him again brought forth a visceral reaction that I didn’t expect. She smiled and giggled and tried to touch his face on the screen. They have a beautiful father/daughter kinship that was made so evident today that it gave me goosebumps watching this all unfold. It’s hard as an adult to keep in mind the developing perspective of babies and toddlers. Our 4 year old kind of gets that his dad is gone, but we’ll see him in a couple weeks. So while he doesn’t really like this reality, he still knows that dad is alive somewhere. I’m not sure that our 1 year old understood that. She got to say good bye at the airport and watch him walk away, but based on her reaction today, she may have thought he had just disappeared. To my well aged mind, it’s old hat, people come and leave and some of them come back, nothing to be concerned about, but to a one year old it’s as if an integral piece of her life just fell off the face of the earth. But is does make me think that sometimes we do act like we are still in the stage of a one year old. We know people who have moved, or who we have moved from, still exist, and we appreciate their influence on our lives, but when they are gone we forget. We don’t forget how much we loved those people and what they meant to us, yet we do forget that they too are somewhere else, living life, and moving on, maybe even wondering what we’re up to.

This weekend we attended our old church on Sunday. Nate was the youth pastor there and I was the church secretary during our first year of marriage. It is the singular place that impacted the course of our life and faith journey. That’s not to say there hasn’t been other points of influence, but this is our home. This is where our old views were knocked down so we could see the towering heights behind the shrubs. From here we began our journey, the one we are on now, and it’s from here that we pursued certain courses of action and communities. So when we return, I am always teetering on the edge of complete joy, and total sadness. Joy that we are indeed home, in a place that revives our souls with fresh water and sadness that too easily we forget this place, and too quickly we are again dried out. There are some people in the world that I would like to miniturize, stick in my pocket and carry around with me everywhere so that I could pull them out in moments of doubt or despair to let them whisper words of life and hope into my being. So, instead, we renewed a vow to keep in touch better and use the good old telephone. And I want to remember. I want to grow out of my infant self, forgetful of others and mindful, much too mindful of self. So I wonder, do we make ourselves grow up, or does it just happen? Does it just happen during these moments of realization, times of widening perspective during which we lean across to other human beings and simply say I love you, you exist, you are more important than me? Or do we have to work at it, remind ourselves, continually remove ourselves from the center of our minds and little galaxies to shatter what comes between us?

To the county fair tomorrow, it should be interesting. Hot, dusty, and full of interesting people.

What??

Okay, so these just got my funny bone going. Enjoy!

Has anyone really done that??

I've read thousands of labels and have never seen this...and you know a label like this would only work in the north woods of Wisconsin. I guess if you have food allergies, you just don't touch it!

4 Generations

4 Generations. 4. It's amazing and we are grateful that our son will remember his great grandparents full of life, laughter, and love. 6 of his 8 great grandparents are still living and thriving in their own ways. Ranging in age from 80 to 98 1/2 years old they have all offered him a large dose of love and another dose of good old common sense. They come from what is known as the Greatest Generation. They watched this world move from telegraphs, to telephones, to cell phones, from the Pony Express to the Internet. They brought innovation and infrastructure to our country and they raised a generation that carried on that momentum to bring about some of the greatest inventions of our time. We are thankful to still know a few and always enjoy being with them and learning from them.

Old Friends

Do you remember that childhood song that goes, ‘make new friends but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold’. Well Wednesday we got to shine up a golden friendship with a roommate from college. She’s one of those people that it doesn’t seem to matter how long it’s been since you’ve seen each other, or even spoken to each other, you can just pick up where you left off. We spent the morning with her in deep conversation bouncing from lighthearted ‘what’s new with you’ and delving into deeper issues. She showed us her new home, she’s a newlywed, and shared all their dreams for the place. And then we went to park to play, where I sure you can guess it., it rained on us. Sheets of rain, we tried to hide in the play structure only to be dripped on, so we finally embraced it and just got wet. The kids had a ball and we left reminded of how important that friend is to us, someone who knows our past and hopes for our future as we do hers.

So dear friend, I’m pretty sure you’re reading this, thank you for a beautiful morning. Thank you for remembering with us, knowing who we are, getting to know who we have become, and dreaming the future out loud beside us. You truly blessed our hearts and it was hard to drive away.

Iowa

We entered Iowa being chased by another thunderstorm a week ago. We had just stopped at a place to eat on the way from Wisconsin, sat down and Nate happened upon a tick in baby girl’s hair. So we hurried over to the convenience store side of the gas station/eatery, a very classy place, and bought some Vaseline to smother the tick out. As we went about this, I realized that everyone in the eatery was watching us intently, so I announced that we were just getting a tick out and that it was going fine. Expecting icy stares followed by silence in the typical Seattle manner, I was pleasantly surprised when the other parties expressed concern and relief along with their personal stories of ticks. That’s when I knew Iowa was just over the border. We ran out of the store in the pouring rain, hoping to drive out of it as we were to spend the next couple nights camping in my grandmother’s backyard. And luckily we did. She has an indoor cat, so as soon as we got there our little guy’s face puffed up and stayed that way for both the days. Needless to say, sleeping inside the house was not an option. So we camped in the muggy heat of the Midwest, where it often threatens to rain, but just falls short leaving one to suffer in the 90% humidity.

Iowa is amazing in many ways, though, and many of those ways are hidden to outsiders. As we crossed the border both Nate and I mentioned to each other how it suddenly looked so Iowan. If you don’t know what that means, it looks something like this…tiny, rolling hills coated in corn growing up to the sky, tassles swaying in the wind, clouds dotting the sky, the huge wide open blue sky, popping up amidst the cornfields are little thickets of trees where inside resides a farmhouse of some sort, grain bins, hog barns, and tractors all sit on the horizon. It’s a simple, earthy place and that feeling permeates the atmosphere.

We spent Monday and Tuesday with my grandmother, sleeping in the tent at night and finding things to occupy ourselves with during the day. She lives in a small town, maybe 200-300 people, most of them retired, where our most noted observation was that good coffee was hard to come by. Her home is usually one of my favorite places. She is a pack rat and so amongst all the seemingly useless items she has kept, there are some gems that can be admired. I always enjoy hearing the stories behind those gems. But we soon realized that being cooped up in a house with 2 young children, my grandmother and my uncle was not ideal. So we went to the farm. It was my great-grandmother’s farm, and then my grandmother and grandfather took it over, and now my other uncle is working the farm. He showed us around, and we felt a bit like farm tourists, shooting photos of the 1941 tractor that my grandpa had bought, which they still use, taking rides on the tractors, and oohhing and ahhing over the cows, sheep, and laying hens. It’s a pretty cool place to be. He talked to us about the hard reality of working a small family farm, trying to make a living by raising a small contingency of antibiotic/steroid free animals to sell at market and then there’s the second job he has as a tree trimmer. It’s not glamorous, but I admired him for his dedication to working the farm in a certain manner. We met my cousin’s baby twins, they are 1-2 month old little bundles of sleepiness. I have never seen two more kick back babies, picked up and put down several times, they slept through most of the afternoon.

The next evening was the county fair parade. Our kids first time gathering the candy thrown from the floats. Since we don’t allow much candy in our house it was so much fun to see their excitement over the little treats they were plucking from the street. Amazingly, they followed the rules about the candy and we haven’t heard a peep about wanting more since.

Mosquitos

I think I could live a very nice life without these pesky little critters. I’ve waged war on them all summer and only have bug bites to show for it. As do both my children. We tried natural bug spray, we reluctantly tried deet bug spray and to no avail, we still get bitten. And then there’s the itching. I can hold back, the baby doesn’t seem to want to itch, but our little man itches until he bleeds. So we began another round of trials, Caladryl, white vinegar, a Benadryl stick, and some Dermacort, all this just because of a tiny little flying insect. They have kept us indoors on days they swarm so thick the minute you step out you feel like a landing strip at a busy airport.

It makes me feel guilty to be sitting indoors on a sunny day afraid of a tiny little bug. I find myself hollering at my son to either be in the lake or in the house, but not running around on the grass in case he gets another bug bite to add to his collection! So mosquitos, look out, we’re coming to Iowa and if you are near me, you can be sure your life will be short.

If anyone has any tips, we'd love to hear them!

Loon Lake

My husband grew up going to a family cabin in northern Wisconsin. So, we returned to Wisconsin to spend time at this place that is so dear to his heart. It is where so many memories were made for him. Fishing, frog catching, hunting, playing cards, boating, swimming all filled his days. Not growing up with such a place I have only a small understanding of how this formed him, and a large sense of jealousy. So I am always eager to join him here learning more about him and his family. It has been 7 years since we have stepped foot here. Years of talking about returning, about how great it would be to get back to the cabin, how we’d like to share this place with the kids. And we are finally here. It looks the same. New paint, but that’s about it. Even the fixings for s’mores are still in the same place. It’s so refreshing to be in a place where things have stayed the same. We join his grandparents and his brother and sister in law. Later this week, his sister and dad will also come up. Selfishly, we had hoped for some time here to ourselves, but are so glad now that it won’t be that way. This time spent with these people is precious.

Our 4 year old is getting quite used to being in his swimsuit, so he jumped right into it and hasn’t taken it off yet. The men have spent the afternoon fishing, it’s not great fishing, but it’s more about time spent together on the dock with reel in hand, talking, waiting, and taking in the place. It is a peaceful lake, small in size and no motors are allowed so the peace is maintained. After dinner, and once the kids were asleep, we headed out on the canoe for some fishing and evening air. A clear sky and calm water greeted us as we paddled across the lake looking for a fish to take our bait. It was a slow night of fishing, but a full evening of renewal. Paddling the canoe was like dipping the oars into liquid glass, so, not wanting to disturb it too much we slowly made our way. Loon Lake is the name of the lake we are on, and loons are what we saw. They are regal birds, pointy bills, dark heads and polka dot feathers, they glided toward us to see who was joining them this night. As we watched them, the sun set over the trees lighting up the clouds pink and orange and reflecting the light off the mirror pond. I wondered at how jittery I had felt to this point, and tried to let that all drip away into the water letting it be soaked up and left behind. I have never felt so much like a city girl. Used to the quickness of not only the tasks of life, but also the way we speak and interact, I found myself feeling loud and brash even in my silence. And in this I felt incomplete, halfway there to wholeness, lacking in something very important. There is a book out about children and nature, about the nature deficit in children and the resulting attention issues, the calmness they lack. While we focus on that in children, we forget that we as adults are also affected. We can miss a piece of life, the calm piece, if we are never outside. Filing our lives and beings with a go, go, go attitude, errands to run, and things to do, we can quite easily lose our sense of calm. So, last night we soaked it up, we tried to soak it up. To bring into our souls the peace, the wholeness offered simply by sitting in a canoe on a quiet lake with birds singing, frogs croaking, and trees standing.

More days of this to come, so if you don’t hear from me, I’m here, just being. And I hope you have a place to just be for a bit too.

Wisowa - Sunday to Tuesday (last week)

A combination of two places into one family, Wisowa was born of a marriage between a Wisconsinite and an Iowan. No, it’s not referring to my husband and I, rather the grandparents of my mother-in-law’s husband. A wonderful grouping of cabins, playhouses, and even a schoolhouse it’s set up for family fun and relaxation. Unfortunately for us, it rained the whole time we were there. When it wasn’t raining, just wanting to rain, we set out on the paddle boat, caught frogs, and swam at the beach. It’s always amazing to me, when given the right imagination and funds what a person can create. It’s got me thinking about what I would create in a place like that, what buildings, spaces, and potential would be possible. We’ve been having fun dreaming about the future, no real answers yet, but dreaming is sometimes the best part of the process.

One of the most enjoyable times for me was the sauna. We tried it only one afternoon, it was raining out and my mother-in-law offered to watch both kids while we sat in the sauna. So we went in with her husband to rejuvenate. I had experienced a sauna prior to this, but not a sauna followed by a dip in a lake. The lake is tinted brown from the color of the trees surrounding it, and after 15 minutes in a 150 degree sauna we ran out in the rain to dip ourselves in what seemed to me like maple syrup. Then we ran back to the sauna to do the cycle over again. Rejuvenated we returned to find the kids content. Baby girl asleep on grandma’s lap, a rare sight as she is showing quite a bit of separation anxiety lately.

We passed the rest of the days running to and fro in the rain, trying to stay dry and still have fun without feeling too cooped up. Rain in the Midwest summer is different than that in the Northwest. It’s a warm rain, one you can play in without shivering. It falls hard and fast, but not torrentially. When my husband and I were dating we would run out and play in rains like this, a time to flirt a little, laugh, and be silly together. The rain we’ve been in reminds me of this past of ours, a past of much laughter. So I wasn’t surprised to find him one day pushing our son on the tree swing, both of them in swimsuits making the best of a rainy day. That’s one small thing I am inspired in by him, he is outside in the rain, outside with the mosquitos, outside just to be outside whenever he can be despite what nature throws at him. He’s a resilient man and is teaching that to our children. And I love that.

Well, Wisowa, we thank you for your hospitality! We hope we get to see you on a sunnier note someday and we look forward to the next time we will see Grandma and Tom.

Family

Here we are amongst family. It is different each time we come back. We always enjoy seeing everyone, filling in each other’s lives since we last saw or spoke to them. Sometimes, though, I find myself striving, most likely needlessly, to maintain the person I have become. I can be fiercely independent at times, and often push against being boxed in, so when I am back to a place that is where I was so young I instinctively want to press back against who I used to be. It creeps up on me trying to take away the energy I’ve found, trying to sap me of the adult I’ve become and turn me into a child again. Maybe some of you can understand. Sometimes we run away from those places to find ourselves, to see what we’re made of. It’s not an uncommon human response to life, found in even in ancient civilizations. Going on walkabouts, or tests to enter into being a warrior for the tribe infiltrated each society. I think in our modern society we all in some way seek that challenge and when met we want to be welcomed back as a contributing part of the clan. If the clan still acknowledges you as a child, it can be heartbreaking, but when they see you, all you can do and have become, and in turn acknowledge your independence within the whole, then life can continue on in a healthy fashion. From early on, we mold our children, we take them and teach them how to behave, and what priorities make life worthwhile. But someday, we let them go, into the world and can only hope that when they come back to us they carry a bit of us along, adding, growing, and multiplying themselves as persons able to care for themselves, their family, and their community. I like to believe that my husband and I have done this, and so when we return to find family that treats us as we have in fact accomplished this, we are content.

South Dakota - Wednesday

South Dakota…where did you go? Oh, that’s right we passed through you during the night. We missed the Badlands, the sweeping views of striped rocks. For those of you who have not been there, it is surprisingly beautiful for being comprised simply of rock. They hold the colors of the southwest bound to Earth. Canyons, hills, and mounds reflecting in their being the sunset all times of day, but we drove past at dark and couldn’t see the sight. But we were not sad to drive the rest in the dark, it is otherwise a fairly flat, dry, expansive state, much like Nebraska. The kids slept and we made it to Mitchell’s Econolodge. Clean, simple, and affordable, right up our alley. Here’s a little travel hint; always call ahead when you need a last minute hotel room. If you just show up, you appear to be rather desperate and willing to pay anything, but if you call ahead you can then use the ‘well, we’ll call around’ tactic and possibly get a deal. Thankfully, that worked well for us this time.

When we awoke, we were officially in the Midwest. Towns started to look like Midwestern towns. Cowboy themes and names of the West disappeared into farmland. Minnesota was the next stop, Albert Lea, boasting a small campground called Myre-Big Island State Park. It was clean with nice facilities, but a bit disappointing in the island aspect. Lacking in swimming area and beach access, we found ourselves rearranging the car once again. Organization of the inside of the car has kept us sane. One of the most frustrating things of living out of one’s car is the constant search for this or that item that is needed. So we’ve put an extraordinary effort into keeping everything in its place. And I think it’s paid off in fewer arguments starting with words like ‘who put what where, why did you do that, and it’s driving me crazy.’

The most wonderful part of this night, was the clear night sky. After a difficult time getting the kids to sleep, a long tedious affair that ended in the way that nobody likes, going to bed upset, Nate and I laid in the tent talking over the evening and soaking up the stars peeking into our tent. We saw the Big Dipper, and I’m sure countless other constellations I have yet to learn the names for. They twinkled at us, winking down on Earth speaking of the expanse of space. Sometimes, when we have a hard time getting the kids to sleep it’s easy to feel like that preoccupation takes over our entire family. I wonder why they can’t just go to sleep, why so much effort on our part to get them to lay down, and why is that always the time they choose to be the most belligerent. But then they sleep, and I remember, as the stars remind me, that this in fact is not a big deal. It is not important if they sleep when I dictate, and in the grand scheme of things we are all quite small cogs in a quickly spinning, orbiting planet taken up with the wings of movement across a vast sea of darkness. As I was laying there pondering this, a sudden clank from our picnic table startled me. Thinking I was hearing something, I sat up and listened, there it happened again. We were a bit careless with our food, knowing we were out of bear country we left some rice from dinner sitting out. So I quickly woke up my husband, who we all know can protect me from the largest of animals to the smallest of spiders. He got out his light and shined the table, and off scurried a little rodent of some sort! It was too quick to get a good look at, but somewhere between a small raccoon and an opossum. Since it wasn’t a bear, my mind did go there unnessecarily, we laughed at the clatter and cleaned up the mess.

Wisconsin is the next state on our list we’ll be enjoying a birthday party for Nate’s 80 year old grandma!

FWD: Sorry!

Sorry for so many posts at once, we have only hit wi-fi every few days! Hopefully it’ll even out a bit as we settle down for longer stretches. To read them in chronological order you'll have to read the Craters of the Moon first and read up, not down. I'm still figuring this thing out. :)

Gone A Little Crazy

Driving. Driving. Driving. So, if we left the Tetons at 7:48am this morning and we’re still driving at 8:11pm tonight with another 5 hour push, does that make us crazy? From Yellowstone to I-90 was some of the slowest, most beautiful driving to this point. Curvy mountain roads led us through the Big Horn National Forest at a less than desireable speed of 40 mph. Canyon dips and mountain climbs ate up our day, gave little back in distance, but tore at our hearts to stay and never return. It’s a mix of the lushness of Idaho and the stunning rock stratification of the Badlands. I think I found my paradise. Not to sound like an infomercial, but I could possibly sing it’s praises all day long. Realizing that it would be too late to set up camp in our favorite spot in the Badlands, a free little campground out of the way of everything except herds of buffalo and barking prairie dogs, we decided to instead let the kids sleep the night away in the car while we sped over South Dakota to crash in a hotel for the night. This is a strategic move as it sets us up for a very short day of driving tomorrow (instead of another marathon day) to a spot in the middle of Minnesota that we’re very excited about and another short day Friday will land us amidst family in Wisconsin.

I know you’re now wondering if we’ve gone off our rockers. And if you’re not thinking that, you’re probably curious how we made it 12 hours in a car (pit stops, of course) with 2 small children. Well, it’s a miracle. In reality, the kids continue to amaze me. We did happen to also do some planning ahead to for these long days of driving. We brought at least one complete change of books and toys. This along with some ‘sure to please’ time consumers, serious effort reading and singing together, and a couple little surprise toys throughout the day set the kids, and us, up for a successful day on the road. The highlights of the day? Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do You Hear read with vigor and family participation in creating the animal noises, this one even got the baby laughing. The Automoblox are always a hit, a particularly riveting story told by dad with vinyl sticky bugs, and a brand new Etch a Sketch. Old school, I know, but everyone was fairly content, and this without a DVD player! Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against playing movies in ones’ car, in fact I think I’d rather enjoy that too, but on a trip where we’re making a conscious effort to bond with each other and discover the world and ourselves, the DVD player may greatly hinder that endeavor. And amazingly, we found that we really enjoy each other. We can make each other laugh, we can listen and tell stories, and we truly like being together. That’s my favorite discovery to date. Hoping to sleep in tomorrow, knowing that won’t happen, and looking forward to more spontaneous craziness.

One more item of particular note, somewhere around Eastern Wyoming, the husband decided to turn off the AC and just let the ‘cool’ air come in. Instead, we were inundated with warm, humid air. I choked back tears as the sweet, and often not so sweet, air of home hit me. We are close. So close the atmosphere itself whispers memories to me, it’s hard to believe that home still hits so near to my heart. Will it always have this effect? Is anyone else this emotional about going home when you’ve been away for so long? I will take it, I will take Americana at its grassroots and enjoy each friendly wave on the road, the helpful people, and the muggy air.

Tetons

It’s 7:48am. We’ve already packed up our second camp at the Tetons and are halfway to Yellowstone. We won’t have time to stay and explore Yellowstone, but will press on to South Dakota.

Last night was epic. Camped overlooking Jackson Lake in the Tetons, tall trees swaying and the 4 of us laying in our tent, a thunderstorm came up. We don’t get real thunderstorms in Seattle. Sometimes we get a bit of thunder or lightning, but not a real storm with the wind whipping and the clouds clapping and lighting up. Thunderstorms are a part of my history that brings excitement and joy. I have many memories of waking up to the smell of a just finished storm. It smells like electricity, invigorating and full of promise. So last night with my son gripping my neck for fear of the thunder, Nate and I laid there enjoying the familiar sounds and smells, almost giddy, wishing we could leave the kids in the tent and find some bluff to stand on feeling the wind fly by and kick up our spirits.

The whole day, in fact, was grand. We had camped the previous night in the southern part of the park and had decided we wanted to find something closer in with better views. So we set out, it took us a couple hours, but the timing worked out perfectly to place us in such an amazing spot. After setting up camp we decided to take the kids hiking and swimming for the morning. For a 4 year old, we have a brave one. He jumped right into the icy mountain lake, knees, waist, then chest high. I think for him, being in the water is much like being in a thunderstorm is for us, as long as its safe being on the edge of safe is the best place to be. He is fearless. Baby girl also found herself in the water enjoying some time to move around and play, I see now she is as fearless as her big brother. An afternoon thunderstorm put us in the tent for a nice snooze and the evening found us fighting off mosquitos by the dozens as we drove up to an overlook to see the valley below. Along the way we ran across a male grous attempting to attract a mate. His feathers fluffed up behind him, all his glory on show, this for the female who was aimlessly wandering around about 100 feet off paying no attention. It made me think of how often we are like that male grous, all dressed up, trying to live life, to connect with someone, and for many people they find themselves shouting hello to perfect strangers just to talk to another person. The Tetons themselves are the grandest of reminders that many times we need to simply revel in the grandeur around us and in the people around us. Today reminded me of that with my family. Finally feeling freedom from the rules of everyday life, we all reveled in one another. Less ‘no’ and ‘don’t do that’ and more laughter and giggles. Being less like a bunch of female grouses ignoring each other, we took time to invest in our family and it has brought a closeness that had been run over by the mundane routine of the everyday. My hope is to build on this and bring it back to the everyday with us.

On to South Dakota and beyond. A photo album will hopefully be put up soon, but as there isn’t wi-fi on every corner (?!) it may take some time.

Craters of the Moon, ID -- Monday

Today we made the long drive from Boise to the Tetons. We chose to take a slower route so we could go through a place called Craters of the Moon. As you can see in the photo, it’s a lava field in the middle of Idaho. Comprised of caves, and walking paths, we could have stayed a whole day exploring, but driven on by the goal of a day out of the car we took a short walk and stared in amazement at the dichotomy between the lush green hills and the valley of dark lava rock. I’m finding the natural world full of these paradoxes, they seem to keep jumping up at me, hard to ignore, and always telling me stories, speaking into my own life of paradoxes lived out, the day to day tension we find ourselves being pulled between. I can find within my own heart both a volcano wanting to erupt and spill lava rock to harden over everything or lush green hills of quiet and sustenance taking over, filling my life and family with peace. Sometimes I choose which way to turn and sometimes I just have to live holding onto both knowing they both exist within me.