A Side Stop

A while back we were going to visit Heidlebeere and decided to take a side trip, the scenic route, if you will.  Highway 131 runs along side the Kickapoo River, which is the longest tributary of the Wisconsin River.  As a river, it begins near Wilton, WI and winds and twists its way south, eventually reaching the Wisconsin River 126 miles later.  However, as the crow flies, its only 60 miles from its beginning to its confluence with the Wisconsin River.  That's one crooked river.  And, while its doesn't match the river turn for twist, Highway 131 stays pretty close most of the way.  So that's the way we decided to go.  Get in a little sight-seeing since we were headed that direction anyway.

We also made one stop along the way.  Well, we stopped more than once, but we only stopped once to do any sight-seeing. That was in the southwest corner of the Kickapoo Valley Nature Reserve, just north of La Farge, WI.  There is a little covered bridge there and I'm a sucker for covered bridges.

This little covered bridge is on the Old Highway 131 Trail, and is part of the reserve.  It was a nice little area.  We weren't able to drive all the way to the bridge because the road was closed to vehicle traffic.  But it was just a short walk down a paved road to get to the bridge.

This was mid-way along the river so it wasn't real wide at this point.  The trail is open to vehicles later in the summer but not at the time we stopped.

It is a nice little bridge, more open than some we've visited.  That's kind of nice.

Looking south along the river from the bridge. 

Its a slow, easy river at this point, not very wide.  We were there in the evening.  We were also the only ones there at the time so it was nice and quiet.  About the only sound was all the birds, and there were plenty of those.

Looking north along the river from the bridge

It was a very peaceful, quiet little hike down to the bridge and back.

We walked across the bridge, and around the area for a little while.

Out on the river there were a couple of geese, I would guess from the sound of the honking. We never actually saw them.  We just heard them. I'm not sure what they were doing but there were sure making a lot of noise about it.  Almost sounded like a disagreement, got pretty loud and heated sounding for a little bit.

There were some interesting rock formations here on the trail and all along the river that we'd been seeing as we drove through the area.

Lots of trees down.  Made for some interesting scenery.

As we were heading back to the car the sun was reaching the horizon.  It was a good stop.

The bridge and the whole drive was interesting.  On this drive we saw an elk, an Amish farmer out plowing his field with four draft horses (he was standing on the plow), a goat standing on what looked like a dog house, and three Amish buggies.  And, of course, the covered bridge.  This was a very nice drive through the "driftless area", the area at the leading edge of the glacier that once covered most of Wisconsin.  Basically most of the southwest corner of he state.

Later I discovered that a few miles north of this bridge, still on the Old Highway 131 Trail, there is another crossing of the Kickapoo River with a covered bridge.  Of course I added it to my list.   All the way down Highway 131, as we took in the hills and valleys, we kept thinking this would be an even prettier drive just a little later in the season, when all the leaves were out on the trees.  Next time we go we'll have to stop at the other bridge.  That would pretty nice.

Commonplace Book

 A Commonplace Book. “Commonplace”, from the Latin 'locus communis', meaning “a theme or argument of general application.”  For me, it is a collection of thoughts, ideas, anecdotes, poems, observations, and quotes that stood out and caught my attention, some with comment, some without. Essentially a scrapbook, a repository of thoughts too good to just pass over and let go.

“Yesterday I was so clever I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise so I am changing myself.”

(Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, 13th-century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar, theologian, and Sufi mystic)

“For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring: And they shall spring up as among the grass, as willows by the water courses.”

(Isaiah 44:3-4)

“This is the principle of stewardship. As the kingdom grows larger, more and more responsibilities have to be delegated and stewardships handed out. Men respond in different degrees of valiancy to their stewardships. God is very patient and long-suffering as he waits for some of us to rise to our responsibilities. He usually gives a man a long enough rope and a long enough time either to pull himself up to the presence of God or to drop off somewhere below. But while God is patient, no puny arm of man in his stewardship can long impede or pervert the work of the Lord. The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind ever so finely.”

(Ezra Taft Benson, BYU Devotional, December 10, 1974)

“The Light of Christ should not be confused with the personage of the Holy Ghost, for the Light of Christ is not a personage at all. Its influence is preliminary to and preparatory to one’s receiving the Holy Ghost. The Light of Christ will lead the honest soul to “hearkeneth to the voice”, to find the true gospel and the true Church and thereby receive the Holy Ghost.”

(Joseph B Wirthlin, April Conference 2003)

“It seems almost beyond comprehension to think that He paid this enormous price for me and for each of you. And yet, as far as we are concerned individually, unless you and I do our part, His atonement will have been in vain. It is that covenant relationship—that mutual trust—that makes His atonement such a personal gift. It brings us protection, perennial hope, and the promise of joy.”

(Russell M Nelson, BYU Devotional, 6 January 1991)

“Happiness is reflective, like the light of heaven; and every countenance, bright with smiles, and glowing with innocent enjoyment, is a mirror transmitting to others the ways of a supreme and ever-shining benevolence.”

(Washington Irving)

“Yet whatever he learned about ministering more effectively, he also saw that he couldn't hold every marriage together or ignite every wavering testimony. But he did learn to take personal problems seriously, and that alone expanded his vision and that of the people he counseled.”

(Bruce C Hafen, describing Neal A Maxwell during his time as bishop of a college ward in A Disciple's Life, the Autobiography of Neal A Maxwell, Deseret Book 2002, 310)

“When the flurry of motion became too much, she looked up ahead and fixed her gaze on a particular tree, following it as it slowly approached, streaked past, and the gradually receded behind her. Was life like that? You could look ahead to the future or back at the past, but the present moved too quickly to absorb. Maybe sometimes.”

(Brandon Mull, Fablehaven, page one)

Jesus, Lover of My Soul

Jesus, lover of my soul,

Let me to thy bosom fly,

While the nearer waters roll,

While the tempest still is high,

Hide me, O my Savior, hide,

Till the storm of life is past.

Safe into the haven guide;

Oh, receive my soul at last.

Other refuge have I none;

Hangs my helpless soul on thee.

Leave, oh, leave me not alone;

Still support and comfort me.

All my trust on thee is stayed;

All my help from thee I bring.

Cover my defenseless head

With the shadow of thy wing.

(Hymn 102, Hymns of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1985)

Sugar Cookies are the Best

The other day we were down in the store room looking for some photographs.  We did find them but we also found something else, cookie cutters.  We also had a stash up in the top of the pantry.  It was suggested that they should all be donated, cleared out and gotten rid of.  I suggested that instead of just tossing them we should go through them and see how many duplicates we had.  Surely with as many as we had there must be some duplicates. Maybe we would just get rid of the duplicates.  I didn't really want to get rid of them all, they're used with sugar cookies and sugar cookies are so much fun to make and frost and even more fun to eat.  But anyway, that's kind of where we left it and nothing happened after that for a little while.

So today I decided to go though them and see just what we had.  I pulled out the table and got them all out.

I dumped them all out and and began looking through them.

I began by picking out all the letter shapes.  There were some number shapes, too.  No nine, you can just invert the six for that.  And no zero.  you can just use the letter "O". Only one punctuation shape.  That was a little disappointing.  But what can you do?

Then I sorted out a bunch of emoji cutters we had.  Interesting.  Not sure we'll keep them.  I don't really use emojis in my online communication.  Maybe, maybe not.

Then all the Valentine's Day shapes.  I was surprised at how many of those there were.  Popular holiday for cookies, I guess.

We also have a bunch of Halloween shapes.  Another popular shape.  Give away cookies for treats?  I suppose you could, depending on where it was at.  Door to door I'm not sure they'd go over well.  Have to be careful these days.  But at a church social?  Sure!

We also have lots and lots of Christmas shapes.  Of course!  What better excuse to make cookies than Christmas?  Some people go all out with Christmas baking - why not include cookies?

We also have several Easter themed cutters.  Cute.  Easter, which could also include some spring shapes, like flowers.

Then there were a bunch that were transportation themed.  Except maybe the cowboy hat.  Not sure how it fit in.  Maybe I grouped it wrong.

A few dinosaur shaped cookie cutters.  I have a couple of grandkids that would love to put them to work.

And a few martial arts cutters.  They were part of a set we bought several years back.

Some sports themed shapes.  Not sure how the bone or fish fit in here but that's where I put them.

Then these.  Yeah.  They probably won't survive the purge.

Some teddy bears.  Everybody likes teddy bears, right?

And the miscellaneous shapes.  Some of these could have gone into some of the previous groupings.  Like the shirt?  That was from an "ugly sweater" kit we bought once.  That's kind of a Christmas theme, right?  Or at least winter.  Maybe those two "J's"are actually supposed to be candy canes and should also be with the Christmas shapes. And the round one could be the sun, so maybe it should have been with the Easter shapes.  But since there was also a moon I put them both here.  And the star could have been Christmas but since it has six points I didn't think it really fit.  You could get into the whole Jewish question but we won't go there.

And then there were some sets that obviously went together.  Shapes meant to be used together.  Like these star shapes?  We make Christmas trees with them.  Stack the cookies all up, stick them together with green frosting, and put sprinkles on to make wonderful Christmas trees.  I suppose those might have gone with the Christmas shapes but since we have these other sets I made them a category of their own.

And then Brombeere's favorite, a little frog.  Yeah, she likes frogs.  In a class by itself!

In the end I don't think we're going to get rid of very many.  I bagged them all up by groups and stuck them in a big tote that would hold them all and took them back down to the store room.  Its a clear tote so it will be easy to find next time we want to make sugar cookies (I hope).  We have a number of kitchen things down there that we don't use real often.  If we keep them all more or less together maybe we'll be able to keep track of them and actually use them from time to time.  So it was a good exercise.  And I feel good about keeping most of them.  After all, sugar cookies are pretty much the best kind of cookie there are.

Now You See It, Now You Don't

The other day I was having breakfast with a sweet young lady and her brother.  We were having Lucky Charms.  While I really like Lucky Charms, it had been a while since I'd had any. 

I noticed that the package said there were unicorn marshmallow shapes in the box.  I'd never seen such a thing. 

So I looked through my bowl until I found s shape I didn't recognize and picked it out.  It was the only shape I didn't recognize so I figured it was probably it.  But I thought I'd ask an expert so I picked it out and held it up to show my little granddaughter. 

She reached out her hand to take it for a closer look.  I handed it to her.  That was a mistake.  She no sooner had it, than she popped it in her mouth and it was gone.  I guess it didn't make a lot of difference if it was a unicorn or not.  At least not to her.  But I was satisfied that that was what the unicorns looked like.  And my expert had shown me that it really didn't matter - it was still yummy.  What a sweetie, reminding me what was really important.

Finally Finished

When Christmas season ended and it was time to take down all the decorations, we had a light out of the front lawn but we were unable to fully put away.  This light had been set in a pipe that we had driven into the ground.  We got the light put away with no trouble but the pipe was frozen into the ground and wouldn't budge. That was on January 18, 2019.

And so it got left there.  At the time we took the light off there was a skiff of snow on the ground.

But as often happens around here, our serious snow fall didn't happen until after December.  By late January we'd had a couple of storms and snow had begun to accumulate in the yard.

Before long the pipe was buried in the snow, out of sight.

Then we had a little bit of warm and some snow melted off a little.  The pipe peeked up out of the snow.

But then we had a few serious storms and the pipe was thoroughly buried and well out of sight.

And the snow kept coming.  After a while we had a couple of feet of snow in the yard and the pipe was no where to be seen.   February we had a record breaking amount of snow fall.

But then, in March, it began to warm up and the snow began to melt in a serious way.

By the middle of March the pipe was back out, pretty much free of the snow.

So in late March we went out and were able to get the pipe out.

But it was like taking a core sample.  A chunk of dirt came out with the pipe.  Unfortunately, it was frozen in the pipe.

So we left the pipe out in the yard and waited a few hours.  Then, in the afternoon when the day was at its warmest, I went out with a stick and poked the dirt out.  Then I put it back in the hole as best as it would fit.

And so it was that the very last of our Christmas decorations were not fully put away until March 23, 2019.  Now that's really dragging out the holidays, right?