Catch up, January 09

We spent December through March down in Cordova, MD, which is near Easton, MD.
In January, we visited the Harvey's a lot and had wonderful times with Harrison and Colton. Our normal routine would be to drive over to the Harvey's on Saturday afternoon, feed the boys dinner and put them to bed while the Susannah and Will got a chance to go out to dinner.......something that they rarely can do on their own, without grandparents to watch the Cookie Crunchers. It was a Win, Win deal because they loved the Adult Dates, and we loved our time with the boys.
We would all have coffee on Sunday morning and we would head home early enough to get home (for our naps. (:>)) Some January Photos follow;

Mogie and Harrison (new Space Suit)

Early in January I took Harrison on two different 'Ventures, to see some fantastic model train displays. First we took the Metro down to the Washington Mall to the Conservatory where they had several different train sets running elaborate and ornate automated toys and trains running amongst the plants. Another trip was to a fire station and an old train station up near Baltimore, where we saw some other very elaborate and colorful model layouts. Needless to say, Harrison was in hog heaven.

A guy has to check out ALL LEVELS, doesn't he?

Some of the layouts were pretty close to the glass.

Here is 'Daddy' hard at work at his computer.

At the firestation, we saw this old Fire Engine and we could get close to the newer ones, too. The fire hat was a gift from the firemen.

January is Harrison's birthday (just turned 5.) The Space Suit came from the new Air and Space Museum out near Dulles Airport.

Update to December

Updating Blog; The first of December made our Winter Migration to the Eastern Shore of Maryland for December through March. We have already had the pleasure of visiting the Harvey clan on three occasions. Two were to babysit while Susannah and Will got to go out on a DATE (for a change.) It was our pleasure and the boys were great. The two little Heroes (sometimes known to their mother as Heathens) were lots of fun and well behaved. The last visit (just last Saturday) we took the boys out for ice cream after supper. That was a treat for all of us. There is the usual confusion and energy levels. We OLDERS are slowly adapting to that. The boys are really GREAT BROTHERS. When Colton gets hurt or is upset, Harrison is most often very willing to hold him and comfort him.

Colton and Harrison

We ventured up to Wilmington, Deleware, one day a few weeks ago and visited Winterthur, the big home and estate of one of the duPont clan. They had the tour of two of the many floors and these two had rooms decorated for Christmas as they would have been in the 19th century. Mogie and I were to as impressed with the whole place as we expected to be. The exterior of the house is really dull and uninspiring. The furnishings are terrific and the Christmas decorations seemed less than expected and did not exude quality (to our minds.) It was a good trip, though and we are glad we made the trip. The history of the place is realy great. It is 1000 acres and used to employ more than 200 people, grounds and house. (no pictures, though.)

Last Saturday I got into some trouble at a country auction that had a collection of horse drawn farm equipment, buggies, wagons, sleighs, etc. I have always loved those old things. I had an old sleigh years ago but never restored it. On this occasion, we could not stay for the auctioning of the neat old buggies, etc, but an acquaintance said he would bid. I gave him a few preferences and a top limit. Mogie and I were driving to Virginia when the man called and aske, " How many do you want?" He explained that the first sale was an old but good Bob Sled that went for $200. I said to get me what he could. He was able to get my first choice, a black 'Buck Board' that is technically, I am told, and Amish Durbin. A fellow at the sale said it was probalby worth twice what it sold for, and we got it for $700. It has shafts??for a single horse. I thought it would be just ONE MORE project for Montana. (Now the big question is to figure out how to get it to Montana (:<)
Despite the Moving challenge, I am delighted. PLUS, it gives Mogie another reason to shake her head and ot tease me about impulse purchases.
I will have to figure out if Sam will learn to drive without wrecking all of us.


New Addition to the ROLLIING STOCK for Montana.
This is an Amish Durbin, with some history from New York state.
The maker's name in cut into the steel of the steering mechanism,
and the wheel hubs apparently have ball bearings. There is little or
or no slack in the wheels. It has a foot brake and did have rear
lights, powered from a car battery, but they are gone.


This enclosed Amish buggy apparently sold for only $175.
Since I was not there, I almost cried when I heard the low price.

UNIQUE FAMILY SHOT

In mid-July this past year I was driving down near the hardware store in Ennis and spotted the scene below. It was great to see.

MAMA STOPS TO GIVE THEM A SNACK.

Blog Catch-Up.

Well, it is November 23, 08 and I have FINALLY decided to try to get back to the blog. The last entry was June 19, which makes me a tad ashamed. ALSO, I am a bit shamed when I read Melynda's blog, becuase she is so assiduous about maintaining hers. (:>)

The PROJECTS in Ennis mentioned in my June 19 post have been finished and some new ones added.
I hope I can find a few pitures to go show the evolution of the various 'works-in-progress.' The most signigicant changes were;

• Finish the new deck, with seating and steps
• plant about a dozen trees. We bought the biggest we could get becuase we probably won't live long enough to see them grow to maturity
• Installed new sod in front of the house
• and finished unfencing the corrals and replacing the old posts with new ones PLUS electric wire. (the posts appear a bit 'staggered' because I drove them with a post-driving machine and rocks often forced the posts out of line or to slant in order to avoid a large rock.

Almost Finished

FINISHED WITH SEATS

SURE GLADE I DID NOT HAVE TO DIG THOSE HOLES!

TRYING TO SET THEM STRAIGHT.
THE SOUTHWEST WIND DID NOT HELP IN FOLLOWING WEEKS.

RESULTS WITH THE SPRUCE TREES.

QUALITY CONTROL!
ANDERS IS FIRST TO USE THE NEW DECK.

NEW SOD

FENCE DECONSTRUCTION
(THAT PART WAS FUN)

FENCE CONSTRUCTIONL
(NOTE THE FOREMAN IN TEH PASSENGER'S SEAT.)

A LITTLE OF THE FINISHED PRODUCT.

Antelope Meadows Projects

There has been a lot of activity around our house on Antelope Meadows Road, Ennis, MT.
This activity includes several projects. The first and most prominent, at this point, is the replacement of an old deck, which had nails working upward out of the wood, many splinters (latent and actual) and many boards that were springy and un-level.
Javier Ramierz, our House Doctor Extrordinaire, removed the old deck with chain saws in a matter of a couple of hours and put all the scrap in a HUGE steel, Oversized Dumpster.... the kind they have at local community trash collection sites. Melynda, Henry and Anders arrived one day (before it was full) and Melynda said, 'GREAT LAWN ORNAMENT, HENRY!" That same day, since the dumpster was empty, Anders and I played inside and banged on the steel sides.
Anyway, the ACTIVITY with the new deck has not been as ACTIVE as we would have wished. The carpenter is very good, very thorough, but not ALWAYS on the job. (I think he shifts his time between jobs and we get about three days a week (if we are lucky.)

Needless to say, we have had a number of weeks where access to the usual doors to the Living Room or the Bedroom has been a bit of a challenge. I used the opportunity to try to strengthen my left leg by stepping up about 2 1/2 feet . My hope has been to be able to step into a stirrup and mount a horse with less clumsiness than normal. Mogie, on the other hand, found that sitting down on the threshold and then scooting herself into the house, was what worked best for her. The dogs have had relatively little problem except when all the stringers were up but NO decking on them. The dogs tried tight-rope walking to little avail.

Below are some shots of the new deck under construction. As I write this, the decking is 50% complete. Eventually we will have two sets of steps going off the deck (the original location at the main entrance and a new set opposite the French Doors to the Living Room,) the sides will have all benches with some wooden planters interspersed along the benches. We will fashion some sort of retaining structure to keep little people ON the deck where they are in sight.

More on Grizzlies

The day after we returned from our trip to Yellowstone we had an opportunity to attend a great lecture by Charlie Russell (not the artist, but the 'Bear Guy.") It was held at the Museum of the Rockies Auditorium in Bozeman.

Mr. Russell talked at length about his aspirations to show that Grizzlies are not necessarily the mean spirited "Ogre's" that public AND professional lore makes them out to be. He feels that it is the human element that leads us to approach all relations with bears as necessarily hostile; we expect meanness and we respond with fear, cruelty and our own brand of meanness. Charlie showed us many slides depicting his experiences with bears, first as a bear guide in British Columbia and then during a decade or more in Northwest Russia. He went there because of the supply of grizzlies AND an absence of regulations controlling what humans can, and cannot, do when interacting with bears. He actually bought orphaned cubs from organizations that had them caged, where they would have died had he not taken them into the wilderness. Almost all of them survived. I think he said the only one he lost was killed by a predatory male grizzly.

Here is a quote from an entry on Charlie's website that seems to explain his motives and his conclusions; ".......I have devoted much of the last 45 years to understanding bears; figuring out what they are capable of with regarding getting along with us. The answer is that they have no problem at all as long as we follow a few simple rules. I found that if we manage food and waste so bears can't get into it and treat the bears with respect , they are wonderfully easy animals to get along with. Teaching respect does not mean being violent with them in any way....."
The operative word, which he stressed over and over is '(mutual) RESPECT."

There is no way to describe the entire lecture and the fascinating experiences Mr. Russell shared with us through his talk and his many slides. The best way to learn more about this great AND successful experiment is to view Charlie Russell's website. Some of the photos showing him with bears are truly amazing, and humorous. He has produced a 95-minute DVD, which I purchased but have not had time to view. I plan to soon. A photo gallery
shows a number of slides of his Russian camp and lots of bear shots. If you see these links, I hope you will enjoy and gain a greater appreciation for the REALITY of bear/man relationships.
(Caution AND RESPECT seem to go hand in hand.) (Some photos from the website follow;

Grizzlies and Wolves

A week or so ago Mogie and I traveled over to Yellowstone Natl Park for a couple of days.
Our goal was to look for any kind of game animals in the Lamar River Valley, that is in the northeast corner of the park. We stayed over night in a cabin at Pine Edge Cabins in Silvergate, MT, which is just one mile outside the NE park entrance. That put us about 20 minutes from the center of the best area for possibly seeing game.

On our way over, we got to the Lamar Ranger Station, which is also the location for the Yellowstone Institute where there are a myriad of courses during the summer season.
As we neared the area we spotted a number of cars on the side of the road and a ranger obviously directing traffic. We pulled up to ask what was going on. He told us that there was grizzly bear feeding on an elk carcass about 100 yards away. As we looked for a place to park, a car right by us pulled out so we pulled in and had 'front row' seating in the center of the line.
Sure enough, about 100 yards off the road we could see the brown back of a bear. Unfortunately, it was mostly hidden by some fairly tall sage brush. There was a wide variety of Optical equipment set up along the road with spotting scopes, binoculars and fancy cameras with long lenses.
We watched for quite awhile, and I shot a few photos trying to catch him when he raised up a bit. Some of the results are below. His size and his claws are something to behold.


Here is a Raven leaving the scene. No Scraps.

We were struck by the breadth of his head.

After leaving the Grizzly, we headed to our cabin in Silvergate, investigated Cooke City, where almost nothing was open yet (too early for the season) and picked up a frozen pizza for supper. After we consumed a half-cooked pizza, we went back to the Lamar to see what the evening might provide. Sunset is around 9 pm this time of year (mid-May) so we had some light left.
Believe it or not, not far from the previous sighting place, we saw a big grizzly wandering up the river bottom land, about a mile away. It seems reasonable that it was the same bear that we had seen earlier in the same area. He was too far away for pictures but with a spotting scope and good binoculars we could see him well. He gave us quite a show, too. As he wandered along, periodically, he would sit down on his rump, lean back, grab his hind foot toes with his front foot and rock back and forth. It was like he knew we were all up on the hill watching him and he was showing off. One lady said, 'He is doing is Pilates.' That was a real treat.

We headed back to the cabin for a good book and some sleep. Next day we headed out about 6 (and many others were well ahead of us.) On our way to the Lamar, we spotted a lone grey wolf, eating something on a gravel bar. He, too, was no more than 150 to 200 yards away and in full view. We were the only ones there. However, we could not get any pictures because there was no place to pull off the road to use the camera.

We drove about 10 miles and found a group of people watching for wolves at Slough Creek.
They had seen one adult and a cub before we got there, but we were out of luck.
As we left that area, Mogie spotted another grizzly on a far hill. He had a coyote hanging around, hoping for a free lunch.

We decided to go back to where we saw the first wolf. When we got there, several people were watching what was apparently another wolf that had been feeding at the same river bar.
We finally got a few good looks at him, quite a ways away, as he ran through the willows. He was a different wolf and was almost black.

All in all, it was a great visit and we are ready to go again.