Raise the Roof

Our neighbors who live across the street and down one house from us have been raisin' the roof today--literally! They took their roof off of their house this morning. It looks so funny!!! They are doing some pretty hefty remodeling on their home, and they took the roof off of their garage yesterday. But today when I pulled onto the street, the main roof of their house was sitting in their front yard! Tonight all of the neighborhood kids have been climbing on the roof that is now on the front lawn. I bet they're hoping it doesn't rain tonight! :-)

Today was technically a work day, but Mark gave me the day to just hang out at home to do some writing for the exhibits I'm putting together for Stagecoach Inn and the school house at Camp Floyd. I love research and writing days when I can just be on my own schedule and not have to worry about driving out there (although I did miss seeing the mutant deer today). Since I was at home for the day, I got to go meet Dr. Rugh for lunch at BYU. She is sooooo nice! She is seriously one of my favorite people in the whole world. We had fun catching up on things, and I got to see her cool new office in the SWKT. She has a sweet view of the whole valley.

I have something random and funny to write about before I head to bed. The other day when Mom, Dad, and I stopped at the Territorial Statehouse in Fillmore, they had a hallway full of pictures of early Fillmore settlers in the basement of the building. One of the pictures was of . . . Susan Black!













Hmmmm, she does kind of look like the pioneer version of THE Susan Black, don't you think?

I'm It!

I know I already did a post today (which, I might ad, you probably shouldn't read right before you eat potatoes for dinner), but I got a blog tag from one of my favorite people in the whole world, Missy Stowell! The rules for being tagged are as follows. I must:

1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
5. Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.
6. Let your tagger know when your blog entry is up.

Okay, so I need to write six random things about myself. Here goes:

1. I can only focus out of one eye at a time. (I have peripheral vision out of both eyes at the same time, but I can only focus out of one or the other because of an eye condition called Strabismus.)
2. I want to have a cat named General Sterling Price someday.
3. My mom used to babysit Gerald and Betty Ford's kids (yes, THE Gerald Ford, as in President of the United States).
4. I have never been to California.
5. One time when I was at BYU I met Steve Young, but I was in such awe that I was literally speechless. I shook his hand, but I seriously didn't say anything because I couldn't get anything to come out.
6. When I was little, Dan Rather was on my list of favorite people.

So now you know a little bit more about random me :-) Now I need to think of six people to tag . . .

Mutant Deer and Petrified Potatoes

There is a sign along Highway 73 out to Camp Floyd that says, "Frequent Deer Crossing, Next 15 Miles." And I know it's true because there are always a lot of dead deer along the side of the road. I never get a very good look at the dead ones, but sometimes I see some live ones running through the fields--or running across the road. Every time I see one, I say to myself, "What the heck kind of deer is that?" The deer out by Fairfield look like something you would see on an African jungle safari (not that I've ever been on one, but they look like gazelles you see on NOVA specials about Africa). The Fairfield deer don't have regular horns. From what I have seen, it appears that the males have two horns that point backwards. They totally look like gazelles--only with shorter horns. Hmmm, maybe it is some kind of mutant deer that developed as a result of the nuclear waste that's out at the Deseret Chemical Depot in Toole?

Today at Camp Floyd I got to whip out the power drill (my favorite power tool) and fix some of the artifact display cases in the museum. I know I complained about all of the hard labor that Mr. Riccio made us do when we were preparing for the museum exhibit in the spring, but I must admit that I learned quite a bit from him, and I was able to employ some of my exhibit construction skills today. The coolest part about it was that I got to remove the artifacts from the display cases. There is a cool pocket knife that belonged to one of the soldiers. There are some buttons and other uniform decorations, as well as a lot of bullets and percussion caps. The two artifacts I am not too fond of, however, are the potatoes. Yes, "historic" potatoes. Calling potatoes "historic" is another way of saying that they are shriveled up, dry, nasty, disgusting food particles from 1858 that were buried in the dirt for a long time. I decided today that the potatoes have begun to petrify. I have no idea why we have the petrified potatoes on display in our museum. They are totally gross. They are about 1/8 the size of normal potatoes and they are totally black. Unfortunately I had to remove the potatoes today when I was fixing their display case, so I carefully scooted them around using a long screwdriver. I could tell just by softly touching them with the screwdriver that their consistency is nasty to the max. But, in the end I didn't have to actually touch the potatoes, and the artifact cases look really cool. Mark was very surprised at my sweet handyman skills :-)

I think that the potatoes are probably toxic and I bet if someone touched them their skin would turn black and shrivel up.

Fantastic (?) Five

Sundays will never be the same. Today I started my new church calling which is to teach the CTR 5 Primary class--which consists of 5 five-year-olds. Needless to say, it is an energetic bunch, and by the end of church I am pooped. :-) The kids are really very cute, but I have one rambunctious child who seems to inspire rowdiness in the others. Her name is Nauvoo (seriously, that is her first name). She is extremely smart but very out-of-control. She talks constantly and loudly. Hmmm, I'm going to have to figure out what to do about her. Greg suggested Benadryl-coated candy :-) The other kids are, for the most part, very well-behaved. I totally love the Faragher twins! They are adorable and very sweet and quiet.

Today for primary class we talked about saying "thank you." The kids were kind of bored until I whipped out the bandages to reenact the story of the 10 lepers (only it was five lepers for us). I also had them write thank you notes to people (well, they can't really write yet, so they drew thank you notes to people). Somehow, during the course of the lesson, we got off on the topic of ice cream. Ashley Faragher said, "My dad says that the ice cream man is very mean and that all he wants to do is steal our money and make us fat." :-) I'm sure there will be many good times and funny five-year-old stories in the near future.

The Art of the Self Portrait

There is only one thing that I am better at doing with my left hand than my right hand--that is taking a self portrait photograph. I have tried taking self portraits with my right hand, but it just doesn't work as well. The self portrait is a very specialized kind of photography which allows one to photograph themselves with up to two other people without needing to ask for assistance from outside parties. It is especially handy when one is traveling by oneself, as it is usually embarrassing to ask someone to take a picture of just you by yourself. Sometimes it is also awkward to ask someone to take a picture of you with other people--so the self portrait solves the problem. It is also a necessary skill to have when no one else is around to take your picture. I mastered the art of left-handed self portraiture in Mississippi. There are three types of self portraits--

1. The Single:
This is especially useful during those times when you are sightseeing by yourself and find yourself, say, on top of the 80-foot-tall observation tower at the Grand Gulf Military Park in Port Gibson, Mississippi--without anyone else in sight. How are you going to document the fact that you were there? You take a self portrait. It's okay that you can see your arm reflected in your sunglasses.

It is also a useful skill for when you are driving around by yourself in vehicles belonging to the United States government.






2. The Double:
My best buddy Angie and I found this type of self portraiture very useful when we visited the Louisiana Country Music Hall of Fame and Tomb of the Unknown Confederate Soldier State Historical Park in Louisiana--because there was literally no one else around to take a picture of us. (Visitation isn't too heavy at that particular park.)

Angie and I also used "the double" self portrait when we were on top of Little Round Top at Gettysburg in January. Because it was -10 degrees outside, we were the only ones brave enough to be out and about. And you must have a picture of yourself at Little Round Top!

Mom and I have employed "the double" self portrait technique countless times on our different escapades throughout the country. When we visited the American Gothic house in Eldon, Iowa when we were driving home in May, we were the only ones out there. But you HAVE to have a picture of yourself at the American Gothic house! So luckily we have perfected the art of taking pictures of ourselves.

Mom and I have even perfected the art of including signs and other distinguishing background features in our photos!







And of course there is this famous double self portrait which was the first picture ever taken of Greg and me. There was no one out at the Lincoln Log Cabin State Historic Site that day besides us, and when I suggested to Greg that we take a picture together, he wondered how we would do it. I said, "We will take it ourselves"--and he laughed! Little did he know that I am a professional self portrait artist. He quickly learned that the best photos are the ones you take yourself.

3. The Triple:
This is the most difficult form of self portraiture and features the maximum number of people that can be self-photographed while still being able to see all faces clearly. My first real attempt at "the triple" was when Mom and I went to Melrose with my good friend Kate before I left Natchez last summer. There was no one around to take our picture, so we took it ourselves, and it was a surprisingly great photo!

This is also an efficient way to take a photograph of you with your two CUTE nieces when you're having a sleepover and are awake long before anyone else in the house!






Lindy, Mom, and I recently employed this technique to record our visit to the Sarah Granger Kimball Home in Nauvoo. It worked great--except that there is too much of my head in the picture!

So, this weekend when Mom, Dad, and I had our fun trip to St. George to visit Grandpa and Grandma F. T., we tried out "the triple" self portrait technique.

Our first shot was at the Brigham Young Winter Home in St. George, but we accidentally kind of crowded Dad out of the photo.




But we did a little better when we went to the Jacob Hamblin home in Santa Clara. Mom and I decided that we need to take Dad on more trips with us so that he can be in more of our self portraits!



Mom, Dad, and I had a wonderful trip to St. George--it was especially fun to see Grandpa and Grandma since I hadn't seen them since I got home from school. We were going to go to the temple yesterday, but I forgot my temple recommend :-( It was in my other bag from when we were in Nauvoo. I was very sad about this, but we made the most of it and had a fun day going to different historical sites in the St. George area. We also spent the afternoon reading through the page proofs for my book. I decided that my book is much more fun to read than it was to write! Once I get the proofs sent back, they will do one more edit of the book, then they will start the printing process. The book is scheduled to be available in stores on November 3.

Today Mom, Dad, and I had a fun drive home from southern Utah. We made some stops in Cedar City, Beaver, and Fillmore to take pictures of historic Mormon architecture for the paper I am going to be revising as part of the requirement to receive my master's degree. We also stopped at the original State Territorial House in Fillmore which was very cool. It is a state park, and they have the building open for tours. If the capital of the state of Utah had remained in Fillmore rather than Salt Lake, the configuration of Utah would indeed be very different than it is today! We had a wonderful trip and were able to visit Grandpa Taylor and Grandma Cathy on our way home today. Good times!