Oh Pioneers

New Age Pioneers in striped socks.

All of us from the Park ward at one time, now all of us have moved on, and have a similar sense of style.

Here's all the Sister Missionaries and Pioneers.  Or the Fire Sisters, as we are called, because we do most of the tumble weed burning. 11 of the 13 couples gathered early on Monday to do our trail ride.  We typically don't use the hand cart trail, but have auxiliary trails that we drive side by sides on, to get to various venues where we interact with the young people on the trail at planned times.  This is our only chance to ride the trail the hand cart trekkers will be pulling on.

I had to laugh when I saw the model of the Crumps side by side.  Of course Dad and I don't own one, as about 6 of the couples do, so we made do with a Mosida owned side by.

It was a chilly morning as we started out, and it would take all day.

This is our young service missionary, Ian Reed, from Highland.

and off we go.

We stop at each venue and talk about what we do.  We also had lunch at one of the sites where the trekkers have lunch.

That night we hook up with the Kews to attend a lecture by a birder, and ran into Kaisa Lee.  She has been so sick, that I was surprised.  She said she doubted she would make it through the lecture, but had come to support her boys who are fledgling birders ... (hahaha)

The Birder, Noah Strycker, is a pioneer in the birding world, as he started the tradition of seeing the most birds in the whole world year.  Prior to this birders informally competed like in the movie, the Big Year, with Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson, competing in a single country.  He made a map, and found a sponsor in his publisher, who paid for the travel etc, for the year.  About $60,000.

He packed only these items, in a small back pack of which you can see the edge on the left.  This way he saved time not picking up checked luggage, and it was enough. On the left of the coat in the upper right hand corner, is a sleeping bag liner that he used to sleep everywhere, visiting cold climates in the summer. 

It was a bonus when flight cancellations left him with just 6 hours in Iceland, 12 midnight to 6 AM in July, and his guide there (Who he connected with on the internet, as he did most of the guides in various countries) was happy to go birding for those 6 hours, when he thought he wouldn't be able to see anything, after he had flown out of New York City.  

Here's his route.  He was super entertaining, and we loved the lecture ... almost he persuadeth me to be a birder.

He and Steve visit after the lecture.  I bought his book called Birding without Boarders, and expect to be highly entertained.  By the way, we also saw Carolyn and her Birder husband, Dennis.

Our task at Mosida was to burn the tumble weeds that gather on the fence lines, I'm pretty sure the pioneers did a fair bit of this.  They gather, on both sides, because the wind compacts them together against any impediment, then they stay put as they are interlocked. Dad with Blair Andreason, the former 'owner' of our turkey vultures and a firefighter with the Payson fire department.

 

Ron Crump is enjoying the work ...

 and even more so as the flames climb higher.  As the retired manager of Payson Power company, back in the day, he was the perfect guy to watch out for the power lines above, so we didn't melt any.

Here we see the Childs with Sister Crump behind.

The girls, Sisters Andreason, Crump and Child, learn to lean.

Elder McNeil and Sister Child make it an art form.

Dad makes leaning look manly.

Here Dad and I use our pitch forks to do the Gothic American stance ....

But I think, even without a pitch fork someone else has a stronger resemblance. 

And this is what firefighter Andreason saw after his leg felt sort of 'hot'.

Time for lunch... After which Dad went back to work on burning more of the tumble weeds, I drove out with him initially, but couldn't stand looking at the dead baby mice everywhere ... the other girls, 'the farm girls' had made fun of me .... 'You can tell she wasn't raised on a farm'  The saddest casualty I saw was a raccoon running away from the fire with a rat tail (Having lost all the stripy fur) and a singed bare bum.  The only way we knew he was a raccoon is that one of the farm raised Elders said he ran like a raccoon, and he'd seen his patched eyes. 

I got a ride back to the lodge and spent the afternoon raking and picking up broken limbs and twigs off the poplar trees around the 'park lawn', with three other people.  Now that is work I do know how to do. 

We drove out to the Cast Iron Bistro in Eureka afterwards for some good pioneer food.

I loved the old cast iron pioneer stove worked into their stone wall, now I'm looking for cool cast iron pieces for my memory wall in the fairy garden.

 

I finally got to DI on Thursday morning and met this nice lady in line.  She said she makes recycled clothes because the average American throws away 70 pounds worth of clothing and other textiles a year.  Whoa.  For being an oldster I thought it was amazing that she is pioneering in this new area of recycling.  I thought her drawstring pants were so fun.

Here's a detail of the bottom. She sells at a boutique in Las Vegas, because, as you know, Utahns are cheap.  I like to think of it as fiscally responsible.

After work  on Wednesday, I stopped at Macey's and bought groceries to make dinner for a few Antique Mall friends the next day.  I have really been working to pioneer my vegetarian Mexican menu to make it appeal to my carnivorish friends.  So when I got home I made 2 kinds of enchiladas, to be cooked the next day, and some vegetarian tamales.  I was up so late wrapping them, that it was 11, and they still had a half hour to cook, and I was dead tired, so I turned off the heat and went to bed.  After all 'no meat' to spoil.  I would steam them for the other half hour before my guest arrived the next day, and voila! Fresh Tamales

.

I set the table before heading to work on Thursday.  I brought the watering can flower arrangement down from my bedroom because it matched, and took it off when it was time to eat.

At work on Thursday, I worked on putting out more Fleaology reminders on line.  Then had Pat come in to work the last two hours so I could finish dinner.

Here they are, Chuck, Mary and Keith.  It was a conversation at work with Mary last week that brought about this dinner. Mary has bought a lot of things from me over the years, we both love Romantic style, English Cottage Style, and antiques in general, though she is more boho than I am.  I told her I wanted to see her house, because I love everything she buys.  Then she said, she'd never seen my house ... and thus it began.  I invited Mary and all of the four people who were working that day, and Keith's partner, that left us at 7, so I thought Pat, who everyone likes, would make a great 8th.

Pat, Nikki and Chuck.

Keith tries out the 'fainting' couch in my room.

Here we all are, thanks for taking our picture Dad.

Mary, Pat, Keith, Chuck, Rosemarie, Nikki and Me.  It was sooo fun!!

Oh, and my version of the Mexican dessert, Tres Leche Cake, which means three milk cake.

Charlie was hanging out with her besties too!

Nikki brought over her second load for the upcoming sale, and the garage was full, so she had the right side, and my stock is on the left side.  We would both set up Friday afternoon.

Dad and I spent the morning loading the van, then my friend Wendy came by and we met Nikki at the farm to set up ... this is mine.

Here's Wendy setting up hers.

Here is the first installment of stuff I bought from Wendy that night.

Then it was off to the Eva's play, Curtains.  She plays a director who took over her husband's job after his untimely death.  Her daughter is also a member of the cast.  She was fabulous.

Others had come the night before, but we enjoyed Titan, Becca and Hannah as co audience members.

This young woman played the love interest of the star of the show.  Her grandfather is one of the dealers at the antique mall, who comes in most days ... how fun is that.  Eva was in the main 5 actors, and Clint's wife, who has seen it the night before, said Eva had been fabulous!!  Yes she was.

Afterwards we went to a new (to me) faux ice cream place.  It was amazing, only naturally occurring sugars, no refined sugar, and the toppings sounded like a grocery list for a health food store ... Its was called Everbowl. 

I got up at five on Saturday and headed to the farm.  It was still dark, but I had promised to be unencumbered by 6 to help other dealers, so I parked the car to shine its headlights into my booth and finished my pricing.  It was soooo cold, it had frozen over night, so we were pleasantly surprised with a lovely warm spring day, after the sun came up.  Here Kathy (one of three) came early to wash her dishes.  She runs a wedding prop business, and no one has wanted china wanted china, so she dug into her stash, most of which was dusty, or dirty from storage, and washed them,  She also sold other props which have not been chosen for weddings lately.  She said she did 400 weddings last year.  For $350 you go to her 3,000 square foot warehouse and choose whatever you want.  So she brought in items that haven't gone out for a couple of years to sell here. 

I was amazed to see this late Victorian hall sink, like the one that would have been in the upstairs hall of our house, where the computer desk now stands.  We tried to think of someway to use it, but in the end said goodbye.  It was  oak with a two piece bowl and counter (marble) and was only $65.

Wendy ended up buying these pastel wicker chairs ...

and I bought this french hen set ... for the parlor.

LaVern is first in line at the gate ... 

I went over and chatted with them all, until opening.  When I first came up I asked them all what time it was and in unison they all said 10!!  I just laughed and asked to have someone let me know when it was 10.  A lady with a watch hurried and changed it and showed me, and everyone laughed.  I felt like a stand up comedian.  Finally at ten this lady raised her phone, and they were off.

Of course I have made so many friends in the antique business over the year.  This is Shirley from my craft group, who I first met at Treasures.

We had 24 dealers on our list, 4 cancelled in the previous three days, including a man with covid.  Thank you.  Then we had 4 or 5 no shows, one who showed up and introduced himself, and said they were on a trip, and didn't get home as soon as they thought they would. So we carried on with just 16 dealers, after I had advertised 25.  Oops.  At least everyone had a ton of stuff, that was good, everyone over pilled the 12 by 12.

Here I am with Katie Cooper (Davis), as was, one of our missionaries, who is the niece of the home owner here, her husband stayed in the car with the baby. 

Then there was Dad's cousin Brenda, it was fun to visit.

This guy bought Steve Kew's tennis racket.  He said he owned an identical one in the 70's and is going to make it into a fishing net.  I guess that's a thing.  Steve got a kick out of it anyway.

Then there was Emma Quigley, one of our missionaries, who came along with her boyfriend and his parents, she had not known it was my sale.  How fun is that ... we made plans for another missionary dinner in May, and Emma's going to do the asking, and bring a Finnish dessert to go with the Salmon soup.

Here she is with her main squeeze.

Dad surprised me by bringing lunch, something I hadn't thought of, because it was always at my house. Pioneering this new market at the farm has been so much work, but it turned out to be a success, and we have already chosen July 16th for our next sale.

That night we went to a missionary's reception, and it turns out the bride is in the same ward with Pat and Julie Martin from our ward in Orem.

Here we are with Elder Harlan Stevens and his fiance, Elena Borrowman, she is from Virginia and they dated before his mission.

This is me with two random missionaries , Nathanael Cheney and Nicole Peterson.

The bride and groom now Jennifer and Oliver Harlow. Her father is the brother of a man with whom Steve Kew had played with in a 3 person band, through out college.  Small world once more.

Here are all the missionaries who came, save the groom. They are left to right: Nick Larson, Nathanael Cheney, Harlan Stevens, Chase Kimball, McKennion Melton, Keaton Carter, William Lewis, Ashleigh Bicknell, Aubrey Christiansen, us, Gwyneth Allen, Will Hall, Nicole Peterson, and Andrew Hale.

Sam is keeping busy in Texas and made a roof over his back porch in one day ... Pioneering his building skills.

And the perfect ending for our day is this poster we saw at church, for the Elk Ridge stake, they are going on trek with us this summer.  In fact, Joe Weight, who served with Trevor on his mission in England, is now a Bishop in one of the wards, and we will see him on Trek in June.