gone Fishing

This is how my Saturday went: Slept till 9:00 a.m. (so nice), then I did house chores and spent a lot of time in my kitchen. I baked whole wheat bread, chocolate chip cookies and beans.
Once I got done with my cooking, my husband and I took off to do a little fishing.





This is Silver Lake. It's about 20 -30 minutes drive from our home.




That's me with my pink fishing pole:





We enjoyed relaxing outdoors and taking in the pretty view. We didn't catch any fish though. We suspect that we don't go at the right time of day.
It's time to get serious and wake up early some morning and go when the fishies are hungry.



Here's a duck family that swam around us for awhile. We also had a muskrat swim around our dock.

Clark Reunion

Today my husband and I went with my parents to the Ezra T. Clark Family Organization Meeting at the Old Rock Church in Farmington Utah. This is the oldest running Family reunion in Utah.
Grandpa Clark died in October 1901 and this has been going ever since. It seems to be well attended each year as there are thousands of decendents.
His first wife(Mary Stevenson Clark) had eleven children; nine of which had children.
His second wife (Susan Leggett Clark) had ten children: eight of which had children.
I come through the only daughter (Mary Elizabeth) of the first wife (Mary S.).


This is the Old Rock Church:



This is a mural in the original chapel of the first primary. The boy in the black suit, standing by the pulpit, is Amasa Lyman Clark. He's one of Mary Elizabeths brothers. Dad calls him Uncle Amasa even though it's a couple of generations back.
In case it's not totally obvious, that's me in front of the mural:



This is what is written in the corner of the mural:




The picture on the right is another grandfather (Joseph Lee Robinson). Below his picture it say's First Bishop (1849-1851?). The Clark's and Robinson's were tightly entwined families.


I found this in another glass case in the same hallway. It's a picture of Amasa Lyman Clark as an adult with some awards:


The meeting was held in a new chapel that was added to the building. The original chapel is too small and is often kept locked up.
Up on the screen is a photo of Ezra T. Clark:


In the cultural hall there was a large display of artwork created by several different Clarks. I think I see where my older sister got her super art genes from. I can be creative and I do have a firm appreciation of art, literature and music but the true art ability escaped me.
Just for the sake of record keeping here is an outline of the program:
Opening hymn America the Beautiful
Invocation By invitation
Welcome and Family roll call David M. Clark
Salute to Dr. Russel B. Clark by his son Dr. John Clark ( Dr. Russell B. is 109 years old and currently the oldest living Utahn)
Genealogy Update Ralph Clark
Family Discoveries Presentation by Glen Clark
Speaker John Meese "Utilizing Computer for Genealogical Research"
President's message Antone Clark
Closing Hymn (pg. 300)
Benediction

Cranberry Honey

Fathers day is just around the corner. I've been on a recession budget lately and I wondered what I could do. I've been practicing my self sufficiency skills and it seemed quite fitting to extend this to making gifts.
I must say that I'm pretty happy with these jars.
I know that canning was a common practice with my grandparents, but it's still somewhat new to me.

June hail storm

This is life in the Rockie Mountains:

My garden really took a beating.

Dangerfields visit

This will be a short post. I'm counting on my daughter, Susan, to make the complete report. She took lots of pictures while she was here.
We were very pleasantly surprised when Sue told us they would be coming up to see us this week!
If I have the time line correct; on Monday morning (Memorial day) Sue and Ben decided to travel from their home in the Phoenix area to Utah. They called us on the phone to see if they could come. It's not hard to guess what we said to that! So, they were on the road by that afternoon. That's what I call spontaneous! So fun.
They stayed in Vegas over night and got to our house on Tuesday evening.
Wednesday we must have stayed mainly here at the house (It's all a busy, happy blur).
Thursday we all visited Sues grandma and grandpa (my mom and dad).
Friday we took the kids to a splash park and Thanksgiving point gardens.
Saturday Sues husband, dad and brother went golfing. Sue, the kids, Susans little sister and mom went to a Pixar movie called 'Up'. It was about an old gent who ties balloons to his house and floats away on an adventure.
Susans brother lives in Provo, but he came up several times to see her and to play scrabble and other games with us.

Mom and Dad with their great grandchildren:



Emma watching two squirrels in gr. grandpas tree:



Being a grandma is neat. I just love these little people.

Rhubarb Pie

Today is Memorial day. So far, Joe has worked on the front yard by putting in a dirt barrier around the flower bed. After our big project of ripping out bushes there was nothing to keep the dirt from just washing away. He also added fresh topsoil to the depleted ground.
I made a Rhubarb pie. Dad let me pick some rhubarb from his garden. I put the extra in the freezer, so I can make another one.
I made the crust from scratch and it seems to be pretty flaky. Hooray for success!


While the pie was cooling, Joe and I played a game of Scrabble. We're possibly going to Thanksgiving point to walk and buy flower bulbs.
Thanks for sharing your rhubarb dad!

Memorial Weekend

Hello to my family and friends. Monday is Memorial day, but dad was wise and decided to visit cemeteries today instead and beat the traffic. It was a good plan because there was plenty of traffic anyway, and lots of people with the same idea. There were already lots of pretty flowers and decorations on graves.
I was really happy to get to go along on this venture with my parents. My husband came along too.
I took a small notepad and pen and tried my best to learn more about some of my relatives. I also needed to be reminded as to where some of the people are located.
Most of the pictures that I took will stay on file for my own use. I'll just show a few that may be familiar to some of you.

We started in the Salt Lake City cemetery, as it's very close to mom and dads home. The very first site that we went to was my younger sister; Laurie. We lost her last summer. It's very strange to comprehend.
I have to mention that Dads car trunk was filled with flowers for several graves. He also brought stakes and string to tie up the flower pots. This way they wouldn't fall over.

We also swept and decorated his step-moms grave in Salt Lake. Dad's mom, Beth, passed away when he was 12 (She's in Logan). Later grandpa Smith married Lela, who happens to be Beths sister.
Grandmas plot has 5 pots of flowers on it now; very pretty. I didn't take a picture of her stone though.

Next we drove to Farmington. If cemeteries can be loveable, this one is it. It's small and homey. It's also filled with relatives.
Here we tended to my Great Grandma Robinson; Beth and Lelas mother. Then we went to an older section and took care of people that lived in the 1800's. I'm glad they wrote journals, because I have a good sense of who they were, and I really wish that I could meet them and talk to them.

Here's one that I really like:



This is my other favorite person; Ezra T. Clark. His first wife was Mary S. Clark. We come through her.

These were awesome pioneer people. Their lives were hard, but they were history makers.
Like I said, I'm keeping this post simple. I'm leaving out several grave sites and there are really good stories about the people.

When we finished in Farmington, we drove up to Logan. It's really pretty up there.


I think this first picture is of Grandpa Smiths parents. I didn't write this one in my notepad, so I could possibly have it wrong.
We filled a bucket with water to wash off the stones. Birds must like to hang out on them. Then we swept them off really good. Dad carefully tied up flower pots, everywhere we went. They brought about 15 pots.


Here's my nice mom:


I like this picture the best, because it's just me and my dad. We're standing behind Grandpa Calvin Smiths spot, after we cleaned it up.
I really liked my grandpa Smith. He passed away when I was about 14, but I remember him perfectly. He was very good to us.
We were raised in California, but many summers we came up to Utah to visit grandparents. When we stayed at his house he sometimes walked with my sisters and me down to the local ice cream store and bought us cones. He also kept gum in his pocket for us. When we were really little he would sit in a big chair and let us put curlers in his hair. He was pretty neat.

Before leaving the Logan area, dad took us to the college for some Aggie Ice cream. This ice cream thing is a really good tradition!!
By now the day was getting long and we stopped at Maddox restaurant for the best late lunch ever!! It helped that we were all starving by now.
I had Salmon, mashed potatoes, veggies, rolls, and Shrimp cocktail. It had jumbo shrimp. It's my new favorite menu item.



I thought for sure mom and dad were ready to get rid of us by now, but instead they had us go in their pretty backyard. I picked some of dads rhubarb so I can make a pie on Monday. They're also going to have lots of apples this fall. Yum.
I don't want this to be the longest post in the world, so I'll end here.
Have a nice memorial weekend and don't forget about your loved ones.