Indoor Throwing!!

At the end of Football Season this past Fall, we bought a giant parachute at a military surplus store. We hang it from the steel rafters in the gym and throw the discus into it. It has worked great in stopping the discuses and has allowed us to continue throwing with snow on the ground. Jeff has progressed nicely this Winter. I think the first meet he will get to throw in is March 13th at Declo High School. I have no idea yet where Declo is, but I will find it on the map. We have not thrown outdoors yet and I am a little bit worried that we don't get to see the discus fly very far, so we don't know if he has developed problems with the release of the discus or not. In general, and for the short flight that we can see into the parachute, he looks very, very good for this early in the year. With his weight lifting class at school and the throwing repititions we have gotten in, it should be a fun year. If you have the time and can arrange it, it might be worth saving the weekend of May 22-24 in Boise this year. He has a good shot at placing very high at State this year. To the right is a pictures of Jeff throwing into the net.

Fun Memories!

We got some pictures of Mette this past weekend. I thought it would be fun to share them with you all. In her letter to Julie, she asked what foods I liked when I lived in Sweden and it got me to thinking. In Kalmar, I lived right over a bakery that made the most incredible sweet rolls I have ever eaten. I got to know the owners fairly well while I lived there and they sent me home with their recipe for the rolls, but I have never made them. I need to dig the recipe out and see if we can make them. They were basically a cinnamon roll with bits of chocolate baked inside it.

I also remember lingon berries on Swedish pancakes. When I say pancakes, I mean more like crepes than pancakes. Very, very thin with lots of eggs mixed in the batter. I put butter and Lingon berries all over them.

I also loved fruit soup. I have never liked soup both before or after my mission, but this was great. It was kind of like fruit kool-aid, but thicker and hot. I had a little old lady who lived in Karlstad that made it from scratch for us every Sunday afternoon and she would put ice cream in the bowl as well. It was wonderful.

When I lived in Hässleholm, we had a family there that would invite us about one every other week for dinner. The wife made a meatball in a brown gravy that was incredible. It was made by mixing both beef and pork with a little bit of egg and corn syrup to hold it all together. She said hers weren’t really Swedish Meatballs, she called them Not-Swedish Meatballs. I have incorporated some of this into my recipe for bar-b-qued hamburgers, those of you who have helped me make hamburgers know what I am talking about.

During my 2nd Christmas in Sweden, living in Kalmar over the bakery, the same bakery made a potato ball that was basically the size of a base ball. It was boiled potatoes mixed with flour and rolled out like bread dough with bits of beef and\or pork sprinkled in the middle and formed in the shape of a ball. They would drop the balls in boiling water and boil them until they floated to the surface. I don’t remember their name for the life of me, but they were definitely one of my favorites. I made them for a couple of years after Julie and I got married, but I totally forgot about them until last night reading Mette’s email.

Most of you know that as Mormons, we don’t drink alcohol. When I lived in Göteborg, (for my first Christmas in Sweden,) we pasted a little corner store everyday on our walk from the bus station to our apartment in Angered, (where Marabou Chocolate was made.) The owners of the market made and bottled there own Christmas drink that was great. He called it ”Glögg.” We would stop off and get a ½ liter bottle each every night. It was after about three weeks of buying this that we read the label and discovered that it had alcohol in it, not much, about 1%, but still had alcohol in it. We felt foolish, here were two Mormon Missionaries stopping off and buying a bottle of booze each night before going to bed.

Prior to my mission, I never really liked potatoes, mushrooms, onions, or garlic. I don’t know if it was the Swedish food, or my tastes changing as I was getting older, but I came home loving all of the above, especially potatoes and mushrooms.

Some of the things that I absolutely hated was Split Pea Soup. We had a little old lady in Karlstad that had us over for dinner every single Thursday (or was it Wednesday.) She said that it was customary for Swedes to eat Split Pea Soup on Thursdays. I hated it. It was all I could do keep it down and not throw it up. I hated lutefisk. There is nothing else to say about it except lutefisk is the worst thing any human can ever eat. It was never intended to be eaten by living, breathing people. The also had a rotten egg that they would eat as well. I can’t remember the name of it. It stunk horribly and tasted even worse.

This was fun remembering these things. Thank you Mette for the question and all of the thoughts and memories it has provoked in me.

Very, Very Odd Weather!

This morning when I got up to go to church, I had to shovel the driveway because there was about 8" - 10" of new snow that fell last night. By the time church was out, a bunch of the new snow had already melted away. The picture to the right is the thermometer at our house - it shows that it is 40.9 degrees (16 C) outside right now. Water is pouring off the eaves of the house and the streets are turning to mud. (Remember, all of our streets, except two are dirt here.) It should be interesting to see what is here tomorrow morning. If it continues like it is right now, tomorrow just might be icy all over.

We got a package from Mette's family yesterday. It was a variety pack of candies from Sweden. Jeff has had fun with them. I had forgotten how much better Swedish chocolate is than the typical chocolate here in the US. To the right is just a small sampling of what they sent. I asked him if he was going to take and share any of it in Seminary this morning (he only has Seminary on Sundays here.) He said no, then it would be all gone. I don't really blame him, they are very, very good. Tack så mycket Familien Ericsson!!

Mette - Our Exchange Student Took This.

Mette sent us two pictures she took last weekend looking out over the sunset in Southern Sweden. We get more and more excited for her to come with every letter we get. The Southern Swedish coast doesn't get as much snow as the rest of Sweden. They have a warmer flow coming up from the Mediteranian. It is cold, but not snowy and frozen. I love the pictures she took. I am looking to get a nice new camera before Jeff's first track meet this year. Hopefully, we can all have fun taking pictures this next year. I have decided that I really don't want to hunt ever again, so I think I'll take pictures instead.

New Pictures!

Here's a picture I took plast night. The colors are untouched - isn't that a beautiful sunset. Here is one of the reasons we love Idaho.

Mark & Dana - Here are the Appliances.

First, the Double Oven. The cut-out is the same as the cut-out for the following unit: (By the way, this double thing is heavey as heck. Jasona nd I struggled with it.)

http://www.thermador.com/product.aspx?product_id=774

The warming Drawer has the same cut-out as this unit:

http://www.thermador.com/kitchen-appliances-cooking_warming-drawers_traditional-warming-drawers_WD30EP.html

The Cooktop has the same cut-out as this unit:

http://www.thermador.com/product.aspx?product_id=604

Remember, these units are now three years old. They are virtually unused - The oven and warming drawer are unused - the cooktop has minimal use. Look these over - if you guys really want them, they are yours.

What the Wind does to Snow.

Other than blowing the snow and filling in low areas, (hence, our driveway, the walkway to our front door, sidewalks that have been blown out, and roadways,) the wind creates some of the most unusual shapes and formations. This odd shaped formation is in our back yard, where the wind comes off the Camas Prairie and hits the our house, dumping snow as it is whipped up and over the house, where it dumps a lot more snow. This wasn't here when we went to bed last night, but the wind blew all night and created this light cornice across the top of the drift that's been in the backyard since it first started to snow back in late November.

Snowed In!

Yesterday, Thursday, all of the roads leading out the of the Wood River Valley (where Ketchum, Sun Valley, Hailey, and Bellevue are,) were closed due to snow, wind, and drifting. I mean every single road. Julie and I had to spend the night in Sun Valley and Jeff was home by himself. We learned a lesson. We need to watch the weather all day and not get caught when it turns bad.

Our Recent Adventures.

The entire State of Idaho is getting so much snow right now that even the long-time Idaho residents are amazed at how much is dropping.I thought I would include some picture of the City of Ketchum in the snow. To the right is driving down 2nd Avenue (the street Engelmann, Inc. Office are on,) looking straight north at the Warm Springs area. I love when there is this much snow on the mountains how they look as if they were fluffy pillows. (Forgive me for sounding so stupid, but that's exactly what they look like.)

This is the first place I have ever been in my life that has an avalanche warning sign posted on the road. This sign is in the Warm Springs area of Ketchum. There were, in fact, three avalanches two weeks ago in Warm Springs. One that was large enough that it crossed the road and filled the road with snow, ice, trees, and debris that was 8' high. One of Engelmann's customers lost the garage doors and outside doors on the side of their house, along with filling their garage with snow and pinning their cars in the garage for two days.

To the right is a picture of a house that Engelmann is completing right now. I know I say this about every home that Engelmann has built, but this one is possibly my favorite. The owners did the interior designa nd decorations themselves. It is has clean, simple lines. They followed the Craftsman style very, very faithfully and the house and it's minimal use of wood moldings makes the house just beyond elegant. It feels warm, cozy and somehow soothing inside. I wish I could take everyone through it as you would all love the house. Also note how deep the snow is on the roof. That's some serious snow, in case you didn't already notice that.

The last picture is looking westward out onto the Camas Prairie from Fairfield last Friday afternoon. A huge storm was coming in and the wind was drifting the snow deep over the road. Tucked against the mountains to the west is the little community of Hill City. (If you remember, I wrote about it last Fall and included a picture of a prairie log home on the first of the Abandoned Idaho

Series.) It almost looks like a lunar landscape. I love the dark and ominous clouds out on the western horizon.

An Exchange Student for School Year 2008-2009.

After talking about it for several years, we decided that we are going to participate in the exchange student program. We are going to have an 18-year-old Swedish girl come stay with us for the up-coming school year. We are very, very excited and look forward to a very, very fun year. We are trying to arrange for her to arrive here before July 25th so she can travel with us for a week when she first gets here. We'll leave that night to travel to Oregon. Spend the weekend and Monday in the Willamette Valley and the Oregon Coast. On Tuesday we're going to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and see Thornton Wilder's Our Town that night. Then on Wednesday, we'll sight-see around Ashland and then attend A Comedy of Errors that night. Both plays will be outside in the Elizabethan Theatre. I am esspecially excited to see Our Town. I saw it on film my first year at The University of Portland. I can't wait to see it in person.

We will then travel back and spend more time with family and friends. On Saturday, we are rafting down the White Salmon, one more time. I have honestly lost count how many times we have been on the river, but we love it. (Everyone that is planning to raft with us, let me know right away so we can reserve the proper number of rafts.)

Back to our exchange student. Her name is Mette Ericsson. Her emails to us have demonstrated excelent English. She wants to participate in as many sports as she possibly can (only three here in our little 1A school,) and she sounds very excited to come. We want to make her as happy and have as much fun in the coming year as we can. The picture to the right is her older sister Nelly (on the left) and Mette (on the right.)

Abandoned Idaho in the Snow.

I haven’t updated the Abandoned Idaho segment for quite some time. Partially because I don’t want to get out and freeze my butt off and partially because I just haven’t been thinking about it much lately. I took pictures of this abandoned house in mid-Fall. I walked and crawled through the entire house. Little by little the old siding has been stripped off the house as well as the wall materials inside. We cover walls with sheet rock now - they covered the walls then with 1x6 t&g boards run at a 45 degree angle and then covered the walls with a wall paper of occasionally just white washed them. There is also an old, broken foundation for a barn just north east of this structure with a date writtne on a door-way entry. I can't for the life of me remember what the date was that is written on it.

More Snow and Cold!!

Sorry we have been away for so long. When we moved at the end of December, we lost the internet. We will be back up and running next week. It is quite a chore to be connected here as there is no DSL, T1, or Cable internet available here. They have a wireless sender stuck on the side of the grain tower in town and you have to 1) Be in direct line of sight to the tower (which we are,) and 2) Beg, plead, cajole, and almost bribe the owner of the sender to come up from Glenns Ferry and install and antennae at your house. We finally have an appointment and will be back up running next week.

Well, mid-week last week, we had extremely cold temperatures. We had four days in a row where the temperature in Fairfield did not come above -10 F (-23.3 C.) We had two days that dropped below -20 F (-28.9 C,) with the low being -27 F (-32.2 C.) This was followed by three big snow storms in a row. I’ve lost track of the exact amount, but we’ve gotten close to 36” on snow since Sunday evening.

With all of this snow falling on snow that had been frozen hard for a week or more, it created an unstable layer of snow on top of the hard-pack, which caused small and large avalanches all over the valleys here. One of our job sites had built an avalanche burm along the base of the mountain the house was being built next to. As the side of the hill let loose, the guys said the sliding snow hit the snow piled on the burm and launched the sliding snow into the air, scattering it in the wind like a shot gun scatters pellets. They said it was pretty cool. The owner of our company, Earl Engelmann, got trapped in his house for the second time this winter by sliding snow covering the only access to his house by 7’ to 8’ of snow and debris. It’s not just snow, it small trees, low branches, rocks, anything it picks up along the way down the hill.

Off to Jail I go: Next Tuesday, February 5th, I get to spend the day in the Elmore County Jail Facility. Engelmann, Inc. is going be building 4 County Jails in the next 18 months and so I am spending the day wandering through the latest facility to get a feel for the construction methods and procedures. It should be an interesting day, to say the least. I’ll take as many pictures as I can and post them next week.