Camping is Great!

I've been so busy since we got back from camping that I haven't had time to write. The camping was wonderful! The lake was so beautiful and blue, and not a mosquito in sight. The campgrounds were clean, and we just happened to luck out and get a spot that had firewood that was left by the people before us! A whole stack of really nice firewood. All we had to do was collect kindling, which was so readily available that I didn't even need to make fuzz sticks. We had a very enjoyable weekend, and when we left, we went to a ghost town that my husband's boss told us about. We almost didn't make it there. When Don told us about Bannack, he made it sound like it was just a hop, skip and a jump from where we were camping. It was 150 miles!!! As we are driving along, and driving, and driving, we almost turned around and went home, but I finally convinced my hubby that we were so close that it would be a shame to go that far and not go the last 28 miles. As it turned out, we were glad we did. Bannack is a really neat place. I took a mess of photos. We got there at the same time as a big group from Michigan, 30 people that I think were all members of the same family, so when it came time to pan for gold and garnets, it was really crowded, so we didn't do any panning, but maybe sometime we'll go back. It looked like fun.

As we were traveling to Bannack we passed through several little towns that almost weren't towns. They were so small, they didn't even have a service station. Some had schools, but some didn't, the same with churches and stores, and it made me think about life the way we live it. How many of us could live without our conveniences? When we left Bannack, we came home a different way. We went over to Dillon and then up the freeway. Now Dillon isn't a very big place either, but way larger than places like Jackson or Wisdom. There was an LDS church there, and that answered the question of where all the mormons in that part of the state went to church, but it would be a real drive for some. Would I be willing to go that far to make it to church on Sunday, or to get my kids to mutual, and what about seminary? And then I thought about my mom. There were times in my youth when we did live that far away, and my mother always made sure that we made it to church. I got to all my school activities and church activities and everything else that I thought was important, and my poor mother, she spent a lot of time sitting in the car reading a book. I don't think I have ever really thought about the sacrifice she made of her time, just so I could be part of whatever was going on.

When I was in high school, we lived 40 miles away from school and church. My dad had just retired from the Air Force and went to work for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, at a pumping station out in the middle of the desert. My mother spent a lot of time on the road for me, as well as reading a whole lot of books! At that time, we had Sunday School in the morning and Sacrament Meeting in the evening, so we made two trips every Sunday, plus she had Relief Society on Tuesday morning, I had MIA on Tuesday evening, and mom taught Primary, which was on Wednesday after school. Then there were all the ball games and dances and concerts, and practices and everything else connected with school. I don't know how she kept her sanity! I do know that we put so many miles on our cars that my parents were able to use it for tax purposes! (Because my dad's job was out in the middle of nowhere and required us to live there, mileage was allowed for a lot of things.) I wonder if I were in her shoes, would I be as gracious about giving up my time (and money) as she was? I don't think I ever heard her complain about all the hours she spent waiting on me, and they were considerable. I was your typical ungrateful teenager, who thought my mother's life revolved around me and that she was supposed to give up everything for me. Boy, have things stayed the same at the same time that they've changed! Teenagers are still selfishly ungrateful, but mom's are out of the home more and more, with less and less time to spend with their kids. Wow!!! Did I get off on a tangent, or what? Sorry!

Back to camping.....the weather was so nice. It wasn't too hot or too cold, no rain, just perfect, actually. And there were a lot of little squirrels and chipmunks running around, trying to find food to store away for the coming seasons. The birds woke us up in the morning, and I think we were the first ones up in our area of the campgrounds. We're pretty early risers normally, anyway, so it was kind of nice to be up before all the noise and rambunctiousness started. It's the best time of the day, especially in the woods. We watched the sun rise up over the mountain as we started our fire for breakfast, seeing it turn from a weak little light to a bright golden sun. We were right at the foot of the mountain, so it took a little while to reach us as it inched its way down the slope and through the trees. In the this photo you can see a momma duck and her little babies. They were so cute! My husband did some fishing, but he only caught one little one that he threw back. It was a good time all the same.

As I close today, I want to leave you with something I heard in church this morning. "Try to learn from the mistakes of others, because you don't have the time to make them all yourself." Hug someone you love. 'Night, Gramma G