day 4, saturday, road trip 2021

Posted on October 2, 2021 by is there any more pie?

Yes, I know I skipped Day 3 but tonight at dinner I drank this.

Day 3 had been fantastic and I have pictures, but I drank tequila tonight and can’t feel my face. I will tell you about it tomorrow.

We went to dinner at Oscar’s Bar and Grill in Limon, Colorado tonight. It had been a long day on the road.

I’d had to get cranky with Banjo Man a few times. He thinks the GPS works immediately. He thinks the search engine on my phone works perfectly and easily in response to any question that pops in his head. He is frustrated when he has to wait more than ten seconds for an answer.

He demands directions from the GPS and then doesn’t believe them.

He eats constantly, meaning he wants me to find his chocolate or sunflower seeds or Triscuits or oyster crackers every fifteen miles or so.

I told him I felt like a vending machine.

He knew he’d pushed me too far today and wanted to make it up to me and go to dinner. I honestly would have been fine with my Honey Nut Cheerios again, but Banjo Man insisted.

I ordered a shot of tequila and a glass of ginger ale and lime. I mixed them.

It went straight to my head. Which was a very good feeling after 380 miles on the road with the Tapeworm.

Back at the hotel parking lot I tried to unlock the truck by pushing the security alarm button. Banjo Man’s face???? Priceless! I laughed til I cried, doubled over in front of the brand new La Quinta by Wyndham, while the alarm blared.

By the way, they accept pets here. One couple has two WOLVES. I kid you not.

So, Colorado. Land of weed and pet wolves.

And John Denver, too, and doesn’t that feel like a hundred years ago?

Good night.

Posted in family, road trip, travel | 4 Comments

photos from day one of 2021 trip east

Posted on October 1, 2021 by is there any more pie?
Hiway 200.
Snow on the Missions.
Clark Fork River.
Anaconda in the morning.

Posted in family | 2 Comments

day 2 of the 2021 trip east

Posted on October 1, 2021 by is there any more pie?

Thursday was much better than Wednesday, but then again we had nowhere to go but up.

Here’s a deer in the parking lot of our motel.

After the non-breakfast in Anaconda and after I pulled myself together, we hit the road. First stop? The Madison Buffalo Jump State Park. There was a long gravel road, which upset Banjo Man (“Does anyone know what a grader is????”). But a pretty significant bluff from which buffalo plunged to their deaths for thousands of years loomed in the distance.

This is our third buffalo jump. We find them fascinating.

The most interesting part of this one was that circles of stones used by the Indian women for their tipis were still visible.

We didn’t hike up to the top, but it was a beautiful day for walking the lower trail.

Later on we stopped in Bozeman to tour the Museum of the Rockies. We had hoped for more Plains Indians exhibits, but the dinosaurs were the best we had ever seen.

Successful Christmas shopping.

The day ended with dinner at Montana Club in Billings, a restaurant very close to the lovely, spacious, warm Hampton Inn. I spent some time in the pool and the hot tub before crawling into bed and sleeping for nine hours.

Banjo Man ate his weight in BBQ ribs and declined a swim, preferring to check email and get in bed early.

Things were definitely looking up.

Posted in family, road trip, shopping, travel | 2 Comments

day one, to anaconda

Posted on October 1, 2021 by is there any more pie?

We got a late start on Wednesday, but it was actually sooner than I expected.

I have some great photos, but I have spent half an hour trying to load them here and nothing works. I used to be able to download photos from my Kindle to WordPress, but I suppose those old brain cells are dead.

Banjo Man unfortunately stumbled upon the Trip advisor website back in August and discovered all sorts of tempting reasons to stay there.

I argued, but I lost.

Which resulted in driving too many miles when we were already exhausted, staying in a funky, vintage, very cold motel, scarfing down pizza at 8:30 pm and “eating” at a supposedly fantastic breakfast place that didn’t actually serve breakfast.

I am not kidding. Why didn’t we find a real cafe? You’d have to ask my husband.

The only way Banjo Man could stop my tears was to sincerely promise never to go on Tripadvisor again.

So…the Mission Mountains were topped with snow, the sky was blue and the road long. We shared a turkey sandwich from the Pantry as we left Clark Fork and headed towards fall and winter in New England.

Stay tuned, as I pick all the other motels…..

Posted in family, road trip, travel | 4 Comments

one last look

Posted on September 28, 2021 by is there any more pie?

Yes, I am looking for arrowheads.

No, I did not find any. Which is sort of the way it goes. But it was good to be down at the beach for one last time before we pack up and leave tomorrow.

Leaving is always difficult. We shipped fabric and books home instead of hauling them around in suitcases. We have given away the food that we won’t eat and have taken all the garbage to the dump. The refrigerators are shiny clean and look remarkably organized. My last chore tomorrow morning will be to vacuum and then wash floors.

Packing wasn’t easy. Why is it that the older I get the less makeup I carry and the more medical supplies and medications I have to stuff into various ziplock bags? It is quite shocking. My under-the-seat rolling airplane bag has morphed into a mobile first aid station.

Our plan is to drive to Anaconda (Montana) tomorrow. It’s about 275 miles from here and will take us about 5 hours or so. For some odd reason Banjo Man was surfing Tripadvisor.com and discovered that Anaconda has a funky vintage motel, a highly rated pizza restaurant and a patisserie for morning breakfasts.

So nothing would do but we spend the night in Anaconda and sample its delights.

I will keep you posted as to how that goes. I’m a little skeptical, as I prefer the Best Western in Missoula with its next door MacKenzie River Pizza, home of the pear and balsamic flatbread.

But Banjo Man wanted an adventure, something different, a slo-mo road trip that would encourage whimsical stops along the way to Nebraska.

I have been left to wonder what exactly it is that we haven’t seen in 51 years of traveling the West.

I will let you know how this works out.

Posted in family, lake, road trip, travel | 2 Comments

end of summer, beginning of fall

Posted on September 25, 2021 by is there any more pie?

And so it ends for another year.

Will built a driftwood fire Wednesday night and we cozied up to the flames and enjoyed the evening. Thursday would be a busy day as the guys put away all the chairs and tables and kayaks and made many trips up and down the steps, up and down the hill, up and down the driveway.

A huge job was completed. But before all that work happened, the three of us sat on the beach and enjoyed the lake and the mountains and the warmth of the fire.

Yesterday Will, looking forward to grad school and to hearing some live music, flew back to Austin. The house is quiet this morning.

Too quiet.

We are so spoiled by having our grown children and our grandson here at the lake this summer. Oh, what a good time was had by all!

And I have the future Christmas card photo of all of us to prove it.

Posted in family, lake | 2 Comments

there is always more pie

Posted on September 24, 2021 by is there any more pie?

Wednesday was the day that Will and I headed to town for our annual Pie-Hut-And-Shopping afternoon.

First stop: Pie Hut. They offer a soup, salad and pie combo that is irresistible. Will had the peanut butter chocolate pie and I settled for a simpler chocolate cream.

Then it was on to the Antiques Marketplace for browsing. And Evans Brothers coffee for buying. And to Foster’s Crossing, another antiques store that’s good for roaming around.

While I finished cliimbing under a sewing cabinet to inspect it’s innards, I heard a southern accent as a man explained to the cashier, “I’m from Nashville. I love it here.”

Another man explained, “He’s a famous songwriter. He’s written hundreds of songs and a lot of hits.”

So I had to find out who it was, of course. The songwriter, a small, wiry man in his 60’s, was asking the woman behind the counter if she’d heard of the song, “I Love A Rainy Night.”

So I started singing the chorus. He laughed and came over to put his head against mine and sing the song with me.

Hilarious.

Who was he, you ask? Even Stevens, he said introducing himself. He wrote for Conway Twitty and George Jones and Clint Black. He and Eddie Rabbit wrote over 900 songs together as writing partners.

And yes, he’s moving to Idaho. To build a house on the lake.

I love pie and I love a rainy night.

Posted in books & music, family, food, just for fun, lake | 3 Comments

storing up for winter

Posted on September 22, 2021 by is there any more pie?

These are my acorns.

With the demise of brick-and-mortar fabric stores in New England–they are few and hard to find–I have been loving my trips to town to a real fabric store.

I am loading up.

And I have no fabric-shopping guilt. After finishing fourteen quilt tops and using yards and yards of fabric last winter and the winter before that, I am ready to make more quilts once the temperatures plummet. And I have room on my shelves for the new treasures.

Sewing keeps me sane. But you already know that.

Tomorrow I’m going back for one more bit of shopping at Selkirk Quilts. I plan to spend a lovely long hour or so imagining the possibilities in all the fabrics I see and touch.

Posted in lake, quilting, shopping | 2 Comments

bounty

Posted on September 21, 2021 by is there any more pie?

Dancing Mandolin Player has always been very generous with the fruit produced by her many pear, apple and plum trees.

Aren’t these beautiful?

I made two pear tarts and I also dried slivers of pears, a treat I used to put in the boys’ lunch boxes.

On Sunday I used the last of the pears to create a pear-walnut-gargonzola salad.

Here’s the link to the recipe:

Pear Salad with Creamy Walnut Vinaigrette

It seemed decadent to have a huge bowl of pears to play with, because I love pears almost as much as I love peaches.

The guys have taken plums up to the cabin for snacking. I wish I had time to can some, but the days are going by way too fast and I have all I can do to clean out freezers and refrigerators and closets and drawers and cupboards.

The rain has stopped and the sun is going to shine for the rest of the week, which will make packing up easier as the kayaks and chairs go back into storage and my little garden of pots will be readied for winter.

Will ate the last pepper in his eggs Monday morning, but I will grown more next summer now that I know I can.

The canning jars have been put away for another year and the canner will be loaned to a friend for her salsa-making next week.

Jars of peaches and apricots line the cupboards, applesauce is in the freezer and jam is ready for gift-giving.

I love this time of year.

 

Posted in family | 6 Comments

oktoberfest, 2021

Posted on September 20, 2021 by is there any more pie?
Banjo Man loves to volunteer to serve food at Oktoberfest.

Saturday was the most rain we’d had in one day since January 12. At least, that was what the Spokane weatherman said on his broadcast Saturday night.

We needed it. Desperately. But it certainly put a damper on the annual Memorial Community Center fundraiser, Oktoberfest. Still, we sold 100 bratwurst dinners (and oh, was that a tasty meal!) and who knows how many hot dog dinners.

The dining area looked beautiful, with gorgeous flowers, gourds and blue-diamond table runners. Tents and heaters aided sales of beer and wine and covered the DJ and his equipment. There was music, along with lots of conversations between neighbors who hadn’t seen each other in a while.

But did we need rain? Yes, we did. More than one glass of beer toasted the end of the drought and the end of the fire danger.

And no one went hungry.

Posted in food, friends, lake | 1 Comment