Gobble till you hobble

Thought you all might want to see the silliness of the grandkids from Thanksgiving.

A Very Big Squirrel

This is a journal entry I found the other day while perusing old entries dated August 12th, 2006:

When I was 8 years old my family and I went to a state park for the afternoon. It was the kind of park with picnic areas and large ponds with all sorts of fish that you could see from on top of wood walkways that labrynthed their way over top of the ponds, standing some 7 or 8 feet above the surface of the water. Each type of fish had his own sign that told you everything about him like what he eats, where he lives, how to identify him and so on. Well, it was nearing the end of our excursion at the state park when my brother Jon and I were wandering through one of the picnic areas that we spotted the biggest squirrel we'd ever seen! We both started off chasing it, not really knowing what we'd do if we caught it; but luckily childhood is not often plagued with frivolities like thinking ahead. He was a quick and nimble fellow but we were young, full of energy, and eager to formally introduce ourselves to this new potential friend.

We were gaining on it and were some 10-15 feet behind it when my brother stopped and said to himself in a quiet voice, "That's not a squirrel, that's a skunk." By that time I had nearly caught the poor creature; who, despite my excitement to be his friend, turned and sprayed me. It was only after it was too late that I learned my folly. I had to rinse off in the sprinklers in my underwear (a horrible humiliation I'm sure), and then ride home in a packed car with all the windows down. The smell eventually wore off with the help of some tomato sauce but two lessons stick with me from my experience that day.

First, once you've been warned make it a point to warn your neighbors. My brother had discovered the truth about the curious creature but hadn't the time to warn me. If he had, he would have saved me from embarrassment and the family from temporarily corroded nasal passages, but he also would have prevented me from learning this second important truth. One that my father repeatedly reminded me of during my teenage years when choice of friends becomes critical to spiritual well-being. He would often tell me, "If you run with the skunks, don't be surprised if you start to smell like them."

Artist's rendition of a proud, young Travis if I had actually caught the 'Very Big Squirrel'.

Rural Childhood Oddities

The other day I surprised Michelle by bringing home 4 bales of straw with which Pete and I could build forts, railroad tracks, reenact circuses or death-defying stunts that we see in movies, etc. Michelle, having grown up entirely without the privilege of having a haystack on hand, failed to show the appropriate enthusiasm at me having made our first born's childhood complete. As I was explaining to her the endless possibilities that these straw bales offer our budding child I came to the realization that these life-size LEGO's may not be the common staples of every childhood as I had simply assumed.

With this foundation of my youthhood development shaken, I started to reminisce back to discover more and more things from our joint Millet childhoods that were probably unique to a rural Idaho childhood if not unique to a Millet childhood altogether. Some of these memories include every winter hitching up a rope and sled to the four-wheeler/Chevy cavalier and being towed, (sometimes on top of the sled, sometimes beneath it), around the racetrack that is Steve Clapier's field until our fingers froze around the rope; or every summer stripping down to swimming suits and irrigation boots to go play in the run-off puddles that would accumulate waste water and diesel on either sides of the shop, (so far I have not sprouted any extra limbs or gone blind so I think the side effects were minor if any.)

One of the childhood toys that our 3 year old is currently going without were the dismembered Deer/Elk/Carribou legs that were often found prancing about in the yard. It turns out that there is no meat in the lower leg portions of these animals meaning there is nothing to rot and therefore, excellent children's toys (honestly, I can't understand how Fischer Price has not come up with the "My First Dismembered Appendages" collection to add to its line). I've illustrated the deer skinning process that yields the 4 legs per deer as best as I can remember it from my childhood (you'll probably have to click on it to get the full details).

So what does a child do with dismembered deer appendages? Well ... anything they want! Play fetch with Moose or Bonnie and Clyde or Oreo (depending on the decade), play fetch with younger siblings, sword fight, pretend to be a frolicking deer in a mountain meadow of clovers, bludgeon things, make about 26,000 left-footed footprints and then try to convince the Benson kids that there's a herd of feral deer right in their backyard! Below is an artists rendition of one of the many possibilities:

...and now you know what to get Benji for Christmas.

P.S. Sorry Brooke, I spent 3 hours shading your upper baby lip and it still didn't turn out.

Disclaimer: Several animals were killed in the making of this memory.

Is that the temperature outside?

On that same trip to St. George, Brooke was in the backseat again. We were just outside Cedar City in a snowstorm. Brooke looks out the window through the falling snowflakes and sees a large sign for a gas station. The sign read that gas was $1.29 and Brooke says "Is that the temperature outside. 129 degrees?" Only in Dixie can it be 129 degrees and snowing at the same time:) You are too funny Brooke!!!

"I wish... for webbed feet"

Mom, Brooke and I were traveling down to St. George for some reason, I'm sure just to thaw out, but nonetheless, we were making that delightful 12 hour drive. I was driving, Mom was in the passenger seat and Brooke was asleep in the back seat. It was 11:11 p.m. so I announced, "its 11:11, make a wish." Brooke pops up from the back seat and say with a very profound, ready to solve the world's crisis, voice "I wish... for webbed feet." Mom and I started laughing so hard, I'm not sure how we did not wreck.

Party Animal

Here's one of our favorite pics of Nate from Jon and Sheila's wedding. I don't know what kind of sorrows a 4 year old has but he's sure drowning them in his Martinelli's. Between Nate and Pete's Sparkling Cider problem and Taiz's preference for Bud Light, it seems we have a whole family of lushes.
~ Travis

Clueless Halloween

I remember when I was in middle school I really wanted to go trick or treating on halloween. I think mainly to show off my awesome costume, but I wasn't allowed to go alone. So dad dressed up as a vampire and took me around Marsing. This seems like a small thing, but remeber this was middle school my not so slim days and I went as clair from clueless so dad was walking me around to all the ward members and his friends houses with his 160lb daughter in a skimpy unflattering school girl outfit. As teenagers I thought our parents were supposed to embarrass us, but I am pretty sure I embarrassed him, but he took it like a trooper.

~ Brooke