Journal: Big Wind Storm and the County Fair

We will be having our 37^th anniversary on Friday, the 15^th of July.  There is no traditional gift for the 37^th anniversary, at least not in the U.S.  And no modern-day alternative.  In Spain and Italy, however, the traditional gift is stone.  I should give Larry a pet rock, maybe?  In Germany, it’s aluminum.  I know, I know!  I’ll give him a bumper!  

Speaking of anniversary gifts:

A friend’s parents recently had their 67^th anniversary.  She tells the following story:  “My dad forgot their anniversary one year.  My mother went out and bought an expensive grandfather clock from him to her.  Daddy didn’t forget again.  LOL”

Somebody spotted the outline of my lens cap in Larry’s shirt pocket in this picture of my brother Loren, his brother Kenny, and Larry.  After inquiring into whether it was a can of snuff (of course she knew perfectly well it was not), she suggested, “You could just tuck that cap behind your ear the way newspaper reporters did with pens back in the day.”

“Ah ain’t got African elephant ears, you know!” I retorted.  “Mine are little dainty Asian elephant ears.  No lens cap could possibly stay put behind them.”

Our neighbors had LOUD fireworks last weekend.  Scared the cats outa their livin’ hides.

I made supper for my brother Tuesday afternoon, and he came and picked it up:  a bagel dog, corn, mixed vegetables, pasta salad with cucumbers, blueberry streusel cake, strawberry jello, chicken breast filet, and pierogies with gravy.

I ordered a suit and shoes from eBay that I plan to wear to Kurt and Victoria’s wedding.  I found another pair of shoes on eBay and a pair on Amazon that I ordered, too.  My shoes are all getting old and worn out.  Some are 20 years old!  I used to wear 3-4” spikes... no mo’, no mo’, no mo’.  2 ½ is as high ----- wait.  I need to measure these.  Ooooooo... they’re right at 2 ¾”.  :-O  Well, they’re very comfortable; they should be all right. 

The suit and shoes arrived in just a couple of days – and, wonder of wonders, they fit!

A friend, upon seeing these pictures, wrote, “You better be careful; you will steal the bride’s show.”

I replied, “First, that suit doesn’t look the same on me as it does on the manikin.  Second, wait’ll you see Victoria’s gown!  Ain’t nobody gonna steal her show, huh-uh, nosiree.”

((...pause...))

“Unless maybe it’s the flowergirl,” I reconsidered. 

I’ve gotten some pretty good bargains on eBay.  Those shoes are $80 shoes, and I got them for $29.99, with free shipping.  The suit was $44.99 – and the tag says $199.00.  This is more than I usually spend on clothes.  I rarely buy them, and when I do, I usually get them at the Goodwill.  Nevertheless, I got a good deal, don’t you think?  And it’s for my baby girl’s wedding!

Kurt and Victoria’s wedding will be the evening of October 30; it’s usually fairly cool that time of year here.  In fact, I remember one Halloween about 25 years ago when we had a rip-snortin’ blizzard and wound up with 3-4 feet of snow.

I hope that doesn’t happen, because Kurt and Victoria are heading out to the mountains for their honeymoon.

A big bad storm suddenly moved in early that evening, bringing rain and strong winds of 70+ mph. 

Larry called; there was no power in the shop.  He was stuck in one of the bays, and would have to use a ladder to get to the auto-door-trip thing so he that he could manually lift the door and exit the place.

Something crashed out in the garage ... or maybe up on the roof?  I looked out, but didn’t see anything any more amiss than usual.  Maybe the walk-in door just blew shut?

A good part of Columbus was without electricity, including Super Saver, where Victoria was working.  At one point, the managers herded customers and employees alike into reinforced backrooms; and then when the worst of the storm had passed, they sent the customers out groceryless, on account of the lack of power to run the cash registers, and closed the store.

Someone took this photo from Super Saver’s parking lot; Victoria found it online.

We still had power out here at our house, but just ½ mile to the east at Teddy and Amy’s house, they had none.  The kids considered it all High Adventure. 

They were putting together wildflower bouquets to enter in the county fair the next morning, arranging the flowers by flashlight and having lots of fun.  However, when the lights failed to come back on and Jeffrey was unable to bake something for a fair entry, he was a bit sad about it.  But they took mulberries instead, and received a couple of ribbons for them.

Norma sent a text – the church steeple was down!  She and Lawrence had broken branches in their yard, and the crabapple tree had bitten the dust.

Teddy wrote to say that the steeple had punctured a hole in the roof over the nursery, and rainwater was ponding inside.  Men were hurrying to cover the hole, as more rain was expected during the night.

“Do you need lanterns or flashlights or anything?” I asked Teddy.

He said he didn’t, as he was already blind from the kids’ lights.  hee hee

Once when our power went out in town, some 23 years ago or so, I went around lighting lanterns – the kind with mantels in them – and turning them up ’til they were really bright. 

Then, “I can’t see!” said Lydia, who was about 2 ½.  I turned around – and discovered she had on a big ol’ pair of dark sunglasses.

I said to her, “Maybe if you took your blinders off...”

She removed them, and made that funny face of hers, trying not grin, half embarrassed...

And of course all the other kids were laughing.

Here’s a photo Bobby took right after band practice Tuesday night, as the storm was moving in.  The setting sun, just under a dark bank of clouds, was shining on the steeple, which they noticed was swaying in the wind.  It was probably just a few minutes before it came tumbling down.

By the time the storm moved out of the area, branches and huge trees were down all over the place.  Some had snapped right off at the base; some were broken up higher; and some had been totally uprooted. 

I tried looking up weather-related things online, and found a note someone had written on Twitter Weather:  “I love this weather we are having here in Columbus, Nebraska.”  I thought the person was being sarcastic – and then realized the date was August 25, 2014.

Lydia wrote, “AccuWeather said the wind speed was 5 mph, with gusts at 7 mph – while I could hear it roaring through.”

It was 70 mph, not 7.  On the Telegram’s website, it said that crews from Albion and Fullerton were on their way to help restore electricity in Columbus.  Transformers had blown out and sparked fires here and there.  They had a lot of trees to remove and poles to replace.  A house south of Columbus lost its entire roof.  In Tekamah, the same storm blew through with 78 mph wind gusts, and caused a lot of wind damage.

Remember the motorcycle accident I mentioned in last week’s letter?  Well, in looking for news about the weather, I learned about the crash, which had happened on the highway north of our house:  The motorcycle had struck a deer, sending driver and passenger, both in their 60s, to the hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.

So the LifeFlight was evidently not related to the motorcycle accident.

Wednesday morning, Amy texted me:  “We took our flower arrangements to the fair, and saw your things... so the kids and I are discussing whether or not to tell you what you got, or to let you find out on your own.”

I promptly wrote back, “I vote, TELL ME NNNNNNNNNNNOOWWWWWW!!!”  Then, “Do I get a vote?”

I must’ve gotten a vote, because she soon wrote and told me:  The Mosaic Lighthouse quilt made State Fair Choice, and so did the Chopkey Hexagon origami pillow.  The pillow and Jacob’s Hershey cow placemat both got Grand Champion, and the other things I entered got first-place ribbons in each of their categories, too.  Wheeeee!!!!

I spent a good three days last week editing photos and working on a photo/music DVD for my brother’s birthday; he’ll be 78 August 9^th.  He certainly doesn’t look it or act it; he appears a good 20 years younger.  The photos are all edited, and I’m making good progress on the DVD.

My great-niece Rachel, Susan’s little girl, found a toad at our Fourth-of-July picnic at Pawnee Park.  Sometimes it’s the little girls who are made of snips and snails and puppydog tails.  It was so funny... Rachel and her entourage were traipsing around all over the park (at least, all over that part of the park we were occupying), chattering like young magpies, rushing hither and yon on all manner of ILGB (Important Little Girl Business).  They’d go trippity-tripping right smack-dab through the middle of a ball game, never mind whether it was football, basketball, or softball --- and the game participants would pause the game until the oblivious little girls skipped through and on out the other side, whereupon the game would resume. 

I’m laughing all over again, just remembering the spectacle.  One little boy, just rounding the bases, skidded to a halt (as did the man who was preparing to throw the ball), waited until the gaggle of girls passed, and then gathered himself together again and loped to the next base.  The man with the ball politely waited until it would be too late to get the little boy out ... and then threw the ball.  Little boys who pause for little girls in the middle of base runs deserve to make it to the next base free, don’t they??  :-D

It was bright and sunny that day, and somewhere over by the cornfield to our north, a bobwhite was whistling cheerily.  I always wonder how many birds get killed in such bad storms as we had Tuesday night.  The baby robins at Hannah’s house were still in their nest the next day; but not all would have been so fortunate.

Ladies on an online quilting group were discussing their ancestry.  One, whose ancestors seemingly came from every country in Europe, called herself ‘Heinz 57’.  hee hee

I’m Scotch, Irish, English, German – and a dab and trickle of Indian.  Pocahontas was my 13^th-great-grandmother.  When one of my uncles worked up the genealogy and discovered that little tidbit, some of the relatives were horrified.  The rest of us were delighted.  “No wonder we feel like going on the warpath now and again!”  That kind of thing.

That night, the band, directed by Bobby, played several patriotic hymns at the end of the service.  It’s so inspiring, to hear them play.  I love those old hymns.

When we got home and pulled into drive, we saw what had probably accounted for some of the crashing during the previous evening’s storm:  two big branches are broken from the maple tree.  One landed on Larry’s mower; the other is still stuck in the tree.  Not until Saturday afternoon did Larry notice that the large branch that made up half of the Black Locust tree had come down, too.  The trunk splits into two large branches a few feet up, and one of these branches broke some distance up.  The tree is totally lopsided, tall and thin, now.

Late that night, lightning and thunder could be seen to the northwest, and it looked as though another big storm was bearing down on us.  But, as sometimes happens, the storm split narrowly and went around us without spilling a drop of rain.

Thursday, Loren worked long and hard helping his neighbors cut up trees and branches that had fallen.  The next day, the neighbors returned the favor and helped him.  Saturday, he helped Larry and Jeremy cut some big walnut trees in Fullerton.  Some of the trunks Jeremy took intact; he will cut them as needed in his sawmill.  Just one of those large walnut trunks, uncut, is worth $300-$400.

It’s too bad so many beautiful trees were ruined and houses and vehicles damaged; but, on the bright side, Loren now has enough wood to last him through next winter.  The walnut that Jeremy couldn’t use in his sawmill will be used in fireplaces.  Walnut is a hardwood, and burns hot and slow, thus not coating a chimney with creosote like softer pines and suchlike do.

I tried calling Loren as usual at about 2:00 Thursday afternoon, but couldn’t get him.  I figured he was outside working, and didn’t worry – until about a quarter after five, when I called Lura Kay so she could worry with me.  She had some goulash and lima beans for Loren, so I headed to town to pick it up and take it to him, and to make sure he was all right.  He called as I was backing out of my drive; he’d just come in after a long day outside with chainsaw, pickup, and trailer.  He was tired.  He can’t ever seem to remember that he’s almost 78 years old!

A lady from the county fair called that evening and asked me to be there Friday evening, as someone from the Telegram was going to take pictures of the award-winners.  If only this Blepharospasm didn’t make my eyes behave all goofy, especially when I’m nervous.  :-P

I wrote to Hester:  Wanna go with me to the fair to have me pitchoo tooken?

She did.

Friday morning, it suddenly occurred to me:  I totally forgot to enter my Christmas tree skirt in the Fair!  Good grief, I’m getting early-onset Alzheimer’s.  Sigggghhhh...

Ah, well; guess that means I have something already done and ready to enter in the Platte County Fair, circa 2017. 

That evening... ♫ ♪ We went to the animal fair; ♫ ♪ The birds and the beasts were there!  ♫ ♪

We first walked through the stables and barns, looking at all the animals.  This year, there were three bears on display – two big ones and one little one.  The little guy kept trying to work up a game, but the big one – maybe his mother – was hot and bothered.

In the horse barn, one of the horses seemed determined to give us a Vaudeville act, and seemed as crestfallen as a disappointed child when we walked on.

By the time I got home, I was half starved half to death, so I cooked a little Schwan’s chicken pot pie.  Mmmm, those things are yummy, to say nothing of quick and easy.  They have a foil liner in the box in which the little pie comes, so they can be cooked in the microwave and still brown nicely.

A customer’s quilt arrived Friday morning; she’d made it with the same Amazing Grace panel I used for Caleb and Maria’s quilt.  So, after a bit of discussion as to quilting design, thread color, and suchlike, I loaded the quilt onto my frame and got to work.

The lady also wants me to bind it and make a machine-embroidered label.

I went to Loren’s house Saturday afternoon, because he’s been having troubles with his front-loading washing machine.  It stalls out, and then the door won’t come unlocked.  He finally got it unlocked after asking the people at Sears what to do, but the clothes were dripping wet.  He called, asking if I could spin his clothes in my washer, but I was washing clothes, too, and it would have been an hour before that load was done.  BUT! – I knew he had another washer, a top-loading one, that he and Janice had gotten five years ago when the same thing had happened with this front-loader.  So I went to show him how to set it on Drain and Spin.  I think he’s going to like using this washing machine better, as it’s mechanical rather than computerized.  Janice only used it one or two times, while the other one was repaired.

She liked the front-loader better, because it was easier for her to remove heavy, wet clothes and put them straight into the dryer beside it.  But in the many reviews I’ve read online, most say the top-loaders get clothes cleaner.  Plus – the door won’t lock and refuse to unlock.  It has a straight-forward dial, no electronics to figure out or to go bad. 

Home again, I mended some pants for Loren, then got back to my customer’s quilt.

It was after midnight when I finished the quilting, took it off the frame, and trimmed it. 

The lady did a wonderful job piecing and putting the borders on; it was all smooth and straight, a pleasure to work on.  And it was her very first quilt! 

This morning, I picked up Lyle and Jeffrey and we went to Ag Park to collect our things, including ribbons and money, from the fair.  Lydia’s bag that I’d entered as a surprise for her got a First Place ribbon, and she got a couple of dollars.  Small town stuff – no big monetary prizes; but it’s fun to win, nonetheless.  If you enter enough items, you wind up with a few shekels – maybe even enough to buy a pack of gum!  We picked up Hannah’s and the children’s things while we were there, and dropped them off.

I was glad to see one of the county fair coordinators in the large building where everything had been on display, assisting those who were picking up their things.  Last year nary a soul had been around except two other individuals getting their belongings.  Everything was free for the taking in open cupboards and on tables.  But today, the cupboards were locked, and the lady was keeping an eye on all the things that were waiting to be picked up.

For the nine items I entered in the fair (pictured throughout this letter), I got $16.50.  So you can clearly see, it ain’t no way fer ta git rich, huh-uh, nosireee!  Fame’ll have ta do me.  

It’s been worth doing, because last year’s quilt caught the attention of my former Home Ec teacher from Jr. High, a sweet lady that I always loved and still do.  You probably remember that she invited me to do a Show and Tell at her local quilting group.  I decided to draw an appliqué pattern to give the ladies – that was the irises, first flowers for my Buoyant Blossoms collection.  Then I thought those looked a little too difficult for beginning appliquérs, so I drew the three-heart mug rug design.  

Well, I never want anything to be wasted effort, so I decided to go on making flower blocks, and turn them into a free ‘Block of the Month’ – while setting each previous month’s block at $5.00.  I’ve made about $400 selling patterns since then!  

That’s the Ripple Effect – pennies at the fair... a small amount for my presentation at the quilting group (I was surprised about that)... and now a whole lot more in the selling of patterns.  Plus, I have Big Ideas:  I hope to put it all together into a book, complete with photos and poetry, a recipe or two, and other possible projects using these patterns.

The money wasn’t so great, but the inspiration is good!  

Kurt and Victoria must both be on their respective lunch breaks at the same time.  They each have smartphones... and they are evidently texting, because Victoria’s iPad is over there in her case (gesturing vaguely in the direction of the living room), and I can hear it whistling periodically as Kurt sends her a text (which comes in on both devices – the smartphone she has with her, and the iPad here at home).

Dorcas’ husband Todd accidentally wrote to me this morning:  “Just as long as you know I love you more.”  I considered politely ignoring it so as not to embarrass him (after all, the only time he ever wrote was to tell me Dorcas and the new baby were doing well)... then thought if he was answering something Dorcas had written, she might feel bad if she thought he hadn’t answered her... so I wrote back, “I think your note got misdirected.  I am happy to know you love my daughter, however!”

He replied, “Sorry, new phones.”

So I wrote back, “It’s okay.  At least you didn’t smack me in the back with a chunk of banana like Larry did my mother, way back when we were dating!”

He answered, “That’s funny.  You have yourself a good day!”

Here’s the rest of the Flying Banana story:

There was Mama, standing at the sink washing dishes.  And there were Larry and me, sitting at the table having a snack.  Larry decided to show me how he could snap a banana in half by giving it a mighty yank.

Except... it didn’t snap into two pieces.

It snapped into three pieces.

The small middle chunk flew across the kitchen and ker-splatted into Mama’s back.

She neither flinched nor moved a muscle, other than those she was already moving to wash a dish.  She didn’t turn around or acknowledge the banana (or Larry) at all. 

Larry’s eyes grew quite large, and he turned alternately pale and then red.

Looking back, I’m quite sure Mama was trying hard not to laugh.

It’s hot and muggy here.  Again, another storm was expected, but it bypassed us to the east.  Lightning was putting on quite a show.  I should’ve grabbed my camera and tripod and tried to get some good shots of it, but my camera is way over there (pointing toward my room) and my tripod is in the Jeep.  I’ll do it... mañana.  Another day.

Now to put the border on my customer’s quilt!

I’m anxious to get back to the pieced border for the Buoyant Blossoms quilt.  It’s all cut and ready to sew... but I’m going to make the DVD first.

No, first, I’m going to make myself a fresh pot of French Vanilla coffee!

,,,>^..^<,,,       Sarah Lynn       ,,,>^..^<,,,