Twenty-seven years ago, in 1995, one year after we moved into our house in Northfield, we added a cedar deck in the back. Gary took good care of it over the years, but it finally started to deteriorate.
June 2022
We decided to replace the deck, and we decided to use composite material that does not need to be stained every other year. It should hold up well – perhaps for the next 27 years…
Going…going…
Gone.
The deck will be a bit different. We had flower boxes built into our old deck, which I loved. Our contractor said he had not seen that design before…well, that’s because we designed it, and the carpenter, who build our deck back in 1995, built it how we designed it.
In summer I planted petunias in the flower boxes.
In winter I added evergreen boughs and lights in the flower boxes.
At our home in Burnsville, we also had flower boxes on the deck…so I’ve had flower boxes since 1980. I think I’ll miss them.
On with the new…
We kept the pergola Gary and our son built years ago.
Looking good.
We enjoy our deck, and use it a lot. We have shade trees that help keep it shaded for much of the day…however, there are a few hours in mid-afternoon when there is full sun.
Finished. We like it!
We like the way the deck turned out… and the openness it offers that we didn’t have before.
I was the benefactor of an unexpected gift recently. I can’t remember the last time I received an unanticipated gift. A gift, intended only for me…for no reason…no special occasion. A friend just thought of me when she saw the gift, bought it and wrapped in up in a “brown paper package tied up with string”.
A beautiful surprise: a brown paper package tied up with string…
Wonder, why, love…were the thoughts and questions I asked myself as I read the sticker on the paper with the string forming a frame around the words, “Thanks for being you.” I was deeply touched.
I carefully untied the string and removed the brown paper. It was a small, vintage book titled, One year of haiku. What a thoughtful gift. I like books, especially old ones. I write haikus, and like to read haikus written by others. The gift inspires me…not only to write haikus, but to pay it forward.
Thank you, friend.
And so, I wrote a haiku:
Given from the heart
Unexpected gift tag read
Thanks for being you.
We started our annual bike trip by getting lost. While finding the house we rented through AirB&B, we had transposed the numbers into the GPS…whoops. Eventually, we found the house.
The house facing the river.
Once settled in, we ate lunch and then took off for a bike ride. It was a beautiful day. We rode on the South Riverside Trail. It went along the Cedar River into Cedar Falls where there happened to be an ice cream shop. Perfect. We enjoyed some tasty ice cream and met a local man who had also biked to the shop for ice cream. We visited together while we ate.
We said good-bye without getting his name, and started back the way we came…but somehow missed a turn and we lost our way back to the rented house. With some backtracking we finally found a different trail back.
The next morning it was rainy so we went to the John Deere Tractor Museum and then went into a couple shops on main street in Cedar Falls, where the guys ran into the same man again. They stopped and chatted. Once again, we did not get his name, so as a group we decided to call him Waldo.
Our group, lost in downtown Waterloo.
That afternoon the weather cleared; it was sunny and nice outside. We hopped on our bikes and rode out in a different direction, towards Waterloo. According to the map, there was a designated trail around the town…but we didn’t find it. It started out well marked, but soon we couldn’t find the trail. We ended up using our GPS system to get back to the house. It took about 1 1/2 hours to go four miles.
The Cedar River, our house on the right, seen through the trees.
Once back to the house, we decided to ride the same trail as the day before. We followed it and found ourselves back at the ice cream shop. Hooray!
And…there was Waldo! It was quite comical. We visited and ate our ice cream with him (but still didn’t get his name). He retired from John Deere Engineering.
Fortunately, we paid attention to our turns this time, so finding our way back to the house was no problem. We did not get lost.
Sitting on the deck, watching the river flow.
The house we rented was lovely… lots of windows and a large deck overlooking the Cedar River. It was nice sitting there, watching the river flow, after being lost three times…and finding Waldo three times.
Twenty-six geese, all in a row, swimming up river, against the current.
We were staying near Waterloo Iowa for a few days this week, on a bike trip with friends.We’ve never been to Waterloo. While we enjoyed Cedar Falls (a neighboring town) better, Waterloo boasted a John Deere Tractor Museum.
This photo is of the outside of the John Deere Tractor Museum. (It was taken after our time inside. The rain stopped and the sun came out.)
Because it was raining, we decided to visit this tractor museum, since we couldn’t ride our bicycles. The museum was well done. It was sizeable. And it was free!
John Deere Waterloo Boy Model “N” Tractor, 1920 in the lobby of the museum.
I find these early steel wheels very interesting.
My husband grew up on a dairy farm in Pennsylvania. His family never owned a John Deere tractor. They had Farmall and International Harvesters. There seems to be a lot of rivalry, and friendly banter, between tractor owners…but Gary found this museum – focusing on these green tractors – very interesting. As did we all.
Gary reminiscing using a slide rule and drafting board work stations in the “good old days” when he did engineering work.
The John Deere walking plow.
As per usual, interesting stories were told on story boards throughout the museum.
Tractors have come a long way…from the walking plow to the modern, gigantic tractors that have several steps to get up into the cab…
I don’t remember the model of this huge tractor.
…and, that cab has air conditioning, cushioned seats, wrap-around windows and a state-of-the-art computer system. I know we’ve all seen these big machines in the fields. At night they look like space aliens out there.
The steps up into the cab of this tractor.
John Deere also manufactures the riding lawn mowers that are popular, and they used to make bicycles. In fact, a guy in our group used to own a John Deere bicycle…he was lamenting the fact that he got rid of it.
This is an old John Deere bicycle.
The museum was informative, and we all enjoyed it. It is definitely worth a visit…we would go to visit it again, given the chance.
Green, green – everywhere green.
When we were through the museum, the rain had stopped, the sun came out, and we were able to get back to biking.
Last week we went on a picnic… Our financial advisor held a picnic outdoors under a tent in the parking lot. They handed out box lunches, and had a duo playing guitar and singing quietly in the background. It was nice.
We were first to sit at our table. Then we were introduced to a local pastor and his wife who sat down across from us. As we chatted, the places where we grew up became a topic of conversation. They spoke first and they said Columbia Heights and Fridley.
McKinley Street Northeast Minneapolis
I immediately responded I was familiar with that area because I grew up on 35th and McKinley… then Gordon, the pastor, said with much surprise, that he did too, until he was six years old! We discovered we lived four houses away from each other. He is four years older so I would have been two years old when his family moved away, but he did remember playing with my older brother and all the neighborhood boys his age. There were seven or eight of them!
He also said he remembered my mother, and her name, Ruby.
What a serendipitous moment. We were excited to discover this fact, and had fun reminiscing about that great neighborhood in Northeast Minneapolis.
Later I asked my brother if he remembered Gordon, and he said yes… playing ball together.
I’m slowly going through our “stuff” in an effort to declutter. My latest task is going through the antique Mason jars sitting on top of the kitchen cupboards. It was a nice place to display them…they were not tucked away in some cupboard, but were on display – yet out of the way. I decided to either put them to use, or get rid of them.
The jars on top of the kitchen cupboard.
So one by one I am taking them down. As I pulled the first antique jar down – a blue Mason jar with a glass lid – I noticed I had matchbooks stored in it. At one time we collected matchbooks from different places. Businesses do not give away matchbooks with their logo anymore – but they used to, and the matchbooks were easy to collect. I do remember going through our matchbooks before, and keeping only a few special ones. I forgot that I kept these few in the Mason jar.
The matchbooks.
Here is a list of the matchbooks that I found in the jar, and where they came from:
The Old Spaghetti Factory: This was a restaurant in downtown Minneapolis, and the place where Gary and I had our first date in 1976. It closed in August 2019.
Mardi Gras: The cruise ship we took for our honeymoon, a Caribbean cruise in 1978. Along with the matchbook, there was a champagne cork in the Mason jar, also from the cruise. I remember our table-mates had a bottle of Bollinger Champagne they shared with us, and told us keep the cork. That was the first time I heard of Bollinger champagne…too bad the winery was not the same Bollinger family as the one I had just joined when I married Gary! HA
There were two different matchbooks from National Parks we had camped in: Zion, Bryce Canyon and the north rim of the Grand Canyon (we visited in July 1992) were together on one matchbook called The Sanctuaries. The other matchbook was from Glacier National Park (this must have been our 1989 visit). I would say these were our favorite national parks overall.
Boca Raton Resort and Club: This was the most luxurious resort Gary and I stayed at in Florida (February 1992). It was for a work convention. We were with friends from work and enjoyed the beautiful accommodations, the lush landscape and grounds, the ocean and ocean views from our hotel balcony, and the service…o my.
Hotel Uzwil: a hotel Gary stayed in several times when he took business trips to Switzerland. It was located in the village of Uzwil, east of Zurich.
One matchbook was from Cargill, the first company Gary worked for after he graduated from college.
Another had the Greek letters for the fraternity, Delta Theta Sigma, which Gary belonged to in college.
The Orion Room: I hardly remember this restaurant, but it was on the 50th floor of the IDS center. In 1972 the IDS center was built in downtown Minneapolis. In 1974 the restaurant opened. It is no longer there, but it was considered an excellent dining establishment in its day.
Good ‘n Plenty Family Style Eating: A family-style Pennsylvania Dutch restaurant in Lancaster County Pennsylvania, the area where Gary grew up in Pennsylvania. It was my first introduction to the Amish in his hometown.
These two jars now hold epsom salts in our bathroom.
Once again, it was fun to go down memory lane. Now, after writing about these matchbooks, perhaps I can use them up. I wonder what I’ll find in the other jars on top of the cupboard?
Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. I am posting excerpts from a memoir my friend wrote about her family pet, a lovebird named Babypie.
Babypie
By Joy Kimi Kanazawa
...Babypie was quite a character. He loved classical music and used to bob up and down in time to Beethoven, as though conducting the orchestra, looking like a green baton or a green Leonard Bernstein.
Seldom in his cage, Babypie had the run of the apartment and used to sit on the shoulder of anyone he felt like being close to.
Every weekend we (our family) would go to our cabin in the Pocono Mountains, a two-hour drive from the city. Naturally, Babypie always went along for the ride.
One night my father went outside onto the deck, forgetting that he had Babypie on his shoulder. It was a rainy night and suddenly there was a flash of lightning and a loud crash of thunder. Startled, Babypie flew off into the night.
... we returned to New York without Babypie, all of us heartbroken...
Two days later I decided to go back to the Poconos (as impossible as it may have seemed) to try and find Babypie. I walked the roads near our cabin and a quarter of a mile away I looked up and saw what looked like ...Babypie.
I got out of my car, climbed onto the roof, and blasted Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony on my boombox. Babypie flew down to his beloved Beethoven. What a miracle from God! Babypie was back!
Our church held an interesting and fun event last weekend. The music director had the great idea of hosting a bicycle rally. This was an outreach event to our church neighbors… to help people get their bicycles into shape for the summer season.
The flyer.
There were a few bike stations set up…for minor repairs and pumping up tires as needed…there was a giveaway table, a raffle for bike helmets and bike locks. There was sunshine (although chilly at the beginning), and of course, there was music and food…donuts and coffee, hot dogs and water…all free…for all. O yes, and free t-shirts.
One of several bicycle help stations.
The raffle table, and overview of the lower parking lot at church.
Gary and I volunteered to help at the event. We envisioned lots of kids coming with their bikes. We were surprised, and enjoyed the fact, that many families came together, and many adults had their bikes serviced.
Another bicycle station.
A station for decorating bikes. Kids had fun with this…including the old-fashioned playing card attached to the spoke to make your bike sound “cool”.
There was a good turn out, and steady…not everyone came at once. We were there for four hours and all of us volunteers could tell people were having a great time, as were we!
There were a couple obstacle courses set up in the front parking lot.
The bike rally was deemed successful. We were able to show love to our neighbors, and offer them something practical and fun.
Hot dogs on the grill…always yummy.
It was most likely the beginning ofan annual event.
We have had success putting unwanted items on the curb, free for the taking. I like that it helps keep things out of the landfill, and people can find another use for what we no longer want. Our latest item on the curb was our old Coleman camp stove…the classic old-style green one. It still worked, but was in rough shape so we thought some young folks might like it as a starter stove for camping. Apparently, someone did – it was gone the next day.
The camp stove served us well. Gary already owned it when got married, and we finally replaced it last year, in 2021, therefore it was over 44 years old. A few years ago, it converted easily to using one-pound propane tanks.
The camp stove holds fond memories. We used it on numerous camping trips over the years. Mostly when our two sons were younger. We liked to camp in Minnesota State Parks, and we liked to take road trips to the National Parks throughout the United States; from Acadia, to Great Smokey Mountains, to Yellowstone, to Zion, to name a few. We had many good times together on our camping trips…sometimes with friends, sometimes just the four of us.
Our firstborn son was three-months-old when we decided to go away for a camping weekend. We didn’t go far from home but one still needs to pack the almost the same amount of gear as for a longer stay. We made it to the campsite and got the tent (we always used a tent) and site all set up. After dinner, it started to rain…pour…so we quickly took the tent down, in the rain, and headed home. Camping in the rain is never fun, camping in the rain with a three-month-old is even more not fun.
But, we made up for it by taking several camping trips over the years…instilling a love of nature and the outdoors in ourselves, and in our sons.
Camper cabins are cute and cozy.
We did buy a replacement stove, but doubt it will get the same use. Although we love to camp, we like being off the ground these days, so we try to stay in camper cabins. We discovered you need to collect the same amount of gear -just minus the tent- for camper cabins, but it’s much more comfortable than sleeping on the ground which we did all those years.
I’m grateful we were able to take these camping vacations. It made great memories for Gary and I to look back on now that our sons are on their own, making memories with their own families.
