Family Visit at Bear Lake!

Emily and Sophie and Ethan and I drove up to Bear Lake for the weekend.
Joe and Hyrum and Jesse and Benjamin were all there, too.
We had hotcakes for Saturday morning breakfast.

And we all sang some songs (in our pajamas) and then went and helped pull dry weeds out of the front lawn.
Joe & boys left, taking Ethan, Saturday afternoon, but Emily and I stayed awhile longer.
We had a lovely visit!

Camping near Arches

On this last campout, I made breakfast for the OAC.
This is a variation of English bread pudding...
but in order to fool the students into eating it, I called it French toast.
It's the same ingredients, anyway, just layered and baked in a dutch oven.

It was very cold overnight (there was some frost in the morning) and everyone was very happy to have a hot breakfast. I was too cold to sleep in, so I was up at dawn, starting the fire, wearing my clothes over my pajamas to keep warm! (Sorry, no picture of that.)

We had hoped to camp near Moab but all the campgrounds were full.
So we headed out toward Canyonlands and got a good site at Horsethief Campground.
Some of the folks opted to sleep out, despite the cold.
The stars were incredible!

Arches Trip!

Arches is especially gorgeous in the spring.
The (daytime) weather was in the 60s- perfect for hiking.

I hiked out to Double O Arch (above), more or less in connection with the OAC students.
A couple of them hiked with me; others went ahead, went exploring, and then we all met up at points en route, like at this overlook for Dark Arch.

It was about a 4 mile round trip plus another 0.5 to 1 miles of side trails to see additional arches.
The rock fins at Devil's Garden and the La Sal Mts were especially beautiful along the way back.

In the evening, heading out, we stopped at Park Ave for some late light photos on the spectacular rock wall.

I never get tired of Arches National Park!

Easter is a good time for Cemeteries

...especially if those cemeteries are Cool Historical ones.

I particularly admired this winged cherub head (emblematic of the resurrected soul) on the grave of Mrs. Lydia Procter, in King's Chapel Burying Ground, Boston.

Who can resist a winged skull paired with a heart on the tombstone of Matthew Skinner, 1713?
(Boston's Old Granary Burying Ground)

Our favored epitaph of the visit came from Copp's Hill,
the gravestone of Charles Seward, Revolutionary war soldier,
d. 1800.
" The lonely turf where silence lays her head,
The mound where pity sighs for hon[ore]d dead,
Such is the grief where sorrow now doth sigh:
To learn to live is but to learn to die."

Later but certainly not lesser...
What visit to Boston would be complete without a stroll through the beautiful Mt. Auburn cemetery?

Boston-- chilly but terrific

On Easter weekend, I went to Boston for the Popular Culture Association Conference.
I presented a paper, and so did 5 of my undergraduate students.
On Saturday, we walked the Freedom Trail.
We got to admire historic cemeteries:

This is as close as Angie will come to liking seafood:

Deborah and Aaron both enjoyed touring the U.S.S. Constitution:

On Friday night, we all went out for terrific Italian food (not seafood) at Antonio's, by MGH:

Left to right are: Deborah Bailey, Christina Penrod, Angie Thompson and Aaron Hunsaker.
What we are eating: spinach ravioli (Deborah), chicken parmigiana (Christina), chicken Alfredo (Angie), pesto gnocchi (Aaron) and veal stuffed with proscuitto and fresh mozarella and mushrooms (me).

Signs of Spring

For the past couple of weeks, I've been enjoying signs of Spring.
Blooming forsythia
(with Benjamin & Edward, in Joe & Kathleen's yard.
I don't think Edward was quite sure of me at first, but by the end of the visit, he was cannonballing quite happily into my midsection- ow- so I concluded he had lost his initial shyness.)

A robin's nest outside my window...
(the bird has been working on it since February, but I haven't seen the robin herself lately. I hope nothing has happened to her)

And down at the Botany Pond on the south end of campus: turtles!
There are always ducks (no ducklings, yet) but the turtles are great fun.
I love the way they line up in a sort of Turtle Conga to enjoy the sun.