Gabe's Winter Blizzard Experience in Idaho

Oh What Do You Do In the Wintertime When All the World is White?

As you know, we had a blizzard on Monday. These are a few of the pictures Alan took after the wind settled down. Click on the pictures twice if you want a better view. This is Grandma and Grandpa Baum's front porch.

















These pictures are taken looking east toward the Tetons from in front of the east cellar.

These pictures remind me of the layer of rock named Navaho that you can see out at the wedge on the desert. Look at how the wind carves the snow into such interesting shapes.

This is my garden ornament. It sticks out of the soil about three feet. So you can see we have a good snow depth.

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This is the front of the east cellar. You can see how high the snow drifted from the blizzard.

This is Zack in the Joh Deere clearing our neighbor's driveway.






























I think Zack was trying to blow the snow across the highway into the windbreak.

These are pictures Alan took this morning (Thursday) of the sunrise. Approximately 7:40 a.m. Its pretty nice when you can look out your kitchen window and see this in the morning.

This picture show the snow depth from the highway. It is pretty deep out there so don't get off the track.

Tuesday, No School -17 Degrees This Morning

Two days in a row out of school. What could be better. I'm just catching everyone up on what we're doing. the blizzard Sunday and Monday left a mess outside yesterday. The fields look like a frozen white sea. Alan got up very early and blew snow for us, Kris, Kent, the Connors, our L neighbor, and a few others so we could all get to the funeral at 10:00. It was a nice funeral for our close friend Kevin Egbert. We are sad that he is gone and at age 47 it was a real shock. He had a heart attack and his wife, Dawn(an R.N.), could not revive him. Then the deep freeze really came. This morning we read all the schools who were not holding classes today. I can't think of one school from American Falls north to us and from Teton to Challis that went to school today. Even the senior citizens meals on wheels got cancelled today. I went to a relief society meeting this am and by the time I had run frommy car to the church my nose and the boogers were frozen. BRRRRR. The young men are going to the temple open house tonight so Alan is going with them. I'm going VTing from 5 - 7 and then I have the book activity group at our house tonight. I made some good treats for it, but I wonder if anyone will come. Today I practiced tennis on the wii. I'm now at about 1600. Yes, I've gone pro - but it's getting harder and harder to get a win from these miis. We are enjoying everyone's blog. Keep doing it, it helps the winter blues I get from really setting in. I think I have a little cabin fever and need to go to a warmer climate. Does anyone have airline tickets to Hawaii they would like to give me? That's All for Now folks.

A Wintery Flurry

It has snowed and snowed the last 24 hours. I'm sure we have over 3 feet of snow. Shortly after church, the wind started to pick up, not really strong, but enough to carve and make some good drifts.

This picture is looking north from our house across the garden toward the north and the back machine shed. The yellow things are the mint wagons.

This is a close-up of the same picture. I was kind of disappointed when the wind blew the snow off the sunflower heads. I was enjoying the accumulation of snow and was curious to see how much snow could build on them over the winter.

Our sidewalk with drifts. Zack shoveled the walks when we got hom from church, a lot of good it did!

There is a big snowdrift in this shot. It is building even as I'm blogging. The drift is directly infront of the garage. The snow is blowing from the north across the roof of the garage and the snow is getting deposited right in front of the garage doors. I hope you can see the snow in the picture.

This is me, Alan, trying my hand at updating our blog.

These are some recent winter pictures arround the house you might find interesting.

It is interesting how crystals will form after a night of fog.

This is our new fence looking south towards pine trees after a night of heavy snow.

That's all for now...

Shelley's Excellent Pictures

#1

Benjamin holding Zachary - April 1991

#2

Zachary - October 31, 1992

#3 Banner on Hannah's blessing day - Summer 1999

Here they are! The best Shelley and Alan have to offer. We have too many to choose from, so Alan is also going to post some of scenery. Then again, we can post as many excellent pictures as we want, not just three. But here are our top portraits.

Temple Openhouse

Dear Family and friends, Starting last Thursday (the third) Alan and I started our volunteer time at the Rexburg Temple openhouse. We will be tour guides every Thursday until the 24th. We, along with about 12 other couples from our stake, arrive at the nearby stake center for prayer meeting at 11:45. We then start the tours. Alan and I were the second couple from our stake to take a group through the temple last Thursday. We were very nervous. We are assigned a group, anywhere from 35 to 50 in number, we sit through a film about temples with them, then we take them through the temple. We leave the stake center and walk uphill on tent-covered walks. Right before we go through the doors we all put on booties over our shoes to protect the floors in the temple. The first room we stop in is the baptistry.


Here we explain that baptism is the first step in our progress back to live with our Father in Heaven and also the first ordinance performed for those who have passed away who did not receive the gospel while here on the earth. I am in charge of this part of the tour and I kept forgetting the scripture that goes along with this part. 1stCorinthians 29:14. Alan pointed out to me that the scripture was on a board set in front of the room for all to read. All I had to do was look and read it. I felt pretty goofy. Oh well, you get what you pay for, right?
Next we lead the group up one floor to the main foyer area.

This picture is of the waiting area just beyond the front recommend desk. We explain that we change from street clothes to white clothes in the temple. We then lead them through the sister's dressing room, up the stairs to the second floor. We lead them into one of the two instruction rooms. Alan takes over the leading of the tours from this point on. The murals in the two rooms are not the same, but were painted by the same artist, Leon Pearson, a local man. The murals are beautiful and very detailed. They are of scenery here in the Idaho area. We explain that we receive instructions here concerning our premortal and mortal lives and the blessings we can receive in this life and the next. We leave the room representing the creation and telestial room and pass by the room representing the terrestrial room (they can look into that room and see that it is much brighter and they see the curtain that covers the veil of the temple). There are two terrestrial rooms as well.

The next room we take the group to is the celestial room. It is a beautiful room, as you would expect. You can see that it is two stories high and very open. The large window and the three windows at the top of the picture are stained glass with a wheat motif. So beautiful. I thought that the wheat was representative of Idaho and our agriculture, but yesterday in our relief society lesson, it was pointed out that wheat is a symbol of righteousness, as in the separating of the wheat and the tares. I like this symbolism better. Agriculture is good, but righteousness is better. There are two opposite mirrors hanging in this room, and you can stand in the celestial room and see yourself continue into infinity and beyond! (A little Buzz Lightyear humor). I hope you don't think I'm being irreverent. When I'm in the temple, I never say that to the tour groups. By the way on Saturday night when we cleaned the temple at 9:30 p.m. -12:30 a.m. Zack was given the assignment to dust in this room. Wow, I was envious of his cleaning job. When we leave the celestial room, we climb yet another set of stairs to the third floor and all of the five sealing rooms. All are decorated the same, they only differ in size and how many chairs are in them. Again, you can see the stained glass windows and a little bit of the mirror on the right side. The chandeliers in the temple are stunning. Really. We always get asked how they clean them. I heard that they are let down on their chains from the floor above, to a height that is manageable for cleaning. That makes good sense. Also on the third floor are the nursery for small children waiting to be sealed to their parents, and the waiting rooms for wedding guests. These rooms are not on the tour. After the sealing rooms we take the tour down all the stairs at the other end of the temple (there are elevators) to the bottom floor and back down to the stake center. We get to rest for maybe ten minutes and then we take another tour.
This is a picture of one of the temple corridors. There are many paintings depicting events in the life of Christ. There are a few of the Teton mountains. They are all beautiful. I wish you caould all be here and see this newest temple. Hopefully, when you come to visit, we can make it a point to go and do a session together. On Saturday night, as I mentioned previously, we had the opportunity of cleaning the temple. Afterwards, the man in charge of our cleaning crew took us on a tour and showed us places that are not on the tour. Zack was with us and we stood with him in both the celestial room and one of the selaing rooms where we could see into the mirrors. I got very choked up, because it was wonderful for Alan and me to stand and see ourselves with Zack. As we left, we all agreed that there are wonderful blessings that come from service. Had we not volunteered to clean, we would not have had that opportunity to see the temple in detail and have Zack with us as well. Monday afternoon, we again went down to help. This time I was in charge of the bootie crew (young men and young women from our stake), and Alan and Zack were directing traffic in the parking lot. Zack was sent by himself up to the upper temple parking lot to direct cars down to the lower stake center parking lot. He said he waved and smiled at everyone. Alan directed traffic and drove the shuttle bus for people who need rides to and from their cars. It started to snow at about 3:30 and did not stop all night. Zack was dressed in his warmest clothes and still froze. He stood outside from 3:00 - 6:00. Then he got to come into the stake center and eat cookies and drink punch. So now we have volunteered as much as they will let us. Alan and I still have three Thursdays to go.

January wild weather? So far ... No.

Today is Friday. We are all at home - no place to go. Just hangin' out and listening to all the irritating political news. Alan could listen to it all day every day. I can't, it makes me crazy. Zack is writing a paper for English? Kristine got home yesterday and missed driving in the storms. Good for her. I went to I.F. today for the ceremonial taking back of unwanted Christmas gifts. I dropped Alan off in Rexburg at Pioneer equipment so he could bring home the tractor, drill combo, thingamajig, etc. He said it was good traffic and clear roads, so it must have been meant to happen. An interesting comment, I thought. Came home and read Morgan's blog and fixed dinner. That's about it for excitement around here. Hopefully this storm that's coming will pile up some inches outside.
The pictures are all in Ashton or thereabouts. We did not take them, but the pastor of the Baptist church here in Ashton did. He is really a good amateur photographer. His name is Christopher Leavell. I thought you would enjoy the beautiful pictures. I especially enjoy the one of highway 47 from the Hugginsville corner.

Christmas morning 2007

October 2007 - Flying Geese

March 2007 - Melting of the Snow

Another beautiful shot. I love those Winter sunsets in Ashton.

I took one camera lens back to Inkleys and ordered another one. The new one is supposed to cut down on vibration. And then, voila!... beautiful pictures of the most beautiful area in Idaho!