Opening Day

Watching the Ridgeline

Saturday was opening day of deer season. Grandpa and Grandma Howes where here, so Grandpa joined me for the hunt. Our house is on the far hillside straight above Dads head!

Awesome Country

Grandpa Looking Things Over

Notice that Dad has something in his hand? It is an old horseshoe and a broken tent pole. As long as I can remember Dad has always 'hauled out' more than he has 'taken in'.

We only saw one deer, and it was a doe. But it was still an awesome day of hunting!

Photos taken: September 15, 2007

The Boys' Turn

Spencer (#5) Dribbles the Side, Preston (#6) Follows

Preston Breaks Away!

Preston Inbounds to Spencer

The boys also won there game last night! The kids really had a great time. They haven't had much chance to play this season, and last night they all let loose!

Photos taken: September 12, 2007

Soccer at Last

Breaking to goal!

Dribbling around the boys!

Free Kick from Goal

Makes the Save - Jake tells Her She's the Bomb

Finally the kids get to play some soccer. The games have been called because of weather the last two weeks. Today was perfect soccer weather.

Ruby made a goal tonight and made several saves playing goalie! She has really improved this year. Her team easily won their match. 10-3

Ruby and the boys played on fields next to each other and at the same time. Tomorrow I will post pictures of the boy's games!

Photos taken: September 12, 2007

NFL Week One Results

Week one is over, and Angela didn't do to bad. She finished a decent 9-7. She only picked 2 games different than I did. Unfortunatly she missed both of those! I better not brag too much. This season has just begun, and she is bound to get the best of me sooner or later.

Bill Whitaker - President Simplot Agri Business

Dry Valley Phosphate Mine

Phosphate Mine of Old

Thursday and Friday I spent on my quad touring Bill Whitaker and Martin Hunt, from Corporate, around the SE Idaho phosphate patch. We were joined by Dale Butler and Lori Hamann out of Pocatello, and Dennis Facer, Chad Gentry, and Scott Donahoo from Smoky Canyon Mine on Thursday. Fridays tour included myself Mr. Whitaker and Mr. Hunt along with Terry Douglas, Verlen Andrews, Sadie Thompson, Dennis Facer, and Brian Woolsey from Smoky Canyon. Martins wife also toured with us both days.

Photos taken: September 07, 2007

Tornado Warnings? In Star Valley?

The gold star in the center of the image is our house!

Today was a very wild day of weather for Star Valley. This morning thunderstorms developed in Southeast Idaho. There was a report of a tornado just north of Soda Springs Idaho. Simplot has a pump station near were the tornado was. NOAA confirmed that there indeed had been a tornado. Tornado warnings began popping up across SE Idaho and were moving quickly to the east. I captured this image off of the NOAA site at 1:41 PM and called the school to see if they new about the warnings. They did not. My boys were headed for the bus. I called the administrator and sent him this image. They took all the kindergartners off of the buses and back into the school and held them there until the warnings had passed. I called Angela and had her hang out in the basement until the weather passed.

There were no reported touches of tornado's in Star Valley. There was however; severe lightening and flash floods. A mudslide closed the highway in the Snake River Canyon between Star Valley and Jackson.

Angela's Picks for Week 1

Angela has made her picks (shhhh......she always does her picks after I have finished mine). Notice we only picked two games differently. We will keep a running total to see how we are each doing.

One Tough Kid

Spencer crashed on his bike today. He cut his head, and it was one of those wounds that isn't that bad, but really bleeds. His face was covered with blood, his hands were covered with blood. Preston and Jayden were scared. I cleaned him up and settled him down a bit and wanted to take a picture.

He asked if I was going to put it on the blog. When I told him I would, he did not want me to take the picture until I had cleaned up all the blood, put a band aid on it and he wasn't crying anymore.

He insisted that "Grandpa was not going to see the blood, and Grandpa was not going to see him cry!" He didn't notice the blood left on his hand. So Grandpa....He didn't cry at all! :D

Photo taken: September 3, 2007

Week 1

When we lived in Fallon, Angela and I and her family had a weekly tradition of picking winners for each weeks NFL football games. Since moving to Star Valley that tradition has kind of went away. I use to have fun with it, so here are my picks for week 1! ;0

Pirates of the Caribbean

What are They up to Now?

Inspecting the Work!

Setting Sail

Backyard Ship for the Maties

The kids put their imaginations to work and crafted this delux pirate ship, complete with a 'Jolly Roger', and a wheel at the helm!

Photos taken: September 2, 2007

Busy Day Swiss Steak

Craig's Favorite Recipes

In 1988 I accepted a position with British Petroleum Minerals America (BPMA) at their Alligator Ridge gold mine in Eastern Nevada. There I met a Mining Engineer by the name of Thomas Behling. Tom and I became close friends. BPMA was bought by Rio Tinto and the name of their North American operations where changed to Kennecott. In December of 1989 I transferred to their new operation, the Denton Rawhide Mine near Fallon Nevada. Tom transferred to Rawhide a few months after I did.

Tom was a very intelligent individual. His social skills were lacking, so he didn't have many friends. He use to talk on the phone with Professor Stephen Hawking on a somewhat regular basis discussing his theories with him. Tom wrote a book titled "Introducing Life into Physics". He was a devout catholic, but never married. In 2001 Toms health took a turn for the worse. He had some serious heart problems. Soon he was force to retire. He just couldn't work with his poor health. In 2002 Tom was traveling in Minnesota to visit family. I received a call from Toms sister to let me know that Tom had taken ill and had lost his life. Tom was in his early 50's.

Soon after Toms death I was surprised to learn that Tom had willed many of his possessions to me. Mostly his hunting, fishing, and camping equipment. But also all his books. The books included some cookbooks of his. Tom had on occasion invited Angela and I to his house for dinner. This recipe was found in one of those cookbooks, Southern Living, Cookbook from 1967. We have often cooked this dish, because it is easy, it taste great, and it is good for the tougher meats, like round steak. It makes them very tender.

Now that was a long story to get to a short recipe, but here goes;

Busy Day Swiss Steak

1 tbsp. butter
1 pkg. of dry onion soup mix
2 lbs. of steak (top round, cube steak)
2 cans of cream of mushroom soup

dot the center of a large sheet of heavy duty foil with the butter. Sprinkle half of the dry soup mix. Place the steak over this; spread with the mushroom soup. Sprinkle the remaining dried soup mix. Fold the foil over tightly closing, making sure to pull the ends up to avoid leaking. Place on a cookie sheet and bake at 375 for 1 hour.

This dish is great with either mashed potatoes or baked potato. There is lots of 'gravy'.

Enjoy.

Precious Sunflower

I have been experimenting with some new software that I recently purchased. This image was created by taking a picture of some sunflowers and superimposing a watermark over it. The watermark was created from a photo I took of Ashley and Mellany, that I previously posted. I embossed the water mark and added a significant amount of depth to it.