This Used to be My Playground

On our way to South Park City the other day we passed the middle school and high school that I attended. Both have changed dramatically in the *ahem* few years since I was a student. I pointed them out to Nicco, thinking it might be an interesting fun fact for him to see where his mama went to school.

Just for kicks, we decided to take him to my old elementary school too. It has a playground, after all.

Deer Creek Elementary School, Home of the Eagles

This sign on the wall wasn't there when I was a kid. Apparently, it was an eagle scout project for one of the local boys.

We drove up to the playground and I showed Nicco where I played. We had this blacktop where we roller skated, jumped rope, played 4-square, and hid and climbed on, in, and around giant tractor tires.

We also had these metal climbing structures, the only equipment left from my school days. We swung on the monkey bars and did baby-drops (who ever came up with that name? Nicco's gym teacher calls them cherry drops.) from the high bars. The old swing set and the two old slides are gone.

I was trying to talk Nicco into hanging upside down like we did to do a baby drop, but he was chicken.

There used to be a row of about a dozen big boulders that we would hop along from one to another. It's funny, I know many modern schools have removed swings and monkey bars from their playgrounds in the name of safety. I mentioned to Patrice once that our schoolyard would never pass a safety inspection by the nanny-staters who take away all fun things to prevent us from harming ourselves. (I was a little surprised to see the old monkey bars still on this playground, but then again, these are mountain kids. They're tougher than city kids.)

This is the soccer field. Yes. Soccer. Field.

In the years between my elementary school days and now they have graded and raised the ground and added fun (and relatively safe) equipment for the youngsters to climb upon. This sign is on one of the play areas:

When I came home from my first day at DCE, I told my mom that there was a gnome at our school. She wondered what the heck I saw that made me think such a thing, but then she saw Tom Hoganson and understood.

Tom is a slightly hunched, slightly disheveled, wrinkly and warty and greasy and dandruffy guy who to elementary kids probably always looked old. Tom is also a man who lives on a higher plane. He loves people. He is among the most sincerely kind and true people that live on this planet. He attended meets and games and events of all 3 schools in our district and he wrote articles in the local paper about the kids in the schools and their particular achievements. He could probably name all the kids in all the schools at any given time.

Once the school district was making cuts and Tom was going to lose his job. The community rose up and defended him. It's possible that torches and pitchforks were involved. He kept his job.

My mom and dad ran into him one day, probably at a high school football game, and he still remembered me and my sisters and asked about us. And it was likely not small talk. Knowing Tom, he was probably genuinely interested in our lives.

Here I am pointing out what used to be and where I used to go.

 Here's my boy playing on the new monkey bars.

 And flying on the new swings.

 And climbing on the new tunnel.

And taking a picture with his grandma.

My dad and I told stories from the days of yore.
It was a fun and slightly disturbing walk down memory lane.
Ghosts of childhood on that playground.

South Park City

We took a little drive up into the higher mountains to visit South Park (yes, that South Park.) The townspeople have made a museum city with original old buildings and artifacts from the early days of the town. It's fun and interesting and it always makes me grateful to see how those folks lived. I'm happy to have my machines and luxuries which make my day to day living a life of ease.

The entrance to the museum town

Some building facades

 Our first stop was the little church building.

 Nicco played an opening hymn

 then he shared the Good Word.

 After church, we went to the saloon for a little gambling and booze.

Perhaps we should have reversed the order of those two stops!

Then we checked out the mining operation. Nicco climbed in the ore cart that dumped into the waiting train cars below. He said, "I'm climbing in there. My Grandpa promised me I could climb in trains."

He's a miner, forty-niner

This is my just-shy-of-four-feet-tall boy sleeping in the sheepherders' wagon. It had the bed at one end and a little kettle in a sink sort of thing on the left and something else on the right side, with a very small stove in the front. What a way to live!

Nicco also tested out the bunks in the caboose.

And here he thought he could hide from his grandmother. No such luck, buddy!

Walking toward the big locomotive, Nicco pretended that he was going to get run over by the train. When he climbed up on the engine, someone somewhere turned on a very realistic and loud train engine sound. It scared the living daylights out of my boy. He stood still as could be, thinking the train would start moving any second. It was funny. To me.

His favorite thing was anything he could climb on. He almost went into the coal bin. I didn't think that was a very good idea.

In the captain's chair

My dad told Nicco to stick his finger in this vise. Totally trusting his grandfather, he complied. Dad squeezed and squeezed gently until Nicco got a little worried about his digits.

Then my boy turned the crank and said, "I really would have got my finger smashed! Hey, Grandpa, now YOU stick your finger in there!" Wisely, my dad said no way.

These miners' tools were very heavy.

I liked all the old tools and other items of daily life. Here are some eyeglasses. Nicco likes his better.

A pump at the sink.

An old stove.

An elk head and an old phone.

An old cash register.


An old sewing machine

Bath time!

Nicco has been playing with my parents' bellows so he was interested in the blacksmith's pedal bellows.

Our final stop was the drugstore. Nicco was waiting at the counter for a soda from the fountain.

Even back in the day they knew the value of chocolate.

When our tour was over, we went to lunch at the bowling alley. Apparently, it is the second best place in town!

Our Fourth of July Celebration

Like a good little Madsen, Nicco is always on the lookout for a holiday parade. He was lucky that we only had to drive about 30 minutes to Indian Hills rather than an hour or so to Georgetown or Como to find one.

We got to the turnoff and saw parade watchers set up along the road for about 5 miles until we reached the fire station where parade was to begin. The sign said the road was closed from 11-1 for the parade. I'm pretty sure it took the paraders the full two hours to get to the bottom of the mountain!

Prior to the start of the parade we got to climb inside an honest to goodness real life helicopter. We missed its landing, but it took off and circled around a couple of times while we were there.

Then Nicco bounced in the bounce house for a little while and he only got his face smashed under one pair of feet.

We saw a bunch of people along the side of the road with water guns and water balloons and thought there must be a local water gun tradition for this particular parade. Sure enough, along with the traditional veterans carrying our national colors (thanks, vets!) and fancy old cars and fire trucks, the paraders and spectators alike shot each other with various water weapons. It was a very wet parade. There was a distinct absence of parade princesses and high school marching bands. The water fight made up for it, I suppose.

We were in a primo spot...right at the beginning of the parade with no other kids around. Nicco hauled in enough candy to last him AND his cousins for the whole visit!

Later we went down to some long time friends' house and had a delicious barbecue dinner and patriotic blueberry and strawberry dessert. It was sad not to have any fireworks, but not as sad as burning down the whole state. Besides, being among family, friends, and the small town community is the highlight of any celebration.

Rainbows and Doe-Eyed-Deer

Nicco is pretty much unplugged at Grandma and Grandpa's house. There is the t.v. and I have let him hop on the computer a little bit, but pretty much he's left to his creative devices. Sometimes he asks me what he should do and today I suggested we play marbles again. We started sorting by colors.

There are a lot of marbles to sort, so we took a few breaks. He took more breaks than I did, and eventually Grandma joined us. Once all the marbles were sorted, we made a rainbow:



 Kind of awesome, I think.

Then we came upstairs and looked out the window and what did we see, a doe-eyed-deer looking back at me!

How Does THAT Feel?

We had lunch at the hot dog today. Nicco always looks forward to hot dogs at the hot dog when we visit Grandma and Grandpa. This morning Grandma asked him if he would like to go to the hot dog for lunch today and he said, "I've only been asking since I got here." We took that as a yes.

Anyway, while the grandparents went to get our ice cream after lunch, Nicco told me that Isabel never listens and always tells the teacher "no." I said that is not very polite or respectful and I hope that he follows all his teacher's instructions.

He went on. He told me to give him an instruction. I told him to put the trash in the garbage can, please. He said, "No!" then, "how did that make you feel?" I told him it made me feel sad and mad. He said, "I'm sure that is how Madame feels." I agreed and said that I hoped he was polite to his teacher. He said, "Have you ever seen me do anything bad?" I said no, understanding that he meant at school, not at home. Ahem.

Happy Independence Day

After long debates and deliberations, our founders finally declared independence and revised and approved a final declaration on July 4th, 1776. A couple days before, John Adams wrote to his wife:

"The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more."

Happy birthday America, Sweet Land of Liberty. Many happy returns. PleasohpleasedearLordabove.

To Grandmother's House We Go

Grandma always has some fun surprises for her grandchildren. She let Nicco reach his hand into a bag o'treats and he pulled out this dino mosaic.

He worked and worked and went back to it several times to add new details.
He's very serious.

 She also baked fresh bread. Mmmm...can't resist!

Grandpa pulled out his gigantic bucket of marbles. Nicco sorted them. His categories were hollows, pretties, and cat's eyes. I think he confused "hollow" for "solid." I don't know how he distinguished the "pretties" in the pile.

After we pulled out all the hollows, pretties, and cat's eyes Nicco wanted to mix the separated marbles together to see how pretty they would be. The smaller pile is the pretty pile, can't you see.

And that's what we do at Grandma's house!