Making Mud Pies

One warm summer day when I was about five or six, Dad and Mother had to go to Burley, Idaho after something.  I was taken down to Uncle Vance and Aunt Vida’s place to play with Cousin Marilyn, while they were gone.  Marilyn was about two years older than I was. We played, swung on the big rope swing out under the trees in the back yard and had a good time.  Then we decided that we would make some mud pies.  We mixed up a nice batch of mud to make our pies or cookies out of.  While we were looking in the old root cellar near where we had our pies laid out we found a light brown tube of jelly like stuff.  When we mixed the jelly like substance to our pies it greatly improved the texture.  We would lay them on a board and pat them out and were certainly proud of ourselves when we looked at our array of pies.

When Aunt Vida called us in for dinner, hurried and washed our hands and cleaned up.  As we were eating, Uncle Vance asked us what we had been doing.  We excitedly told them what we had been doing and how good our array of pies looked.  We told him we found some of the best stuff to mix into our pies.  He asked us where we found it and what it looked like.  We said, “Down in the old cellar.”  Uncle Vance’s face went white, he got up from the table and went outside.  When he came back he told us we had been using dynamite.  It was some that Grandfather Lind had used years before.  It was old and had liquefied and even the slightest jar could have made the nitroglycerin in it explode.  Luckily he could find no more.

I’m sure the Lord was looking over us that day and had something more in this life for both of us to do.

The New Saddle and Bicycle

 When Douglas was about fourteen and I was about eleven, for a winters project, we ran a trap line and trapped muskrats in the creek.  We had good success with our new venture and caught a lot of muskrats and occasionally we would find a mink in one of the traps.  I don’t think either one of us kept track of how many we caught, but by spring we had a nice pile of pelts.  Every afternoon after school we would walk home along the creek and check our traps.  We would carry what we caught along with us.
 
When we arrived at home, we would skin what we had caught.  We had to be very careful and not cut a hole in the skin with our knives, as that lowered the value of the pelt.  The pelt had to be taken off the animal in one piece.  Then we would take the pelt and stretch it fur side in, down over a heavy wire frame that Dad had made for us.  Dad made us several of these frames, as sometimes we would catch several muskrats.  The skins had to dry for a week or more, then we had a place in the garage where we could store them.

In the spring a peddler came around and bought all the pelts we had.  Daddy supervised the
sale so I’m sure that it was a fair deal, that we got as much money that way as if we had hauled them to town and sold them.  When the deal was complete, we had enough money that Doug could order the saddle that he wanted and I was able to order the bicycle that I was hoping for.

Montgomery Ward’s was the catalogue that we used to do the ordering.  The pages were well worn by the saddles and bicycles.  After the order was made, then came the long wait for the articles to arrive.  About two weeks later our prized possessions arrived with the mail carrier, it was indeed a happy day.  That night we took the saddle to the corral with us when we went to milk.  After the milking was complete, we tied old Speck (a brockle faced milk cow) up to the corral fence and put the saddle on her.  Doug said, “Now I’ll ride old Speck as he got in the saddle”.  He was doing a great job of riding, when all at once Doug and the saddle both left the cow.  We looked at the saddle to see what the problem was, one of the three inch rigging leathers had broken.  The next trip we made to Burley, we took the saddle to Hoggan’s Leather shop and had the saddle repaired.  Doug never did ride old Speck.

My Hawthorne bicycle was red with white trim.  It had a speedometer on it so that I could tell how many miles I had ridden and how fast I was going.  The speedometer was marked in increments up to thirty-five miles per hour.  One day I rode down to the school house and was on my way home, when a brilliant idea hit me.  If I were to ride it up the Grouse Creek mountain, I could really come down fast.  As I started up the mountain, I soon realized that the road was too steep to peddle.  I pushed the bike about a mile and a half up the mountain, then got on the bike and coasted down.  Coming down was much easier than going up.  I really got going fast, in fact, I got going so fast that it broke the speedometer and it never worked again.

As I got older, I have thought about what a stupid thing that was to do.  I could have easily killed myself.  The bike was well used for many years as was Doug’s saddle.  Our trapping adventure that winter gave us enjoyment for many years.

An Answer To Prayer

(R-L): Grouse Creek Jack, Jenny (his wife), and their granddaughter

When I was about eight years old, Indian Jack and some other Indians came from Fort Hall, Idaho.  They were trading moccasins or gloves for deer skins.  We had some deerskins hanging over the beams in the shop.  Daddy traded for a beautiful pair of beaded gloves.  They were almost white, with beaded cuffs, that went about half way to my elbow.  I was super happy and proud to have such a beautiful treasure.  I was told that I should never wear them while riding the horse as the reins would get my gloves dirty.  I don’t remember if any other gloves were traded for at that time.  All I remember are the gloves that I received.

One day, I saddled up Eagle, our grey saddle horse.  I knew I wouldn’t be gone long, so I took my gloves to wear.  I hadn’t gone far, when I noticed that the reins were getting my gloves dirty.  I took my gloves off and put them in my hind pocket.  I kept feeling to make sure the gloves were there, but when I was about a mile from home, I felt and the gloves were gone, my heart sank, I was sick.  I turned Eagle around and rode back over the same trail, looking for my gloves.  When I got to where I had put them in my pocket, I had still found no trace of them.  I retraced my trail again and still no gloves were to be found.  I was really sick and frightened and didn’t know what to do.

I decided that if I was going to find my gloves, I was going to need to get some extra help.  I had been taught and had seen prayers answered before.  I got off my horse and knelt down by a service berry bush.  I pleaded to Heavenly Father with all the fervor I had, promising all the things I could think of, to please help me find my gloves.  I got on my horse and had ridden only a short distance, when I found my gloves laying right in the middle of the trail. 

There was no doubt in my mind that God answers prayers, He had answered mine, He has answered prayers for me many times since.