Turtles

Sooner or later, I knew this was coming.  But I'll start at the beginning. Julie and I bought our house in 2008.  One day, Julie laid a rope out in the back yard in the shape of a pond, and started digging.  Of course I felt sorry for her, and started to help.  Ok I took over.  Using only a pick and a shovel.  The month after I started, she bought turtles from a source in Florida.  They ship the turtles overnight.  I built a temporary enclosure for them and continued to dig.  Three months later, we put in a liner and a pump. It ended up being 22 feet long, 8 feet wide, and 4 feet deep at the deepest point.  I think it's about 2000 gallons. In went the turtles. The first year, we put in a waterfall.  The next year, grass.  Last year, bushes and a garden.  And Julie thought the pond was too deep, so I filled it in a little.  It's a work in progress.  As in the grass keeps dying.  We're working on it.

The first turtles were a pond turtle (Moss), two western painted turtles (Dribble and Nick), and a musk turtle (Yoda).  We added a few box turtles that we rescued, but ended up taking them back to the forest when one of them drowned (I was able to resuscitate it by pushing it's legs into it's shell several times.  kinda weird, but it lived).  We rescued a wild cumberland slider with a huge bite out of it's shell, and also missing a tail.  We named him Sonny.

We had two surprises last year- two of our turtles had babies- the slider, Moss, and the musk turtle Yoda. On a side note, Bradley is upset that Yoda was a girl turtle  He tried to deny it for a while, and begged us not to let anyone know.  We have 16 new sliders inside out house now.

The turtles are pretty cool.  Mostly, they just like to sun themselves on the log.  They actually need sunlight to help them digest their food.  Other facts about turtles:
-Musk turtles get their name from the musk they emit when frightened.
-The largest freshwater turtle in the world is the Alligator Snapper.  They can weigh up to 200 lbs, and can be found in southern Alabama. And they do snap.
-Box turtles can pull their entire body inside their shell and can seal themselves in so tight they are nearly impossible to get out.
-pond turtles "hibernate" in the winter.  Their blood become a sort of "antifreeze" and they hardly move for 3 or 4 months of the year.  They burrow into the mud, and can absorb oxygen through their skin.
-a female slider turtle can hold 16 eggs inside her body for 2 years before laying them.
-the southeastern U.S. has more varieties of turtles than any other part of the world.

baby softshell turtle- very, very rare find!

baby snapping turtle- not an alligator snapper.  Notice the dinosaur-like plates on arm!

box turtle

female box turtle

Moss and a western painted turtle

baby map turtle.  Very hard to find at this age.

bottom of map turtle

a box turtle we named Spot.

photos

Here are some photos:

William S. Berry

I got into family history a few months ago. My great ++++ grandfather was killed as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints back in 1888 in the Tennessee Massacre. I found out I now live about 2 hours from the site. So I made the trip to see it. I took some photos.

Ironically, William Berry was born and died in Tennessee, but not before he moved to Nauvoo Illinois a few months after the prophet Joseph Smith was killed, and headed west with the pioneers and Brigham Young. After reaching the Salt Lake Valley, the Berrys were asked to settle in the St. George area. Finding their ambition was bigger than the area afforded, they moved just outside of town, and called their new home 'Berryville'. In those days, the town would give acreage to anyone willing to work on the canal that would provide Hurricane, Utah, with water.  I think William got about 10 acres out of the deal. He planted pecan trees on his land, and there are still pecan trees on the Berry side of town to this day.  After getting comfortable, William Berry was called on a mission to the Southern states by Brigham Young. He served in several areas in Tennessee before ending up in Hohenwald, TN.

Instead of retelling the rest of the story, here is a link to Bruce Crow's blog.

to knit

So, I learned how to knit. I know- not too manly. But only in America. Most other European countries, men are knitters, too. Granted, just try and find a magazine dedicated to men who knit (crickets chirp in the background). Well, for me, it started when Julie's mom had a kidney transplant in 2009, and Julie was so bored while at the hospital with her mom, so she asked if I had any ideas for what to do.

I said, "Ask her how to knit."

A few days later, Julie came home and showed me the 'knit stitch.' A week later, she showed me the 'purl stitch.' I was 'hooked.' I read all about it online- found the world's fastest knitter video, how to cast on, bind off, knit in the round, and with dpn's. I joined ravelry, and lion brand, and downloaded some patterns. I have knitted half a dozen hats, 2 pairs of socks, 3 scarfs, a pair of gloves (hobo gloves- the fingers are open at the end), a hoodie for Diesel, and I'm in the middle of a hoodie for Levi.

But it really started in New Zealand. All those people knit- men and women. I have some beautiful sweaters, (and some ugly ones, says Julie!), and a lady there tried to teach me to knit. I never had time to knit, I thought, and that was that.

Now I knit in my car while waiting in line at the bank, the doctor's office, the school, late at night. On a side note, it is really cold in my shed right now, and so woodworking has taken the season off.

October 2010