Interior Design Week: WPA Posters

Sometimes it's embarrassing to splurge. I had just decided not to buy a swimsuit for my upcoming Hawaii trip (yes, I'm going back) because it was too expensive when I ran across these WPA posters from the 1940s. I immediately loved this retro art look, and thought it would be a nice departure in our house from the photographs we have displayed. The Internet buying bug bit me.

The funny thing is that I knew I really admired these Colorado Plateau posters, but I didn't just buy one: I bought three. The price was OK--$40 per poster, but once I saw that $120 added up, I couldn't believe I was forking over that much on a whim.

These posters came last week, and they are gorgeous and wonderful! I am planning to put them up in the study/library of our house. The biggest problem is that they are 13.5" x 19". I searched all over town last Saturday for a frame or mat that would fit, but it was no use. I really hope I find something soon, and I hope I don't have to pay for custom framing. If any of you have suggestions, I'd be happy to hear them!

P.S. Sorry that these sizes aren't all the same. That's pretty lazy of me for design week, isn't it?

Dreaming of Red Rock

I've been aching to get down to Southern Utah. Yesterday I found out that my backcountry reservation for a backpacking site in Chesler Park was approved for this spring. Yea! Chesler Park, which is in the Needles District of the enormous Canyonlands National Park, is one of my top three spots. My brother Matt was wonderful enough to print and frame this picture he took in Chesler Park and give it to me as a birthday present. It now has a spot on the most looked-at wall in our house:

One more thing, Matt and Brooke went down to St. George last weekend and were awesome enough to go to Zion National Park. Here's my favorite photo from their trip:

I'll get there, eventually.

Parunuweap Canyon

It's officially mid-July, and even though it's pretty dang hot where I'm writing, I have to say I'm glad I'm not out in 113 degree temperature in Zion National Park on a hike that ends in failure. Sure, I love the wilderness, but I'm usually pretty good at keeping my wild desert excursions in a tolerable temperature range. I have a hard enough time as it is getting out and running just 2-3 miles in the evenings, after it's been 95-100 degrees all afternoon.

Two years ago, I wasn't so lucky. My brother was on leave from the military in July, and he is the most enthusiastic Zion National Park lover in the family, and since that was the time he could go, we went. Feeling adventurous, my two brothers, Kevin, and I decided to do a long (14 mile or so) hike to Parunuweap Canyon, a slot canyon above the famous Zion Narrows. The only problem is that about 90% of this hike is directly in the sun with no shade. Seriously, try to find a juniper big enough to shade even two people at 2:00 p.m. in the July desert. We thought that this wouldn't be an issue once we climbed down the cliff and into the Virgin River and Parunuweap slot canyon, but unfortunately, we didn't make it that far.This is the look across the road from Checkerboard Mesa, our hike's starting point. These Zion mountains were some of the most beautiful sites on the trip.
The trail wandered through this forest, which became a most-desired destination on our way back to the shade it provided.
We crossed this carved out location along the slickrock before we reached the edge of the cliff where we'd be close to Parunuweap. At about this point, we guaged how far we'd come and decided that it had taken much too long. We still wanted to see the Virgin River and its canyons, however, so we pressed forward.

And here's the look from the cliff down to the Virgin River and Purunuweap. It was heartbreaking to get here, to see the lush vegitation and running water, and not make our way down. But, we had promised to meet my sister and brother-in-law back at the parking lot by 5:00 p.m., and, we were nearly out of water. Wisdom has its price, I guess. I'll have to revisit this one in April or September sometime.

November

I relish the way the autumn air in the Wasatch Front blows down from the canyons and makes the air in my yard smell like the mountains.

In autumn, I like to I take inventory of my life, and I feel it is a time for letting things go, such as unnecessary stress, political games, and anything that doesn't feel as comfortable as coming home. On the other hand, it's time I make resolutions, and I have decided to meet my challenges upfront on the job, in my church service, and with my friendships.


Chesler Park at dusk

Reluctance
Robert Frost: A Boy's Will

Out through the fields and the woods
And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
And looked at the world, and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
And lo, it is ended.

The leaves are all dead on the ground,
Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
When others are sleeping.

And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown hither and thither;
The last lone aster is gone;
The flowers of the witch-hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question 'Whither?'

Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?

Hidden Canyon: Zion National Park

There's nothing like a sunset hike in Zion. At that time of day, we found it very relaxing and quiet, and a lot of the animals came out.

"So are great reaches of our western deserts, scarred somewhat by prospectors but otherwise open, beautiful, waiting, close to whatever God you want to see in them... It is a lovely and terrible wilderness, such as wilderness as Christ and the prophets went out into; harshly and beautifully colored, broken and worn until its bones are exposed, its great sky without a smudge of taint from Technocracy, and in hidden corners and pockets under its cliffs the sudden poetry of springs. Save a piece of country like that intact, and it does not matter in the slightest that only a few people every year will go into it. That is precisely its value. Roads would be a desecration, crowds would ruin it. But those who haven't the strength or youth to go into it and live can simply sit and look. They can look two hundred miles, clear into Colorado..." --Wallace Stegner, "Wilderness Letter," December 3, 1960