Elwell Family Blog

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POTATO HARVEST – POTATO OR POTATOE?
I headed up to Shelley, Idaho to the Hanny potato farm for a weekend of potato harvest. Melanie Hanny is my long-time friend from graduate school way back in the day. We’d always talked about it (for 8 years to be exact) and I finally bit the bullet and drove up. Shelley, Idaho is about 15-20 minutes outside of the thriving metropolis of Idaho Falls. It is COLD in the winter, perfect spud weather. I drove past the high school, home of the Russets. Apparently, those potatoes can be fierce.

So, Melanie taught me how to drive the potato truck (9 speeds) and I made circles in the potato fields with my erratic driving. We started in the fields and once the potatoes were out of the ground, we drove the potatoes to the cellars. They do everything with machines, so the potatoes are dug out of the ground by a huge machine that covers about 8 rows and brings the potatoes into the truck. They unload them from the truck onto conveyor belts where rotten or damaged potatoes are picked out (along with rocks, dirt clods, potato vines, and anything else non-potatoish). We helped the hired Mexicans as they pretended not to know much English to get out of doing a lot. Things broke down a couple times, so things came to a halt.

Anyway, Bishop Hanny has about 5 cellars and they fill them totally full. As we were in the cellar, they turned the lights off on us and so we were scaling potatoes trying to get out. There are huge fans that blow cool water to keep the potatoes cold and then they keep the lights off once they’re finished. It was amazing! I will never look at potatoes the same. Next time you’re biting into your french fry or baked potato, you will think about the wonder of the Idaho potato.

 
The harvester loading potatoes into the truck.  

 
Standing on about 40 feet of potatoes

 
The cellar about halfway full.

 
Potatoes that made it through inspection…

PUMPKIN CARVING
For Dad’s last FHE with us in Utah, we decided to celebrate Halloween and carve pumpkins. Creativity was encouraged, so we came up with some more interesting, non-traditional pumpkins. We got to roast the pumpkin seeds and watch a movie. Sarah and I will not be there for the trick-or-treaters this year but we decided to be festive anyway. The weather is turning cold, as Utah always does in October. We love to celebrate fall, but aren’t excited that it means winter is around the corner. We’ve already had a few days of snow. It hasn’t stayed, but is a teaser that it’s coming.

IDAHO OR BUST
Heather & Sarah headed to the wilds of Driggs, Idaho for some R&R over Labor Day. Sarah was recovering from a traumatic wisdom teeth removal (ha ha) from a couple of days earlier, which greatly hampered her ability to enjoy the amazing food Mom had prepared. 

We were antsy to get out on the golf course but had to warm-up our skills on the driving range. It was pretty pathetic and Dad & Jon tried to salvage what they could through lessons. Sarah did well off the tee, Heather struggled and was never able to recover a semblance of her former game (except for a rare par).

Shannon and Conrad arrived later that night, and we had a party while they settled in. Jon kept us in stitches with his Brian Regan impersonations. Mom kept us all well fed. And Dad kept us on track with scripture reading and ensuring that we arrived to church on time.

If the weather cooperates, tomorrow will include yet more golf. If not, we’ll head back to the “big city” (Salt Lake) to finish off the weekend.

HOBBLECREEK HALF MARATHON
Well, it’s over and all the hard work paid off. I posted my best time (although I’m not sure the official time), but it was great! I was starting to feel pretty tired at mile 11 and by the time I hit mile 12 it was just a gut-race. It was so much fun, though! They said we weren’t allowed any headphones during the race, but being the American public that doesn’t read or regard most of what they read, about 99% brought them, and luckily I brought them just in case my reasoning paid off. It was a pretty run down American Fork Canyon and along Hobblecreek Golf Course (when I saw the golf course, I wished I was playing instead of running because it was so pretty!) It ended at Mapleton City Park, where I saw Conrad right before the mile 13 marker and then raced into the finish line to see Sarah, Shannon, and Conrad. It was good to be finished. All finishers got a t-shirt and all the women finishers got a flower. It was just a fun day. Afterwards, we went to lunch where I threw caution to the wind and got the fattening pot-stickers. Hey, I had just burned over 1,000 calories so it was well-deserved.