Gazebo weekend

Man, oh man, what a weekend. I'm sore all over and tuckered out. Hans and I worked like hell on the library gazebo all week, getting the structural strapping on and gluing corks in the bulletin board. Then we had a hell of a time directing volunteers, cleaning up the premises, installing this and that and cutting and hammering and sawing and chiseling and painting and sanding and digging and lugging and...well, you get the picture. People mostly didn't arrive until noon, which had us feeling sorry for ourselves in the morning because we got there at nine each day, and then sorry for ourselves in the afternoon because then we couldn't concentrate on the tasks we were hoping to get done because we had to help people find tasks to do. But despite all that, it was amazing. A ton of people showed up and a ton of work got accomplished. It was great. I wrote a big thank you to all the volunteers I could think of on the JTEL blog.

There's still more to be done, but Hans and I are going to take care of the rest of the ceiling and the varnishing this week. We hope. I'll post photos as soon as I find my camera.

The gazebo is beautiful, and is now officially the Ida Lane Clausen Gazebo. Bobby Lounsbury read a wonderful biography of Ida, and Ray Hadley described first meeting her. George also spoke, and Shannan Turner told a few anecdotes about her, one from her sister and one from Christie Ragan Barstad. Joe Thomas showed up to the dedication party, and asked for a tour of the library land, so Maggie Billington and he and I walked up to the (extremely overgrown) library drive and proceeded to view the cliff, the car garden, and driveway & parking site, and the actual library site itself. Oodles of people came. I keep remembering more of them: the Lounsburys, Jody and Jerry Hassle, Janet Thompson and Dave Sala (who took a tape recording of Ida at the Malemute that Jill Cameron had and recorded it onto a CD so we could play it as background music for the event), Jill, Amy Cameron and Joe Geiss, Kate and Maggie Billington, Scott Allen, Ray Hadley, Ruth Jasper and Shannan Turner, Hans and me, Nancy Burnham and Don Cameron, Ginger Meta, Sarie Brainerd, Jeff and Corinna Martt (who brought bratwurst and a grill), Margaret and Stanley Rogers, Kayt Sunwood and Sine Anahita, Monique Musick (camera in hand), Greta Burkart, Lynn Kulp (with homemade mocha ice cream!), Brad Rouda and a friend of his named David, and a whole lot of wasps (who concentrated on the salmon, so we left them to it).

The place is wonderful for parties on a summer day, I can tell you! It's an amazing space. I brought Ida's Clip Joint sign, someone else brought a photo of her, and we have a copy of the dedication on the cork board. Amy Cameron brought a few posters, so now the cork board is Officially Open for Posting.

Yeah!