Big Red - the yellow wagon

Father's Day 2014 - Jessica and Sarah take Dad for a ride

Many of you know that my brother Brad runs a nursery, Deseret Nursery and as part of it, has a lot of garden carts for customers use while they purchase plants.  One particular time, Brad purchased a very large cart, yellow in color, but named it Big Red.  While he decided early that it was too big, some of his customers were drawn to the name because if you know my brother, the fact that a yellow cart was named Big Red, is not an unusual thing for him to do!  Well Cathy and I decided to purchase the cart from him and keep it at our home.

In our initial year of use, I was drawn to the size of it, and having been decades since being pulled in a wagon, asked my girls to take me for a ride around the neighborhood for Father's Day.   It was a lovely experience.  Later, for our Stake Youth Conference, we used it to haul food and other items, since the distance to the parking lot at the camp site was a little longer than most would want to carry.

In the years that would follow, we used it to haul wood around the yard, leaf bags for recycling and other uses as they came along.  It worked well, with one exception in that it seemed like one of the tires was always going flat on me.  I did purchase replacement tires from the original seller, Growers Supply.  They were $30 a pop, and would work fine until another would go flat on me.  I tried the green slime, even tried to pull the tube out once but always a pain and a tire would be flat when I really needed it.  This year after a service project at my Church's recreation property, it picked up some goat-heads and alas one of the tires went flat on me again.  I was about to order a new tire, when the thought of going with a flat free tire resonated.  I knew I would most likely have to replace at least a pair at a time, and looked everywhere for them, including from the original seller.  

Then a few weeks ago, I came across a web site, ZORO.com. After many measurements, thought I had the nearly perfect match, they were 2" smaller in diameter, but same width. This created the need to replace all four wheels, but in the end a good investment.  They came very timely, looked great and when I went to put them on, realized the axial width I measured was for the width of wheel, leaving no room at the end for a cotter pin to secure the wheel.

I called the company to explore options and was set to call back the next day to talk with their product reps, when an idea came that since the axial was fixed, could I weld something on the end to hold the wheel on.  Since they were flat free, I didn't really need to take them off again.  I'm not a welder, but in exploring the option with friends, even briefly thinking of purchasing a welder, I went to "the top of the mountain" to ask the genius of our neighborhood, Martin Baker.  Martin knows everything, has fixed items I could never imagine being repaired and has tools that even I don't own.  I was going to an evening community meeting and he agreed to solve my dilemma. Martin drilled a hole in the center of the axial, tapped it for threads and then put in a bolt with washers.  It worked perfectly!  By the end of my community meeting, Martin had all four wheels connected.  He even fixed a cotter pin issue in the handle for me.  No finer man exists, I'm always indebted to Martin Baker!

I brought Big Red home last night and the yellow wagon is ready for the next job around Christensen Acres.  I sometimes demonstrate my pride in my projects at completion by assimilating myself to Sparticus, but alas, even Sparticus has limits and everyone needs a Martin Baker in their life.

Making sure you're following the right Measurements in your life!

Christensen Acres Weather Station

A few years ago, while going through Costco, I came across a weather station and decided to purchase it and then gave it to my family to give to me for Christmas!  I later linked it to the internet, and if you Google "Christensen Acres" you can get live weather data straight from my backyard!  It was a fun novelty to me and occasionally added entertainment during a boring meeting.  As a year or so progressed, we added our Solar System and it helped to link the weather station to it.  I initially attached it to the roof of our backyard playhouse, but found it was too close to the shingles in a heavy snow storm and in the summer, picked up the heat from the asphalt shingles giving me artificially high temperatures during the summer.  I placed it up higher to get away from the shingles, and it helped, but finally decided to attach it to the north end of a bench swing we had, that would move it away from the high heat, looked better in the placement and put it up high enough to get better wind readings as well.

Last May, we decided to update our 65 year old Sprinkler system with automated valves.  I purchased a Rachio 3 Smart controller and it had an option to link it weather stations, including just mine, which I was really excited about.  The Rachio controller worked great.  It monitors the temperature, adjusts watering schedules accordingly, if it's windy, skips that night, etc.  I just had one problem that I didn't fully appreciate until I received my first water bill, anticipating doing better than last year.  It was much higher than historical levels.  I wondered if I had done something wrong, then realized that I had noticed my weather station reading much higher temperatures than surrounding systems.  I first brushed it off, thinking that only I really used that data, but suddenly realized that it's accuracy had a direct impact on other things in my life!  The weather station had a problem with keeping ambient air temperatures controlled and those high temperatures were giving false readings to other systems. I decided to replace my weather station with a more robust system that had two solar panels, giving it more flexibility in controlling ambient temperatures and more accurate readings.  I compare it periodically to other friends stations in the area to make sure that I'm in line with theirs as well.

Christensen Acres weather Station (in the circle) compared
to surrounding stations

Obviously geography (proximity to the Jordan River) and placement affect variations in readings, but usually I'm in the same ballpark now.  My hope obviously is that this summer's watering accuracy will be much better than last year!

This has caused me to think a lot about how so often we find ourselves in places or circumstances where we shouldn't be.  Are there aspects of our lives and the measurements we follow simply leading us in a direction we might later regret?  Is it a wonder we are where we are, if the measurements we use aren't the correct ones, much like my old weather station?  My brother Clayton, wrote a great book a number of years ago, "How Will You Measure Your Life" that was on the NY Times best sellers list that has some great thoughts on the subject.  More importantly however, will be an opportunity on the first weekend in April and then later on the first weekend in October, when we will hear from prophets of God.  These are the times for the General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.    You will hear loving teachings of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Receive instructions that will give one guidance as they contemplate and get through the challenges of this life.  They are not messages of fear, but of hope. They are not messages that constrain, but rather free me to know where I will truly find happiness.  How grateful I am that my Heavenly Father didn't leave me to figure it out entirely on my own.  While he gave me choices, he also has given me guidance to help me know for myself the direction he wants me to go.  I hope you will join me in listening or watching through multiple options.  It's the right weather station for this life!