Picturing Pierre, SD: Camping at Farm Island Recreation Center

This weekend we chose to go camping with the kids at Farm Island Recreation Area (a SD State Park). Farm Island is just outside Pierre, about a ten minute drive from our house.  There is a fairly large campground at Farm Island and our site was near the entrance end of the main campground. We were just across the road from the swim beach, which stretches the length of the entire campground (if you were on the other side of the loop you'd have to circle around some trees to see the water, it could be a hike with little kids.)  The beach is fairly shallow and very easy for little kids to enjoy, even ones that aren't terrific swimmers. They can play quite a bit without accidently getting in deep and even the Princess could be trusted at the water's edge without my having to be right with her. As you can see in the picture with the Princess, the water flows to the right, which pushes them into the end of a little cove, not out to open water. I was able to sit on the beach and just let them play. It's not super sandy once you get in the water, but it's not overly rocky either. There is a good bit of squishy mud in the water, but the kids don't seem to mind. Farm Island has full comfort stations with showers and electricity, as well as scattered vault toliets (nice clean ones, with motion sensative lights). All sites have electricity hookups, picnic tables, and fire pits.  You can rent bikes, paddleboat, and fishing poles. Last year during the flood the campground was completely under about 3 feet of water, so we were worried if there would be a beach or any grass, but I am happy to report that it seems completely recovered.

I ended up taking the kids up around one, before Mike got off work, which meant I had to park the camper all by myself. Granted, we only have a small popup, but I've never backed it up by myself. I've taken it alone to pull through camp sites, but the ones at Farm Island are not pull through slots. Amazingly, I was able to back it in myself, and promptly took pictures and texted them to half the people on my phone. It was nice and straight and everything!   By the time Mike got off at 5 and stopped by the house for hamburgers, I had the camper set up and ready to go.  Our particular site didn't have a lot of shade, just one tree near the road, but we set everything up and it turned out fine.

We planned it at the last minute and I didn't take time to really think about packing, I just threw everything in a bag and ran out the door. We keep a few things in the camper anyway- the bedding, bug spray, paper plates, some toys- so it was just a matter of food, clothes and swim gear. Plus we were ten minutes from home if we needed to fun back.  Mike stopped at the house and got the dog and some burgers and chips and met us out there. We made dinner and swam a bit, then had a campfire (OMG BOYS AND FIRE! So cliche, so true.) and then tried to get everyone settled around 10.  (By the way, the next picture was taken around 9:30 pm. It's not dark at ALL.) Mike and I were exhausted and the Pirate was willing to sleep, but the other two were just insane. We finally gave up around 10:45 and came home to sleep in our own beds.

The next morning we went out to break the camper down and took turns letting the kids swim while the other parent took it down. I am incredibly proud of myself for being able to do it all start to finish now. If I were completely INSANE I could go camping without another adult.

One last cool thing, when we were swimming at dusk we happened to notice turtles sunning themselves a short way down the beach. We tried to sneak up on them, but of course turtles aren't stupid, and they swam away before we got a good look. We both noticed that they weren't the more common hardshell turtles, and after googling have decided that they were Spiny Softshell turtles as seen at that link.

Real Life Networking

For Day 3 of Armchair BEA, they would like us to talk about our experiences with real life networking. This is a tough topic for me, as I am not by nature an outgoing person. I have to force myself to strike up a conversation , let alone to approach someone to sell myself. Cold calls were the thing I hated most about my old job!  I often go months without telling people I have a blog, and I sometimes even hesitate to talk about the blog to family members, let alone strangers. Despite all this when we first moved to Pierre I knew I had to put myself out there if I didn't want my children to be friendless. In the 19 months we've been here I've managed to find a handful of local people and groups to socialize with, and I'm really proud of my boldness.

This doesn't address the blog, though, which was the question! I often think of things I'd love to do with the blog involving my community, but I haven't been bold enough yet to put much of it into action. I did start a feature called Picturing Pierre where I intend to feature different parts and facts of Pierre, SD. If you're unfamiliar with small town American, this post on just how small and isolated Pierre is might be interesting. I wrote a post on our flood last year that was really popular with search engines and I found a handful of local twitter friends that way.  In my imagination this becomes a terrific local resource, but obviously that won't happen on it's own, especially with my current record of posting about it.

This is a very small town though, in the middle of absolutely nowhere, and we don't get many author signings. We don't have a chain bookstores, only one tiny little indie (though looking at other things on their website makes me think they might be open to some collaboration.) We have one very small library, which is very good, but very small and not very technologically advanced (I wrote about it here.) I have imagined myself approaching them and asking if they'd be open to starting a book club or help in utilizing Facebook or Twitter, but I just haven't gotten the gumption to go do it. With any luck reading all your wonderful posts today will inspire me to finally take that step!

Three things to love about Pierre, South Dakota

1. This morning the Bug, the Princess and I went to the thrift store. Tuesday is the day all the new stuff appears, so it's a fairly crowded day in a very small building. Add a loud 3 year old and a stroller and you can imagine how much they love me, but we still go every week.  Today I had given the Bug his very own five dollar bill with which to buy his toy. Predictibly, he lost it. I mentioned it at the check out and she took my name and number, but really, it was $5 and I expected it to be gone.   I got a call, less than an hour later, that someone turned it in. Yes, this could happen anywhere, but it seems like such a small town thing to me.

2. When we first moved here I worried about the tiny library. One of my first posts was about the library and how  less technologically advanced it was than my old one. As time has gone on, I've come to love the little library. I can get most of the books I want off their shelves, and if they don't have it there is always Inter Library Loan. They forgive all fees if you return books on Wednesday and Sunday, there's no limit to the number of books you can check out, and all books are 30 day loans. With only one or two exceptions, the librarians are all very friendly.  But here's why I really love it- on Sunday, Mike dropped me off at the front door so I could run in some returns and pick up my holds. I get a LOT of holds. I was standing at the desk putting my returns in the bin, when one of my favorite librarians looked up and saw me. She said, "Oh! I have something for you!" and propped against the phone, right there on the front desk, was a little note attached to a card that they had found in one of my returns. The amazing part is not that they would return it to me (though really, it was an unremarkable Christmas card), but that I hadn't told them my name. They didn't KNOW I'd be in on Sunday unless they'd noticed I'm there every Sunday.  It wasn't with my holds that I hadn't even asked for yet.  When we go to story time, which is not as often as you'd think, the children's librarian remembers ALL the kids names, including mine. This personal touch is exactly what I want in a library.

3. We recently had some work done on our car.  We only own one car, our other vehicle being a company truck. We are allowed to ride in the company truck, but it only seats four. So we had no car that the entire family could fit into. The day that it was returned to us was a particularly busy one for Mike and he was having a hard time getting away from work, let alone finding someone to take him to pick it up. When I was talking to the woman on the phone, she offered to bring it to me. "Oh, I'm headed that way anyway, I'll just have my partner follow me. No big deal!" No extra charge. My car showed up at my door within the hour.

Levees, we haz them.

Are you ready for this Pierre? Today is the big day, as of about two hours ago, water began flowing out of the dam at the higher 100,000 cfs. That will slowly increase over the next few days, leading the Missouri River to rise four feet by Tuesday.  The people in charge expect that the levees will hold, that all of the homes behind the levees will be ok.  Of course, there are homes outside of the levees that will not be ok, but I think the town did everything in it's power to help them too. (Wouldn't it make you cry to have your waterfront view replaced by that wall of dirt? Better than a wall of water, but still, so heartbreaking.)


The parks are almost all on the wrong side of the levees. See the island out there in the middle? There is a new swimming path on that island! (for the fish to use?)

The town of Pierre has come together in amazing ways. Everyone with hands has turned out to sandbag or to deliver food or to volunteer their truck or trailer to the cause.  People are offering their yards for tents and campers, are offering to keep your pets for you, to let you use their washing machine. Restaurants are donating food and selling food at cost to volunteers. Someone called Mike's store yesterday and bought $100 worth of gloves, and Knechts matched it. Everyone is in on it, young and old. I went sandbagging a few nights ago and worked alongside a couple carloads of high school students, a handful of 6 year olds, and a dozen National Guard soldiers, along with an assortment of folks of my generation and that of my parents.  Sandbagging continues around the clock. The businesses downtown all got together and built a berm all the way around the block   Just a quick look at this Facebook page that is helping coordinate efforts will show you how terrific everyone has been.

I am so proud to be from Pierre, SD. I may be new to town, but I am loving the way everyone pitched in.  Everyone we talk to from out of state talking about how amazing this town, Pierre and Ft Pierre, is. How they've never seen so much generosity and hard work. Today the water is coming.  My optimistic nature tells me that it's enough, that we've done enough and that the water will lap peacefully at the levees instead of the houses. Meanwhile, the people won't stop working. Bags are still being added. Berms are still growing. Downstream in Dakota Dunes people are still packing up and getting ready.

It promises to be a long summer of watching the water, of waiting to see it recede instead of rise.  Watching it instead of playing in it. Eventually though, the water will go down and life will return to normal. We'll all get used to living on the water again and we'll forget the threat it poses. I hope we don't forget the feeling of helping each other, of being there for the friend we don't know yet. I've said for months what a friendly town Pierre is, this experience just proves it.

(First two photos courtesy of SDPB, last two from this Facebook page)


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Revising our plans for a flooded Pierre summer!

Like a lot of people here in Pierre, SD, the flood has changed a lot of our plans for the summer. I know this doesn't in any way compare to losing your home or your business, no need to point that out, but it does change what we had planned for our summer. This is our first summer in Pierre and we were full of plans for boating on Lake Oahe and fishing on the weekends. We were expecting picnics at the band shell and camping at Farm Island (pictured above). I had big plans for taking the boys to the park on the waterfront during the day and walking around La Framboise Island with the dog. All of those things are on hold, for at least two months. 

Now I'm on the search for other things we can do in Pierre.  Harrison Park remains high and dry. We can play on the playground at the Pirate's school- and check out the playgrounds at the other schools. We can talk walks around Hilger's Gulch and skip rocks into the lake at the memorial by the Capitol building. We can still go to the library (if my children ever find their inside voices) and to Zestos.

My mother will be visiting for several weeks in June (can you believe she hasn't met the Princess yet? Sidenote: the Princess is 9 months old today!!). Mom is an elementary school teacher, so I'm planning to squeeze every creative idea out of her while she's here. Left to our own devices, my kids will be flying kites made of Wal-mart bags (hey, don't laugh too hard, they did it for over an hour!)

We'll make detective kits and look for mysteries and bug catching boxes. We have sidewalk chalk and bikes to (learn to) ride.  The boys excel at scavenger hunts and now that the Pirate can read it's even easier for me to make them lists.  The Pirate still finds educational things fun- learning to count money, and making up worksheets and tests for us to take.  I've promised to buy them a case of carbonated water and let them shake it up and spew it at each other once we have a hot day. Worst case I take them to the mall and plunk quarters into the "rides" that litter the place.

So there's still plenty to do here in Pierre. It's just not the same as we had planned. (And if you have any suggestions, I'm all ears!) I am optimistic that the Corp's plans will succeed and that by August we'll be out on the boat. That everyone's homes will be dried out and that Pierre will recover, with slightly different flood maps.



I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.

There's a flood coming to Pierre, South Dakota.

You probably haven't heard, since it doesn't seem to be making the national news, but South Dakota is preparing for a flood. Heavy rain and snowfall this winter and spring in the mountains of Montana (they're flooding too, maybe you heard?) is sending record amounts of water down the Missouri River, through North Dakota and into South Dakota.  The capitol of SD, Pierre,  is right on the banks of the river. The Oahe Dam, just north of Pierre, is holding back all this extra water, for now. Eventually it'll continue downriver and flood areas of Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri.  I'm sure you've all seen these pictures of the flooding in Mississippi- people were building sandwalls around their homes in an effort to save them. We're doing that here in Pierre, South Dakota. We have until Thursday.

On Thursday, the US Army Corps of Engineers will be upping the amount of water released through the spillways to unprecedented amounts.  All of this extra water will flood into the towns of Pierre and Ft. Pierre.  It WILL happen, there is too much water to prevent it. They are holding off until Thursday while the SD National Guard, and every available body in Pierre, turns out to build a series of levees along the river in both towns. Every size, shape, model and vintage of dump truck is on the road hauling sand. The levees are expected to hold back water reaching a height of 1436. These numbers were determined on Saturday. Last night there were 5 more inches of snow in the Black Hills. Billings, Montana got more snow. It is raining. Once it floods the water is expected to stay in place well into July.

There are maps posted showing where the water will go when it gets here. There are a lot of houses that will be underwater. Like this one.  There are neighborhoods that won't get any assistance because of the short amount of time. Most people in those neighborhoods don't have flood insurance, since the flooding is exceeding the 100 year flood plain.  They are left to build their own sandwalls and to empty their homes of anything they might want to keep dry. It will flood all the riverside parks, playgrounds, the baseball fields, many of the walking paths, and all of the campgrounds.  Boats won't be able to get into or out of the water. Fishing is unlikely. Hopefully downtown Pierre will stay dry, but the homes between downtown and the river may not be so lucky.

Mike has sold out of every bit of flood preparation possible at his store, and then found more. He's made special trips to Rapid City to get more sump pumps and sewer plugs and miles of poly sheeting from the other stores (or had employees make special runs.)  His cell phone number is posted on the front door of the store for anyone who needs supplies off hours and he's stayed open hours past the official closing time, as well as gone in early to load more plywood and sheeting to other people.  So many of them sound so hopeless, even as they do their best to prepare. One man told him that if he hadn't put such a large downpayment down on the home he bought just three years ago, that he would walk away. He doesn't have flood insurance and he is expecting 6 feet of water in his home. Good thing he has all that equity, right?

It is both heartbreaking and heartwarming. It's a slow motion disaster, but people are really pulling together and helping each other out. Volunteers are filling sandbags by the tens of thousands.  People are spreading the word on Twitter with the hashtag #oaheflood, even if the national outlets aren't talking.   Roads are closed, people are asked to stay home if they can't help (like me, it's really hard to go fill sandbags with three small children!)  It is horrifying to watch, and at the same time you can't help but be a little optimistic that the sandbags and the levees will do their job and the town will be saved.  And be heartbroken for the people that didn't get a levee.

For us, we're on the north side of town, well out of any danger. However- one of the houses we looked at in December already has water at it's door. One of the houses we considered in March, the one we really thought we'd get, is in the floodplain.  It is only luck that we're not joining the hundreds of people who are leaving their homes for the summer.  It is amazing to me because if it snows hard I have friends from other states call or email to ask if we're ok, because it makes the news. Snow is nothing. We had feet and feet of snow and not one snow day. But not one person has asked if we're going to flood.  I don't think this is because they don't care, I think this is because it's not news. Yet. It will be.

(If you're here because you googled flood information, you can find a lot more specific info and levees and sandbagging and specific info about Pierre, Ft. Pierre, and the rest of the state of South Dakota at the Disaster Recovery page and the Capitol Journal homepage.)
I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.

Welcome to Rawlins Municipal Library in Pierre, SD!

One of the biggest changes for us (ok, ME) in this move is the move from a large automated library with a huge selection to the tiny little library in Pierre.  This library is largely charming. There is no automation, the librarian checks your books in and out manually and stamps each one with a date stamp. There is a website and you can search for books and check your account online, but you can't check them out yourself.  There is no coffee shop as in the Rapid City Library, but there is a little coffee cart with free coffee and hot water for tea. Instead of plastic bags with the library's logo, the Pierre library has a nice stack of (donated?) canvas bags for you to use, should you forget yours. (They also have some grocery store bags so kids can have their own bag.) You actually have to talk to the library to check out a book! Fees are forgiven if you check your books in on Sunday or Wednesday. Overall, it's very charming and I think we'll find it perfectly acceptable (especially since we can get ILL from Rapid City.)

Let's take a little tour, shall we? See this picture? This is the ENTIRE library. This is standing at the front wall, looking all the way to the back. The middle 1/4 of the library (at least, maybe even 1/3) is public computers and magazines, just over that low shelf there behind those kids.

Looking to the left from here is the kid's section:

What you can't see in that picture are these little boxes for each popular author or series, like this:

No expense spared on those boxes!

They also have sections for all the Newbery winners and Caldecott winners, so you don't have to search them out. It inspires me to read through them all, but I need to find a nice list.

This is the children's librarian's desk. Note: not office, desk.

At the very far back, right corner of that first picture is the young adult section, which looks like this:

About half that back wall is young adult fiction, along with the side you can't see of that freestanding shelf. The front of that freestanding shelf is young adult non-fiction. The rest of that part is the Large print books.

I haven't had much of a chance to check out the adult section, but it's divided up with sections for Westerns and Mysteries that are as big as the section for general fiction. The movie section has more VHS tapes than DVDs.

I've been keeping track of everything we check out, in part so that I can remember what Mike has read while I'm there, but also as a little experiment for myself. I'm marking each book with an R when I return it read, a DNF if I return it unread and don't want it again, and am contemplating what to use for "returned unread, but check it out again." Suggestions?  Right now it's in a moleskin, but if I ever get a smart phone I plan to make a spreadsheet. It should help later when trying to think of good blog posts as well.

What is you library like? Do you have more than one branch? How do you remeber what you've checked out? What you want to get again? Am I the only one still using paper? What  is the best feature of your library?

I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.