Personal Challenge 2018 - Week 43

This is the 43rd week of my personal 50-week States of the Union Challenge. Each week I research one of the 50 United States (in the order they attained statehood). I share tidbits of information about the state here on my blog and I create a card that is inspired by something about that state.

This week's state (the 43rd one to attain statehood) is...

Idaho

Date of Statehood: July 3, 1890

Idaho's combined wilderness is over 4.7 million acres, which is greater than the US's three smallest states combined. A whopping 63 percent of the state is considered public land.

The total length of Idaho's rivers and waterways (over 107,000 miles) could stretch across the US thirty-eight times.

Idaho's State Capitol Building is the only one in the U.S. heated by geothermal energy. The heat comes from hot springs located 3,000 feet underground.

Boise Idaho is the state + capital spelling with the fewest number of letters possible.

Shortly after Idaho gained statehood in 1890, its governor decided it was time for a new state seal. The First Legislature for the State of Idaho held a national competition with a $100 prize that would be awarded to the best design. Artists from all over the country entered, but it was Emma Edwards, a recent Boise transplant and art teacher, whose painting of a male miner and a female goddess, signifying freedom and suffrage, won the competition to become the official State Seal in 1891. It is the only state seal in the U.S. designed by a woman. 

Idaho has a nearly perfect 1:1 ratio of men and women.

Idaho is home to the highest navigable river in the world. The river is called St Joe River, and it flows from an elevation of nearly 7,000 feet.

Most people think the Grand Canyon is the deepest canyon in the US. Wrong. Northern Idaho’s Hells Canyon is the deepest river-carved canyon on the continent — the Snake River that runs through it sits 8,000 feet below the east rim at its highest point. That makes it about 2,000 feet deeper than Arizona’s showpiece. Coming in a hot second is Idaho’s Salmon River Gorge, where the granite walls rise 7,000 feet above the valley floor.

Heaven’s Gate Lookout, in Idaho, is a location where you can see Washington, Montana, and even Oregon

The state grows nearly one/third of America’s potatoes. 

The word “potato” was first used in the state’s license plate back in 1928,and the state has not looked back since.

Idaho's most famous crop (the potato) isn't native to the area. The first potato in America was actually planted in New Hampshire, in 1719. A missionary named Henry Harmon Spalding brought the potato to Lapwai, Idaho, in 1836 to teach the Nez Perce tribe how to grow their own food. They were the first to cultivate and sell spuds in the area.

The Lake Coeur d’Alene boardwalk is 3,300 feet long and is known as the longest boardwalk in the world. This is definitely for all those who love to walk by the beach.

Idaho is home to the Niagara of the West. Yes, those who want to experience something like Niagara Falls could check out Shoshone Falls with its 212-foot drop.

Thirteen U.S. states are split into two time zones, and Idaho's one of them. The majority of the state's area and population fall under Mountain Time. The area above the Salmon River is part of the Pacific Time Zone.

The state horse, the Appaloosa, was brought over by the Spaniards in the 1700s and embraced by the Nez Perce tribe. Settlers called the spotted equines "Palouse horses" after the Palouse River, and the name stuck.

In 1936, a Swiss engineer brought the world’s first aerial chairlift to Sun Valley, Idaho, at the same time that a four-story ski lodge was built. And thus, the country’s first destination ski resort was born. While the original chairlift is no longer in operation, Sun Valley is still one of America’s premier ski mountains and a homebase for dozens of Olympic skiers and snowboarders. And, true to its name, it gets 250 days of sun per year.

Someone paid $600,000 for a bull from Idaho. This was the most expensive bull ever sold. The cost was high because the Hereford bull weighed 1,410, and its lineage was impeccable.

If you're dog tired and traveling through Cottonwood, Idaho, you can spend the night at Dog Bark Park Inn, a bed and breakfast shaped like a giant beagle.

Who needs the ball drop in Times Square when you have a giant potato falling from the sky in downtown Boise? The Idaho Potato Drop attracted nearly 80,000 people in 2014 with a bustling block party featuring local musicians, a beer garden, food trucks, and, well…a 17 foot potato for the countdown.

Idaho actually holds a strange little Guinness World Record for a maze. Yes, the state is known for the longest straw bale maze, which is in Rupert.

This state offers the longest gondola ride in the world, so strap in and enjoy nature from above. The gondola is in the Silver Mountain Resort in Kellogg.

A mayor seemed to have a strange adoration for his small town in Idaho. He declared that Wallace, with a population of 800 people, was the Center of the Universe. A manhole cover was made to mark this declaration and the place he said was the center.

It might sound a little strange, but it is against Idaho law for a man to give his beloved a box of sweets that weighs more than 50 pounds.

People really love to smile in Pocatello, Idaho. This obsession with smiles went so far that it became a law. Yes, it is illegal not to smile in public in this little region of the state.

It is illegal for a person to fish while they are riding the back of a camel. 

A person cannot sweep dirt from his or her house into the street. This is a law in Eagle, Idaho where cleanliness is definitely valued by the people in the city.

I decided to go with this bit of Idaho information for my card's inspiration... The 485,000-acre Morley Nelson Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area was set aside in 1993 to protect the habitat of the densest concentration of large nesting birds in North America. Every spring, over 800 pairs of raptors — including hawks, owls, eagles, and falcons — flock to the Snake River plateau to mate; the crags and crannies of the Snake River gorge provide the perfect place for raptors to guard their young.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

Stamp: Woodware Patch Owl stamped with Memento Tuxedo Black Ink and cut with Scan N Cut

Papers: Recollections Black and 110# White and SU Ballet Blue CS and DP from AMuse Studio (I punched the leaves out with a SU punch)

Embellishment: Heart-shaped Brad from an unknown vendor