Family Pictures

When we were in Montana Uncle Pat and Aunt Sarah had a photographer come and take family photos.  We also took our own of the kids and Daddy and I.  

We had everyone but Aunt Liz and Uncle Greg who were not able to come because of work.

Kayda's 14th birthday and Thanksgiving in Montana

Kayda's 14th birthday landed on black Friday this year.  Dad's family decided to spend Thanksgiving at a big house in Montana.  We celebrated a little early privately and then she celebrated with everyone on her actual birthday.

I thought this picture was hilarious.  Everyone on their phones, not interacting at all.

 

The house had an access road down to the river.  It was amazing being in Montana with the lower humidity. It was below freezing but I felt more comfortable than 40° at our house.

Left-center-right with candy!

Ticket to ride.  

Happy birthday Kayda!

Uncle Pat and Grandpa H brought some 22's and the kids did some shooting.

When there's a river, rocks must be thrown.  The boys had a great time doing that while Kayda and I wandered and played photographer.

Climbing for icicles.

They attempted to have a bonfire. It didn't work but it was a valiant effort.

Random quarantine shenanigans

The governor shut down schools March 17th and escalated to masks everywhere, restaurants being take out only, stores being closed and an enforced isolation, without work for a lot of people.  We did a lot of things.  We believed the situation was inflated and unreasonable.  Instead of shutting everything down people whose age or whose medical situation (verified by their doctor) put them at extra risk should have been quarantined and the rest of society should have carried on so the virus could eventually be minimized through a type of herd immunity.  So we lived our lives as normally as possible.  I was grateful to be able to spend time with like minded families. We had a couple of friends that chose to actively quarantine.  We invited them so they had the option but they usually didn't come.  Which was fine, it's a personal choice... Or should be at least.

Some things were just projects we needed to do anyway.  Covid closures gave us a lot of time to do them.

We dealt with the giant pile of junk the previous owner left.  It had years of debris and garbage.  It ended up being a burn pile and a trip to the dump.

W pulled out almost 20 bushes in order to change, eliminate or shrink gardens to make it more manageable.  

I transplanted a lot of plants from areas we eliminated gardens and sleeved with other plants too.

We spent time at the river.

Put up the shed we brought with us to help organize the shop.

Got a riding lawn mower and trailer.  With a yard this size, probably almost two acres maintained, it's a necessity.  While we were waiting Daddy tried push mowing the front yard.  After an hour or so, with minimal progress the neighbors (Alan and Denise) took pity on him and offered us use of their lawn mower.  Having our own has benefited us and them.  Theirs was out of commission for a while so they used ours and we like to mow their yard when they're out of town for a while.

We had to move this little greenhouse in order to make room for the shed.  Let's be real.  I am a "little to no maintenance" plant person. There was no way I would EVER use this.  We gave it to friends of ours. After unsuccessfully trying to dismantle it we finally loaded it up in their truck.  It was hilariously redneck driving it to their house.

The kids did a lot of random activities to stay sane.  

While we were waiting to put back together the front gardens (we ripped out almost everything there) the boys decided to use it as a mud bath 

Weeding, adding bark and shrinking gardens turned into redoing the poorly constructed pond.  This included tearing out the nasty grass in the bog pond, digging out probably a couple cubic yards of pea gravel, adding new liner and new pea gravel, adding a variety of bog pond plants and redoing all the rock.  The pond had been so gross you could only see a couple inches down.  The new bog pond had it crystal clear in a week or so.

Carson got a kick out of mowing. Daddy loves to mow, it's very relaxing for him.  I had to tell him firmly he was not allowed to mow any further into the pasture. Every time he mowed he was going further out.  

Since pools became outrageously expensive and there were no water toys available, we created our own slip and slide.

The neighbor, Alan, used his tractor to help me move boulders around so they were more aesthetically appealing. We also moved one to function as a stair on the side of the porch.  He helped us tear out several trees also.

The river with Carson's best friend Kailey.

The river with Leelan and Avry.

"Shop class" with Eric.

We spent a lot of time with Austin, Darcy and their family.  A lot of time.  We usually got together a couple of times a month. One day we went to his parent's house which is right on a small river.  The kids had a great time playing.

More shop class, welding this time.

Despite having online school we ended up with snow days, not because of snow... Because of power outages.  We had four power outages in the fall.  One lasted for three days.  I was so grateful that we had gotten a generator hook up installed and purchased a generator before this happened.  Especially because our well AND septic require power.  I was ridiculously prudent with the power though, just out of habit from growing up.  Turns out the generator is strong enough to run almost our entire house.  We could even turn off a couple of things to run our heat pump or dryer.  I didn't like using the lights though because the generator power isn't "filtered" to stabilize it so they flickered.

A friend organized pick up lacrosse evenings.

The kids really enjoyed the game "among us" and created a live version.