Successful Hunt!

Randy took both Kyla and Colter out hunting last Saturday and they both filled their deer tags!  

Tonight we process the meat and fill the freezer!

The way of the hunter is, then, the way finally of passion, a passion that is every bit as old 
as those hills it carries us through and into our home, in the game fields filled with real life.
  
- Thomas McIntyre, The Way of the Hunter, 1988

If you see Kyla or Colter, be sure to ask them about the wolf they got to see 
later that day as they were headed home. Our wild Montana... :)


I don't often share stuff like this, but I thought this video does a really nice job of saying some
things that are difficult to put into words.  Thanks Uncle Keith for sharing it with us.

Hope you enjoy it...

Who We Are from Sicmanta on Vimeo.

Hunting Season 2014 has begun...

 Our hunting season started this year with a week of Hunters Education for Colter.  Here he is (above) taking part in the field day were they can practice some of the things they learned in the classroom. 

In Science, we've been studying about the Earth's magnetosphere.  This science project (above) shows a compass that we made with a magnetized needle, stuck through a piece of cork, and placed in a lid with water.  It was right on!  So, it was neat to do a science project that went along with what he was learning about survival in his classes at Hunters Education.   I love it when the subjects we're learning about coincide with each other!

After the class was complete, it wasn't long and he and Randy headed out into the woods for a youth hunting Thursday together.  They didn't get a chance at any deer, but they watched a black bear on and off all day and they had a GREAT day in the GREAT outdoors!

Here's to another hunting season, with another hunter in the family!

Another "Best Birthday Ever" for Maya and Randy!

The pure and simple truth is that our third child has reached the double digit age of 10 years old.  And because I like quick links to the past,  here is the birthday that Kyla turned 10 and here is the birthday that Colter turned 10.  The grandparents might enjoy seeing the comparisons like I do.

Anyway, their birthdays fell on a week that was extremely busy with hunters education going on every evening, all week long.  So on Maya's actual birthday, she and Kyla and I made cake cones to take into her class and then we just ate a quick supper and presented her with... a TENT!  She has wanted a tent for her tenth birthday (just like her older sister got) for about forever!  

Now the next birthday wish was to SLEEP in her tent!  This posed a big problem because it just so happened that I had the entire family room in the basement "up-side-down" as I was mudding, sanding, priming, and painting down there.  Did I mention we had a VERY busy week going on?  The only solution to sleeping in the tent seemed to be to actually set it up outside and sleep in it.  Well, it was nearing the middle of October but it had been a beautiful week.  So we promised Maya that if it was still nice on Friday night, she could sleep in the tent.

The thing was that Melita made up her mind that she was going to sleep in that tent to with her big sister Maya!  The only way that was going to happen, I figured, was for me to sleep out in the tent too.  Then my sweet oldest daughter offered to sleep out with the girls and I got off the hook!  I still figured that Melita would be inside before the night was through... but NO!  She fell right into a deep sleep and slept the whole night away, snuggled between her sisters!!!  And that was that! And it got COLD out there in the night, I tell you.  I had my bedroom window wide open to hear if everything was okay during the night and I just about froze.  That Melita, she's three years old, going on... well... ten!  Here are the three girls, nestled into the tent...

Then on the following Saturday evening, we celebrated Randy and Maya's birthday together with a little party...

And she got a few more goodies.  These Caroline books have been on her wish list for a long, long time as she has the Caroline doll and the first book (which she had read multiple times).  When I went to order the set of books for her birthday, I found they had changed all the books and I was sick! But finally I found a set on Amazon.  Hooray for Amazon!

And then we got Randy a SPOT.  It's so we can keep a closer watch on him when he's hunting. ;)  And it works great, so far.  But, that's another story for another time...

Well, none of us are getting any younger, but I couldn't think of a better way to pass the days and years, than to live together and love together.

I love you, my dear family!
Mom

September 2014

september started with the return to school.  and the return to school always starts with a first day of school picture.  :)

melita and i had the pleasure of bringing maya into her 4th grade class on her first day.  oh, how melita wanted to go to school (see her little backpack?)

in september, colter got to spend some time with his cousins down in wyoming.  they got to run in old bill's fun run...

 i was able to get the outdoor  play structure stained in september.  which was something i've been wanting to get done for a long time.  so i was pretty happy about it and had to share it... :)

in colter's 5th grade history curriculum, he was learning about the first americans.  here is a project he did to go along with what he was learning.  It reminded me of this project that kyla did when she was in fifth grade...

maya and melita helped make apple sauce with apples that we picked off the neighbors tree...

we celebrated grandpa's birthday with a delicious zucchini cake made by kyla...

colter started guitar lessons in september. here he and randy are working on tuning and chords one saturday morning...

Randy took another ride in September and here is a picture from his ride up in the yaak...

Well, that brings me up to October 2014.

Maybe I can keep caught up with myself now.

Happy Wednesday!

Alison

August 2014

Welcome to August!  Here are some pictures from our month.  The above picture was taken by Randy on a Motorcycle ride that he took in August.  Love it!

Luckily all of our cousins stayed for the week after the reunion we had at the end of July.  Here are all of them except Kyla.  She was gone camping at Glacier with two other cousins for the weekend.
(Boyd, Colter, Monte, Grady, Emma, Tyler, Maya, Kendra, Melita, Sarah)

For my 38th birthday, my kids made me a wonderful breakfast in bed...

 And my dear mother made me dinner!  I am the luckiest girl ever!

 We made two trips up to Lake Koocanusa during August, to spend some time with a bunch of our Canadian friends who were camped out up there.  We had a great time.  Here is our friend Berwin giving the kids a sail on his catamaran...

 And Kyla finally got to meet her friend Saffron, who she has been emailing for a while.  She lives far, far up North and its really amazing that they actually got the meet.  An awesome surprise!!!

Then we got to meet our friends Dee, Erica and Dawson down at a beautiful place on Flathead Lake for a picnic supper one evening...

 

And Maya got to go home with Erica for a few days, to spend some time on her ranch.  They had so much fun together...

We went to the county fair in August.  Here is Melita learning how to spin wool into yarn...

 Here are the Maya, Kyla and Colter on a ride...

It was also Kyla's birthday in August!  She turned 14!

She and Elise spent the weekend together...

As usual, we spent the last week of summer vacation, before school started, camping in Glacier Park... 

 Grandpa and Grandma camped with us too.  The guys went back and forth to work from where we were camped.  Grandma, the kids and I enjoyed our days up in the park.  Here we are at Jammers...

A quiet evening in the trailer...

Also in August, Colter and Randy made these RC airplanes and had fun flying them.  They have been crashed multiple times but are easy to fix and get flying again...

Last but not least, we enjoyed all the garden goodness.  We cut way back on the garden this year but still had plenty to enjoy!..

That pretty much sums up August.  Now its beyond the middle of October, and it's been beautiful here this month.  Today the temp is 74 degrees!  So nice!

Have a good one, Alison

July 2014

Like I mentioned in the June post, we went over east for a family reunion at the end of June and beginning of July.  Here is a picture of all of us (above)

I can't share pictures of everything right now from our week togethers, but here are a couple.  A lot of fishing was done...

A beautiful wild rose I found along the walking path one day...

Our last evening together, us girls went to the theatre and watched the play Cheaper By the Dozen...

We had a wonderful week of camping and uninterrupted Husband/Daddy time.  Kyla left us for a few weeks to go to Nebraska to visit her cousin Deshka after this...

The next event in July was Colter's 12th birthday...

Part of his birthday celebration included the waterslides with friends (and sister Maya)

At some point, my washing machine died, so I spent most of July, August and into September using the laundry mat, until our new washer and dryer was delivered...

It was so fun to have Lori and Rubin and kiddos stop by on there way back to Texas from Canada and spend the night...

Then we made a quick trip to Lewistown to pick up Kyla.  Here are these girls saying goodbye...

On our way home from Lewistown, we stopped at the Great Falls, Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center, and lots of other cool places...

Then Laura and Carolyn stayed with us.  Here is Laura making tortilla's with the kids.  She made an entire meal for us and it was wonderful!

We had a session of swimming lessons for Colter, Maya and Melita.  It was Melita's first lessons and she was SO excited...

Here are the kids cleaning the car one evening...

Randy snapped this picture of his growing corn in July!

Randy also took his bike over Going to the Sun and took this pictures...

We ended the month of July with another family reunion, with my Dad's side of the family.  The entire family was able to be there and we had a very special time together, here in the valley...

July was a very packed, busy month with lots of pictures.  I'll just share these for now until I can get pages made of it.

All for now!