End of My Summer Trail

I guess it's time for one last post. Dad and I made it home safe and sound and are trying to catch up on sleep and unpacking and repacking for school. Our house is a disaster zone.

Dad made it out to Cody on Wednesday and spent a couple days with me before we headed home. He picked me up from work on Thursday and took me out for lunch in town, which was really nice, and then visited around the museum with me that afternoon. I got to introduce him to lots of people that I work with, and really enjoyed letting him see my niche for the summer. My boss, John, was out of town that day, but Dad had met him earlier in the summer so all was ok. After work, we took Jessica out for supper at a supposedly good steakhouse in town. While the food was above average but not absolutely terrific, we felt that they really needed to work on their customer service.



On Friday, Dad went exploring in some of the areas around Cody and up the Beartooth Highway (which he had a blast doing, and said that the road is MUCH improved since we did it 18 years ago...for those of you who don't know, the Beartooth is an extremely narrow and dangerous road full of switchbacks. It is too narrow for large trucks and RV's, and takes about 2 hours to drive 40 miles. There is about 6 inches of shoulder between you and the edge of nothing, although Dad said that NOW they have guard rails on the side of the road. Needless to say, it's fairly trecherous). While he was out exploring, I was at my last day of work (sad!) serving cake for 4 hours. August 13th was Annie Oakley's 150th birthday anniversary, so we served cake in honor of that and also had some other exciting events going on. It was a very full day, and I was not ready to leave. The education dept. took me out for dessert at the end of the day which was very nice of them, and we had a nice break after a busy day.



On Saturday, Dad and I got up early and went to the Shoshone Lodge (they have excellent pancakes!) and had breakfast and then went horseback riding. It was probably the best trail ride i've ever been on, and we had a really great time. The ride was fairly difficult, and the horses were frisky, so it wasn't the typical "bumper to bumper" trail ride that most are. Dad's horse liked to bite mine, so we tried to keep them in check. I got a kick out of one of the wranglers. He kept instructing me on what to do when Lucky (my palomino) got out of line. I had already done what he was telling me to do by the time it came out of his mouth. About halfway through the ride, conversation brought out that Dad and I have a fair bit of experience (mostly Dad) riding horses, so the wrangler didn't try to give me instructions anymore.



We were several thousand feet up in elevation past where the road was. We rode about 5 or 6 miles, and were about 3 or 4 miles from the east entrance of Yellowstone. We saw some recent bear droppings, and also saw a couple deer out on our ride. It was really fun and Dad and I had a blast.



(This is the road headed towards Yellowstone. You can see Pahaska Tepee at the bottom)


Saturday afternoon, I loaded up the car with all my packed stuff finished getting everything ready for our big drive on Sunday. That evening, we headed out to the George farm and had a cookout with Jessica and her family. We roasted hot dogs up at the pond and had a big time. I really miss them already, but plan to keep in touch. I was really excited for Dad to meet the people who had been so great to me all summer and given me a place to go and just get away from town. I really appreciated their generosity with me and especially Jessica's friendship. I really hope that she can come visit me sometime soon and see what things are like in the south.



Sunday morning, I finished loading up the rest of my stuff and checked out of my house and then went to pick up Dad and we headed to church. Dad really met a lot of people while he was picking me up. :) It was fun for me though, especially since I got to show him the 3 places that I spent the majority of my time this summer. He really enjoyed the church service and I'm glad that he got to meet my friends from the summer. We stopped for a quick sandwich on Sheridan (that is their big main street) and pulled out of Cody about 11:30. We drove all day with a few minor stops, and ended our day in North Platte, Nebraska.



If you know anything about William F. Cody (aka Buffalo Bill) then you might remember that his home when he wasn't touring with the show, was in North Platte, Nebraska. After seeing original pictures all summer, I thought it would be neat to see the real thing. So before setting out again on Monday, Dad and I went to Scout's Rest Ranch and got to see the home that his wife lived in and the barn that is still standing on the property. WFC and his wife had a very tumultuous relationship, so it's not really a surprise he didn't spend much time at home. Anyway, it was fun for me to explain certain things from the museum inside the house to Dad about why things were the way they were, and a few stories behind several of the objects. Dad said that I knew more about the place than the people working there. I don't know about that, but it is fun to go see a historical place and know why things happened the way they did, and what is so important about that place.



We spent Monday night in the east side of St. Louis. It was fun to say Tuesday once we got home, "hey! we were in St. Louis this morning!" We traveled a little over 2,000 miles and about 36 hours of driving to make it home.



Thank you Lord for safe travels and a most blessed summer. Who knows, I might be retracing my steps and taking the same trail again next summer! I had such a great experience and have decided that museum education is the career path I hope to get to one day, and I would absolutely LOVE to get back out to Cody, even if it is just for a summer. This journey of my trail has ended for now, and as I head back to school for my senior year, I look forward to seeing what choices and paths lie before me as I finish the end of my college trail.

Home Again

Just wanted to let everyone know that Dad and I made it back home safe and sound, and that I will post more as soon as I can. I have a lot to do with wedding stuff and unpacking from the summer and re-packing for school, so I'll update with my final summer adventures as soon as I can!!

Last Week Shananigans

Since my summer is quickly drawing to a close, I've been trying to pack EVERYTHING I have left that I want to do into the rest of my time. I haven't had a lot of sleep, but i've been having a blast! I think i'll be able to catch back up on the 2,000 mile drive home.

Friday night I spent the night at Jessica's again. We stayed up late watching a movie out at one of her friends' houses, and then slept out on the trampoline and watched the sunrise. It was beautiful! The next morning we went adventuring on some parts of the farm that I hadn't been to yet, and went on a semi-hike down by a creek that had a really pretty waterfall.

We stopped for a short break one of their multiple tire swings (I've counted 4 so far), and I have several splinters from the rope that I still haven't been able to get out yet. Last night we played a bunch of games and then stayed up late watching another movie before getting up super early to help with farm chores again this morning.

After church, I got to take a good nap, and then went over to Jonene's (she's the choir director) and played card games and dominos for awhile. We had a blast.

I had a visit with my advisor last week and got a lot of my school schedule finished planning and I'm MUCH less stressed about being a senior and having all my requirements to graduate. My schedule is pretty easy on MW and really tough on Tuesday and less tough on Thursday. Friday will be a breeze, because I don't have class at all on Friday! So i'll be free to go home Thursday night or Friday mornings! I'm really excited about that. I only need 27 hours to graduate, 15 of those are required classes, and the other 12 are electives. I think that this will be a good year, and once I get back into the swing of things, I think I won't miss being out here quite so much.

Dad comes out on Wednesday, so it will be fun to have him out here and to show him all my favorite places.

Friends, Fairs, and Milking

This week has turned into a fairly busy one (no pun intended). My longtime friend, 8th grade chorus/band teacher, and piano teacher came by for a visit with her daughter and parents, all the way from Germany! Her parents live in Montana, so while she was visiting them, they all popped over for a quick visit. It was SOOOO great to see them.

Friday night, I went to the Park County fair, which is the county that Cody is in. My favorite exhibit by FAR was the hay exhibit. I could have stayed in there forever it smelled so good! There were lots of wildflowers and beautiful pictures and neat things on display.

I spent the night with Jessica, and this morning, I got my first lesson in milking! Grandaddy would be so proud of me! Even though they do mechanized milking, I still got to practice by hand
which was a little weird at first, but I got milk to come out first try! I was very proud of myself, and Jessica said I did a good job, since most people she teaches don't really want to do it. Naturally, I squirted my shorts first thing, so I got to walk around with warm, soggy, milk shorts for awhile, but it was a lot of fun. They have a system down for milking that was really efficient, and when we timed them, the average time it took to milk a cow was 7 minutes. If you can be fast washing them off and attaching all the milkers, you can really shorten the milking shift. The George's milk their cows twice a day, starting at 2 in the morning and going till 9 or so, and then again in mid-afternoon.

Things are starting to wind up out here and settle down. I'm finishing up on my projects at work and i'm trying to get those organized and finalized in the next 2 weeks before I come home.

National Day of the American Cowboy

What an incredibly busy past few days! Friday was an average day at work after a long week, so a relaxing evening would have been nice. Instead, I went to the lake with Jessica and some of her friends from her church and got to go tubing which was a workout! When we first got there the wind was blowing pretty good, so I wanted to say underwater to keep warm. Eventually the wind died down and it was really comfortable, even at 9:00 when it was still daylight. I didn't have my camera with me in the boat, and I really wish I had because the sun set right behind the mountains and the almost full moon was coming up on the other side. It was absolutely incredible. It looked like a page out of that kids book about the Indian paintbrush with all the different hues and muted colors. I had a lot of fun out at the lake.

I spend the night at Jessica's because we were both working Saturday, celebrating the National Day of the American Cowboy at the museum. It's a good thing I did! We were using some of the calves out in the gardens for kids to look at and pet, and there was a lot more preparation involved in getting all the stuff together than we were expecting.

We had so many fun games and activities for all the kids. The education department (which I'm not working for, that's just where my office is) helped organize the whole day and included some of the Rodeo people. There was a stick-horse station where kids could make a stick horse that they could use later in the day in a barrel-racing competition.

The rodeo people set up a place to learn how to ride saddle-bronc style and also taught kids how to lasso. Carpentry built a plywood steer that kids could brand with a real branding iron (HUGE HIT!) and then an area where they could make their own brand out of pipe cleaners and stamp it on a paper cow with paint and take it home. The day was extremely popular and very successful.

(Daisy-the black heifer who was about 2 days old, and Dandy-the white bull who was a day old)

Sunday, I sang at church, and it went really well. I was pleased with how everything turned out. Then in the evening, I was invited over to Jonene and Pat's house for hamburgers and card games which was a blast. Jonene is the choir director and has been really nice to me all summer. We had a lot of fun playing games. They live in a straw-bale house so I got a lesson in how that was built which is really neat. Their house is up at the top of the hill by Beck Lake (Dad, that's the lake across from the airport) and have a great view of the entire town and Heart Mountain. I had a busy, but fun weekend.

Baby Bowtie

What a busy weekend! I went swimming out at Jessica's pond again and there was actually good weather this time! The past two times that I've been out there've been storms that sweep in right when we want to get in the water. After swimming, I got to help out with some more farm chores. I found my baby calf, #143, who I have renamed Bowtie, because of the white spot on her forehead that looks like a bowtie.

I got to feed her by hand which was fun, and I think she remembered me!! :) All the cows liked my pants, and everywhere I turned, there were calves licking my pants. As the calves get older, they get moved from the individual crates into a bigger corrals. We had to move some of them from one side behind a barn to the other side in a narrow section with a stream in it. We got the calves to chase us to get them to go to the right side, and the ones closest to me kept licking my pants. Cow tongues make me laugh, especially on the full-grown cows. They stick their heads through a gate to eat grain and hay on the other side, and they'll sweep their tongues around on the ground til they get every last bit of it. It is hilarious!

After feeding the calves, I got to go irrigating again. After getting caught in a brief rainstorm, the sky cleared up pretty quickly and the sun came back out again. I've been able to set the 1 1/2 inch pipes, but the 3 inch pipes are really tough and I can't do them. I am determined to get at least 1 set by the end of the summer. Watching Jessica and Arley just set them and throw them down first try is frustrating sometimes because I don't want to be a burden while they are trying to get chores done and I just want to be able to do it! Hopefully I can get it down pat soon.

Back at the farm, I got to see one of my favorite sights---the sun shining from behind the clouds with its rays spanning out. I love it when the sun does that, because I always feel like God is looking down on us and checking to make sure we're doing ok. One of my favorite times that i've seen it is over behind Grandfather Mountain. This one was hard to beat though.

Sunday was certainly a day of rest for me. I had spent the night at Jessica's and got up early to help them feed the calves again (personal feeding #2 for Bowtie!!) and then I headed back into town to get ready for church. After church I got to take a good nap which I really needed and I pretty much spent the rest of the day relaxing and piddling around. Sunday evening, the other interns and I went to see Inception at the movies. It was awesome! I certainly agree with Mike that it's one of the better movies i've seen. I liked it so much, i'm going back on Thursday to see it again! Monday night, I went to the drive-in in Powell again. This time we watched The A-Team which was ok. The setup is really nice, because they put a whole bunch of couches in the back of the trucks and back up towards the screen. There are supposedly 3 drive-ins in NC that i'm going to have to look up. I may have a new hobby! :)

Adventures in Yellowstone

I just got back from an awesome trip to Yellowstone. The Education Dept. at the museum has "Discovery Field Trips" throughout the summer to various places with super fun activities. Jessica was supposed to go on this trip as a leader, but unfortunately, she got sick again. We had just been to the drive-in movie with her brother, cousin, and a bunch of their friends the night before, so I was really surprised when she called me early the next morning to see if I could go in her place. After running around like a chicken with its head cut off, I finished packing in a hurry and rushed to work. I double-checked with John to make sure it was ok with him that I be gone for two days, loaded up into the Acadia (which is one of the nicest cars i've ever driven!) and followed the van off into Yellowstone.

Since this was an educational AND recreational field trip, we stopped off for a picnic lunch and then headed to the marina for a lesson about cutthroat trout and lake trout. The lake trout are not a native species to Yellowstone, while the cutthroat are, and after being introduced, the lake trout are more or less taking over the lakes. It is a very invasive species of trout, and the park has a very extensive system in place to catch, kill, and dump the lake trout so that they don't kill off the cutthroats. It's a somewhat serious problem, and Chelsea, the park ranger who showed us around, did a really great job explaining, and then showing us hands on, some of the methods that they use to control fish populations. I know lots about cutthroat and lake trout now, so if you want to know more about this, please feel free to ask.

After learning about fish, we went hiking for a bit, and went to view Natural Bridge. I ran into somebody wearing a Gators t-shirt, so I just had to stop and chat for a few minutes. Gator Nation really is everywhere!

We set up camp over in the Bridge Bay area and fixed some delicious Hobo Meals. I've never had it before, but can't wait to go camping again so I can fix it next time. Angela and I successfully pitched the tent with only 1 pole left over (which we really didn't need anyway, honest!) and felt very proud of ourselves. It wasn't shaped like most tents, because it had little places that jutted out for extra people, which made the process a little tricky, but we pulled through and it didn't fall down on us during the night. It got down into the 30's last night, and I woke up and my pillow was a little damp with frost, but I was warm enough for the most part. After supper and setting up camp, we went on a drive through Hayden Valley. We didn't really see much wildlife, but when we pulled up to an overlook, we talked to some older men who had super expensive telescope things, who said that there had been a pack of wolves across the river about 5 minutes before. I really hate that we missed seeing them. Maybe next time! The sunset was absolutely gorgeous, and it seemed like there was a fire somewhere because the sky got really hazy. I don't know for sure, but I do know that the sunset was beautiful.

This morning we got up pretty early (I woke up about 5:45 and couldn't go back to sleep, so I enjoyed the morning noises and smells) and fixed breakfast and broke up camp so we could go pull noxious weeds! We volunteered to pull Goats Beard, flixweed, sticktites, white canpions, fanweed, and others that I can't remember the names of. We were supposed to keep track of how many of each we pulled and report back to the rangers, and our group of 9 people pulled nearly 3,000 weeds in an hour and a half! It was way more exciting than it sounds, especially because I got to be outside ALLLL day yesterday and today, and not everybody gets to say that they pulled weeds in Yellowstone National Park! After our weed pulling, we stopped for a picnic lunch.

We did a little bit of brief sightseeing at the mud volcanos. I don't know if this buffalo was lost, taking a nap, or getting ready to die, but he looked rather out of place next to a pit of boiling mud. We weren't really sure why he was there.

After our little stop, we got to go horseback riding! It was really fun, my horse was named Ash, and was extremely docile. I had hoped for a horse with a little more spirit, but that was not to be. I could have been sitting on a trolley car going around for all the spirit Ash had. I'm sure after all the rides those horses have given, they can do it with their eyes closed. One good thing about a non-frisky horse though, was that I could look at all the beautiful hills and valleys and rivers back away from the road that most people don't get to see. The scenery was BEAUTIFUL and I had a great time.

It's back to my real job tomorrow. More research, reading, and computer screens! But I am extremely thankful and glad that I got to go on this trip. It was like a mini-vacation even though I was still working. That will make the next few days not seem so bad since I can tell everyone what all we did.

A Night At War

Yesterday was such a great day for me. I got to go out to Jessica's farm again and spent most of the day. We took a picnic lunch over to the pond before swimming, which was quite the adventure because we had a tractor tire inner tube to transport over there on the top of the truck. So with 2 girls riding the running boards, clinging to the truck and the inner tube for dear life, we finally made it up there 2 minutes before the bottom fell out. We finished our picnic in the truck while we waited for the worst of the storm to pass, which wasn't too long, and then jumped in. Because the sky is so big out here, and there aren't any trees to block your view, you can see for 30 or 40 miles sometimes. It's hard to judge how far away a storm is sometimes, just by looking at the clouds (at least it is for me) because sometimes I think the storm is gonna get us, and then it doesn't, and sometimes I think the storm is gonna miss, and then we get it. The weather can be a bit tricky sometimes. After jumping off the inner tube a couple times, and getting tackled off once, we headed back to the farm with the inner tube back on top.

After changing into some work clothes, I got to go help with the irrigating, which was a BLAST! I was very thoroughly instructed in a couple different methods of irrigating (one was successful and one was not) and really enjoyed myself. One of the corn fields needed some adjustments so after a few pointers, I marched out with my trusted shovel and got to work.

Once all the chores were through, we headed over to Byron for the fireworks show. This town is about 30 miles away or so, and boy, do they put on a show. Jessica has some family that live about 75 yards away from where they shoot off the fireworks, so we went up on the roof to watch them.

Time for another history nerd moment. :) Because we were so close, we could see all the fireworks shooting out of their containers and all the way up until they exploded. The show was so intense, that many times, I could see people 100 yards away like it was daylight. It was one of the most eerie experiences I've ever been in. With all the explosions going on (especially when they sent up about 25 of the fireworks that just do bright flashes and big booms) I felt like I was in WWI. I kept waiting to hear a whistle blow for the men to rise up out of their trenches and charge across No Man's Land. It was like a scene from a movie when they send up the flares and then the artillery starts their barrage on the enemy. It was extremely eerie, and I have a better understanding of why some veterans don't like fireworks shows. If you look at the trees in these pictures, you can see how bright the sky was. During the grand finale (and boy, was it grand!) there were so many fireworks in the sky, and it was so bright, that it literally looked like daylight. It was incredible. No matter where I might be next summer, I would come back this particular weekend to visit just to be able to watch the fireworks again. It was awesome!!

Eventful Day Off

What a great day off this week! After the excitement of the 4th, including a small wildfire set off from the fireworks, I was ready for a relaxing day. So what did we do? We went shooting! One of the men that works in the Grounds department at the museum offered to take several of us interns, so we had a blast (no pun intended) shooting over on some public land. I got to wear the holster, which made me feel like a true gunfighter. We got to shoot revolvers, pistols, rifles, and shotguns. I am ready to go shoot skeet with Dad once I get back! I need a lot of practice with that one though, I didn't do very well with the pigeons.


At the very end, we got to try out some expired bear spray, which people out here try to use before actually shooting the bears if they attack. Basically, it's super strong pepper spray. Let me tell ya, it really works. I was finishing up the last squirt of the bottle, and a puff of wind blew it right back into my face. We had been spraying with the wind instead of into it, so this wouldn't happen, but it took a turn right when I sprayed, so I got it straight in the face. If I was a bear, I would definitely be turned away from attacking somebody. My face turned bright as a cherry and it was about 20 minutes before we could get back to the house for me to wash off. As soon as I washed it off, it felt fine, but I was still pretty red. Tuesday and Wednesday, people at the museum were commenting on the sun I had gotten over the weekend. I had to sheepishly tell them it wasn't the sun, but bear spray. That got a pretty good chuckle. :)

The rest of the week has been pretty normal, with lots of reading and research at work, and after work just trying to be outside as much as possible. Jessica and I have plans for this weekend for some outdoor farm activities, so I'm really looking forward to that.

Laura, one of the year-round employees of the museum is having us all over for supper tonight. She went out of town last week and we took care of her cats, so she's having a thank you supper for us, so I better go get ready.

Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July!! This weekend is a whirlwind of festivities and fun! Friday night, I went to the Tough Enough Rodeo, which was raising money for breast cancer research. Some of the museum staff volunteered at the rodeo, so we got to go watch once our duties were finished.

Yesterday, I got up early and went to watch the parade at 9:30 with Laura and Vanessa. We had a great spot about halfway through the parade. We saw some really great floats, including one with veterans from WWII in the Pacific Theater.

...and a woman with her pink poodle. The only word I can use to accurately describe what she looked like, is tottering. She tottered down the entire street and it was really funny to watch.

The parade also had a bunch of really old farm equipment and old cars that were fun to see. I thought Daddy would like this tractor. We think it was steam powered, but we have no idea. It didn't have rubber tires, just the metal frames, and it chugged down main street like it owned the place! That one was one of my favorite "floats." There were TONS of horses, i'd say about 150 or so, in the parade, and all of them were absolutely BEAUTIFUL.

Tonight, I am going to the rodeo, and then to a party that the museum is having before watching the fireworks. We are going down by the river behind the musem on some secret property that the museum has which is really close to where the fireworks are shot off from. I'm looking forward to it, although I am missing both the festivities at Montreat as well as Collettsville. I will miss seeing everybody at the ballpark in Collettsville, it has always been such a great time to catch up with some of my childhood friends, not to mention the best fireworks show in Caldwell County! :) I also hope that the parade at Montreat went well today and nobody lost any kids!

Happy Fourth of July to all, and God Bless America!

New Life

What an exciting past few days! Sunday after church, I went back and got to play piano for about an hour and a half. After not having played in about a year, I did a lot better than I expected to. The church has an amazing Grand Piano so I expect that I will be back several more times to just be alone and play my music. It was great!!



Yesterday, I got invited back to Jessica's farm to go swim at their pond and have a hot dog cookout. The temperature yesterday was perfect for a swim while we were peeking out the window at the museum! Temperatures got to 102 degrees (hot! but NO humidity!) and everyone was using their air conditioning so much in town that there were three power surges during the afternoon. I only lost about 5 pages on the first one, and it was a pain to catch back up, but I was better prepared for the next 2. I'm almost to the point to get stressed with work...I'm not yet...but getting close. My work load is increasing and I have so much to do that takes a lot longer than I expect it to because I have meetings to go to all the time. Anyway, back to the story at hand.



After work, I ran back to the house to get my bathing suit and car and met Jessica down the road. She's having a huge family reunion this weekend so a lot of her cousins were there and went up to the swimming hole with us.





By the time we got up there, our lovely 102 degree weather had plummeted behind an ugly storm cloud. The storm hit Powell, which is about 15 or 20 miles away, so we just caught the edge of the storm with sprinkles, but it was CONSIDERABLY cooler- even I was cold! We swam anyway and had a good time. I got some really beautiful pictures up by the pond. The sun doesn't set til really late and it doesn't get totally dark til after 11 which makes it fun to be outside.


We saw a double rainbow that turned into a triple rainbow that stretched all the way across the sky. We could see both ends of it which was super neat. I think i've only seen that happen before once. I guess I should have taken it as a sign of the things to come!


Once we got back to Jessica's house, we went to look at her animals and farm (her family runs a dairy farm). We noticed that a cow was dropping its calf, so we stuck around to watch. After some time had passed, Jessica decided the cow was having troubles and went to get some help to pull it. She got her younger brother out and they started working on it. Guess who else got to help!?! ME!! It was really exciting! It turned out the calf was backwards, so it came out back end first when it is supposed to come out front end first. Samuel tried to push the calf back in til he could figure out where the other hoof was, but his arms weren't long enough, so Arley, Jessica's cousin, came over to help since his arms are a lot longer. Once he found both hooves they put on the chains. One! Two! Three! Pull! and out came the calf! I got to hold the cow's tail out of the way the entire time (which Jessica reassured me was a crucial job) so I was right in the middle of the action.


I don't think that I've ever been so close to the miracle of new life before, and it was just an awesome experience. I hope that I can help out again (I've been invited back out to the farm anytime!) and learn parts of farm life that I've never experienced before. I really like Jessica's family. They are the laid-back, simple, easy-going kind of people that I'm used to, which can be a change of pace from work at the museum. Each new place I go and new experience I have is going to make it harder and harder to leave at the end of the summer.



My trail seems to be winding around Heart Mountain (which ironically is NOT shaped like a heart, it is named after the man who discovered it whose last name was Hart/Heart), which is in turn wrapping itself around MY heart. This summer is such a great experience for me, and is a time in my life that I will treasure forever.

Amazing Day!

Today was quite an awesome day! The most important thing is that I helped birth a calf and it is definitely not an experience I will ever forget, and I hope I get to do it again! I'm really tired tonight, so i'll most definitely update more about this tomorrow after work, but this was just too good a story to pass up tonight before I go to bed. It's not every day that you get to help new life into the world! More about this tomorrow!

Days of Adventures

Family Fun Day was a huge success! I had a great time playing with all the kids and being outside for the entire day. This is my station...a puppet stand with some REALLy neat puppets!


We also had some homemade ice cream that we served after lunch. It was probably the most popular thing we did that day.

A family band came and played some songs and taught line and square dances that was really fun for the kids.

Yesterday, I went to Billings, MT to do some shopping and see some different scenery. Jessica, another girl in the Education Dept. rode up with me and we had a great time. Her family is Mormon, so they all went to the Temple while I was shopping and then we met back up again after they were finished. I got some neat stuff at Hobby Lobby, which is one of my favorite stores, and was very pleased with my entire trip.

After lunch, Jessica's cousin Arley decided to ride back with us, so we had a few more stops and made our way back home. We all stopped at the Japanese Relocation Camp about 10 miles outside of Cody, which was really neat for me to see. There are only a few building left standing because they were parceled out to homesteaders to use as houses. Jessica's grandmother lives in part of one of the barracks. Her grandfather was one of the first people to discover Buchenwald in Germany, and I got to see some of the pictures that he had taken.

This is part of the hospital complex that was in the camp.

This is inside one of the barracks. They are all boarded up so people don't mess them up, but I squeezed my camera in one of the cracks to get a clear picture.

The camp was 1 square mile of barracks, plus a couple of other buildings and facilities around it, taking up most of the valley that you can see here, with Heart Mountain in the distance.

This is probably my favorite picture that i've taken so far out here. It is absolutely beautiful. I love it out here! :)

At church today, I met a guy from Hickory! He had been out here back in college and met somebody and when they got married, they moved out here. He's also an alum of UNC so we had a big time talking about UNC stuff and Hickory/Lenoir stuff. What a small world!

Perfect Temperatures

Last night's weather was absolutely perfect. It might possibly have been the most perfect weather I have ever been in. I was out taking a walk through one of the nearby neighborhoods behind the museum because I just wanted to be outside. The temperature was about 70 or so with a slight breeze blowing. There was 0% humidity and it was perfect. I kept walking around and around just so I didn't have to go back inside! I sure hope that we have more nights like that.

Unfortunately, while I was outside enjoying the perfect weather, the mosquitos were too. While I was taking in the fresh air, they were taking in ME! I didn't think about putting on my bug spray before going outside, but believe me, I won't make that mistake again. I have 3 huge welts on the back of my leg that itch like crazy. I made it back to the house and decided to look at the back of my leg. Good thing I did because the mosquito was still attached!! I slapped him REAL fast...but it was too late. He'd already got me. Side note, I also discovered that a mosquito had mdae its way into my hair, and I have an extremely annoying bug bite in my hair. They won't catch me out with no bug spray again!

I went a few miles out of town on a short drive today just to take in some different scenery. Mike, I found some more fences, so please oblige me. I tried to take pictures of the fences with something in the background to look at so you don't just have to see the fence. A lot of the farms (I guess they are ranches out here) were irrigating right at dusk. There were a lot of deer and antelope out enjoying the freshly watered grass, so I made sure not to hit one. I then caught the end of the sunset behind the clouds before heading back to town.

For a bit of terrific news, I finished the 1894 scrapbook today!!! That was one of my big projects to be working on throughout the summer, so now that I've got that behind me, I can concentrate a lot more on specific research. No more staring at tiny newspaper clippings scanned into the computer. My eyes will thank me! I will still be using it periodically, but not everyday like I have been. Tomorrow is an exciting day, because I get transferred over to the Education Dept. for the day. They need all the help they can get with a "Family Fun Day" that they have organized. We are planning to have food, games, and educational things from the 1800's that I am TOTALLY pumped about! I'm in charge of the puppet station before we rotate around, and we have some REALLY cool puppets. Fran and Nancy are the cowgirl and girl horse, we have yet to name the boy horse but he will probably end up being Ned to go with Nancy. There's also Bill the Buffalo (I know, I know, I had to do it...we work in the Buffalo Bill Museum), Fertie the Ferret (I did not name that one), Bucky the Mule Deer, and plenty of other animals we haven't named yet. There's going to be relay races with a yoke and buckets carrying water, blind horse relays (which I practiced today in the office and it is pretty awesome), making corn husk dolls, homemade ice cream, and my personal fav, a marbles station to play marbles. It is a very ambitious day for the 7 of us that are manning the stations, but I am VERY excited. This is my first time working with the public at the museum, so the change of pace and assignment will be nice, but mostly, there's going to be KIDS there!! I'm hoping the 7 and 8 year olds make it to my puppet station because I could use some "peanut butters" to play with.

I'm planning to take TONS of pictures of Family Fun Day (when i'm not busy being a puppeteer of course), so look out for those!

A Quick Visit Home

We live in a beautiful country. Having gone across 4,000 miles total of it, I think I have a pretty good idea of what it looks like- well, at least the 20 or 30 miles I could see out my window. :) The flight from Cody to Denver and back again is gorgeous because you can see a stretch of the Rockies that still have snow on the tops.

Leaving Cody was quite an adventure. I woke up Thursday morning and thought, "Oh great. Just what I need, a thunderstorm." After I got ready amidst all the noise, I walked upstairs, looked out the window, and saw a clear blue sky. What I had heard was the wind that sounded like thunder. It had blown trees over and was like nothing I've ever seen or experienced before. Walking from the terminal outside to the plane, I almost got blown over- and it takes a lot to blow me over! One woman lost a book and somebody else lost their shoes (But I'm not quite sure how THAT happened). My connection in Denver went smoothly and as soon as I stepped outside the terminal in Charlotte, I wanted to fall over again! But this time from heat stroke. It was simply awful.

I have a nerdy, history major confession to make. All during my flights, I kept imagining myself in a B-29 bomber somewhere over France or Germany. All the little puffs of clouds looked like white "ack-ack" shot out of an anti-aircraft gun. I could imagine myself looking through the bombsight finding my target and shouting "Bombs Away!" :) Needless to say, I had a BLAST flying home and back! (No pun intended) Watching the sun dance through and around the clouds was a lot of fun too.

Jessica's wedding went off great. I'm glad I could share in her special day and be there for her. It was great to visit with her family who I haven't had the chance to see in about a year and a half. I had such a great time.

Yesterday, some of the girls from church left for their week at Worship and Music at Montreat. They don't konw how badly I want to go with them. I know they will have an awesome week- it's impossible NOT to! I am praying that their musical gifts and talents will glorify God and that they will feel His presence each time a choir sings like I have.

I'm back to work tomorrow. I'll try to share some more good stories from this weekend tomorrow or the next day. Safe travels to Mary Catherine who travels to Denmark tomorrow! I hope her flights are as fun as mine have been!