Get Lost in Montana!

After a few days in Billings, we headed to Big Sky for Brady's wedding.  We had our own little deck over looking the resort grounds.

Ready to party!

Reception area

Kya tearing up the dance floor.

 

 

I'm surprised I have this picture of Ryker on Linkyn, because Ryker spent most of his time pinned under Linkyn.  I had to go break it up finally after Ryker got up and started throwing punches and shoving.  Once I explained to Ryker that Linkyn knows real wrestling moves and he was usually going to be able to get him down and hold him there and explained to Linkyn that Ryker was younger and knew nothing about wrestling, they were good to go.  Don't feel bad Ryker, the kid won a State Championship this year in little guy wrestling.  It also might be time for me to come clean on the wrestling moves, I've been teaching you......I know it looks like I'm awesome, but none of those moves with fancy names are real.  Time to train with your dad! 

Ahhhh.....boys and dog piles.  Get on there Adino!

S'mores!

 

I didn't have my camera for the wedding and much of the reception because I was busy keeping kids out of the river and preventing them from being beaten up or beating anyone up (those boys are wild!) so I stole this one off Brady's Facebook page.

 

Beautiful ceremony, happy couple, fun reception, great people, but it's time to get on the road again.

We stayed a night in Billings with Kara they headed to Wibaux the next day.  We slept the first night in Grandma's new tent!

Love the tent!

We headed to the park bright and early the next day.  Good thing Cosmos remembers the way because we lost him somewhere near the bike jumps.  Here he comes about 15 minutes after we'd been there.

Of course, we went to the grade school playset as well.  We had to check them all out that very first day in town.

Ryker stripped down because it was so hot.   Kya just crashed.

Big girl bikes are tiring!  We ditched the balance bike at Kara's and continued the trip with only her pedal bike.

 

They got into all their favorite stuff, pulled out every toy in the house, then moved outside for some "pop its."

And again......too much activity!

We were eating lunch on Grandma's deck and the kids came running in to tell me that Cosmos was out of the yard.

Foiled again kids......that's Bubba, not Cosmos.

She can't believe she thought it was Cosmos!

And we're off for our 3rd ride of the day.

A little after swimming hair comb by Ryker.

Dino Museum!

Ryker asked the paleontologist so many questions about these T-Rex's and dinosaur excavating in general that he took us back to the room where they clean all the bones and gave us a Dino 101 lesson.

Dinosaur impressions, complete with ROARING!

Yes, that was us leaving in the picture above, but after lunch at the Gust Hauf, we went back for more.  Ryker had some more questions for the paleontologist he bonded with and Kya wanted to look at a couple specific things that she didn't get enough time with the first time around.  Oh my goodness, these two are into dinosaurs!

Ryker got a mini dino excavation kit that he worked on all the way home. 

And then for an hour and a half once he got back to Grandma Patti's.  That is the longest he's ever focused on anything!

2 bones out, 28 to go before he can assemble his dinosaur.

One of their favorite parks in Medora.

 

I was smoked at the Shooting Gallery on the timed game twice by Kara.  I'm still reeling from the defeat and will be practicing next summer before I go back with her.

Rubber band gun shoot off.

And another tiring day for poor Kya.

We toured the Wibaux Train Car and Livery Stable

Off to Jumping Beans in Glendive and look who we found there.....Grace and Coy!

Dax having more fun with the fan than the bounce houses!

 

What goes up.....

 

must come down.

Kya no longer naps but this is how we often found her in the afternoon.  I think you get the picture of how active our summer was.  I'll make this my last napping picture. 

Camo Cosmos.  His favorite cooling off spot for the summer.

Kickin' it at the south slab.

Tree trimming

Of course there was a ride in the bucket!

We hit up the Ekalaka Dino Shindig with Grandma Patti, Aunt Jackie, Kara and Ty.

After a look around the museum, a scavenger hunt that Kara and Ty did for them because it was a little too hard for these two, and some dino crafts inside the museum, we headed to the outdoor activities.

Digging for dino bones and eggs.

Busting open the eggs they found.

Almost has his dinosaur out.

Robo Rex demonstration

We started out sitting off to the side, but the presenter wasn't seeing Ryker when he raised his hand so he moved front and center and Kya followed.  They did the same thing last week at "Mini Explorers" at the Padilla Bay Interpretive center.  We'll see if he's still picking the front row in college....I hope so.

They were showing the difference between how a hyena jaw crushes its food and how a T Rex most likely sliced it's food by using melons and coconuts.  The kids loved it!

Brushing off the track casting he made.

Ryker was pretty serious about this.  We had to buy some plaster when we got home so he could start casting tracks he finds.  So far all we've found are Cosmos' tracks.

Medicine Rocks.  Always a good time.   We're looking for some people to camp with us there next summer so let me know if there are any takers.  We need a couple days to explore all the rocks out there!

I loved going here when I was a kid.  My grandma would pack lunches and haul us all down in the back of the suburban.

The stars aligned for these two this weekend.  Troy requested monster cookies, Ty bought all the ingredients, and Kara was there to make them!

First comes Kya's batch since she doesn't like chocolate.

Look Mom, six of my very own cookies!

Now add the chocolate for everyone else and Ryker will take it from here!

Loading up pan after pan after pan....

Feeding Nellermoe's chickens

Of course we checked out their garden!

Yee Haw!  Found a horse to ride!

Gathering eggs

Nikki and Diane

Yep, we tried out everything they had and had popsicles at the end.  Thanks Mike and Diane!

 Checking out Pierre Wibaux up close.

I was wondering why Ryker was so interested in this when he rode down there.

Then I realized he thought it was a rock wall!

Hey, I didn't know there was a play are at the football field!

Glendive's Frontier Museum

Ryker wanted to touch and then karate chop these guys soooooo bad.

Kya was pretty fascinated with the iron lung.  I actually read her all the newspaper articles taped to it and that just led to more questions.

Every museum we went to had Indian artifacts, but it never got old for Ryker and Kya.  They love the arrow heads.  We went to the Wibaux Library and got a few books about Plains Indians, but that didn't answer all their questions.  We were going to go see Jim Brophy to answer our questions, but the day I called no one was home.  Turns out they were en route to Billings for the arrival of their new grand daughter. 

It rained at least half the nights we were there.  There was more grass than I've seen in a long time, maybe ever. 

We took the kids up to see the teepee rings.  You can't see it very well in the picture because of all the grass, but the rocks make a complete circle in this ring.

Ryker found some tracks that he wanted to cast with plaster.

They took some yucca home to cut up to see what was inside.  I put them in the back of the pickup and when we pulled into the driveway.  Kya said "where's my icky?"  We had no idea what she was talking about until she gave us more details.  Yucca, Icky....close.

I found these gems in a drawer.  Man I was a great crafter back in the day.

 This golden book is the only one I don't remember making so it might belong to one of my siblings.  The gold paint and modge podge are very familiar though.  I went through a big modge podge phase.  Luckily, my Grandma had a back room full of it so I could go to her house and modge podge all day!