Yellowstone or Bust

We spent Thursday at home unpacking from our cabin trip and repacking for our road trip to Yellowstone.  The boys were happy at home, playing with swords, running around outside and heading on down the street to feed the birds from their hands.  Kaleb’s buddies Spencer and Lazlo stayed the night and entire day so it was good for them all to have a pack to hang with.

I took Tina and Are over to my friend, Sharyn Sowell’s house for tea in her art studio.  She’s an incredibly gifted artist and very generous with her time, even when she has a thousand deadlines to meet.  She’s a production artist and works under a lot of pressure to keep her clients happy, but she took the time to let us watch her work.  It was top on the list of things Tina wanted to do in America – to visit an art studio and I am blessed to know just the person for that dream to come true.  She wasn’t disappointed.

Sharyn does beautiful calligraphy and has designed many Kindle covers with her amazing lettering.  One of the covers with the names of cities around the world, has already sold 1.5 million copies through Amazon.  While we were watching her, she penned a sign that said “Say Hello to Norway for me…” and then doodled all over it and gave it to Tina.  She also gave Are an original piece of artwork with a fish, rod and reel on it that is going to become fabric sometime soon.  What a thrill that was for them, and I must say I was a little envious.  Sharyn is over the top when it comes to hospitality and our slice of time spent with her will be a lasting memory for them.

It was a warm enough day that we had dinner out on the deck with all the boys clamoring for food the way boys should, which was a bit shocking since most of the meal was fat-free vegetables.  The extra boys went home late and I took Are over to my pal Dal’s house to borrow a fly fishing rod.  Are’s only dream for his trip to America is to go flyfishing while he’s here.  He thought he might get a new rod and reel at Cabela’s, but was surprised to discover they have a different system here that he’s not used to, so he wasn’t comfortable buying anything.  Fortunately, I know a really nice guy that was happy to loan him his equipment, just in the nick of time. 

We all went to be early so we could get a jumpstart on our big adventure.

Friday morning we were up and out the door before breakfast was even finished, as some of us had to eat in the RV in order to stay on schedule.  We headed east to Yellowstone in our first big motorhome trip.  It was a long day on the road, but we stopped in Leavenworth for a few hours to shop and look around, then stopped again at a park by the riverside in Cashmere for a picnic lunch before the longest stretch of driving.  Kory did all the driving without complaining once, even in rain and over the rivers and through the mountains.  The rest of the gang slept off and on and the boys read and played games, both electronic and otherwise.  I just sat and thought about all the things I could have, should have, and didn’t do to get ready for this trip.  I need to relax, but this tour guide business is 24/7. 

Once we hit Idaho, every river we passed by, I could see Are’s heart start pounding hard, so just after we entered Montana, we stopped for the night by a river on a rural road not far off the freeway.  It was a sweet spot and even though it was late, Are took out the fishing rod and started casting.  He’s just getting warmed up, but I could tell, it settled his soul.

Our goal was to get as close to Missoula as possible, but we lost an hour in the day when we crossed into the mountain time zone, so we had to call it quits earlier than I’d prefer. 

We ate our first dinner inside the RV as we didn’t bring a picnic table, so we were all nice and cozy inside slopping down spaghetti and salad while the sounds of the river drowned any freeway noise we’d otherwise be listening to.  There wasn’t much time for socializing after we cleaned up from dinner, so we just got the beds made and crashed for the night.  It wasn’t as crowded as I thought it might be, and so far, things are pretty sweet in this life on the road again.