Sunday, August 30, 2009

hanging out

Dessi on her reading chair, in her reading room, waiting for me to stop all my foolishness and read her a story! To our chagrin, she is just kooky for Elmo's Duckie Day. I have read it at least 90 times so far. We also have listened to "Elmo's Song" about as much -- la la lala, la la lala, Elmo's song ... (have you had the pleasure?)

Whatever. Who can argue with this face?

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Thursday, August 27, 2009

Choteau, Montana

Eric's mom, Alison, treated the family to a fabulous weekend retreat at a Nature Conservancy ranch in eastern Montana. It rained, it was cold, it was stupidly beautiful, and the wine was free.

Dessi LOVES her Grandma Alison. Can you see it?

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And here's Eric, telling Dessi to keep her voice down so she doesn't scare the bears away.

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We also had a good time at the backyard creek, where Eric and I had many stone-skipping competitions (ultimately, it was a tie)

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along with many, many group hugs. Dessi loves those.

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We also took lots of hikes and one night walk to the top of a cliff in hopes of a grizzly bear sighting down below. Someone did spot a far-away buck elk through their binoculars, but no grizzlies (or I would have lead with that!)

Here's a photo of grandma with Dessi and our fabulous new neice, Neva, and nephew Aksel (whom Dessi calls 'Akel' and whom she's still asking about).

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Sunday, August 23, 2009

Glacier National Park

Eric's family visited us in Whitefish last week. We drove to Logan Pass at the top of Glacier National Park. I never make the drive myself (it's about 2 hours from our house to the top), but it's really so beautiful. For example:

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Here we are on the Highline Trail

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And here we are at our lunchspot, off the trail a bit by a pretty little creek:

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To our delight, Dessi loves to hike. She would walk for miles if we had the time, and we try to make time and to foster a love of the mountains as much as possible. On this particular day, the trail got kind of exposed after half a mile -- too narrow for a toddler. So the others walked on while Dessi and I stayed behind and hiked back and forth along the trail, taking our time but also she can be pretty task-oriented at times. For example:



There were also two mountain goats and a goatlet on the trail with us.

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Here she is taking a well-deserved break:

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Good stuff.