Deer - 1 , Dave - 0

One thing we've heard a few times out here is "It's not if you hit a deer, it's when you hit a deer".  So after a few close calls my day finally came.  

I was about halfway to work when I passed the second group of deer crossing the road (I didn't hit the first ones).  I had slowed quite a bit but I made contact with the second deer.  I stopped immediately after impact.  Got out of the car but didn't see the deer anywhere.  She was alive enough to disappear.  I grabbed the big chunks out of the road and assessed the car.  The radiator seemed to be fine and the airbags didn't deploy.  So I hopped back in and drove to work.

Aside from being a little shaken up I was fine.  And the car is still works.  Once I got to work it was a little lighter out so I was able to take a better look.  I was also on a side street instead of the highway which helps.  No further damage but I removed the loose pieces so they wouldn't fly off on the way home.

Called the insurance to put in a claim and went to work.  All this before 8 a.m.  Just another rite of passage.

Dave at Work

Here's Dave hard at work installing a down spout at a house in Bozeman from his company Gutter Solution's website.

Riding with Elaine

For the past few weeks I've had the super good fortune to learn to ride with my friend Elaine. We connected at the Bank Bar over our shared love for horses and she offered to teach me the basics. Elaine and her husband Frank live just a few miles away from us and have five equines - two quarterhorses and three mules - that she trains and rides. She performs with the Bozeman Saddle-ites, an all-female drill team, with her horse Blueberry. We saw them perform in August at the Wilsall Rodeo - amazing!

Once a week I go over to her place and we catch the horses - primarily Blueberry because she's excellently trained and calm but also Snoopy - and head over to Elaine's indoor riding arena (more amazing-ness!). We groom and saddle them and then practice. We start with groundwork exercises - that's getting the horses to move their feet while you're standing next to them using the lead rope connected to the halter. Then we do some basic riding drills - and I mean basic because I'm a total rookie. Elaine is a great coach and patient teacher. She wants me to have strong foundations so we really focus on the basics.

After we finish - which is always unwillingly but when our toes are totally frozen (riding in Montana in December is not for the faint of heart) - we take them back to the pen and muck the stalls and pens.

Elaine says that having me come by to ride gives her a good opportunity to get out and ride - it turns out, riding in an arena by yourself can be pretty boring. (It's funny how it seems like all the romantic ideas of having horses - and an arena! - lose their luster when reality sets in.)

I am so fortunate to have met Elaine and Frank!

Two miserable weeks without plumbing

Just about two weeks ago, just after our neighbors (and landlord) left us to caretake for their farm while they traveled for Thanksgiving, our plumbing went down the tubes. The toilets stopped flushing, backup filled our bathtubs, and the sinks stopped draining.  


We tried plunging like crazy and dropped lots of liquid plumber down the drains but to no avail. We were convinced that the septic tank was so full that nothing else would go down.


What a nightmare!  But since our neighbors were out of town, we at least had access to functioning indoor plumbing.  We let them know the bad news and called to get the septic tank drained.


I called the septic service but they need to know where the cap is outside the house where they can access the tank.  So Dave and I searched everywhere around the house, not really knowing what we were looking for since neither of us knew about septic tank caps.  No luck.


Seann, our neighbor, came up to look around but couldn't find it either.  So we decided to start the search for the cap.  And then began our week long search to find the septic cap.


He brought up their tractor and we started to clear the rocks and soil in hopes we'd find it.  Three days in a row we cleared a radius of about ten yards from where the pipes headed but no luck.

So finally, the septic service guy brought up the backhoe, dug up the whole area, and finally they found it!  He sorta broke the concrete cap in the process but at least we finally knew where it was - nearly two weeks later.  

But then they discovered that although it was really full and needed to be emptied, that it wasn't full enough to be causing our backup problem.  Nope.  We had a plumbing problem.  


Dave and I borrowed a snake from a neighbor to try to clear out the pipes ourselves rather then bring  out a plumber.  Dave shoved the snake up the pipes over and over again but no luck.  Then, two weeks to the day this whole problem started, Dave and Seann together shoved the snake as hard as they could until the blockage came free.

Working the snake

They did it!


Dave immediately got to cleaning - he bleached every inch of both bathrooms.  And we were back in business.

Our First Christmas Tree

On Sunday we ventured out to the Gallatin National Forest in the Crazy Mountains to cut down our first Christmas tree. We picked up a permit from the national forest for $5 to take any tree smaller then ten feet.

We suited up in our NEW showshoes (they're awesome!) and hiked out from the Smith Creek Rd trailhead on the north end of the Crazies. It was just our luck that in a million acres of forest, we pick an area with a weak selection. It was lots of old growth and moss-covered firs and few ripe for the pickin'.

But after an hour and a half of searching, we found her.

She was close to ten feet tall and she looked best at the top so we cut her down and then cut her in half. Boo was so excited.


Dave threw her in the back of his truck and we headed home to decorate with the bounty of sweet ornaments we picked up at the thrift store.

And here she is:

Anna & Colin Visit Montana!

Our friends Anna and Colin came all the way from Chicago to visit us for a week in early November!  They were our first official house guests and Dave's first visitors from home.  We were so excited to have them and so grateful they'd come all the way out here!

They're both hardcore backcountry hikers so some sweet mountain hikes were atop the agenda.  They got in a summit of Sacajawea Peak - the only over 9k peak in the Bridgers.  We took a hike along a creek drainage in the Beartooth Mountain range south of Livingston.  We hiked up Drinking Horse Mountain outside of Bozeman along with Marc and the dogs.  And Dave, Colin and Anna got a great snowshoe trail on the Bangtail Divide Trail, also in the Bridgers.

But no adventure with Anna and Colin is complete without lots of delicious drinks.  We hit Wilsall's Bank Bar for cheap beer and Shake-a-Day.  We partied in Bozeman one night at the Boz-Mac & Cheese Festival, drinking Moscow Mules, and stayed the night at a hotel.  And we visited Marc down at Big Sky for a big dinner, hot tub, and homemade cocktails.  We also made a Halloween ginger bread house from the discounted rack.

On their last night in town, they helped us celebrate our engagement at Montana Rib & Chop House in Livingston, where my parents had sent us a gift certificate to celebrate.  The lamb, steak, seafood and wine were incredibly delicious!  Thank you, Mom & Dad!

It was a great vacation for all of us.  We are so thankful for friends who go to such great lengths to see us!  We hope they'll be back in January for skiing!

Anna took this photo from our front porch

Goodbye, Crazy View Farm

On November 1st, Sara, Dave and I finished up our work at Crazy View Farm.  It was such an incredible experience from day one.  Dave and I are going to work on a reflection of our experience on the farm,  WWOOFing, small town life and Montana.


There are not enough Thank You's in the world for Laurie the Farmer and Billy, our gracious hosts.  Our lives are changed forever after our time with you.

Here's us sporting our Wilsall, MT, zip ups from Laurie and throwing W & M gang signs!


To be continued...

Guest Blog: A Harvest of Friends

Mette, a WWOOFer at Crazy View Farm, wrote a reflection of her experience on the farm and in Montana for our blog.


A Harvest of Friends

Luck struck when the wonderful people at CVF decided to take a chance on two Norwegian wwoofer's this summer. What I was hoping for as I left home was to learn about organic farming, life in Montana and to create new friendships. It only took me a couple of hours to see that I had ended up in the right place. The very right place.

Learning about organic farming came naturally, I was on my knees in the gardens the first day and my fingernails were stained from that day on. Picking carrots from a soil of clay was a challenging project, but I appreciated diving into it(literally). My questions were always answered right away and I would soon see that a farmer's job is full time; try rest when you have heaps of leaves to keep alive in dramatic Montana weather. Add to that keeping the dogs from running away, spending time with the horses, cook food, clean the house, make it in time to the Farmers Market's, build a hoop house, fishing duck eggs out of a pool, check in on a hen persistent to lay on eggs, taking care of approx 7 wwoofer's, and the list goes on and on. As Billy put it; "Well, there is no shortage on things to do!". 

The lessons of life in Montana came more sporadic. From experiencing it myself, going from a hot sunny day to a freezing night or selling veggies at the market. It also came through the stories we were told around the dinner table or driving around the area.
Amongst other things, Billy showed us around the ranch he works at which gave us an insight to what many rancher's daily life is about; cattle, machines and an open space is what first comes to mind. And Laurie would always do her best to be flexible about our days off if we had an opportunity to experience something.

One of the most memorable experiences for me was gathering cattle on horseback. Growing up watching Bonanza that had been a life long dream of mine. The farrier in town also brought me two horses to take care of, and that is fighting for top billing! Another thing that has to be mentioned is our last night at the farm. The new hoop house was transformed with colorful lights and we had an amazing dinner out there. Music and poems and a great memory! Work related, I think the best experience was to see the whole process, from picking a leaf and follow it all the way to see who ended up buying it.

Being my first wwoofing experience I definitely learned a lot that I will take with me to the next farm. It's hard work and if you are going to do something you have to it all the way. At the same time a farmer has to choose his or her battles. Let something go, and focus on doing what you have chosen to do well.

Wwoofing added to my life goals and direction in a couple of ways. It made me realize that I have the opportunity to grow some of my own food at home, and a new goal now is to have a garden. Another way it influenced me was in terms of my career. I am going to study medicine and it opened my eyes to how important nutrition is and more alternative ways of treating patients.

A good advice if you're so lucky to be going to CVF is to embrace it and enjoy it while you can. Pick Laurie and Billy's brains and you'll find yourself with a wealth of information and some jokes to go with that!

I could go on for a long while, but I'll round up with what for me was the most important. The people I was so lucky to work with! They've inspired me more than most, taught me a whole lot, been patient, open, interested and warm. I feel so privileged who can call the people at CVF my friends.

Mette Pauline


You can read more about Mette's adventures in the States and WWOOFing at http://norwegianscrossing.blogspot.com/

We're Engaged!

On October 18th, I got back to the farm in the early evening after two long days of driving by myself back to Montana from Chicago to find a note tied to a string on our bedroom door at the farm house: "Follow Me". So I did what the sign said and followed it. 


Tied to the string all along the room was KitKat after KitKat (hands down my favorite candy of all time). I followed the string until I came across a little love note card from Dave, and then more KitKats, and then a bottle of my favorite wine, and then...

A ring tied to the end:

Well, the funny part was that I thought Dave might actually be at the end of the string. He wasn't - not even in the room!  I searched around the house for him but he was in the shower - he didn't expect me home for another couple of hours.

I waited for him outside the bathroom. He came out - clean shaven! Saw the look of shock on my face, grabbed me, and asked me to be his wife.

And I said Yes.

Our New Address

From now until late spring, you can find us at:

3 Arrow Leaf Road East, Wilsall, MT 59086

It's a lovely ranch-style house on 20 acres that's about 11 miles northwest of town. It's a big horse property with a garage and shed, a log entrance-way and plenty of parking space for our three big vehicles. The downside is it's on a private gravel road that is a little steep and has huge tire tracks through it so it's tricky.  

We've got three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a laundry room, big kitchen and came furnished - which is exactly what we were looking for. It also has it's own little mountain with unmatched 360-views of the valley:

 We'll rent here through the winter and if we make it through a Montana winter unscathed, we'll think about sticking around.

Farm-sitting at Cloud9

Our friends and now neighbors Seann and Alison at Cloud9 Farm asked us to watch over their farm this week while they visit family for Thanksgiving. So this week, we've been making that 1/2 mile or so walk down the hill to their house twice a day to feed the chickens, ducks, turkeys, pigs and cats that call Cloud9 home.

It's pretty simple - there's three pens, one for the pigs and two for the birds. Their grain, alfalfa and scratch are all in buckets right next to the pens. We fill in their feed boxes with a mix of each in the morning and they have at it. The hardest part is just carrying their water pales from the faucet to the pen. And then I collect the eggs and go in and feed the cats and their son's fish. Allison has some greens still growing in the greenhouses so we water those too.

It's great to be able to help out a neighbor.

My Misadventure with Sara and Old Man Winter

So on Thursday morning 11/17, Sara (the other full season WWOOFer on the farm) and I decided to hop on the road down to a place where she had a chance of getting a house-sitting gig and caretaking for their sheep for the winter. It's in Alder, MT, which is a tiny town of 100 on the other side of the mountains from Big Sky, and a two-drive from Wilsall.

The drive was tricky through a couple of mountain passes but the scary weather was all out in the distance so we did well. She got the job - the woman is amazing, lives in a beautiful converted one-room school house, and the sheep are so cool - they're like dogs but silent.

And before we left town, we stopped at the little town cafe and they hired Sara on the spot as a waitress to start in two weeks. So we're both over the moon about the success of this little trip .. except that it's clear a storm is about to rage so we have to get back on the road.

We get back on the road just as the blizzard starts rolling in. We stopped off half way in Norris to ask if we should stay there but it was only like 3 o'clock so we decided to get on. We get to 10 miles outside of Four Corners (a Bozeman suburb) and I could not get control of the truck up a mountain road, fishtailed all over, and skid off the shoulder. It was scary but all slow motion and thankfully, no driver behind me! 

By then, it was almost dark and we had no cell signal so we thumbed it and a passing school bus stopped to pick us up. We hopped in the bus to Boz and then the bus driver couldn't get going up the same road. He revved it hard and the back of the bus fishtailed right into my truck. He was skidding off the road too so we stopped and tried to call for help but he had no radio. We got out shovels (thank god I had one in my truck) and started to dig him out, he got some snow chains, and finally after a terrifying hour in the blizzard, we got moving.

On the bus

We eventually made it back to Bozeman safe and sound, thanks to the hardy bus driver and Our Hero Dan.

I had, of course, left the truck up on the mountain road and called AAA right away for a tow out.  However, they said they wouldn't tow an unattended vehicle...  So we stayed the night in Boz and the next morning Dave came out, drove us to the truck, gave it a jump and we waited for a tow out. The tow truck guy got us out and when the snow and ice finally melted off, I could see a a bunch of dents in the truck from where the bus had hit it - one big one at the back - and scrapes along the driver side from the bus. Had anything been inches different, it could've desrtroyed the wheel well or the gas tank.

After the truck was back on the road, we headed straight to an auto parts store to get snow chains and an emergency kit.

Scoreboard:

Montana Mountain Roads: 1, Liz: 0

National Public Lands Day at Yellowstone NP

On Saturday, Sept 24th, Dave, Mette, Henriette and I volunteered on a trail crew at Yellowstone National Park as part of National Public Lands Day.

Dave and I heard about the volunteer opportunity in the Livingston newspaper - they were calling for 20 volunteers to do trail work at Yellowstone.  We were excited to have the opportunity to get into the back country a bit in Yellowstone with the park rangers as a guide.

Dave cross-cutting a log in the trail

We were lucky enough to have Mette and Henriette join us to volunteer for the day and then camp in Yellowstone for the night.

It was hard work. I don't know how these rangers and trail maintenance guys go out every day rain or shine, hiking miles with shovels and pick axs to clear trails and restore areas.  We did it from 10 to 4 on one day and were sore for a week.

Henriette and Mette getting instructions

A highlight of the day was our relaxing lunchtime on a beautiful mountain vista with the whole group.  Two of the park rangers gave us a great talk on the ecological history of Yellowstone - how the canyon was formed by a giant volcano and how people used to travel through the area by horse carriage. 

Henriette being interviewed by a WY radio reporter

At the end of our hard days work, we were each rewarded with a pass for one free entrance to any national park, a sweet baseball cap, and a certificate.

Look out next fall for the next National Public Lands Day and volunteer at your local city, county, state or national park!  It's a great way to experience Our parks.