Friends:)

One of Athena's good friends moved to Florida in June to prepare for a sailing trip around the world. We were tentatively scheduled to be on our trip when they flew back so we did the only logical thing, we came home early.

It was great seeing both April and Audrey! We will look forward to seeing them again soon! 

My child is not this strong.

Grand Teton

Our family stayed in West Yellowstone the night before heading through the Grand Tetons and back to Colorado. It's a cute town with a nice park near the restaurants. We picked up dinner to go from the Slippery Otter and played at the park, I can't give them an honest review because we only had salads but it was a great break from huckleberry jam sandwiches, yogurt and fruit on the way down. Oh, and the fighting... Our kids decided to fight over who was able to pet Sparty, our Scottish Terrier. 8 hours later, I was happy to have survived.

The morning of the Grand Tetons we drove through Yellowstone. We missed Old Faithful, Athena was disappointed. She had every plan of showing it to Jay because he had not seen it recently. I think she wanted an excuse to time it. 

We did a few short hikes at the Grand Tetons and attended a few of the ranger programs on bison and wildlife. Having attended many of the ranger led programs at various parks this summer alone, I must say, they did a great job with content and being able to address and engage the entire audience. We plan to head back through each the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone when we travel through the Pacific Northwest. We will hike each of the parks more thoroughly at that point.

She is getting taller... Or maybe she is standing on a rock. 

Toddler hikes- barefoot. It's all fun and games until you step in mud. 

We loved the wildflowers. 

Athena has decided to hike with technology in hand to take pics. Or play games. I'm not sure. Okay, it was the first. I suppose the iPad thing is growing on me because it gives her a camera (which is hard to misplace, unlike her Olympus Tough) to take photos from her level and POV. 

Taking on Idaho in a Day

We decided to knock Idaho off our "to-do list" during this trip and because we were in Northern Montana visiting GNP the day before we wanted to stay near Coeur d'Alene. We started the morning with a mine tour... Considering nobody in our family has mining experience outside of Snow White's seven little buddies singing, "Heigh Ho" it was bound to be educational or insightful.

*Note: It was slightly disappointing when Athena missed the Snow White reference, yet at the same time I was relieved.

The tour company we used was the Sierra Silver Mine in Wallace, Idaho and Lenny, AKA the "Smurf" was our guide. He was funny and brought the tour to life. He had a lot of personality for someone so small, hence why he was nicknamed the Smurf. The tour touches on every aspect that went into mining from the air channels, mine shafts, equipment used, miner safety and more. It covered things which seemed obvious and many "Oh, so that's how it works." I would highly recommend The Sierra Silver Mine. The office staff was equally helpful at answering questions.

Our guide, Lenny. He may be heading back into the mines to work again.

I would be lying if I said I did not want to hijack a mine cart and sing, "Heigh ho," it is however, slightly less tempting than driving on a runaway truck ramp in the mountains.

Lex has had the same life motto going on three years, "Not impressed."

No car seats...

 

We arrived back safely, spinal cords intact, thanks to a great driver and few cars in sight.

As we were leaving Wallace, we needed to grab lunch... The idea was to head towards Old Mission State Park and pick up lunch along the way. There was nothing that was not fast food so we decided to head towards Coeur d'Alene and explore the town. We had lunch at the Dockside, I highly recommend for the views alone. The food was decent for a hotel restaurant.

A fun view from our table:) We took a walk around the boardwalk following lunch.

Athena has always had a strong interest in historical sites so I was a bit surprised when the Cataldo Mission was of no interest to her.

Except sarcasm and goofy smiles.

Our family did enjoy walking the grounds and viewing the graves. However, I would not recommend Old Mission State Park to friends passing through unless they have a strong interest in religious history... which we do not.

That said, it was a fun day in the area. I am interested in finding a coal mining tour to explore the differences and similarities in mining styles and we would love to visit Boise in the nearish future.

Idaho, The End

Glacier National Park

We spent the day at Glacier National Park learning about Glaciers, erosion and  wildlife in the park. Glacier is a great park for kidlet hiking. It is estimated by 2030 there will be no glaciers left in GNP. Global warming... Climate change, either way. It's a reminder that we don't always have an endless amount of time to explore with our kids. 

*He should have tossed her in;)*

Tire 'em out

Happy Birthday to me... We celebrated my last year in the 20's by heading to a soccer game and Montana. Go Rapids?!?!?! Surprisingly, it was fun. I guess I could call myself a Rapids fan now:) Husband- pleased.

LA Galaxy won 4-3

Soccer is more exciting than pictures:)

Roadschooling to worldschooling transition

I made it through trip number one this summer solo with the girls and we are getting ready to head out in late August for trip number two! This time with an additional three family members, the dad and the doggies but a lot less stuff. (Anyone interested in rabbit sitting?)

Our tentative itinerary is: 

Friday afternoon: Head up to Grand Tetons. 

Saturday: Explore GTNP and collect the Jr. Ranger badge (Athena's hobby.) Drive into Montana. 

Sunday: Relax:) 

Monday: Visit the Cataldo Mission House and a mine tour near Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. The girls will head back to Montana with their grandparents and Jay and I will continue on to Seattle. 

Tuesday/ Wednesday: Jay and I will be in Seattle, drive back to Montana. 

Thursday: Visit Glacier National Park. (Athena wanted me to mention a badge of some sort?)

Friday: Hike and relax. 

Saturday/ Sunday: Drive back to Colorado. 

While on our earlier trip we visited New Mexico, Montana and Wyoming we have not yet visited two educational spots to count each of the states. We hope to knock out Wyoming and Montana on this trip and hopefully NM in the fall. 

Jay and I decided to take a few days to ourselves and discuss the transition from roadschooling to worldschooling with the hopes of finding a transition that is suitable for the entire family unit. The two days will be spent discussing: Do we keep our house? Rent it out? Do we rent an apartment or move directly on to some sort of RV? Do we buy new or used? Do we consider a travel trailer which may be better for fitting our entire family in a larger SUV compared to truck with two dogs in tow? Do we keep the pets? (I'm sure this has to be a YES!) How will we balance cultural immersion vs. knocking off countries? There are many other logistics we need to consider.

We've spent months going back and forth on a plan of attack so to speak so we are hoping it is nearing the end and a final decision will be made by Labor Day weekend at the latest.

Wish us luck!