Catching Up

The week before my surgery I was out of town, but my flight got in late Monday night and I was under the knife first thing Tuesday morning, so I am just now getting around to blogging about it. (Update: the swelling has finally started to go down. Yesterday was so bad I was planning to never leave my house again--I literally looked unrecognizable. The doctor even had me come in to make sure I didn't have an infection, but no, it wasn't that. Some people just swell. A LOT. Anyway...)

Back in late December my grandpa died. He lived in Montana and there was so much snow there at the time that they weren't able to set the headstone, so they decided to do it the first weekend in April. Since I wasn't able to go to the funeral, I wanted to make the trek to be with my family at this time. My parents were flying to Utah and then driving out, so I decided to do the same (the fact that the ticket was literally $500 cheaper was a big bonus too!) So Lincoln and I flew to Salt Lake, spent the day in Park City with my parents, my sister and my nephew and then we all piled into a mini-van for the eight hour drive to the middle of nowhere (but very beautiful) Montana. We spent one day there and then headed back to Park City the next day. Kind of crazy, but we had a lot of fun. I always laugh so much when I am with my mom and my sister.

Here is the view out of my parents' house on the morning we left. It was beautiful!!
Finally we made it to Grandma's house and got to spend some time unwinding.

Just a cute picture on Great Grandma's couch.
Me, Lincoln and some of my cousins--Quinn, Faith, Erin (not a cousin, my sister) and Kiersten.At the headstone setting ceremony. As Lincoln had never met his Great-Grandfather, I wanted to have a special picture of him at the grave. He didn't share the sentiment, I guess.

One word to sum up this trip--Wildlife. Man, we saw a lot of it. Lincoln got to see more cows than he had ever seen in his life. And dogs. And buffalo. And--get this--a llama. Just sitting there in someone's yard!!! Montana is much different than any place I've ever lived. Here are Lincoln and I near the cemetery. The brown lump in the field behind us is actually a lazy horse that Lincoln was fascinated with. In fact, that is why he was freaking out so much in the headstone picture above--he wanted to see that horse. Finally one of my cousins was able to lure it closer--oh, the excitement!!!

My grandma and aunt had these cute little dogs. Lincoln loved to play with them--on his own terms. I'm not sure exactly how he felt about this little kiss!Me and Lincoln in front of the Buffalo. Do I look a little nervous, perhaps? Well, just minutes before this picture was taken I was standing much closer to the enclosure. My dad was taking the picture and kept telling me to get closer to the buffalo. All of a sudden I heard this strange, barbaric snorting type noise and I looked over to see the Daddy Buffalo come charging toward me with a wild look in it's eyes! I took off running in a feeble attempt to get away. My whole family just stood there laughing at me--but I swear I thought that thing was going to break down the fence to get to me. My heart was racing for like an hour afterward. Buffalo are very large animals and they make strange noises.
And that about sums up our trip to Montana!!!