Montana

We took a road trip to Montana for a family reunion on my mom's side. My mom and I took off at 5am Thursday morning for the 8 hour drive. The kids did pretty well, sleeping for about 3 hours of the drive, listening to a book on tape for an hour, singing songs for a couple hours and then crying for the last hour or so. They were really excited when we finally pulled up to the hotel. 

The hotel we stayed at had a theme of bears, and they were all over the place. There were bears outside the hotel looking into the windows, bear tracks throughout the hotel and bear carvings and pictures everywhere. The kids had a blast looking at everything. 

They were also excited for the indoor pool!

So excited that they did a little dance in the hallway

That night we picked up Luke and my dad at the airport and then Friday we started visiting with family. We drove to Roundup where my mom's Aunt Sandy lives and where my mom spent most of her summers as a child

Aunt Sandy with Nani, Lily, Wade, Eileen and Jack

Jack and Lily outside Sandy's house

Papi, Eileen and Wade on the porch

Sandy is quite the cat lover with several
cats and kittens all around. 

Since Jack is pretty allergic to cats we couldn't stay at Sandy's house long so we went to a nearby park to do more visiting.

Lily's pout pout face

Relaxing on the grass

The whole group

My mom with her Aunt's

Later that night we drove back to Billings for more visiting. This time we had a BBQ at my mom's cousin Patsy's home.

Jack was excited for the pool and for a new friend

Craig, Papi and Luke hanging out. 

The next day we went and visited my mom's aunt on her dad's side

Then we took the kids to a local splash park for a break in the visiting schedule.

Then we headed to a brewery for our break

It was quite the tight fit for all six of us in the car...especially since people kept giving us mementos to take back home

That night we went back to Patsy's for another BBQ

Everyone was having a great time!

Family from all over the states came to visit. 

And the beer kept coming:

We broke out some card games

And played some poker:

Jack was in heaven with his new friend

The next day we went back to Patsy's house for a visit

Then we went over to Pyro's house and knocked until he came out

We spent some time catching up with him

Even got him to take a picture with the kids

Jack and Lily played in the rocks while the adults visited

Then we made a visit to Grandma Ruth's house

We looked at old photos

Spent time with Grandma Ruth

Lily fell in love with a duck

Then we went to downtown Billings to grab some lunch at another brewery

And headed back to Patsy's

where the kids played in the water

Papi (and Luke) dozed on and off

Took some more pictures

And then went back to the hotel and let the kids swim

And then relax in the room

The next morning we were up at 3:30am and the guys got a 4am shuttle to the airport while Nani and I started our drive back. The kids did much better this time sleeping almost the entire way. We decided to surprise the kids on the way back and stop off at somewhere fun...