And the rest of the trip...day 2

We were bored waiting for the rodeo to finally start. It seemed like forever before they opened the first gate. But it was so worth it...we loved every minute of one of the biggest rodeo's on the circuit.

I caught a snap shot of the cowboys with their hats off while they sang the Canadian National Anthem. Can't say I have ever heard that before or will ever again...The grand entry show was a huge deal and they had fireworks and queens from all over. Flags racing around the arena and then all the cowboys and cowgirls ran into the arena to form a horseshoe shape. It was really fun to watch.

After the excitement of the rodeo, we ran down to the table they had set up in front of the arena where all the winners of that days events would be signing autographs. I borrowed Guy's hat and had Stran Smith sign the brim. Guy took a pic while we posed. If anyone doesn't know who this cowboy is, then I will educate you. He is the 2008 world champion calf roper...so there you have it.

And then we had a few hours to kill before the main event...George Strait of course. So we mosied around the fair and saw lots of animals and stuff. We couldn't resist taking turns putting our faces through this silly cut out of a John Deere tractor. I think that this was meant for kids, but we are kids in grown up bodies.

It looks like Guy was a little shy about putting his face through the hole very far. Thats okay dude...you still look silly enough. Thanks for the fun day at the fair.

Our trip out of the country...day 1

We hit the road early cause we had about 800 miles to go on the first day. Guy had the trip completely planned out as far as the routes we were taking went. So this was what would happen every time we stopped...out the map would come and Guy would be checking to see how many more miles we had to go.

Our first pit stop we decided to make was in Idaho. The town was Idaho Falls and the river went right through the middle of town. The falls were amazing...I couldn't believe that so much water was running through there. We wanted to hurry and just take a few pics, but we ended up spending an hour there. That's okay, we probably won't make it there again, so enjoy it while you can.

While we were there, we captured this great pic of the temple. It was awesome and I bet that it is a great view for tourists which probably attracts them to the visitors center. Later we saw post cards with this similar pic on it, but we captured it for ourselves. So we hit the road again and not even 20 minutes from here...which was almost the middle of nowhere...my car starts to cut out and act wierd. Yeah not a great thing when you are only a few hours into an 1800 mile trip. Guy was sleeping while I was driving, so I woke him up and told him what was happening, so we pulled over on an off ramp and we checked it out. Guy found that it was a short in the wiring harness, so we wiggled it around and got back on the road. It worked for about 100 miles, then started shorting out again...by this time, we had made it to Butte, Montana. So while we were getting fuel, I ran in to buy electrical tape so we could fix it a little better, but they only had duct tape. So that is what we used. But before we even got out of town, it got worse, so we turned around and headed to the Ford dealership and tried to buy a new wiring harness which wasn't going to be cheap. The didn't have one in stock, so we headed to the parts store and bought a few things including a wrench. Yeah I am married to a mechanic who has alot of tools, but decides that it isn't important to take any with when we travel. So we fix it up and get going again, but less then 60 miles out of town, it starts acting up again. We were both frustrated with what was happening, but over the course of the next couple hours, we stopped about 10 times to wiggle the wire to make it work again. Before one of the last stops, Guy had a bright idea to use his shoe lace to hold the wire over a little and see if that would work. Well, it worked about as long as not using the shoe lace. So Guy started to fiddle with the wire more, and realized that it was actually a wire next to the one we thought. So on the side of the freeway, he tore it apart and rewired the plug it went to. And.................finally it worked. We didn't have any more car problems the rest of the trip.

So we planned on getting to Canada at about 8pm, but we didn't pull into our hotel til 11pm. Thanks to the car problems, but thank goodness Guy fixed the problem. This was at the border, which was kind of scary going across. We were so far away from home and heading to a new country. There were no mountains and we could see forever in all the directions. When the sun was going down, it took forever cause there were no mountains to dip behind.

Welcome to Alberta....

Helping with 1st crop...

Well, my dogs have figured out the whole traveling thing. They know when we are about to leave and they do not want to be left behind. I was in the bathroom packing up hair stuff to put in the bag, and I could hear rummaging around in the bedroom so I peaked around the corner and this is what I found...a spike dead asleep in the over-night bag. He did not want to be left behind at all so he was going to pack himself into the bag so that I couldn't forget him. What a goof.

Then we got to the farm and Samantha's kitty's had kittens since the last time we were there. They were so cute, and of course my dogs had to chase them around and tease them. The kittens would sit there and hiss at them like they were so tuff. The yellow kitten was the cutest and Guy kind of wanted to take it home, but I am so not wanting a cat. All my dogs would do all day long would be to chase it up and down the stairs. They already chase the neighbor cats up on the porch and corner it. They never grab them though cause apparently it is way funner to bark at them really close.
We were the hired hands for the weekend, and there was plenty to do...hauling hay out of the fields was the job me and guy had. Guy would load up the bales on the bale wagon, and I would guide him into the stack of hay. Dumping the load can get pretty western, but we got a handle on it.

We were taking a break from hauling hay by loving on my three favorite horses. They are all so nosey...if you look closely, you will see that Ellie(the horse on the far right) is trying to steal my gloves cause they are delicious, and Minnie(the horse in the middle) is about to lick the side of my face like a dog. And then there is Sunny eating the fence cause it is still two hours til dinner and it just might hold her over til then. They tried to talk us into accidently leaving the gate open because their gate leads right into the freshly cut hay fields. We didn't fall for their smooth talking, but maybe next time.

The most exciting summer vacation ever...

Well, Guy bought me tickets to see George Strait in concert...AND I AM SO FLIPPIN' EXCITED. So now you are probably wondering where this concert is and when. It's at the Calgary Stampede...and if you don't know what that is or where it is then you are in for a suprise. It is like one of the biggest rodeo's ever and it is in Calgary Canada. Yeah, so that is in two weeks and we are headed there for the rodeo and the concert. Also, we are going to drop down into Montana and go to Glacier National Park. And I am so excited if I didn't mention that before. I have always wanted to see George in concert and now I really am going to. I can't wait and til we leave and I am probably going to drive Guy insane between now and then. It was kind of a last minute plan to do this, but I can't wait. So I called my mom to see if my dogs could spend the weekend at the farm, she said that they could but once she found out where we were headed, her and my dad wanted to jump in our luggage and go with us. Maybe next time mom and dad...thanks for keeping the spoiled dogs for us while we travel.

In my free time...

Well it is summer time and I was craving some good reading, so I went to the library...where they made me pay $30 because I live too far out of town...and found some books that looked really good. So I read and read and read some more...it was raining for two weeks straight, so I didn't feel bad about neglecting my yard. If anyone is looking for some good reading, these are great, and I still have one more book to read in the series. I can't wait, but now that the sun is shining, I don't have that much time. But there is supposed to be rain in the next few days, so maybe I will get it read, but maybe not.

So I got so used to the rain, that I let some of my plants dry out too much and I don't think that they will be coming back to life anytime soon. Oh well, I'll just grow more or buy more to replace them. If they do come back to life I will be excited cause I have been growing them for a while. It was my squash starts and cucumber starts and my pumpkin starts, so I guess there goes that for my garden. Oh well...speaking of my garden, it is doing so good. Everything is growing great. The other day I was heading out to the garden, which takes quite the effort to get out there because the grass growing around the garden is pasture grass that grows up to your waist. Anyways, I was heading out there and all of a sudden I took a step and a snake slithered out from under it. I screamed and ran all the way to the garden and was creeped out the rest of the time. And my neighbor asked me if I wanted an extra pumpkin plant...I told her that I could use another one, so I thought she would bring it over later and leave it on my porch for me to plant. Well, that wasn't the case at all. I kept waiting for her to bring it over, but that didn't happen, so I just assumed that she had forgotten. Well, when I went to the garden the next day or two later, she had planted the pumpkin plant for me. But she planted it right in the middle of my corn patch. I don't think that she realized that I had planted corn there because the corn was just barely popping out of the ground. I didn't have the heart to tell her or to move the plant, so I guess that I'm going to have a pumpkin plant right in the middle of the corn. Oh well...hope it does fine.

Harvest...

So these are the fruits of my labor(actually veggies of my labor). My garden is doing so awesome this year, and I have started everything in my garden from my own seeds. It was so fun and exciting to have everything grow. It took alot of work, but now I'm getting radishes and turnips. My radishes look a bit wierd, but that is what I was going for. I bought the seed packet of assorted shapes and sizes of radishes. I also bought the packet of seeds that is called watermelon radishes. I haven't seen any of those kind yet, but once I do I will definately post a pic. And in case you are wondering what I use turnips for, I don't really know, but they are pretty delicious raw and dipped in ranch.

It was too dark to take any pics of the other stuff that is growing in my garden, but I will take some tomorrow and post some more pics. My potatoes are coming so fast, and my pea patch is like a jungle. I have to get my fence up in the pea's so that they have something to crawl up. And my beans are coming great, my peppers are looking okay and my tomatoes are almost as tall as me. Okay not all of them, but I have two plants that really are almost as tall as me. I will prove it with pics and I don't have a secret to growing them, they just grew that tall and they keep on growing. I also planted some corn, but I'm not exactly sure if it is coming or not. I have never grown it, so I don't know what it looks like when it sprouts. Guess I will just have to wait and see when it gets taller. With all the rain we have had the last week and a half, the weeds are starting to get ahead of me.

Greatest Husband of the Week...

Well, if you don't know what this picture is, it is an empty sink...duh. There is more to it than that. I got off work early today and all I could think about was getting outside and working in my yard and enjoying the great weather we are having today. But I have this dumb OCDness that I have to clean my house before I can go outside and feel okay about it. So I was kind of dreading going home because I knew that I had left a whole sink full of dishes and I was going to have to do them before I went outside. When I walked into the kitchen, I found this...an empty sink. I was so excited...thanks babes...love you lots and you don't know how excited I was to just be able to head outside and play with all my flowers. But that wasn't the end of the greatness of my husband today. I texted him to tell him thanks and he said that he had made food and left me some in the fridge. I opened up the door, and there was a plate of food just waiting for me to heat it up. It was like my greatest dream come true.