For Thanksgiving, we visited Billings to see family and friends. One big event from the summer was Gramma Pearl's 90th birthday on September 6. Left to right- Paula, Michael, Mandy, Aunt Gloria, Uncle Larry, Gramma Pearl, Uncle John, Uncle Jim, Aunt Mary, Nancy and Ron.
Nancy made the fondant cake herself. It's a quilt cake to mimic the many quilts Gramma Pearl has made.
On July 7, our cousin Kelsey married Peter. They live in Seattle, but came to Billings to marry in the same church on the same day as Kelsey's parents. (photo by wedding pro)
Mandy has a new job as Program Assistant at Montana State University Billings working with Disability Services. When she's not working in her lovely office, she rocks out...
Nancy was an art student at MSUB from 1975 to 1980. (It was called Eastern Montana College then.) At the same time her father, Grampa Adrian, had just retired from a principal job at Beartooth Elementary. (He had been principal at four other schools also.) Adrian decided to take some college courses as well. They often met for lunch at the cafe in this building. (It's been remodeled since then.)
We met Ginger's high school friend Talia! Talia has finished her position teaching English in Japan, and is living with her family for a while before starting her next adventure.
On Thursday, we had Thanksgiving dinner with Gramma Pearl.
Mandy and Nick on a post dinner walk, ready to eat pumpkin pie (throughly covered with whip cream.)
Aunt Mary and family visited that evening. She is going through chemo treatments, but looks gorgeous in her new wig. Nick took a panorama photo on his iphone. He caught Nancy in movement. Left to right, Sharon, Sabrina, Stephanie, Ginger, Stephen, Mary, Nancy, Ron, Mandy, Kelsey.
On Friday, we met Kristian and her boyfriend Amos in Red Lodge to look for a tree. Amos is a photographer for CAN, and he took excellent photos. See more on facebook.
We found a lovely tree and tied it on top of Mandy's Jeep. (We also learned, while playing Scrabble, "jeep" is also a verb that means to travel from place to place in a small vehicle.)
Lewistown, MT
On Saturday, we drove to Lewistown, where Ron is pastoring a church for one year. It's a beautiful two-hour drive from Billings, with wheat fields and almost no traffic. (So different than Rhode Island.)
They are living at the parsonage while keeping their main home in Billings.
We went to church serves. Nancy sang in the choir, and intoduced us to many people. Right, Stephen in downtown Lewistown.
After driving out in country dirt road for 30 minutes, we walked in light snow along empty train tracks to a broken trestle. The supports were knocked out during flooding two years ago. The farmers is the area had previously sent their grain on the train, but now have to use semi trucks, which are rough on the dirt roads.
Denton MT
Sunday, we drove to Denton, where Ron pastored a church from 1982-1990. We lived in the parsonage next door. This is the first time Ginger's been back since she was four. Denton has about 300 people.
We visited Margeret (center) and Betty (in lavender).
Ron showed us old high school annuals (1963), and Nancy took us on the walking trails around town that used to have railroads.
Monday was Ginger's birthday. It was fun to be in the town where she was born 27 years ago. Ron and Nancy recounted the story of driving in -26° weather to the hospital. Thankfully 2012 was in the 30s with sunshine. It was a lovely visit with just a little snow.
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