picture post

Click on a photo to see a bigger slide show.

I think Rachel is showing Rob her crummy letters in their Scrabble game.
Notice the novelty tees? These two are peas in a pod!

Aislynn is so stinkin' cute that she gets away with darn near everything, the little rascal!

We did a drive-by photo shoot of the old house for proof of the changed paint color. Driving through the area, Rob said,
"Wow, this is really the ghetto. I was so excited about owning I don't think I realized that before."

"Addie, what are you doing?"
"Nothing, Lindsey! Turn around!"

Me and my honey on the Coeur d'Alene pier after a TASTY dinner with the Rosses at a distillery.

This hottie had a baby (that little one) FIVE WEEKS before this photo was snapped. Amazing! Joy, Stef, and Meg came up to Bozeman (with Selah and Zeke) for a visit at the end of August, and Mom and Lane came over (with Maddox) for the fun.

Sawdog loves babies and needed to hold Zeke. He was so sweet and gentle, it melted my heart.

Mason, showing me his cherry-stained... everything.

A row(ish) of cousins! Blake, Mason, Smith, Maddox, Sawyer, and Selah in the front.

Sawyer turned two! He now has a cap gun rifle just like the older boys.

A RODY PONY OF MY VERY OWN?!

Oh, Rody, I love you so!

He was thrilled, but staunchly refused to ride him for an audience for a good long while.

Meggie and Zeke.

Maddox snuck off to the kitchen to scarf down as many cherries as he could. God help Lanie during the aftermath of THAT little meal!

Well, HELLO there!

A rare moment of peace, thanks to ice cream.

It was really fun to have them all together.

The crew, sans Momica, who snapped the photo. The three gals on the left are all pregnant!

Shaded Myers ladies.

A carful of kiddos.

Blake loves catching Grammie's chickens.

Sprinklers are a requirement of August.

Dad should probably be watching his fingers.

Our new house! This one was finished much faster than the one we hope to live in...

"I AM having fun Grammie."
"Then tell your face."

With five of her six grandies. What a woman!

We zipped up to Red Lodge for lunch at Bogart's Pizza and snacks at the Montana Candy Emporium.

Hard to be sure, but I don't think Lane puts curlers in Jetty's hair.

Caught Smiggy with a full mouth.

Mason wanted me in his picture.

Keeping them out of the antique store wasn't terribly hard, but they didn't all smile until I asked which of them tooted.

Maddox is a fashion icon...

... these clowns all followed his lead!

A plum on the patio (for drips), sporting a new mohawk for school.
He just looks like such a giant, great big boy. Hard to believe that's where my baby went.

nice to meet you! i'll try not to ruin your day.

It's officially autumn per the calendar, but also per my schedule. Blake's in school again with a new teacher, I'm in a new Moms in Touch prayer group, and I'm in a new Bible Study Fellowship class. I first really ran into the following phenomenon last fall, then have realized it is going to be a regular part of my schedule, so long as I persist in meeting new people and doing new things: I get to share my story.

My story is also my testimony to how God worked (and is still working) His grace in my life. And I have to remind myself to use the term "get to share" rather than "have to share." Because my story is not a simple one, nor particularly happy. And though I can chat about big Blake with folks who already know my story with barely a tear (most times), there is something about introducing that history to folks who have no idea what sort of emotional sledgehammer I'm about to whack them with... it's very difficult not to be overcome with emotion myself. There are invariably questions if I'm not thorough, and even if I want to skip over big Blake entirely and just be a the single mom who met a great guy only three years ago... I can't.

I can't deny God's story in my story. I can't dishonor my late husband by trying to omit him from anything, and it seems that everything that impacts me spiritually revolves around what I learned from that tremendously traumatic experience. I don't always feel like I'm able to honor Rob with as much story time as I give to big Blake, but perhaps that will come with more years behind us.

So I tell the whole story. How happy we were. How we were on the cusp of many great changes and in a new place. How he died doing what he loved with friends and family who loved him. How pregnant I was and how I managed to survive (I don't remember - or have blocked - much, mercifully). How our son shares his name and was my saving grace and little buddy for years as we prayed together for another saving grace named Robert Alan Bedford, though we weren't aware of that name when we prayed.

And I have Kleenex mini-packs in my purse at all times. They are for me and whomever I'm meeting, tenderly trying to show them "me" while not ruining their day nor minimizing the pain of what God's tenderly brought me through. I've usually used them all up by Christmas, when I seem to meet a fresh batch of people and pop a new pack in, just in time for anniversaries of things, Christmas carols... and avalanche season.

God help me, I just got very, very tired!

tickled my funny bone

This could go for environmentalism-as-religion too. I have more of those pushy followers in my life than I do pushy atheists!

the most beautiful hole in the world

Our lot, to the utility boxes near the center.

Same boxes, now on the right, to the corner you can't see on the left.

It's a beautiful hole, and only a tiny bit of a swimming pool.

The beautiful hole is gone! The pad in the foreground is under the garage.

Terrible fires make for spectacular sunsets. It's not a feature specific to our lot, but I'd like to think so.

Preparing for footings.

How firm a foundation...

The ground floor.

In the master closet, looking at the garage door and laundry room.

Hard to tell, but now there are interior walls...

And front porch beams.

It is very happy, and so are we.

labor of love

Rob and I planned to spend Labor Day together as a family, since B has the day off school and summer fled far too quickly. I had proposed a few different, short hikes, mostly up by Hyalite Reservoir, and we agreed to do one or more depending on the energy in one boy's legs. Last night, when I told B of our plans, he was enthusiastic and excited, then upped the ante by asking, "Can we take a bike ride on Sour Cookie Dough Trail after the hikes?!" (For the non-locals, he meant "Sourdough Trail.")

Though I initially answered a hopeful, "Maybe!" to the above question, our trip to Grotto Falls took over four hours. We came home, ate, showered, and swept him to bed. HOWEVER, the reason it took so long was lovely: based on new knowledge graciously given by my friend Nichole, I now know what huckleberries look like. I treated the entire hike like a treasure hunt, and we not only found huckleberries, but raspberries and strawberries as well. If you've ever had a wild strawberry, you'll nod with vigorous understanding when I say OH MY GOSH! They are tiny and intense jewels of summer.

I got to share my new knowledge with no fewer than three sets of people. After a bit of playing around at the falls, I even got to show a nearby father's three kids what the huckleberry tastes like. I'd step off the trail and it was though my legs were instantly surrounded by kittens: "Can I see it?" "Ooh, that's a big one!" "Which ones are the huckleberries?" "That one was SOUR!"

"That one" was a chokecherry.

The youngest boy kept insisting we find cranberries (he meant raspberries), while the older boy and Blake teamed up joyously, and the daughter and I chatted. We never got around to shaking the father's hand, and the youngest apparently wanted to talk both of Rob's arms off, but we enjoyed a leisurely stroll back to the parking lot, finding a surprising amount of mouth- and hand-staining fruits to occupy our time.

It was such a great day.