Clear(er) Day

The sky around Big Sky has been kind of hazy lately because of some fires. The caretaker, yesterday, apologized for the haze saying there are a few small fires burning in Yellowstone but believes a lot of the haze is due to the fire in Yosemite! Wow - that's along way for that smoke to travel.

 It is a clearer day today.

The Rainbow Cabins have their own small lodge and pool. 

 The lodge was closed though, end of season.

The pool was warm :-)

This is a trail marker for skiers.

During snow season, skiers can ski from their cabin down to the big lodge for breakfast and catch a lift back up the mountain and ski back to their little cabin. Crazy but cool.

(the concrete pad is in front of the mountain lodge and the ski sign is just out of site to the right of the picture - so you can see how people can ski right out of their cabins and head on down the mountain)

 Some last shots of the place as we were leaving. This is a much better picture of the Warren Miller Lodge, the main lodge where Greg and I ate and he did some of his business.

Over view shots of the area.

The golf course off in the distance to the left.

The main ski run is flanked by homes and comes right to the back of the big lodge.

Main run from a distance.

- Up close -

 a lovely place to stay.

Big Sky

Our accommodations and scenery while staying in Big Sky at the Yellowstone Club.

We had breakfast buffet at Yellowstone Club's Warren Miller Lodge. It's so big (and it being the end of summer season, not many people) we weren't sure what we were supposed to do but it's run just like the breakfast buffet at the Fairfield Inn we stayed at in Bozeman - just serve yourself as much as you want.

Greg spent the day doing business. I spent the day up at the mountain cabin (really called Rainbow Cabins) and would drive back down to the lodge to catch up with Greg for lunch and dinner.

 The front of the lodge.

"Loved" loading this picture and realizing that one side of the collar of my jacket had 

been turned under all through lunch! Lovely.

Drive through Yellowstone

We spent the afternoon and evening driving through Yellowstone Park. Our goal was to see wild life.

I think this bug eaten log looks like some kind of map.

We saw a lot of elk.

If you look closely, you can see the few elk down in the grass.

We made it to the north side of the park and stopped at Mammoth Hot Springs for a treat.

We saw several bison but too far away to get a picture 

until we came across this guy who was eating by the side of the road.

We were still in the park as the sun went down and at sundown we were passing Gibbon Field, there are two bison way out there but it was the sunset that caught our attention.

We made it to our accommodations in Big Sky. It's a little cabin up top a mountain.

Comfy!

Empty nest again

Greg and I are back to an empty nest.  Eric has been in Utah all summer with occasional visits to San Jose.  Ryan headed back to Provo this morning.  And Evan and Claire are on missions - Evan in Indiana and Claire in Provo MTC.  So where does that leave Greg and me?  On our way to Big Sky Montana of course.

We flew to Bozeman with a lay over in Seattle.  SeaTac has this great giant window that looks west over the tarmac.  We sat and watched planes come and go as the sun went down.  I did get what I thought would be a lovely picture of the sunsetting but ended up, with the window spotted as it was and the camera really a phone, looking more like the tail of a plane had burst into flame.  So I didn't post that.  But I did get a picture of the cool window and common area for plane watching - and a Greg not realizing I was taking a picture.

Into the MTC

This will be a hog pog of pictures - from Sunday (8/18/13) to Wednesday (8/21/13) - events around Claire's leaving on her mission.

Emily and kids came from Santa Rosa for Claire's farewell talk. We missed seeing Ross and Brennan, Brennan was not feeling well. Blair Harris was visiting from S CA and he was able to attend the farewell also. Was so good to see them.  They had a chance to drive the ol' jeep while here.

Last pictures before we leave to the airport.

We met up with some of our Hardester family in Salt Lake to eat at Red Iguana 2. We were so glad to see them before Claire left.

Wrights hosted a gathering for family in Provo. I wish I had pictures of that - again - it was so great for Claire to have the chance to give hugs to so many of her family. Including brother Eric. :-)

Claire taking care of gitters playing the piano.

Not knowing if we'd have time for pictures at the MTC drop off, we went to the Provo Temple across the street and got some fun shots.

Claire trying to "hold" the MTC in her fingers but we're way off (on purpose). :-p

We did have time for a few pictures at the MTC drop off.

Time to say good bye.

She's a full time missionary now!

What to do after you've been set apart as a missionary.

Have your picture taken with family.

Claudia is taking the picture.

We went over to Jensen's later so Claire could say good bye to Uncle Scott.  Love the hand print action going on behind Claire's head.

Nancy was here for the setting apart and went home right after to be with Scott who was hosting single adults for family night.  More hand print fun.

Friends came by to spend the last few minutes - Lots of laughing going on. Claire is playing hymns singing in Portuguese (portuguese hymn book).

We're off to Utah tomorrow. She goes into the Provo MTC on Wednesday.