Church in a Barn, Kersey, and a Trip to Red Lodge

One of my favorite things about Cooke City, (okay everything is my favorite) is having church in an old horse barn. It also doesn't hurt that it's 2 hour church.  Although every time I go, I feel the spirit so strongly I don't want it to end. 

My bosom friend, Tara, from forever ago and her family came up for a week.  Crew, Tara, Matt, Aspen, and Caleb.  They were so fun to have come!

Here is a look right before church is about to start.

Me and Tara.  We have been friends since High School.  Tara came up to live in Cooke City with me and Julia for a summer in college.  We had a great time.  Matt came up to visit us, and he actually proposed to her in Cooke City- about 16 years ago I think!

Tara and I are a lot alike.  We are both very artsy- or as Darren puts it, "free spirits".  We spent our High School years together in the art building.  We had fantastic art teachers- Mr. Watson for ceramics, and Mr. Barney for Art. I loved those classes. 

Matt and Tara have a sweet Jeep they they brought up.  We took it on the Jeep trail to Kersey.  It was fun- and a little nerve wracking. Thank goodness Matt was driving. I would have turned around before we drove through the Broadwater.

Me and Tara with Pilot and Index in the back ground.  Tara is writing a book that takes place in Cooke City.  I have read the rough draft-and it is going to be great.  She currently has a book that was just released, I read that one and liked it too! Especially since the main characters best friend was inspired by me! Yeah, I'm Andi in the book if you read it- boy crazy rock climber;)  Check it out here http://www.amazon.com/Broken-Smiles-Tara-Mayoros-ebook/dp/B00NU69UMU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1412635631&sr=8-1&keywords=broken+smiles+tara+mayoros

Me and Buddy selfies!!!

And here I am with my amazing sister Laura.  Laura is a great examples of an incredible mother.  She loves her 7 kids and is always talking about her kids and how great life is.  She is a great example of someone who loves motherhood.

At the Top of the World! Literately- 11,000 feet!

Then we headed over to Red Lodge.  The guys had hiked over the pass, so Laura had to go pick them up.  We went over with her to see what Red Lodge was like. Since we had been without cell phone service- this is what everyone looked like as soon as our phones all started beeping with incoming texts like crazy. Oh, it was good to be connected for an hour again.  And then it was good to disconnect again.

There we lots of fun shops, antique stores, tourist shops, etc.

There was this really fun shop called the Montana Candy Emporium.  I wish I had taken more pictures.

CANDY!!!!

So, the trip to Red Lodge was fun, but the drive was SCARY.  Switchbacks at 11,000 feet?  No thank you.  I don't think I'll be going back to Red Lodge anytime soon.  I'd rather spend the day at the cabin snuggled up next to the fire reading and taking naps.