Project 52: Week 12

Some of my favorite photos of the week. 

Spring must be super near because I have seen a lot of this little guy the last week. 

Perhaps I should name him? 

Any ideas?

I don't want to get too attached because we are moving in less than 3 weeks and this fat little guy is going to have to say hi to the other neighbors every morning. 

He did let me sneak up on him a little this week though. 

Stepping out of my comfort zone

I'm shy, but I love being around people.
It's hard to explain. I don't think I have social anxiety because I love going to restaurants, parties, hanging out with friends, I worked in customer service, I'm really great at talking to people. Once I am doing something social I enjoy it, but getting myself to do the social thing is hard. I get anxiety just thinking of getting ready to go somewhere where there will be lots of people. In Oki, Paul and I and our friends went out almost every Friday night. I would have anxiety the whole time I was getting ready to go out, but once we got out with our friends I was fine. I'm like an introverted extrovert. Thinking about moving to California, where I already know people through the Marine Corps family, but most of which I have never actually met in real life scares the crap out of me. Even thinking of seeing friends or family I haven't seen in a while makes me anxious.
Since moving to Butte I leave the house to go shopping, or to eat. I don't go do things by myself with E. Besides walking, which does not involve stranger interaction. All summer I was telling myself I was going to sign her up for swim lessons, or some mommy and me class at the YMCA. But I never did. 
Well today I did something that I normally wouldn't do, Story Time at the library. I even tried to make excuses to myself as late as this morning to not go. "If E falls asleep I won't want to wake her" as I tried to nurse her into a nap. But it's like she knew, and she wanted to go. So at 10:30 I decided she wasn't sleeping so I needed to get us both dressed, I needed to put some makeup on, because I can't go out in public looking like a disheveled SAHM. 

And we went.
And it was fun.
Well parking sucked, and I almost talked myself out of going again because I couldn't find any parking, but I parked sort of illegally and went inside.
And E really enjoyed it. 



And that's the first step, I am going to try to go as often as our schedule allows. E often naps around 11, But I think this is really good for both of us though so we may have to adjust nap time to be a little later. 

Fall?

Yeah, we skipped it. 

I know my porch is a mess. And now it's covered in snow. This was at 10pm, looks like about 1/2 an inch. Now it's midnight and we are closer to if not past 3 inches. Oh dear. 

Ringing Rocks

Once upon a time I picked up a silly book about oddities in Montana, Montana Curiosities: Quirky Characters, Roadside Oddities & Other Offbeat Stuff. Fun little book, with all kinds of silly, neat places to visit. One of the fun things that's really close to us is the Ringing Rocks outside Whitehall, Mt. It's only about a 20 minute drive down the freeway and then up a dirt road. So why not? 
What are ringing rocks? well they are some rocks with a weird geological feature. When you hammer on them they make more of a bell tone that rings, as opposed to just a "bonk" or a "tink" from the hammer.
So back in March, While Paul's mom was visiting us we made a family trip out there. It was pretty neat, the rocks certainly made different noises, I even took some videos, but the sound quality is very poor and you can't really hear the pings and pongs. 
There was also lots of rocks available for Paul to climb on. Because that's what boys do, right?  

Oh my gosh E was so tiny 6 months ago!

Military Monday Link-up

This weeks questions: Do you live on base/post/fort or away from the military world?  What factors did you consider when deciding where you would live?  Was one more affordable than the other?  Did it help/hinder your family situation?  What things would be helpful for others to know before they potentially move to your area?
Great questions! But they don't really work in my situation. If you are a new reader, My husband is on recruiting duty for the USMC, and our nearest Active Duty base is about 3 hours away, Malmstrom AFB. So we obviously just live in town. Our current location Paul works at MEPS, we moved here from Helena, where he was a Recruiter, in February. Finding a rental in a small town, that allows cats is hard. So our biggest considering factor was can we live there with 2 dogs and a cat. That drastically narrowed our search window. Then can we fit our stuff in it. We have a king size bed and monster size entertainment centre. The town we live in is an old mining town, and a lot of the houses are OLD, and SMALL. I really thought we would never find a home, but alas this one fell into our laps, and at a very reasonable rate. We save quite a bit of our housing allowance, even after utilities.  Helpfull info about Butte? Well despite the fact that it's highly unlikely that anyone reading this will be moving here, ever, I would say don't judge a book by it's cover. Butte has lots of run down shanty little houses, especially in my area. In fact there is a vacant little shanty house about 20 yards from mine. But I live in a great neighborhood, and I have pretty quiet neighbors. Everyone is really nice, and keeps to themselves.  I was nominated for the top 50 Military Mom Blogs by VoiceBoks, you can vote here. Thank you for your support.

My Town Monday: Fish Creek

Montana has two seasons, Winter and Road Construction.

No seriously, in April, when things begin to think about thawing, the road construction starts, they even have things that they use to help thaw the ground so they can do construction. 

But during Road Construction season, we will call it summer, is a beautiful time in Montana. It doesn't get too hot, and if it does it doesn't last but a few days. Especially here in Butte, It's 3pm and its currently 77 degrees out. I will certainly enjoy it while it lasts though because will will almost certainly see more snow before we move in November. 

But anyway. Summer. Beautiful. Warm. No Snow. 

Paul and I took his jeep out exploring recently, he's done quite a bit of work to it since we arrived in Montana, it's lifted, got big tires, suspension, blah, blah, blah. He likes to take it out on local trails. We've yet to find something really challenging, but on our adventure to Fish Creek we did see lots of beautiful scenery. 

My Town Monday Link-up,
Nothing Fancy, just share a post about where you live.
I started this because I am not too fond of where we are living in Montana, it's a very nice place to visit, I just don't want to live here.
In effort to find more cool things about Montana I am going to periodically do this when I have something cool to share about the place I am currently calling Home.
Link up and grab the button!

<div align="center"><a href="http://confessionsofamarinewife.blogspot.com/" title="Fractured Fairy Tales"><img src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2823/9289974494_3f845aa29c_m.jpg" alt="Fractured Fairy Tales" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

My Town Monday Link Up

My Town Monday Link-up,
Nothing Fancy, just share a post about where you live.
I started this because I am not too fond of where we are living in Montana, it's a very nice place to visit, I just don't want to live here.
In effort to find more cool things about Montana I am going to periodically do this when I have something cool to share about the place I am currently calling Home.
Link up and grab the button at the bottom!

My Town Monday: Montana Folk Festival 

The Montana Folk Felstival was once part of the National Folk festival, which was hosted by Butte in 2008-10, it was so much fun and did so well that when the National festival moved on Montana decided to make their own!

We came down for the festival our first year in Montana, so 2010, it was really hot so we had some snacks and then went back to Helena.
This year the weather was amazing, Saturday we spent most of the day walking around and having festival food, exploring the tents, and eating the food.
There is a lot more going on than just music, there are lots of tents where people are selling things, and lots of tents set up to educate people about things in Montana. They have special area for kids, that had a small 4H petting zoo, and different booths teaching about wildlife and Native Americans.

To be completely honest, I was there for the fair food and beer.
There is something I just love about sitting outside, drinking a cold draft beer, and eating a bratwurst and fresh cut curly fries. 

walking up to the main stage

They close off several city blocks for the party. 

looking down into town, from the main stage area

"The Original" the main stage is under the headframe

"The Original"

snacks... 

jammin to the beats

stopped by the distillery for some cold beverages out of the sun and in the AC

having a seat on the sidewalk in the shade while baby naps

festival food!! 

We didn't ride the special bus

More Food! 

Beer! 

(sorry for the poor quality of some of the pictures, I was using my phone and my coolpix because I was babywearing and didn't want to wear the camera too.)

<div align="center"><a href="http://confessionsofamarinewife.blogspot.com/" title="Fractured Fairy Tales"><img src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2823/9289974494_3f845aa29c_m.jpg" alt="Fractured Fairy Tales" style="border:none;" /></a></div>