4th Of July in Livingston, Montana

We went to Montana to visit my mom and for a little vacation for the 4th of July weekend this year.
Ryan picked me up from work around noon on Wednesday and we immediately hit the road.
We got to Spokane around 4:3o. One of my favorite clothing companies has a store there that I really wanted to check out. It's the closest one to me. After doing a little shopping, we had mexican food for dinner, filled up with 92 octane for the last time and hit the road again.
We stopped at mile post 16 in Montana to get some fresh cherries to munch on. My mom is located off milepost 333 approximately, so we still had quite a ways to go.
There was a lot of road construction on I-90, which isn't surprising, so we had to slow down a lot. Other than that we made pretty good time.
We reached Livingston and my mom's house at 2am Pacific time, so the drive took us about 14 hours.
Thursday we just poked around town and relaxed. We also had a mini birthday celebration for me with my mom since she doesn't usually get to see me on my birthday anymore. I even got an ice cream cake! Yum!
Friday was the parade and we also went to the arts and crafts fair.
Saturday we went to the craft fair with my mom and attempted to go to Fairy Lake but the stupid road was closed. Saturday night we all went to the rodeo which was cool. They were throwing stuff out to the crowd during intermissions and I actually caught something! A hot pink Livingston Round Up hat. I was very excited.
Sunday Ryan and I went to Natural Bridge and hiked around. When we came back to my mom's we had a delicious dinner and watch the fireworks from her house.
We left at 7:20am Mountain time on Monday morning to come home. Our drive back took us around 12 hours.

This seemed fitting to take a picture of. :)

The view at my mom's house

Cute husband

Me and mom

Friday afternoon, waiting for the parade to start

Smokey the Bear!

Family friend of ours. Seriously.

Donkey with a hat? Too cute.

Cool old snow plow in a field on the way to Fairy Lake

Wild flowers

Indian Paintbrush

I love this photo. I really enjoyed messing around with different types of processing. I'm not sure which I like the best.

The road to Fairy like was closed after 4 miles. I was not happy. If we had more time, I would have walked the rest of the way.

Natural Bridge. During the summer, the water flows underground and you can walk over the river. It spits out about a 1/4 mile down.

There are a lot of fossils and neat rock formations all over the bridge.

This is where the water goes under.

The other side.

We hiked down a VERY steep "path" to get to where the water shoots out. I'd never had the chance to go to the bottom of where the river comes out before and it was well worth it. Getting back up was interesting.

Little Ryan next to the raging river.

Home at last with our new little bear. He's made by the same old man as the bear on the step above him. My mom got him for my birthday and I LOVE him.

So adorable. I wish I could snuggle him, but he's wood. :(

Videos of the river at Natural bridge. The first from above, the second from below.