We are finally online again!!! Yea!!! And we have a new phone number. We still have our cell phones but they have no signal in the apartment. It has been a stressful week having no phone in the house. I have a lot of blogging to catch up on so look for updates next week. I will email everyone our new address and phone number. If you don't get an email and want our info let me know so I can get it to ya.
So tomorrow is the busy day! Jared starts his first day of work at his new job with B&W. He is very excited for this new experience. RJ starts kindergarten tomorrow. He is pretty excited and a little nervous. I am sure the nerves would be gone if we were still in Iona so he could start school with all his preschool buddies. He keeps telling me how much he misses his friends and wonders when we will see them again. It is kind of sad. I don't really know what to tell him. Tomorrow is also the day we move into our new apartment. I am so excited to be out of the hotel. I am also excited to cook again. I am getting really tired of going out all the time. So Jared leaves around 7:15 ish. Leaving me to check out of hotel, get RJ to bus stop by 8:30, get keys to the apartment and do our walk through, meet movers with our moving truck at 9:30, and then I'll be in charge of directing traffic as well as nursing a 5 month old and keeping tabs on a three year old. Wish me luck. As I mentioned RJ is riding the bus. He is super excited. When we lived in St. Anthony he had plans on riding the bus but when we moved to Iona we were too close to the school to be on the bus route. But here in Virginia we live even closer to the school but because of a nearby busy road and no side walks, they discourage walkers. They request that you ride the bus or be dropped off and anyone can ride the bus no matter how close they live. Well RJ of course is dying to ride the bus. I guess it is just the cool thing to do. I have my reserves and would much rather pick him up and drop him off. But since there is a bus stop right there at our apartments and he would only be on the bus for 3 minutes and I have two other children to contend with, I have decided to give the bus a try. It sounds pretty safe and the school seems to have a good system. However I might have to try really hard not to follow the bus tomorrow. I'm sure I'll be having a much harder time then RJ will. I can't believe mt little boy is starting kindergarten!!
After a quick, wonderful visit in California and a long day of flights, we are finally in Virginia safe and sound. Today we register RJ in kindergarten and check out our new apartment. We will be staying in a Hotel till Monday when our stuff finally arrives. We plan to be in an apartment for 6 months while we wait for our House in Idaho to sell so we can purchase a home here. We are excited for this new adventure. (Note: I may need to change our blog address now that we aren't the Idaho Wights anymore. :)
Sunday morning we attended church at the small branch in Ennis. It was a nice service. It would be even better if Zachery would let me sit long enough to enjoy the Sunday school and relief society lessons. But he seems to think he is hungry each hour block during church.
After the Sunday services we went back to the park in Ennis and the kids played and we had a picnic lunch before the three hour drive back home. We made one more stop at Big Springs and walked around Johnny Sack's cabin. RJ and Savannah played Pirates the whole time we were there and looked and looked for hidden treasure with out much success. But they did enjoy the BIG fish.
Looking down at the BIG fish
Zachery is really fascinated at grabbing things right now and he loved strating and playing with the tree branch.
(I took a picture of just RJ too, but it didn't come out and he wouldn't let me take another one.)
Now Nevada City, MT was where all the fun really was.
After an early lunch we took a train ride from Virginia City to Nevada City. The two cities are about a mile or two part. There was no train in the early days put the track was put in as a tourist attraction and only runs between the two cities. You can get to Nevada City by car as well but that just isn't as fun as a train. During the summer they run this steam engine but the rest of the year they run a diesel. The kids loved the train ride, but they did say the train whistle was too loud. :)
Hey look, I'm in a picture! This is us on the train.
And here is Savannah taking a little snooze on the ride.
Nevada City is a Ghost town that has been turned into a museum. The original town buildings are all still in good shape and you can walking around and explore them. On the weekends volunteers come in and pretend they are the original town settlers. Some of them even live in the old homes for the weekend and actually cook their meals in the wood fire ovens. It was a lot of fun walking around the old town and greeting all the people.
This first lady taught us how to do our laundry in a wash bassin.
This was inside one of the houses:
The volunteers made us cobbler from the wood fire oven and some hand cracked ice cream.
The saloon was pretty fun. You could buy a cold drink in there (root beer and sarsaparillas) and they taught you some games as well.
The blacksmith was one of our favorites. He was making a belt hook while we were there.
Out side the museum was a Music Hall filled with antique carnival organs and game machines. They had one of those old palm readers that reminded me of the Big movie with Tom Hanks. Some of these machines still work. It was pretty neat.
After the museum we went and did some gold and garnet panning. We planned about $10 or $15 worth of gold. It was fun.
These photos are a little out of order. But the other place the kids loved was the old school house in the museum. It was the first school house ever built in Montana. I love this photo. You can see there was just one swing and if you follow the wooden board walk in front of the school it leads to the out house behind the school. I am so glad to live in modern times!
And these are just some fun pictures I took of the building around the town. It was so much fun and a great picturing taking spot. (Christine, You would LOVE this place!)
From Ennis we drove 15 miles over to Virginia City, Saturday Morning. Virginia City is an old gold mining town which is now been turned into a tourist stop full of fun little old western and souvenir shops. We took an old time family photo here as well as a guided tour round the town. It was fun. I think this might be our first family photo of all 5 of us.
We planned on taking the stage couch tour but ended up taking the old fire truck tour instead. It was a little cheaper and RJ thought it would be pretty cool riding on the old fire truck.
However, as you can see the kids didn't enjoy it much. RJ said "This guy is talking too much and there is too many stops. When are we done?" It was a half hour tour and Jared and I really enjoyed.
But we made it up to the kids with some old fashion home made ice cream.
Here are just some fun photos I took around the town.
We stayed at the Riverside Motel in Ennis, MT. It was a great little place to stay. The rooms were cute and cabin style. There was a park near by with a great little fishing pond for the kids. But we forgot our poles :(
Just down main street was a fun little diner with a bunch of ride sitting right outside. A man at the motel gave the kids a bunch of quarters to ride the rides. We enjoyed some yummy cheeseburgers and RJ had a Buffalo Hot Dog.