the path of your heart: "He ain't no drag Papa's got a brand new bag"--james brown

after driving all day to get to moscow, idaho…we arrive at the home of sara and greg and the sweetest little girl june rose. after a quick intro for me, greg and eric leave for a gig. sara is awesome and we just chat easily about anything and everything while the guys head to clarkston, 45 minutes away to play a gig at hogans. while i visited with sara, watched some documentaries and turned in early, greg and eric were jamming!

now who would have thought that the presence of a two year old would actually provide some rest and relaxation for us? but it did! with the early nights and also early mornings, our usual busy and occasionally wild lives were slowed down a bit to enjoy the simpler things of life, all through the eyes of child. june's love of books and always entertaining commentary was such a joy.

family pig pile!

the fam woke early the next day to visit a property while eric and i got to sleep in, lay in bed and watch movies, a rarity in our current lives. when they return, they humor eric by taking us for a walk to the local frozen yogurt joint. eric's dream local! we have a delicious cook out and great discussion. another good nights sleep. the next day, we went for a hike at kamiak butte.

eric and i both took turns of 'wearing' june in the baby backpack. whoa, if you are looking for a workout, carry a 30 lb. toddler up a mountain! dang! it was challenging!

hey look at the camera=fail

let me tell you, their is nothing more attractive than seeing my partner interact with this little girl. so sweet!

june sang us songs and pointed out flowers, while the aussie doggie, toby led the way.

through out this trip we have stayed with many people and visited with quite a few of their children. you can classify people however you like, but i have found that people who are considerate of the environment, feed their children healthy, organic food, read to them, speak to them as human beings, seem to have the most well-adjusted children. it is really inspiring.

through out our hike, we also filmed one of the best dance videos to date. get ready for when this project is finally completed, it is going to be awesome!

i really enjoyed this family! amazing in so many ways!

we make an attempt to go to the local brewery, but unfortunately, it is closed for the holiday. we then head to the amazing moscow co-op for lunch. sara, greg and toby return home to put june down for her nap, while eric and i explore the co-op further. on our walk home, we explore the little town of moscow. despite most establishments being closed, it looks like a cute little town.

if you guys have been following closely, you may have caught wind of my interest in learning an instrument. we brought a long an auto harp in hopes that it could be my new instrument to master. however, the one we have being rather old and proving difficult to tune is also difficult for me to learn. while we were in seattle, we went to this really cool music store. discussing my challenges of learning the autoharp, the employee of the music store recommended the mountain dulcimer. eric told me to wait to meet greg as he was well versed in the mountain dulcimer and most likely had one for me to try. and that he did! a patient teacher, we had a little music sesh. i think i played my first song? i still get real nervous and insecure, especially when surrounded by talented musicians. i do think a mountain dulcimer could be in my future though, it is promising.

playing an instrument you have never played before in front of someone who has mastered it is totally nerve wracking!

this is me: trying really, really hard

such a lovely visit with such lovely people….next stop bozeman, montana! we received word of snow the previous day, but the drive was smooth sailing.

we make a little pit stop on wallace, idaho and learned a little bit about old timey mining techniques.

baaaahahahahhaha!

of course, we play on some shit too.

we try to stop in missoula to visit the big sky brewing company, completely unaware of the holiday and the fact that most places would be close. so we basically got to look at the big sky brewing company.

we get into bozeman and head straight to the home of my former neighbor in madison, ct and family favorite jer dog (which he is still affecitonatley called, if you must know) and his beautiful wife, katy and their son, reed, doggy gretta and kitty fran. jer dog looks exactly as he did in 1998. he is also still a very awesome dude. his home is perfect, what i think a home i hope to someday own would look like. we have some excitement as a neighbor dude crashed his remote controlled airplane in the mistretta's very tall tree. he comes over and proceeds to climb the tree and retrieve the plane. wtf? he scaled that tree like it was no big thang….holy shit.

katy makes some delicious food which we all enjoy over a few beers. catching up on old acquaintances and what we have been doing with our lives for the last 15 years. we just pick up where we left off. the next day, we wake up to go explore, picking sypes canyon out of many to choose from. first of all, montana folk are outdoors badasses…as old ladies were rocking this trail, a chick with an infant and a runner passed us twice. clearly, we need to up our game and of course, get a dog, in order to hang here.

we hear a chain saw off in the distance and stumble upon some lovely forrest service workers, who are removing a pesky down tree much to the appreciation of mountain bikers. these nice ladies were so cute.

we have some snacks on top of the mountain and just enjoy the scenery, which is pretty damn easy to do.

we reunited with the crew and head out on bike to the bozeman brewery, conveniently located near the mistretta house.

i dig this spot and could easily see myself enjoying a few pints here on the reg.

we make a quick effort to return home as we have a FaceTime date with the riley's in columbus, ohio!

the whole thing is pretty hilarious. dad is fully yelling 'jer-dog' like a million times and thankfully mom had enough sense to make sure they were within the viewing screen. i know it made their day, which they also said. oh technology...

we had another great evening of hanging out. the next morning, eric and i head out on bikes to explore the town of bozeman. man, this place is cute. so many little shops that are just adorable and quaint, most of which have dogs just kicking it in the store. we both affectionately drag each other into stores of our interest: eric: every record store and ice cream shop and me: any ecco conscious place and yarn store. we get a cup of coffee and a smoothie and read the local rag, one of our favorite pastimes.