... And Now We Have Returned

Ugh! Got back from Montana around 3:30 p.m.
Pulled into the driveway, unlocked the door and began unloading the car before I let it "slide" until tomorrow.

Our trip was great.
We had a good time, although it was a bit of a mixed bag of emotions going back this year.

Hotness was raised in Missoula, so that's where her family lived (more on this in a moment).
Every year she'd go back to visit her mom, dad and brother and catch up with friends.
After I came into the picture, I tagged along for the ride and met everyone and just enjoyed myself while I was there.

In recent years, however, there has been less family to visit when we go back there.
Her dad passed away about 3 years ago. Her brother moved to Hawaii. And the last couple of years her mom has been fighting off ovarian cancer (so we'll be losing her in the future).

Her mom (hereafter referred to as Hotness 1.0) has decided to forgo chemo to treat her cancer.
It took quite a toll on her the last time she did it and she figures she's lived a pretty good life and will go when it's her time instead of fighting.
This year, while we were back, she planned to have a "living wake", so that she could enjoy the company of all the people who have known her throughout the years and still get to see them before she's gone.
I'll get to that later, but my point was that as a vacation it was punctuated with this morbid sense of impending death. Not quite a relaxing vacation.

Overall though, we did manage to have a good time. We caught up with friends and just had a nice time in Missoula.

I took lots of pictures. Too many to post, so I'll just be showing the highlights.
But for now, I wanted to get online and let you know we both made it back and were still alive.