How Adam managed to Kidnap me...

This weekend Adam kidnapped me, took me back to America, and let me shop!

Wednesday afternoon Adam asked me if I would like to go to Glacier National Park on Good Friday, spend the day in the mountains, take some cool pictures, and then go back home.  Just a day trip. I thought "sure this sounds like fun" and agreed to the trip.  We left around 9 AM Friday morning, and we got back last night, Sunday, around 10 PM.  Our day trip slowly turned into a weekend trip.

When we got to the boarder, 3 hours from home, and they asked us where we were headed, Adam told the guy we were just going to spend the day in the park.  The boarder patrol agent looked at Adam and said, "Well you won't make it in very far, all the roads are closed until Mid May or later. (There is still LOTS of snow in higher elevations)  As we drove away from the boarder I asked Adam if we should just turn around and go visit the carriage museum in Cardston, which is about 15 or 20 minutes from the boarder on the Canadian side. Adam is not a fan of the carriage museum because, in his estimation, he has been there a million times. He decided we should just drive around the outskirts of the park and take pictures.  After about 20 minutes Adam says, "Why don't we just go to Kalispell and go shopping."  I consulted the map; Kalispell was still at least two hours away.  I am not a fan of car trips.  Especially car trips I have not prepared myself for, but the temptation of shopping got the better of me and I agreed. 

For those of you that are not from Canada, let me explain that shopping in Canada is not fun.  It is ridiculously expensive, and there are no good stores.  I am a fan of Target, Ross, Bath and Body Works, Victoria's Secret, JC Penny etc. and none of those stores, or even any comparable stores, exist in Canada.  Actually, I hear they opened a Bath and Body Works 4 hours north of here, but that really doesn't count since I am sure the prices are crazy high, like everything else in Canada. Anyway, I digress.

So once we figure out how to get to Kalispell, our first two road options we discovered were closed when we got to them, it actually took us about three hours to make it there.  While we were driving through the little mountain towns of Montana, we discovered an amazing little trading post on the side of the road and spent the better part of an hour in there talking with the man that owned it.  Turns out he used to own a little trading company in Kissimmee, FL...small small world. 

We finally made it to Kalispell's "mall".  I use the word mall very loosely, because it really is closer to an enclosed bazaar. Those of you that have ever been in a small town mall that has one option for the food court, one or maybe two old department stores (you know the ones no one thought were still in business), 5 or 6 chain clothing stores that your grandmother would love the clothing from, several mom and pop type gift shops, and LOTS of empty store fronts, know exactly what I am talking about. Their saving grace was that they did have a Bath and Body Works, and this location accepts any coupons from Bath and Body Works, regardless of how long expired they are.  I made out like a bandit.

This mall also had a little cell phone store that was an authorized Verizon retailer.  I went in there to ask the guy about my phone, I have the Storm and it has had some software issues. He told me he can't help me, I have to go to the Verizon company store, which is about 10 minutes away....in front of Target.  Score! Next to Target was Ross, I was in Heaven.

Once in the Verizon store, I  told the manager who greeted us at the door why we were there. Luckily I had already spent most of Wednesday morning on the phone with Verizon, and they had determined that I needed a new phone, so I didn't have to re-explain to them what the issues were.  That being said, it still took forever for the ditz behind the service counter to figure out how to switch out the phones. She did suggest a great place for us to eat though.

After we scored some sweet finds at Target and Ross Adam tells me he doesn't think we will make it back across the border before they close at 11. He has some friends that live in Missoula, another 2 hours and some change south of Kalispell.  He calls them up and they tell us to come on down.  After eating at this great this great BBQ place, I then had to go back to Ross, to find some jammies and underwear since I hadn't packed anything for our "day" trip, and made a trip to the Dollar Tree for toothbrushes, deodorant, socks etc.

Side note, I LOVE American dollar stores because they are exactly what they advertise.  In Canada you have so called dollar stores where things can cost more than $30...really they are just overpriced junk stores up here. Anywho...

So after we finish our last minute pick ups we head south again. This drive was miserable because the roads were under construction, and it is only a two lane road. Our trip to the boarder has now taken us 5 hours south of the boarder. 

The bonus of all this is that I did get to meet the Muller family. Adam met them when he was on his mission, and up until Kalispell I didn't know they existed. Saturday morning as I was getting ready to go to breakfast with everyone, the Muller's daughter, Amanda, shows up in the doorway of the bathroom, asking me if we can stay for Easter.  I told her that was up to Adam because he had to work on Monday.  She informed me that Adam had sent her down to see if we could stay.  Nice work Adam, send the kid so I can't say no.  Really it turned out well though, we went shopping in Missoula (they have a real mall), had an Easter dinner on Saturday afternoon, and then we went to a bonfire out at a ranch Saturday night. Met some great people and had a great time.  Sunday morning we dyed Easter eggs, and then had to head back to Canada.

We decided that rather than going back north through Kalispell, to hook around the mountains to the East and go back up through Montana to the other border crossing we go through when we go to Great Falls. Our friends the Weisners live right outside Augusta (this is who we visited on the last trip, see below) but we didn't have enough time to drive out to their property and say hi on our way through Augusta this time.  As we get to the edge of town and Adam turns right onto the main road, he looks to the left and says "Hey I think that is Cody"  Cody is JT's wife. He turns around, and sure enough, it's Cody.  She was walking her mother home. The Weisners were at JT's mom's house for Easter.  So we stopped and hung out for a bit before heading back on the road.

Once we were back in Canada, about two hours from home Adam keeps looking at this little VW golf that is next to us on the road and saying, "hey I think that's Ryan!"  Turns out it was in fact Ryan, who Adam worked with several years ago at Lawn Master. Through mime motion while driving down the road, Adam explains that we are headed home and that I am his wife.  

Despite being an unplanned weekend trip, this weekend was great fun.  I realized on our trip that these weekends won't work once we have kids, so I should let him have his fun for now.