Jeff and I went to a nursery sale that we have wanted to hit for years - called the Lawyers Nursery Stock Sale (just outside of Plains, MT). Lawyers Nursery is a wholesale nursery that opens its doors to the public one weekend a year (always on Memorial Weekend)... They sell mostly bareroot trees and plants.
So, Saturday morning we left town early driving "Old Blue" (Jeff's Dad's old pickup truck) and got a coffee (and a bone for Skag!) on the way out of town at The Loose Caboose coffee hut...
(Skagit is patiently waiting for her treat from the Barista- it's a tradition Jeff is unfamiliar with, as you can see by the look on his face)When we pulled into Lawyers at exactly 9:00am (opening time) there were atleast 100 cars already parked in the lot and spilling into a field... It was the place to be Saturday morning with barely enough room to really 'browse' casually around the warehouse building where all the trees and bushes and plants were staged. I was glad that we researched the ones that we wanted before we got there. Jeff went directly for the Aspens (x10) Paper Birch (x25) and Fir Trees (x5) and I got some Red Osier (x25), 1 Mock Orange and 1 Saskatoon Serviceberry. I think we were in and out of the place within a half hour. The drive took a little over an hour (beautiful drive!) and when we got back to Missoula we added a couple more things to Jeff's Tahoe (anything we hadn't packed the night before) and headed up to Big Sky Lake for the weekend.
While at the lake we reconnected with the Lawsons, and we had the Bordners up for a visit, too. They were able to stay both Saturday and Sunday. First thing on Sunday Jeff and Dan dug some holes for the baby trees...and I helped plant them. It is not that big a deal since you don't have to use any other soil other than what is there - but the soil at the lake looks a little less than rich....it looks like mostly decaying pine needles and rock. Well, if all these other trees can survive - I suppose some of these will! We got all 40 trees planted plus the 25 Red Osier (down by the dock) and put deer fencing around almost all the trees. We will have to add more next weekend.
Jeff did most of the work (let's be honest)...it is getting difficult to want to bend over to do things lately...since I find I have to hold my breath in order to do so, or totally sit down in the dirt for the process (and it was wet on the ground on Sunday). Dan, Angel and Wilson were such a help this weekend, too. There are a handful of friends in our lives that you can go up to the lake with and feel no pressure to "entertain"...and they are some of them. I think it is because we know that they enjoy the same things that we do about the lake...sometimes its long periods of silence around the fire ring while being mesmerized by a flame, gathering brush, making a meal, fishing, throwing the ball for the dogs, checking out spawning fish in the creek on the other side of the lake, or simply being. It was a great weekend although it was a little soggy at first.
(after a long day at the lake - Sunday night around the campfire)I'm bummed that I don't have more pics to share from the weekend - but instead I took mostly video.
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