Last Days in the Bitterroot

Besides getting wined and dined on our last days in the Bitterroot (with some of Mel's no-knead olive bread), yum!,

and Mary Alice's tomato bisque, made from her own garden tomatoes,

plus her entree of pork chops with wild rice, and a final sliver of her crazy-good lemon tart!

...we entertained a few folks ourselves (if you can call sitting on one sofa and borrowed chairs and nibbling on snacks around the coffee table entertaining). We did pull out some better wines, though, and built a couple of roaring fires. It was fun. People seem to like the place, even if the guest bath is torn out and waiting for drywall and tile (there is a funky master bath that's perfectly usable).

Best of all today, we also received delivery of a guest bed -- a GUEST BED, folks!! Already, one tired traveler has stayed overnight here on our sofa. Next summer, guests will have a queen-size sleigh bed to luxuriate on. And very soon, their own redone guest bath. We're taking reservations for next season! (If we're booked, we have a great recommendation in the next block -- two adorable units, each with a kitchen, at Withy Gate Lodgings -- http://www.visitmt.com/categories/moreinfo.asp?IDRRecordID=17927&siteid=1; we stayed there last June).

Our new guest bed; reservations for next summer, anyone?

A final happy moment today was a break from house work and cooking to get out in the sunshine with two new gardening friends. We went to Great Bear Restoration, a grower and wholesaler of Montana native plants located just south of Hamilton.

The sign at http://www.great-bear.biz/.

 The Web site says it best: "Great Bear Natives is the wholesale division of Great Bear Restoration providing high quality, native plants to retail nurseries and landscape contractors in the Rocky Mountains, Great Plains, and Sagebrush Steppe Regions. We work with both retailers and landscape designers to promote the use of native plants and incorporate them into designs ranging from public works projects to backyard makeovers."

Some seeds of natives collected by Great Bear, under contract with Yosemite National Park and Sawtooth National Forest.

One of several Great Bear employees working with tiny native seedlings that are planted in deep cells to make room for longer  roots.

Michelle Bradley, Great Bear sales and project manager standing next to an experimental "carpet" of natives grown in coir matting.

Truth be told, I instigated this little meet-up, after once suggesting a "Lewis & Clark Garden" to the executive director of the Ravalli County Museum, Tamar Stanley.  She loved the idea. So did Great Bear's Michelle Bradley, with whom I had volunteered on a community garden last fall. Michelle said her outfit could even donate the plants! The rest may be history, as a mostly shade garden of young natives -- as well as many Lewis & Clark finds -- fills in spaces around the front of the Hamilton-based museum. Stay tuned. I'll be back in time to help out, I hope, certainly back for the garden's unveiling at the 32nd annual Bitter Root Day, June 16 (http://www.brvhsmuseum.org/bitterrootday.html)!