From Fairmont Hot Springs Near Butte, MT

We're at the Fairmont Hot Springs Resort, a place we last visited almost two years ago for my mother-in-law's 80th birthday celebration. Our original plan was to be in Glacier Park by now, but after two long days of driving across North Dakota and Eastern Montana, we were all ready for a break from the car. We planned on stopping here for only one night last night, but as soon as we got into the heated-by-thermal-springs pool, with its backdrop of mountains and its canopy of cloudless blue Montana sky, well, I felt rather motivated to stay a spell. So we signed on for a second night.

It's been fun to mark the ways the kids have grown since our last visit. Cassidy can touch the bottom in the shallow end now, where before I had to hold her in the pool the whole time. Bridger was wearing a life jacket last time, but now he swims and dives and cannonballs all over the place. They're also playing together and enjoying each other so much more than they were two years ago.

A few other memorable (to me, at least) moments of the trip so far:

-Driving through North Dakota, I perkily suggested playing the "Categories" game--one person picks a category, like Billboards or Semi-Trucks, and then counts out loud every time they see something in that category. The other players try to guess their category. I chose "Pick-Up Trucks." And then several long, loaded minutes went by on that flat plains highway. No vehicles from either direction. No billboards. No buildings. Just grass, grass, and more wind-blown grass. The kids basically declared "This game totally sucks" in their three-year-old and six-year-old ways, and the van exploded into a chaos of backseat bickering when they realized their only hope for entertainment was to pick on one another. Brian thought it was hilarious that I'd thought there would be enough different categories of anything on a North Dakota interstate. I admitted defeat and resigned my position as van entertainment director and took the driver's seat for the rest of the day.

-Bridger, Cass, and I came up with a pool game in which Cassidy was a catfish, Bridger was her friend the killer whale, and I was a shark trying to eat Cassidy's kittenfish. At one point Cassidy described to Brian her predatory kittenfish's favorite dessert: "Raspberry pie with human teeth, a baby calf, and chocolate ice cream on top."

Tomorrow we head to Glacier National Park for one night of camping before we go to my in-laws' place to spend 4th of July with them. It'll be our first time at Glacier with the kids, and I wish we could stay longer, but between camping with friends in Minnesota last weekend and trying to get to Conrad for the 4th, there just wasn't much time left. I hope to be grateful for the time I get in Glacier rather than greedy for more, trusting that there will be longer visits in our future. It almost seems silly to subject us all to several more hours of driving for only a few hours in Glacier. But I think once I'm there I'll remember why I feel so determined to get back there, even for just a day.