Do these look like pencils to you?

Stacks and truck loads of fresh fence posts are common sights in Big Sky country, especially in the spring of the year when repairs are made and new fence lines are laid out. 

Photographs from across the Big Sky are available from Fine Art America. Click here at jim-cotton.artistwebsites.com 

You'll find an array of prints, phone cases, throw pillows, shower curtains, and duvets available. Featured there are Montana subjects, vintage vehicles, landscapes, skyscapes, and livestock for your perusal.

Montana Music Makers

The State of Montana is blessed with some great bluegrass musicians. Their talent was on display at a recent "Hootenanny" held in the Stevensville area. Bands from Salmon, Idaho, and Washington state were welcomed, and all put on a great show with old favorites being rendered.

Some of the 18 bands represented played and sang original songs which were well-received and pleased the crowd. Sponsored and produced by the Montana Rockies Bluegrass Association.

The resonator or Dobro (brand name) being played with a slide (metal tubing) on the left hand.

Mandolins are very common with most bluegrass bands.

Banjos. The top is being played "Clawhammer Style" without picks. It is of different construction than the bluegrass banjo being played below which uses picking style.

One group substituted a washtub, broomstick, and string for the typical double bass. It works. The flat top guitar is as standard as can be and most bands feature a violin or fiddle, nomenclature depending on personal preference. Some purists favor fiddlin', others say violin, it appears.

The MRBA will stage its big, annual Hardtimes Festival in the Hamilton, Montana, area, July 22 thru the 24th. Dry camping is available.

Festival Location is ten miles south of Hamilton, Montana, on U. S.  Highway 93. Turn west on Forest Hill Road at exactly the 37-mile marker and follow the signs (approximately one mile) to parking at the Pat and Mary Thomas Ranch. The festival site is on the adjoining Tom and Janice Heiland Ranch. For more information, phone 1-406-821-3777.

Scenes from the Missions

The Mission Range in western Montana never fails to fascinate. For some of us, these mountains rival the Grand Tetons in Wyoming or the Sawtooths in Idaho, both correctly revered.

Matching One's House and Car

Found along the backroads of Montana. A new idea for exterior decor found only in the Big Sky, matching one's house to his or her car! That's a beautiful 1957 Buick in the front yard.

Two Dioramas

For the grandchildren's Christmas, 2015:

                Hana's Princess Parade

             Weston's Log and Lumber

The Boys of Summers Run, a novel swimming upstream

The Boys of Summers Run is written for seniors . . . parents . . .  grandparents . . . middle-grade teens . . . and boys, likely the reluctant readers in most households.

The back cover reads:

Fatherless boys become the Four Horsemen of the Outfield

Autumn, and high above the fields and forests of his family's historic farm, Claude Kinkade surveys his life there thus far. His future in rural Pennsylvania remains cloudy. His mother's marriage may move him to the deserts of Las Vegas and far away from his beloved Little League Baseball team, the Panthers.

Worse, Claude's loyalty is spreading its cloak over Shadeland, his father's ancestral acreage. He senses his departed father's shadow following him as he becomes the "farm-boy-in-training" of Summers Run. Must he forsake the memories he yearns to make among the Clan Kinkade? Will Shadeland suffer in his absence?

"Runs" are the brooks and streams linking the countryside together in Claude's new world. Summers Run is one of these, and The Boys of Summers Run is a story of deep roots and timeless springs, nurtured by traditions of family and folkways. It describes the friendships only boys can forge while learning of life and loss, the triumphs and tragedies of it all. One unsolicited reviewer writes:

"I think this is the best book I've read in a long time. I enjoyed it because it taught so many lessons. . . . I would recommend this book for all ages."

Be aware Boys is not a sports story. Nor the typical coming-of-age account. It is a story of a family preserving the land and the values it is duty-bound to protect and honor.  

To order from Barnes & Noble: The Boys of Summers Run

From Amazon: The Boys of Summers Run

From IndieBound: The Boys of Summers Run

(IndieBound is a huge community of independent bookstores found in your hometown and on the street corners across the nation. IndieBound members offer all manner of book services, shipping, and ordering of ebooks for your tablets and readers or softbound versions for your nightstand. Patronize them whenever possible.)

There are a few chapters set in Montana. Read Boys and see if they ring true. They are some of my favorites.

Out at the Metcalf Refuge

Winter provides no rest for photographers as it often offers a new slant to things. Its light is indeed, "slanted" and though brief, is often intense. 

When there's little happening within the local turkey community or on the water and its wildfowl residents or visitors, one turns his or her lens toward other subjects.