Welcome!
Near and Far is a blog following the adventures, and craziness, of a globe-trotting East Coast girl making a home in Montana.
In January 2013, I packed up my half of a townhouse in Alexandria, Va. and loaded everything into an ABF truck. My boyfriend and I stuffed my little Toyota Corolla with everything we'd need for a week and with the pupster, Grover, taking up most of the backseat, we headed west.
With a new job at the local newspaper already lined up, I was feeling a little less stressed about the massive life change, but that meant we had a deadline to get to Great Falls, MT. My new home,
We had friends and family along the way so we made a fun trip out of it (you'll find posts about that trip on the blog!).
We'd been long-distance for a year, him in Montana, me in D.C./Va. I'd been out to visit many times and had quickly fallen in love with Big Sky Country.
I find it funny that as I was preparing to graduate undergrad, I was looking for jobs in Montana and was interviewing for jobs here while I was interning and working in Fredericksburg, Va. Instead, I wound up working for a newspaper in Montgomery, Ala., where I met the boyfriend, Mark. We dated for awhile then, survived a military deployment, but then split. So it goes, right. A few years of no contact later, we found ourselves chatting again and well, I now live in Montana and we got married March 2016.
Just as I was settling into life in a small town and coming down off the pace of a D.C. communications job (I hadn't even really finished unpacking yet!), Mark found a house that we just had to have.
I wasn't so sure at first, but the more we looked at it and thought about all its potential, the more we loved it.
So, here we are with our first house, 26 acres, no neighbors, three dogs and a lotta love.
Buying the house had us pinching pennies a bit for awhile, but we've got big plans to make this a fantastic house, with views of the mountains, buttes, and Big Sky all around. We'll bring you along for the stress-inducing process that is buying a house and the fun/frustration of making it our own.
Since then, we've added a few stray cats, two batches of chickens and four sheep to the mix. Fencing and tractors and all things farm aren't cheap either.
Plus, you'll find bits and pieces from my international travels and also guest posts from some of Montana's finest people, places and businesses. And a few posts from friends I've picked up along the way and friends of friends who will share their awesome experiences traveling at home and abroad, as well as just being really interesting and cool people.
Hope you enjoy and welcome to our home!
In January 2013, I packed up my half of a townhouse in Alexandria, Va. and loaded everything into an ABF truck. My boyfriend and I stuffed my little Toyota Corolla with everything we'd need for a week and with the pupster, Grover, taking up most of the backseat, we headed west.
With a new job at the local newspaper already lined up, I was feeling a little less stressed about the massive life change, but that meant we had a deadline to get to Great Falls, MT. My new home,
We had friends and family along the way so we made a fun trip out of it (you'll find posts about that trip on the blog!).
We'd been long-distance for a year, him in Montana, me in D.C./Va. I'd been out to visit many times and had quickly fallen in love with Big Sky Country.
I find it funny that as I was preparing to graduate undergrad, I was looking for jobs in Montana and was interviewing for jobs here while I was interning and working in Fredericksburg, Va. Instead, I wound up working for a newspaper in Montgomery, Ala., where I met the boyfriend, Mark. We dated for awhile then, survived a military deployment, but then split. So it goes, right. A few years of no contact later, we found ourselves chatting again and well, I now live in Montana and we got married March 2016.
Just as I was settling into life in a small town and coming down off the pace of a D.C. communications job (I hadn't even really finished unpacking yet!), Mark found a house that we just had to have.
I wasn't so sure at first, but the more we looked at it and thought about all its potential, the more we loved it.
So, here we are with our first house, 26 acres, no neighbors, three dogs and a lotta love.
Buying the house had us pinching pennies a bit for awhile, but we've got big plans to make this a fantastic house, with views of the mountains, buttes, and Big Sky all around. We'll bring you along for the stress-inducing process that is buying a house and the fun/frustration of making it our own.
Since then, we've added a few stray cats, two batches of chickens and four sheep to the mix. Fencing and tractors and all things farm aren't cheap either.
Plus, you'll find bits and pieces from my international travels and also guest posts from some of Montana's finest people, places and businesses. And a few posts from friends I've picked up along the way and friends of friends who will share their awesome experiences traveling at home and abroad, as well as just being really interesting and cool people.
Hope you enjoy and welcome to our home!
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