Malmstrom Air Force Base

After the DNCFR I didn’t even return to Bozeman before I was off to another appearance. I drove from Pocatello straight to Great Falls for the Wing Standup for the Wild Wild West Event on Malmstrom Air Force Base. I wasn’t sure what awaited me because I am very unfamiliar with most military branches so I was a little out of my own element. I had two ladies that work in Services on the base, Joann and Staci, who chaperoned me around the base all day. I was introduced at the weekly Wing Standup meeting which is a meeting where the different squadrons report their weekly duties and what’s been going on to the Colonel of the base. Along with that, Services usually have a presentation on what is going on for extracurricular events on base. That is why I was there! I announced the Wild West event and gave out the Buckaroo Bucks they would be playing with on Friday. The Wild West event is a social event for the air men and their families; basically it is a fun poker night with Black Jack, Roulette, and Texas Hold ‘Em and the best part is you gamble with fake money! At the end of the night they auction of items with their fake money and I just happened to be an item. So on Monday I was bussed around the base and participated in several different tours as I promoted Wild West night.

On Friday I returned to Great Falls for the event. I had some spare time so I visited an assisted living home in Great Falls. Things like that is one of the many reasons why I love my job. To know that I can touch a person’s life in just a few minutes of talking with them and giving them a picture of me is such an amazing feeling. I also stopped in to Grizzly Saddlery to pick up a fun little roping toy called “Lil Blue Heeler” that Lorissa and I will be using at our booth at the Montana State FFA Convention Trade Show. I am sure it will be a hit! Once I arrived on base I checked into the cowgirl suite. This was by far the best hotel room I have stayed in so far this year! Dedicated to a Miss Rodeo Montana theme, this room was decorated in the utmost western fashion! I was truly treated like a queen! The Wild West event was a hit among the air men on base. I ended up winning $375,000 playing Black Jack!!! Too bad it was fake money and since I was an auction item I had to give it all away. At the end of the night they sold off a dance with me for almost $400,000!

During the few short days I was home this week I was running around Bozeman like crazy promoting my fundraiser. Pete Hanson let me talk on XL Country again. On Thursday I had an awesome time in Miss Tollefeson’s 5th grade class at Longfellow Elementary. I brought my saddle in and talked to them about the qualities of a real cowboy and showed them what the saddle does and how it works. They were so intrigued! Everyone liked my presentation so well that I have three more teachers getting back to me on when I can come in to talk with their class! It was a blast and a great start to what I hope to be a very successful school tour.

This coming week is a busy one for me. I get to read to the 1st graders at Longfellow Elementary on Monday, I do a quick radio spot for my coronation on XL Country on Tuesday morning and then I am off to Billings for the FFA trade booth set up. I get back on Friday night just in time to meet up with the guys from XL Country at the Western Underground concert. Western Underground is the late Chris LeDoux’s band and I get to be a guest! I am going to plug my coronation and I get to introduce the band! For some reason, I am incredibly nervous for this event! And of course, Saturday is the big day! Don’t forget my coronation is at the Rockin’ TJ Ranch here in Bozeman and everything kicks off at 5pm. Call me or Sarah Capp if you need directions, everyone is invited and it is going to be a lot of fun! My number is 406-209-1931 and Sarah’s is 406-539-4386.

More at the DNCFR

I left off last time on my exciting experiences in Pocatello. I am back in Bozeman and am attempting to catch up on my rest. The events in Idaho continued to be exciting for me. I left off on Wednesday so…Thursday was another early morning as the 17 queens (local queens included) broke up into groups to tour the Pocatello and surrounding communities schools. I was grouped with Miss Rodeo Arizona, Elizabeth Scott and Miss Rodeo Arkansas, Brittany Sing. Dennis Helstad the rodeo clown also joined us and had some funny tricks up his sleeve for the younger students. I felt right at home in the schools because that has been my field of comfort for so long. In front of 2 groups of about 40 to 60 kids I led a discussion on what it takes to be a cowboy and what happens at the DNCFR. They were full of questions!

The next event was skiing up on Pebble Creek ski hill outside of Pocatello. There wasn’t any snow in town so we were all questioning what kind of skiing it would be. Well there were several days of 60 degree weather so it was extremely icy. Many of the girls had never even seen snow before! Needless to say, they were a little shaky in learning, but everyone at least tried! Myself, I am not the most seasoned skier but I mastered the bunny hill so I ventured to the second out of the three chair lifts and went to a more intermediate slope with Miss Rodeo Arkansas. She was about the same level of skier as I was so we felt comfortable going together. Things started a little shaky because of the ice but I gathered my footing and was going along just fine when somehow I fell (I do that often) but this time I couldn’t stop. I lost both my skis and slid right into the thicket of trees on my rear end. I hit at least three trees on my way down and still couldn’t stop! I am not sure how or what stopped me but finally I did stop. I was hurting pretty good but I seemed to be all right. After laying on the slab of I ice for awhile a nice man came to help me up and search the mountain side for my skis. We finally did find them somewhere in the trees. After he came up to hand them to me he asked if I was “one of those queens”. I said yes and when he asked me which state I sheepishly said Montana, embarrassed because the queen from Montana should have been able to ski better than she did! He laughed and said “Well I had better introduce myself then.” It turned out to be Dave Wiefrich from Brookman Rodeo! He said he’s sorry we had to meet this way but he’s glad I am ok. It was extremely difficult to ski down the rest of the hill because I was so scared but I felt it was kind of like getting back on your horse again not to mention I was too stubborn to let them cart me off on a snow mobile as long as I could still walk! I went down the bunny hill once more to ensure I wouldn’t be too scared to ski again and after that, I was done for the day! My new nicknames are “ice burn” and “digger” amongst the stock contractors from Montana and by the time rodeo rolled around everyone had heard about the queen from Montana. I promise I represented Montana much better on horseback than on the ski hill!

Friday we all went to Wal-Mart to raise money for the Children’s Miracle Network. Together we raised over $700 in just three hours. I met a little angel by the name of Anna who is only three years old. She was diagnosed with cancer a little over a year ago and just finished treatment a few months ago. She won’t be completely clear of her cancer for at least 4 more years of checkups every three months. She was a courageous little girl and has never complained a day in her life. She was amazing and I felt like I really made a difference because of all the money we raised for the hospital that treats children like her.

Other than that the weekend was full of incredible rodeo! Sadly the Montanan’s didn’t take home a national championship from any of the standard rodeo events but JC Mortenson did come back on Saturday for the mutton bustin’ and came back to Montana $1000 richer! He won more money than the cowboys that walked away with a Dodge pickup won! What an honor that must have been for him. Dale Stoller, Brett Fleming and Ryan Seimsen were the cowboys that made it to the Wrangler Round and made a really good run for the national championship. Well that is a pretty good review of my trip to Pocatello. It was definitely a trip I won’t forget. And for those of you who are concerned, my bumps and bruises from my skiing accident are healing beautifully!

DNCFR

I couldn’t wait to share all of my amazing experiences from the DNCFR with everyone that visits my blog so since I bring my laptop on the road and had some down time I thought I would let everyone know what has gone on so far this week. The DNCFR is the crowning rodeo of the PRCA circuit system of regional competition. National circuit champions are determined in the elimination-style event. The rodeo consists of five performances and is broken into preliminary, semi-finals, and the finals or the Wrangler Round. The top eight contestants in each event qualify for the semi-finals round, all of the cowboy’s scores are erased. After that, the top four contestants from that round qualify for the Wrangler Round where again, their previous scores or times are erased. This is when your national champions are determined! Each event champion will receive a one year lease on a brand new Dodge pickup and will automatically be qualified in the first two rounds of the Wrangler ProRodeo Tour Playoffs later in the year. Pocatello, Idaho has hosted this event since it’s beginning in 1987!

There were 14 state queens selected to appear for their circuit and I was one of the lucky ones. Every state queen hopes to represent their circuit in March at the Holt Arena. I can not describe the feeling as Tim Fuller introduces me as Miss Rodeo Montana carrying the Montana Circuit flag every night. It is an honor to be here for Montana representing the entire state and its people. I can easily say I was able to touch the lives of many people while I was in Pocatello. I spent the week visiting sponsors, the assisted living homes, schools, and hospitals and I feel I left a piece of Montana with them and made a special place in my heart for all of the people I encountered during my visit. Thank you Pocatello!

I arrived safely in Pocatello on Tuesday evening in time to get checked into my hotel room with Miss Rodeo Oregon and Idaho. We quickly changed into our dresses and headed to the kick off party for the rodeo. I got to meet a lot of the other state queens I haven’t gotten to meet yet this year. After getting to know them this week they are really great girls and we all had such a great time together.

On Wednesday we woke up early for rehearsal at the arena. We rode Sutton horses and luckily I was already familiar with them from the Rapid City Stock Show. They are great horses to ride and some of the horses have been there almost every year since 87! They know the routine! After lunch all of the queens split into groups as our “official queen drivers” drove us around to different sponsors. We signed a lot of autographs and did some shopping. Next, my group was off to the assisted living home and then the hospital. It was a difficult but very touching afternoon. We met elderly people that didn’t have much to look forward to in their days but to have a group of 3 or 4 rodeo queens come in to visit and sign pictures pretty much gave them hope for another day. One man cried and another woman who could not move from her bed said she no longer had to pray to sleep because she could look at our beautiful pictures as she lay in her bed.

The Montana cowboys have been going strong! Curt LaDuke, Steven Lambert, and Andy Bolich are some of our best cowboys and are here to compete. Some of them will be making it back tonight (Friday) for the semi-finals round. We are so close to home there are plenty of Montana fans to help me in cheering them on to a National Championship! I will let everyone know how it turns out on my next blog. I can not forget to mention we already have a champion that will be returning home and he is J.C. Mortenson, one of Montana’s up and comings, he won the Mutton Bustin’ last night! I was once again proud to be from Montana! Check back on my blog soon and I will update everyone on the rest of the results and more of what I have been up to this week in Pocatello!

Outdoor Show and Coronation Preparation

It’s been a pretty busy week for me here in Bozeman. I worked a lot of the week to get some cash flow into my bank account! I never realized how much time it takes to keep up with the paper work I have to take care of and follow ups on things like sponsors and getting auction donations. I’ve been making some real progress in getting sponsors for my year, thanks to all the generous friends and businesses out there that want to support me throughout my year. I have to admit at the beginning it wasn’t all smooth sailing and I thought I would never be able to raise any money outside of my coronation. Thankfully I turned out to be wrong!

Plans for coronation are still going well. The invitations came in last week and they will be sent out this coming week. Because the prices for invitations are so high, we cut down the mailing list so we are doing more public invitations. So, if you don’t get one, don’t worry, you are invited!!! My coronation committee and I have been putting up posters like crazy and I have some advertisement on 100.7 XL Country. We also plan to put invitations in free ad newspapers. In case you didn’t know already my coronation will be held on Saturday, March 31st at the Rockin’ TJ Ranch in Bozeman. Social hour starts at 5pm and you can get tickets online or at the door or by RSVP to myself or Sarah Capp!

After the crazy week of working at the store and working on coronation I was off to Kalispell on Saturday. Miss Teen Rodeo Montana met up with me in Bozeman and we left the morning and returned that night. It made out for a pretty long day being a 5 hour drive from my house. We were going to the Outdoor Show at the Majestic Valley Arena to be guests at the Montana Trappers Association booths. We didn’t really know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised at what was in store for us! I am just a beginner hunter so I don’t know a whole lot about the hunting, fishing, and trapping kind of thing but I was amazed at all the different booths they had. We walked around, visited, and signed autographs. Lorissa and I learned more than we expected about fur trapping. Ask me anything, I feel I could answer any question after this weekend! Fran, Bill, and Ed the 3rd were very nice and told us great trapping stories!

The trip didn’t end with the fur trappers though. Lorissa and I got two auction items for us each out of the trip and matching bobcat tail key chains! Of course with it being our first official road trip together we had to come up with some kind of crazy story and Lorissa thought on the way to Kalispell it would be “funny” if we got pulled over to see if the crown really worked to our advantage. Well someone forgot to knock on wood because on the way back to Bozeman we did get pulled over! Just outside of Townsend I must have missed the sign that said 65 at night. I won’t say how fast I was going but the officer was nice enough to give me a citation and lowered my fine so, in way I guess the crown did work in our favor.

I have a couple of very busy weeks ahead of me so I will probably have plenty of exciting stories to come! Thanks for visiting my blog and happy trails!

Kids Care Fair and Preparation for Coronation!

Well it’s been about two weeks since I updated on what I have been doing since the NRA finals in Billings. I have actually had about two weeks of down time, if you could call it that! After returning home from the NRA finals and San Antonio I caught up on sleep and laundry and I have had a little bit of time to work. My bosses appreciate me coming in every now and then to justify me keeping my employee discount! I am very lucky that they have agreed to be so flexible with my schedule. I can pretty much call in on Monday’s and ask if it’s all right if I work a couple days this week. It’s pretty nice!

This past Saturday I made a quick day trip to Helena for a kiddie rodeo at the Kids Care Fair and I finally got a hold of my first printing of autograph sheets! Jody and I were in question that it was never going to happen. The Kids Care Fair was held at the mall in Helena where different organizations around the state set up booths aiming towards the kids. Booths such as Eagle Mount, dental hygiene and healthy diets were on display. Between booths and exhibits was the event room where every hour there was a presentation by a “celebrity.” I happened to be one of the celebrities! I put on a kiddie rodeo and although attendance was down the children and parents that were there loved it! The girls (and some boys) got paper Miss Rodeo America crowns and I signed autographs after the rodeo. It was a fun day!

In a week I head off to Pocatello, Idaho for the Dodge National Circuit Finals Rodeo. I am really excited for this event because it’s not a long drive for me and I will get to meet some of the state queens I haven’t met already. Not to mention that the DNCFR is like second to the NFR. There is a selection process for the queens that actually get to go and this year I was selected so that’s exciting in itself! I am sure they will keep us very busy throughout the week.

The rest of March is pretty busy for me so I am spending this week working hard on my preparations for my coronation fundraiser. Finding silent and live auction items is a time consuming and sometimes difficult task. If anyone has an idea for an auction item or knows someone who would like to donate please contact me! My coronation committee and I need all the help we can get! Happy trails everyone!