As I walked into the living room of Charly Blackwood and Will Shanahan on a Wednesday afternoon, I was welcomed by the smells of cinnamon, warm buttery oil, and sweet honey, and a nod from their cat Zoey.
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She wears the change of the season as a second skin. As the trees entertain their autumnal dress, so too does she welcome the shifting air.
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Everyone talks about that feeling when they land.
Sweeping in, dropping slowly,
Gliding through the valley.
Engulfing you on all sides—that Big Sky.
A charcuterie board, but one where you can eat the board, too.
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Whenever I enter the Flathead Valley, my body relaxes. My shoulders drop, my breathing becomes easier. I feel a grounding that flows through my body and centers me. The earth pulls me, and I want to embrace every tree, float in all the rivers, see every cloud.
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Every seemingly small decision creates a larger, lasting impact. That one seemingly small pebble, plunked into the shallow shoreline, would create a storm on the other end of the lake.
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“No matter who the threat is, no matter what the threat is, you look them in the eye so that they know you’re human.”
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Summer has always been lemonade. Cool hose water, fresh grass, sea salt or mountain air. But, over time, it’s easy to forget summer as it was— those simple pockets of magic nostalgia that are waiting to be found again. So, in an effort to remember when summer was three glorious, free months with little to no schedule or responsibilities, I made lemonade.
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Like so many modern couples, Bobbi and Marrissa met online.
Marrissa knew Bobbi was the one the first time they met face to face. It took her days to catch her breath.
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As a young teen, I would stare out the window as we drove through the Santa Cruz Mountains, and I could smell the fragrance of the forest floor and watched as the dust danced in the air where the sunbeams wove between the trees. The majestic redwoods soared two hundred feet above us, and the scent of the ocean was just a memory as we arrived at the estate.
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The beauty of contemporary art is that it can mean something totally different viewer to viewer. With traditional paintings (baroque, renaissance, and the like), people have pretty much come to an agreement on a meaning. But contemporary art is a mirror, not a book— what you see is you, whether it’s a manifestation of you or simply what you see in a painting.
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When I took over Montana Woman, I was afraid to speak up for myself. I was afraid to come off as “bossy,” to be too loud, too direct. I carefully crafted my emails to avoid the possibility of someone being upset. Even when, as the owner and editor of this magazine, I had every right to stand my ground and call people out, I still made myself small.
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This simple recipe is from our wonderfully 1970s “Recipe Collector” binder. The one that holds a slew of index card recipes from friends, newspapers, parties— all in different styles of handwriting, some yellowed, some with ingredients stained into the paper.
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Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about where food comes from. As a farmer’s daughter, it’s always been something on my periphery, as I grew up spoiled with eggs in the chicken coop, meat in the freezer from a local rancher, and garden vegetables canned for the winter months filling shelves in the basement.
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On a wintry evening in 2018, I was out walking with my boyfriend around the Downtown Bozeman Art Walk. It was cold, and we had ducked in and out of several businesses before we stepped inside Old Main Gallery. The first painting I saw held me still.
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Solo backpacking can be extremely intimidating, and this was the number one thing several of you asked for when polled about what topics you’d like to see me cover. While there are plenty of ladies out there who jumped straight into it without ever having gone before (even in a group!), that’s not for everyone— and that’s okay!
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Whether you’re just passing through or putting down roots, I want to let you know that you now have a responsibility to help keep this place an incredible place to be.
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“As I live and breathe,” remarks Celeste Shaw with a wistful gaze when asked about Montana. This expression is generally used to emphasize the truth of a statement, but for Celeste, who now wears many hats as a trauma nurse, entrepreneur, restaurateur, and national magazine editor, the phrase conveys her feelings about her childhood home on the Hi-Line.
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