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Member Happenings: Winter on the way… or here?

Cohousers prepare the barn for the arrival of Zeus the billy goat! 

Our agriculture club decided that three of our does will become mamas this spring: Apple, Sunday, and Trouble. Working on a farm is often a fantasy of kids and our goats allow us all to live this dream with shared responsibility. This new venture in animal husbandry is ripe for all-age learning.

  • Preparing “The Love Shack”
  • Mark works, kids jump around
  • Kids are especially helpful because they love to climb and can fit in small spaces.
  • Searching through the snow for the fence post. We love our snow, but ahhgh!
  • I’ve also found they enjoy doing this helpful work waaaayyy more than room cleaning.
Of course the weekend we needed to prepare the barn for Zeus, we had just received a dump of snow and frigid temps. Ahh, Montana life!

HALLOWEEN pumpkins

The witch cat surveys the possibilities
We carved pumpkins and the kids each named theirs.  Lochlan chose the name “Pumpkin Leif” after our youngest cohousing member.
Mask up!

Firewood Stacking

Every year we get a load of firewood delivered to feed our woodstove for the winter.  The kids love helping to stack the wood.  With young kids, this is the most we can do right now, but I hope that once we live in cohousing, we can have firewood cutting parties.  Imagine a group of friends heading out into the national forest in the winter to harvest firewood to heat out homes for the winter.  Chores like this are made festive by sharing them with a community.  Many of the home types in Bozeman Cohousing have the option for a woodstove.
— Kathleen

❆❅❆SNOW!❆❅❆

Yep. Sometimes we get snow in October — but we make the best of it!

Anna demonstrates proper snow-angel technique
Aurora likes sliding down hills, and so does her Dad.

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Member Happenings: What we’ve been up to

Anna and Marci making a shoebox float.

MSU Homecoming had a virtual parade instead of a real one due to COVID. Anna had a total blast getting glitter all over Marci’s office. 😂😂 

Look who came to see the Bozeman Cohousing property! A mama black bear and her cub use the riparian corridor along Matthew Bird Spring Creek as they look for ripening fall fruits before the snow comes.

The Bozeman Cohousing official site plan modeled by Lochlan and Denali with Magnatiles and Playmobil.

Notice how the parking is clustered at the front of the property to make a safe place for children to play. The interior pathways allow neighbors to interact face-to-face instead of car-to-car. The small clusters of homes face each other to create smaller pods within the larger community. If you look closely you can see the goats, chickens, bunnies, dogs, and some wildlife.
🏆 💯

The Gallatin River!

Bozeman Cohousing members enjoy the many outdoor activities that southwest Montana has to offer including world class fly fishing, white water rafting, and rock throwing.

The Potato Harvest

When you live in community, the simple chore of harvesting becomes a festive event. Young and old gather to work, share a drink, and maybe make some music. Digging potatoes becomes a treasure hunt for children and a social event for the adults. Even if you’re not that passionate about gardening, your children can still participate in these types of community events. Perhaps you’re days of kneeling in the dirt are past, you can pull up a chair and enjoy the next generation’s delight. Potato, carrot, and onion harvesting, apple cider pressing, cherry pitting, or pea shelling. All these chores become festive when shared by the whole neighborhood.

Aurora had the chance to conquer the low ropes course at Flathead Lutheran Bible Camp since the campers were gone. Online school does have some benefits…
🙌 💪

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A Game of Cat and Mouse

by Aurora Gilbertson

Squeaks crept out of her mouse hole. She didn’t want to leave her comfy pin-cushion-bed or spool-of-thread table, but she was hungry. She scampered along the floor trying not to make a sound because cats can hear anything. The Xeiders (zee-ders) had two cats, a kitten and its mom, Squeaks didn’t have to worry about the mom, Zeta, but she had a problem with the kitten, Leila. Squeaks almost made it to the cracker cabinet when she let out a squeak and skidded to a stop. She clapped a paw over her mouth, there standing on eight legs right in front of her was the Xeider’s kid’s pet tarantula, Harry. She tried to go around him but he started to chase her around and around the tiled floor in the kitchen. Apparently they were making a lot of  noise because there was a faint click click, when squeaks turned around there was Leila. 

…to be continued…

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Mini Member Spotlight: Denali

Denali, age 6
by Aurora, age 11

Do you have any pets?

Denali has one pet, a dog named Pickles.

What games do you like to play? 

Denali likes to play a game called “Splendor.” Basically you have different gem tokens and you use those to buy “Noble Tiles.”

Do you play an instrument?

Denali likes to play piano and her favorite song to play is “Short Story.”  She has been playing for 2-3 years. Denali likes that you don’t have to bring it anywhere ;P

Do you like to do art?

She has recently done a watercolor of a pumpkin getting into the fall spirit. Her method was to begin with the outline in pencil, then the green paint of the grass, and then the pumpkin ridges in oranges.

What is your favorite food?

Her favorite food is tacos and sushi. She would have sushi for her birthday, but it’s a special treat because she only eats it once or twice a month.

Do you do a sport?

Denali doesn’t do a sport currently but she used to take dance lessons.

What are you most excited about Cohousing?

Denali is most excited to always have a friend right out her door to play with.

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Member Spotlight: Megan Welborn

Hometown & current location:

I grew up in Kansas and then my family moved to Forsyth, MT my senior year of high school.  I’ve been living in Bozeman since early 2003.

What does your life look like now?

I met my husband in 2005 while we were in college, we got married in 2011 and had our first (and only) child, Annaliese, in 2015. I have been a stay-at-home-mom since we brought our little bundle home. We also have a 12-pound princess of a dog, Schatze, a Maltese Yorkie mix.

What is it like to walk in your shoes every day?

When we aren’t homeschooling, I am running errands and doing lots of experimentation in my kitchen. I love to cook and bake and try new recipes – or tweak old ones. One of our favorite pre-Covid days included hopping on the Streamline bus and going downtown to the library and to parks and trails. Or we would swim at Bozeman Hot Springs, visit the Museum of the Rockies, go on hikes, or meet up with other families for play dates. Homeschooling has been a great way to fill our days now and it’s been fun to learn (or re-learn) alongside my daughter. Though some of the best days are ones when we stay at home and just play or relax. On the weekends we usually do home projects or go on longer family hikes. 

I am hopeful that my daughter will amass social and emotional gains by growing up in a neighborhood like this. I love the idea that she will have neighborhood friends and can have hours of unstructured play.

— Megan Welborn

What drew you to cohousing?

My family doesn’t live close enough to see as frequently as I would like. And like many college towns, the friends you make during that time in your life who become your family, often move away. I miss the camaraderie of frequent, shared experiences with friends. Once I became a mom, I realized more than any other time in my life I needed and wanted community. There are so many benefits to living in a cohousing neighborhood but having a community of people who are invested in one another is important to me. Also, as a mother, I want to make sure my daughter is raised in a safe, supportive and nurturing environment. I love the idea that she will have neighborhood friends and can have hours of unstructured play doing things like riding bikes on the pedestrian pathways or splashing around in the creek. 

What is something that makes you hopeful for the future?

I am hopeful that my daughter will amass social and emotional gains by growing up in a neighborhood like this. I like that she will develop a broader sense of the world by living with and learning from a diverse group of people. 

What do you feel is one of your greatest strengths that you have to offer the world?

I feel I am at my best, that I have a sense of purpose and satisfaction, when I am helping others. I enjoy working collaboratively or on my own. 

What do you hope to be doing 10 years from now?

Living the cohousing dream with my family and friends! We love Bozeman, so I can’t picture ever leaving.