Gingerbread Party

For the 8th year in a row, we spent the Saturday after Thanksgiving making gingerbread houses.

Generally, we only make one big house. In the beginning, it was actually just me making the gingerbread house and Stephen escaping with the kids to places far away to avoid the wrath of the stressed out gingerbread architect. But, I like to think I've mellowed out over the years. Okay, at least where gingerbread is concerned!

This year, we invited a few friends over to decorate gingerbread houses together. Some of Alicia's friends from dance class and Tess's friend from school joined us in our confectionery creativity. I had prebaked the house pieces yesterday. Some walls had butterscotch windows, some didn't.

We spent a few hours assembling little houses and loading them up with all sorts of colorful candies. Each guest brought some candy decorations to share and, added to our stockpile, we ended up with a very big selection to meet all decorative tastes. Lots of the houses had Big Red gum doors. There were gum drop bushes and M&M shingles. Several decorators added marshmallow snowmen to their yards.


The end result was 7 little gingerbread houses all decked out in their sugary finest. They looked good enough to eat. But, instead, we just munched on the leftover candy so the houses could be used as decor throughout the season.

These are the Good Old Days

I got an email from a friend of mine who said they enjoy keeping up with us via our blog. She also said she wished she had time to do a similar blog, but she felt their lives were too boring.

I think in the daily living of our lives, everyone thinks theirs is a little boring, us included. We each plod along, go to work, fix dinner, watch TV, go to bed. Get up and start over.

It's in the little happenings each day that reminiscences later referred to as "the good old days" are born.

Have you ever noticed that when you think back on your own personal "good old days", those events you're recalling, at the time of their occurrence, really didn't seem all that special.

Some of my personal "good old days" include floating down a ditch behind our house when I was 8 aboard a raft made of someone's discarded styrofoam slab. At the time, I probably got scolded for getting wet and playing with litter. But that's not part of the memory.

We're all interesting in our own ways. It probably won't seem so to our own perspective, but in hindsight, those shining embers of "the good old days" are all we recall and hopefully cherish.

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. We all played a role in making the meal. Princess Alicia did a great job stuffing the turkey. All the food turned out great, especially the turkey.

We hope all of you had equally delicious holiday celebrations.

Pre-Thanksgiving Update

Tess, Alicia, and I went to the Great Alaska Shootout last night to watch the UAA women defeat Cal State-Northridge. Alicia got to do a little cheering in her UAA outfit. The Shootout is a basketball tournament held in Anchorage over the Thanksgiving break each year. In the past, teams from all over the country have come to play and it's even been covered by ESPN. The tournament is a little toned down this year, for various reasons. But it was still a fun time. The blizzard-like drive in and out of Anchorage was less fun, but what can you do?

We've been getting a little snow lately. It will definitely be a white Thanksgiving. Of course, it was a white Halloween as well... Chances are high that a white Christmas is in our near future. Alicia loves the snow and had the strong desire to make a snow angel last weekend in addition to petting the neighbors' dogs which were tempting Bit to come out and play by trotting around the front yard.

Tess had her second Cotillion Club dance of the year. She was feeling ill, and probably should've stayed home. But I think she survived the night at the Hilton in downtown Anchorage. Before the dance, she and her friend Robyn took a photo opportunity with one of the tall, dark, and handsome specimens in her friend's family room (where some of the girls had readied themselves).

Traffic Report

As usual, I was in a hurry when I left work last night. My new office location poses an even busier commute, especially in the evening.

Last night, I needed to stop into Lowe's on my way to Alicia's daycare to pick up a forced air propane heater for Stephen. I park in the garage each night, which is awesome. But he parks in the driveway and plugs in his block heater. Generally this is sufficient for his truck to start in the morning. But the other day, his gas lines froze and it took him several hours with a little space heater to thaw them out.

Anyway, I told him I'd stop by Lowe's, which is just around the corner from my work, on my way home and pick up a heater.

The problem is, to get into the Lowe's parking lot, I needed to make a left turn across two lanes of solid oncoming traffic without the benefit of a stoplight. As I sat there, blinker on, irritation rising... I was thinking, "I'm never going to get across this traffic."

And just at that moment, out strolled a bull moose, directly across those two lanes of traffic. The onslaught screeched to a halt, and I made my left hand turn thanking Mr. Moose as I went.

Just goes to show... Alaska is full of unexpected opportunities.

Celebrations

Alicia helped me celebrate my birthday yesterday. She was a big help blowing out the candles, opening cards, and unwrapping presents.

She had even wrapped a special gift to me all by herself. What a sweetie!


She and Daddy had made the fish-cake. Stephen had been planning to construct a log cabin cake but was overruled by his Chief Consultant. She did most of the decorating.

Today is International GIS Day. We're celebrating at our monthly meeting of the Alaska Arc User Group, of which I am the Co-President. I volunteered to make the cake. I think it looks super!

Moose Hunt 2008

These photos are from the moose hunting trip Stephen took with his colleague earlier in September. They were taken with his partner's camera. They pretty much speak for themselves...

Winter Visitors Welcome

Hooray!!!!!!!! We're expecting our first winter time visitor! My sister, Rebecca, will be coming up just in time to watch the Iditarod Sled Dog Race in early March.

This will be her first time to Alaska and I know she's going to love it. I think we'll try to make it up to the Chena Hot Springs as well as to the Fur Rendezvous in Anchorage.

We'll definitely be headed to Willow for the start of the Iditarod on Willow Lake.

Oh, and we'll be doing some ice fishing as well! Tons of chilly fun awaits in just a few short months.

Shanty Sweet Shanty

We had a great day on the lake today. Stephen's Sunday drill for the AK Defense Force was cancelled. So we were able to embark on our inaugural ice fishing expedition with the new gear.

It was a lot of fun. We'll be spending a lot of time on frozen lakes this winter.

After church, we loaded up the gear and headed to Mirror Lake, just a couple miles up the road.



We were met at the lakeshore by a bald eagle sentry. He (or she?) hung around for awhile, swooping in and out of nearby trees.

Alicia had fallen asleep (naptime) on the way to the lake. So I sat with her while Stephen set up the shanty and drilled the fishing holes with the new gas auger.

We measured the ice with the handle of the ice scoop... just under a foot of ice. Plenty for ice fishing, and then some.

Once the shanty was up and heated with the new portable heater, we moved Alicia from the van to the little nest Daddy had made for her in the Jet Sled inside the shanty. She awoke soon thereafter and commenced fishing with Daddy.

The first fish freaked her out. But once she decided to try again with her Disney Princess fishing rod, she really enjoyed it.

The lake had been stocked with both rainbow trout and landlocked salmon. We caught a bajillion little rainbow trouts. We didn't keep any of them. It was just fun to catch them and put them back down the hole.

The heater kept things comfortable inside the shanty. The Jiffy gas auger made it a piece of cake to drill the holes. The plethora of fish made in enjoyable for everyone.

Birthday/Election Night Recap

King Crab... it's what's for dinner.

Well at least it was what we had for dinner last night while we watched Survivor. Admittedly, it makes a better Survivor night meal when they're stranded on an island somewhere as opposed to sitting in Africa. But it was still tasty nonetheless!

Here are a few photos from Stephen's birthday celebration. He actually ended up opening his presents that morning before we all departed for our daytime destinations of work and school. One of his gifts was a gift card for Sportsman's Warehouse.

After work, we headed north to Wasilla as that SW is more convenient than the one in South Anchorage. We stopped at IHOP for a yummy birthday dinner. Also convenient, as it is across the street from Sportsman's Warehouse. It was at IHOP that we heard McCain had conceded and Obama was the new president.

We gobbled up our pancakes, eggs, and bacon and spent the next hour or so browsing the ice fishing gear at SW. Stephen loves to shop for that sort of thing. He got a 3-person ice shelter called the Eskimo QuickFish3. (It's the red thing in the sled.) He also got some little ice fishing poles, tackle, and a nice ice scoop. Alicia picked out a Disney Princess fishing pole. She's looking forward to catching some fish with Daddy.

The ice on the lakes is plenty thick enough. And they've just stocked nearby Mirror Lake with trout and salmon. So we're ready to go.

We're down to just under 8 hours of daylight a day. Sunrise is around 8:45 and sunset is around 4:40. So we'll either be fishing with a flashlight or on weekends...

When we returned home, we dove into the ice cream cake. There were 2 kinds of ice cream inside: mint chocolate chip and butter pecan. Afterwards, Stephen played with his new toys and we called it a happy birthday.

Happy Birthday Stephen

We're celebrating Stephen's 42nd birthday today. The ice-fishing cake is still in the freezer. It's ice cream of course. I took a photo of it last night before tucking it away.


Don't tell Stephen, but we got him some great supplies to do some serious ice-fishing this winter... A 10-inch, 3 HP, Jiffy gas ice auger, a Jet Sled for carting stuff to and from the middle of the lake, and a large gift certificate for Sportsman's Warehouse to get an ice shelter, rods, and ice scoop, etc. Shhhhhh....

Luckily, he rarely reads the blog...

It's beginning to look a lot like....

We'll be making our annual trek up to visit Santa Claus in North Pole, AK in mid-December. My goal is to once again mail out our Christmas cards from the North Pole Post Office. If anyone would like us to mail a letter from Santa to a special child, let me know, and we'll see what we can do! Our trip will be the weekend of Dec 12-14. So any outgoing mail will need to arrive here in Alaska to be "rerouted" by Dec. 11th.

Happy Halloween

Tess and I took Alicia out trick-or-treating last night after work. Yesterday was a big day at the daycare. It was Friday, so that means "movie day". They watch a Dora video at the very end of the day. It was also one of her classmates' birthday. So they had a little party. And, of course, it was Halloween, so they did some preliminary trick-or-treating and fun semi-spooky activities (compatible with 3-4 year old tolerance).

Tess and I met at the daycare at 5:45 and left her car there. It's so nice that she's got her own wheels now. It saves me a lot of time and gas.

We drove to a nearby Eagle River neighborhood and started our trick-or-treat adventure just as the sun was setting over the Cook Inlet and Sleeping Lady (aka Mt. Susitna). I had Alicia's purple kitty costume with me. So she changed in the van.

We went to several houses in neighborhoods where we knew a few people. Then we went to the Chugiak Senior Center which was hosting some indoor trick-or-treating and games from 6-8pm. There were lots of people there. It was nice because you could actually see what kids were wearing since the lights were on.

We made our final stop at our neighbors' house across the street. Alicia was their first trick-or-treater ever. So they dumped their whole candy bowl into her little bucket. Happy Halloween!

Here are a few other photos from the church Harvest Festival...