Alaskan cabin adventure. . .

We arrived in Alaska in the middle of the night on July 1. It was strange to leave a pitch black Seattle and see the light increase as we flew north. Although I grew up with the midnight sun, it’s always surreal being outside at 2 a.m. with the sun out.

Alaska fishing, family, graduation, grandmas/pas

We spent the first 10 days of May on vacation in Alaska. It was a combination of business, fun and special occasions. The time flew by and we had a ton of fun.

Visit with Grandma J

Grandma Jennifer left this morning at 3 a.m. after ten days of hugs, kisses and giggles. We kept busy (hence the lack of blog posts) and did all kinds of fun things.

We are going to miss Grandma, but have plans to visit her in Alaska in May – only eight weeks away.

Merry Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a fun-filled evening with too much food and too many presents.

Liam started off a little shy, but it wasn’t long before he was hamming it up. He wasn’t sure about the presents at first, but before too long, he figured those out.

Our journey north

Here are some photos of our journey north to Alaska. Hotels, airports,  4-wheelers, dogs and cookies.  The last 48 hours have been very exciting.

Adios Alaska, Welcome to Washington

We are home after our 12 day trip to Alaska. I’ve been negligent about posting an update because I couldn’t find the cord to upload my photos from my camera. I couldn’t possibly post without photos. . . but I found it this morning, so all is well and here is your update, with pics.

It was hard to say goodbye to my family in Fairbanks, but I know we’ll see them again real soon. In this picture Grandma Jennifer wants to know when Liam will come visit again. He looks contemplative and told her he’d be back as soon as he could.

The daily rind – Liam eats watermelon

As I’m writing this post I realize that I post a lot about Liam’s diet. You’ll have to forgive me, but when all he does is eat, sleep, babble and eat some more . . there isn’t much else to report on. So until he starts walking or talking, you’ll have to settle for food updates.

Liam ate watermelon this weekend. It was funny to watch. I think the cold melon felt good on his gums. He started out all innocent and cute, and before long he was attacking the watermelon like a grizzly eating a salmon (nice Alaskan analogy huh?).

Nobody ‘nose’ where Liam’s cheerio goes

Edible and entertaining – this should be Cheerios new motto. Liam enjoys his Cheerios and has gotten much better at eating them since his Cheerio post a while back. His pincher grasp has improved dramatically and he now gets about half of the Cheerios to his mouth instead of a quarter. I don’t know how he managed this trick, but he ended up with a Cheerio sitting on the side of his nose. He must have seen his Aunt Stacy’s nose piercing and wanted to be just like her. It’s a multigrain piercing that dissolves when wet. Anyhow, he was just hanging out and didn’t seem to mind at all that he had a cheerio chilling on his nostril. At least it wasn’t inside his nose.

Skeeters, droppings and decoys

Warning – this posting is a bit raw. . .read at your own risk.

This a photo of Alaska’s state bird, up close and personal. It’s a mosquito that decided to take a pit stop on my knee this afternoon. If blood makes you nauseous don’t look too closely – you can see through her tummy and it’s obvious she had a big lunch. I say “she” because it’s only the female mosquitoes that eat blood. You might be wondering what the dudes eat – well mosquitoes primarily eat nectar from flowers. I’m posting this not to be gross (even though it kind of is), but because I’m proud of my picture. These buggers are hard to photograph.

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“It’s a piece of art,” my mom says about her moose poop lamp. “You have to have the right kind of decor to go with it, which I do. . .so don’t laugh,” she goes on.

This is the lamp that sits next to the bed in the guest room, which is decorated with an Alaskan theme. My mom made this lamp a few years ago and since then she’s made many others. It’s actually pretty easy – you go out in the woods and you pick up moose crap. You take it home, dry it out and give it a few good coats of varnish. Then you get a hollow glass lamp and fill ‘er up. There is certainly no shortage of the “filling” around Fairbanks, but hallow lamps are hard to come by these days, so moose poop lamp production has slowed way down.

My mom graciously said I could post this on the blog. She added, “if you want to buy one, they are only $200.” Seems like a crap load of money, but I suppose that’s what a load of crap in a lamp costs these days.

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Outside of my childhood playhouse in my parent’s backyard sits a deer decoy that my parent’s shoot at with bows. It’s a bit weird to look in the back and see fake animals and it’s a little disturbing to see parts of decoys laying behind the playhouse – it’s where they go when they have been shot a few too many times. I’ll spare you a photo of the decoy graveyard – it’s disturbing even for this posting.

Grandma helps my dear son Liam check out the deer decoy today. Liam started acting like Doctor Doolittle, talking up a storm to the deer as the two family dogs circled around. I wonder what the deer had to say to Liam?

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These are just a couple photos that sum up Alaskan life. It’s a wonderful, quirky place and it’s good to be home.

p.s. this post has been approved by my mom.

Our first weekend in Alaska

Liam is having a great time in Alaska. We spent a few days in Anchorage with my mom and my sister Stacy. Saturday evening we drove to Fairbanks. The road trip is 360 miles and every mile is majestic and beautiful. Here Liam poses with Mt. McKinley, also called Denali. It’s 20,320 feet tall (that’s 8,128 Liams) making it the highest peak in North America.

Read more about Liam’s Alaskan Adventure.