Christmas morning

 

Sugar sugar sugar

 

December to remember

December December —we made it to December!

After grandma and grandpa left it was back to business with keeping the kids on track with school and getting our Christmas going. Brielle and Cannon worked on a science video and making a snowflake and finding out the answer to the question- why  is Snow White? We cut up pieces of wax paper and glued the tiny pieces into the shape of a snowflake. Lots of fun but also lots of tiny pieces of wax paper all over the place.

One morning I gathered up all the kids to go help the USO deliver goodie bags to all the single soldiers living in the barracks here at Fort Wainwright. The little kids were waiting for me as I was helping Brecon finish up the last few doors and when I got down to where they were I saw Cannon had a red tissue paper in his mouth. He had decided to lick the poor handrail going into the building and it was -15 that day. Needless to say, A little piece of his tongue ripped off and hopefully my little Cannon learned a lesson about metal and negative temperatures. If you zoom in on the picture you can see a little white chunk of frozen tongue on the handrail. I had to take a picture for his book of remembrance.

Cael has been making sure he gets out and about and goes cross country skiing with a couple of friends. It is a good thing for him to do especially with the weather not being too terribly cold. It is an activity that he seems to have been enjoying, and hanging out with his friends is a bonus.

This is not a picture I took but it is some thing that happened the other day as I was driving in town. The sky was so pink and purple it was incredible at sunset. That’s another fun thing about Alaska is the gorgeous colors this time of year really reflect off of the snow and light. You don’t have to wake up super early for sunrise and you don’t have to wait for sunset until it’s late! With the amount of light you we do have during the day we appreciate the gorgeous colors that happen!

We have also been taking advantage of going to the ice-skating rink on post, which is always more fun to do with friends. If we invite just a couple of families we reach the limit to how many people they allow on the ice, but that is the way we like to roll. The first couple of times we went skating and Cannon was getting frustrated and unable to skate forward without falling down. He is now figured out how to move and skate along and can mostly keep up with the big kids going around and around. He is one of the most entertaining skaters to watch, a close second behind Cael who has been doing several figure skating moves and practices in his hockey skates. His pirouettes and turns and waltz jumps are really improving - he is so graceful!

Again this is not my photo but just shows the full sun dog on a bitter cold day. This is probably solar noon

If you look close you can see the little patch of tongue that got stuck to the pole. I was amazed at how long his tongue was bleeding after the incident, it was so sad to see my little boy whimpering around with a bloody washcloth in his mouth.

As we were headed out of the driveway to go skating, I backed up off of the driveway  and into the curb and our car got stuck in our driveway. Just our luck to get stuck in our driveway. The kids ran and grabbed shovels and we tried to get out on our own. Pulling forward pulling backward and putting gripper mats underneath didn’t help us very much. There were some soldiers doing PT down our road and as they ran by three or four of them stopped and finally pushed us out. We yelled at them thank you and made it to the ice-skating rink in time to play with our friends.

 

Castner glacier

One outing that my parents were especially excited about was going to Castner Glacier. It takes about 2.5 hrs to drive out there, a little over a mile walk up into the hills (although it is mostly a flat trail, thank goodness!) and then hike back out... drive 2.5 hrs home-- it was a long, but fun day.  It was quite a drive to get out there, and with our limited daylight we needed to hurry in order to make it home before dark... ha ha ah! We still drove home in the dark, but the adventure was worth it.

The hoar frost on the inside of the glacier can grow the colder it gets in the winter. These were so cool to see in the dark insides just clinging to the ceiling, these fragile icsicles.

In some of our pictures, those dirt veins looked golden. There were lots of people exploring the glacier ... it was Saturday after all and the weather wasn't terrible. A great day to get outdoors.

WE MADE IT! Back to the cars for a quick snack and then to hit the road. I would have liked to take a nap, but the driver should stay alert and stay awake too!

 

November fun

This is a quilt top that I bought from a lady at a garage sale almost completly done and with a whole bag of fabric pieces cut up to continue to make the blanket bigger. All hand stitched. It had to of been some little old grandma that had been working on this for years during the winter or whenever she would sit down. Mom and I had to trim the scalloped edge and put on a border in order to have it ready to go to the quilt shop

This is the final picture taken of the quilts we started from scratch. I had most of the fabric and we bought some other pieces at Joannes to make it bigger than a lap quilt. The colors were so fun, and it was nice to have all the kids helping and working on it to make it.

I saw this funny pie chart and can now relate to the passage of time in Alaska. Summer seems to fly by while Jan-Feb can be torturously long. 

Most of the month was spent playing, working, and trying to do school while Grandma/pa Hoopes were in town visiting. We had a big snowstorm that kept us busy trying to shovel it off of the driveway and sidewalk- Grandpa was staying busy working outside when he could. We also spent time going over to our friends house to watch their dog and make sure their house was safe. Riding their snowmachine and playing around was a fun break to the routine.

Cael gave his brother a haircut and it was one of the more embarrassing things this family has had. The jagged cuts and "bowl" look were almost too much to bear. Usually the difference between a good haircut and a bad haircut is 3 weeks... well... it never got better! I just had to look at this boy and then I would start laughing. If you looked straight at him, he reminded me of a little Swede!

I had bought some fabric off of the lady from the market Place and when my mom was in town I knew it would be a good project for us to work on together. A couple of times we had a whole crew working in the “sweat shop” and it made the work go by quicker. Quilting is a funny thing. You cut pieces of fabric into smaller pieces, and then sew them back together to make bigger pieces and a blanket. 

One time when I wasn’t watching my mom started sewing but put the wrong pieces together and so she had to and unstitch the entire length before she could move onto the next piece. She was mad, but knew that she needed to do it right in order to have the quilt look its best! So glad to have my mom and dad in town and to work and complete this project together

Brielle’s baptism day