I saw a lynx!

I saw a lynx! For the first time in either Venetie or Stevens, one of the Arctic's mammals was hanging around our house. The lynx was walking down the road in broad daylight like it didn't have a care in the world, less than a football field away. I spotted it while running between the back door of the school and our house. I threw open the door and started yelling to Alice and the kids to come to the front door, then realized that it would be out of sight, yelled at them to go to the window. We all watched it saunter on down the road until it went out of sight. So cool! Like the northern lights or the hot springs near Fairbanks, it's these little things that will turn into the awesome memories of living in Alaska when we leave.

Now, the power going out when it's -60 and staying out for 3 hours will also stick in our memories, but for other reasons. After 3 hours without power, the trailer was getting cold, but not unbearable. The village generator had run out of oil and the generator house was so cold that all the extra quarts of oil had frozen. The school generator house's heating unit was also out, unbeknownst to me, and it took a portable generator, heater, and about an hour and a half to get our generator warm enough to run. Then, as luck would have it, the generator was overheating every few hours, and it took some time to figure out that problem. Another day in paradise!

On a plus side, the -60 temperature was a bit of a surprise, as we've been spoiled on temperatures right around 0 for most of January. With the sun coming back at about 5-7 more minutes of daylight a day, it's starting to feel more and more like spring here. We could always dip back down to extreme cold in February, but we really feel like the worst of the winter is over.

In even better news, we're nearing the end of our adoption journey. In fact, we intend on leaving Stevens in a short 5 weeks to begin heading to the lower 48 and then to Africa to complete the adoption. 35 days left! When we finally leave, we will have been in the village, and off the road system, for 200 days straight! We haven't seen a stoplight, a Wal Mart, a Starbucks, a police car, a grocery store...you name it! For 200 days! How have we not gone insane?

If things go as we plan, and they probably won't, we will drive on down to the lower 48, fly to Africa, come back and visit with family before heading back to Alaska in August, meaning we'll have 5 months away from village life. Then we'll begin what will likely be our last year in the Bush, and this time we're definitely coming home for Christmas! After 200 days of living between the school and the 20 yards to our trailer, we have a lot of excitement coming to us in 2013!

Teacher in-service week

Teacher in-service is held in Fairbanks and is usually our September family trip to town. Usually, we're put up at an apartment-style hotel in a 2-bedroom room with a large living room, a dining area and a kitchen. This year, in-service was held in August, and at the dorms of UAF. Nothing against UAF, but no college dorm, especially not the Freshman hall, is large-family friendly. The bathroom was a large shared bathroom with public showers. We were on the men's floor, so the girls had to go down a floor to use the bathroom. Also, we were stuck eating college food all week.

 It actually didn't turn out as bad as it sounds. The food was surprisingly good.The district office was nice to us, though, and got us 2 adjoining room, each with 2 twin beds.  Alice and the two older girls took one room, while Gavin, Arwen and I took the other. Each adult got a luxurious solid-rock twin bed to themselves, and the kids shared.

Alice and I spent the evenings sitting in the floor of the dorm hall and stopping other teachers on their way to the restroom or their rooms for conversation (living in the Bush can make you a bit socially desperate). The kids and Alice spent their days wandering around the campus, blowing bubbles and playing hopscotch. It was still summer classes, so not a lot of college students were there. The campus was set up on a hill and had an amazing view of Fairbanks, and on one clear day we could even see Denali. While I would not recommend living in a dorm to anyone, not even a college freshman, we survived just fine.

Denali viewed from a bench at UAF

A few days in, we noticed Molly Clara started calling the dorms "home." She thought we had moved in for good. Goes to show what our kids think we're capable of, and how flexible they are.

On one of the last days of in-service, we drove out to North Pole, Alaska, to see Santa Claus' house. It had some pretty amazing fudge. It also had THE Santa. He was a pretty cool guy; when we mentioned adoption to him, he started talking about the people in his church who had adopted, and the group that had just returned from doing missions work in Uganda. We found out from some other people that he also has tattoos on his arms. Gavin was impressed with his genuine Santa beard. I was impressed with the fudge; Oreo Cheesecake was my favorite. One piece fed me and the four kids. A few of Santa's genuine flying reindeer (ok, not really) hung out and posed for pictures.

After in-service was over, we transferred over to Chena Hot Springs. On the drive where we saw 19 moose over 4 days in July, we saw....one. Actually, only I saw one, a cow in a stream that had just pulled her head out of the water. The problem was Fall had arrived in Alaska. During the 9 days we were in town, we noticed the trees changing to a definitely more yellow hue. With the average high in mid-October below freezing, we have about 2 months of Fall before winter. When we flew back to Stevens, we reminded the kids that the next time we saw Fairbanks, it would likely be covered in snow.

Macy enjoyed her first horse ride ever while we were at the resort. Well, she sort of enjoyed it. The horse was big for a horse, certainly no pony. The instructors did not really give Macy a lot of insight into what to do; they just told me to help her on the horse. I picked her up on the platform and set her on the saddle...and the horse decided to shift away as I did. She almost fell off the horse, and I had to jump down the platform to steady her. For most of the rest of the ride, she clung to the horn of the saddle for dear life. By the end of the 15 minute ride, though, she was smiling like crazy, and talked about it for a while afterwards, so we figure she enjoyed it.

Alice certainly did NOT enjoy her dentist visit, getting 2 more wisdom teeth removed, but it went moderately better than last time. The pain was a lot less, but the nausea was just as bad, even after Alice took herself off the pain medicine. She's still not feeling 100%, but at least it's over with.

We, of course, did our marathon shopping while in town. We also found out our children do not enjoy shopping one bit. We think it was a combination of being away from home and not being exposed to shopping often. There were really only 5 occasions where we went shopping with the kids over the last 12 months. There behavior showed it.

Molly Clara decided it was appropriate, if her legs were tired, to lay down in the middle of the aisle, flat on her back, with her hands comfortably folded behind her head as if she was watching clouds go by. Arwen, who suffered the most from being out of her routine, decided that screaming was the best way to deal with the stress. At one point on the last day, after I put a bag of cherries in the shopping cart, she yelled "YUCK!" and covered her mouth like she was holding back vomit, then grabbed the cherry bag and threw them out of the cart (she honestly loves cherries). Yeah, I was THAT guy with THAT 2 year old at the grocery store. We had to leave and wait her out for about 45 minutes in the parking lot before she was ready to behave herself.

The fact that our kids are not accustomed to shopping isn't too much of a concern. If our kids have a life-long aversion to Wal-Mart and large grocery stores, that's ok with me.

Only in Alaska

Fairbanks is always full of interesting sights. Apparently, in Fairbanks, you sleep wherever you want. This rather tired gentleman slept with his head a few inches from a fairly busy road across from a shopping center parking lot. We also saw crows eating away at duck tape keeping plastic over a broken window. They were probably just doing the owner a favor, reminding him that he needed to get a real window before temperatures dropped below -40 in December. The garbage trucks in Fairbanks are pretty cool, and the workers all wear solid orange jumpers like Star Wars X-Wing pilots. We told the kids one of them was Luke Skywalker. An older, much more overweight Luke Skywalker...

We are back in Stevens Village for the duration of the first semester, unless we're forced to go back for health reasons or get to go back for adoption purposes. We're focusing heavily on keeping healthy to avoid the pneumonia and strep of last year.

Thankfully, Arwen will be 3 before December, so that very well may be the last time I ever take a 2 year old shopping, unless we adopt under 3 years of age (I will watch 2 year old grandkids, but I will NOT take them shopping). Whew. Glad to be done with THAT stage of my life.

More trip photos

The activity center at the Chena Hot Springs Resort was fantastic! We could get on the internet while Gavin played wii and the girls read books or colored. This is also where we went to get ice-cream treats. It was far cheaper to get some snacks or treats at the activity center rather than the restaurant. 

Macy reading to the kids while they finished their ice-cream

This giant stuffed bear was probably the highlight of the activity center for the kids.

BEAR HUGS!

It's obvious that Mr. Bear was getting sleepy so Arwen covered him up and laid next to him... you know... because the  bear was sleepy.

Going to Town!

Tuesday, July 17th

Leaving Stevens

Our pilot told us the flight to Fairbanks should be "nice." His idea of nice must include anything short of a zombie apocalypse. The flight was the bumpiest we’d ever experienced. Turbulence was tossing the plane around like it was dancing (at least that's what Alice told Arwen). Flying in winter is much nicer. The air is too cold to move! Or something like that. I’m not sure on the exact science.

This is a video of our take off. Our airport is a gravel strip and although take off was bumpy this was by far the smoothest part of the trip. You can also see the whole of our village from the air.

Our first stop (after Taco Bell, yum!) was a dentist appointment for Alice to take care of some issues she’d been having with her teeth. Turned out the issues were pretty big. She needed her wisdom teeth removed! I thought most people got that taken care of when they were in their late teens, but Alice likes to do things differently. 

The appointment was scheduled for the next day, so we headed to our hotel outside of town. On the drive there we spotted three moose! This was the first one.

Wednesday, July 18th

The price of wisdom

We weren't sure if we had just been lucky to spot three moose the previous day. We got our answer leaving the parking lot. A moose slowly crossed the entrance in front of us. Three more were spotted before we made it to town. Each one we saw made us comment, “Wow, that one is huge!” Note to reader: 90% of adult moose in Fairbanks in July…are huge.

Alice had two wisdom teeth on her right side removed (the left are coming out next month). The rest of the trip she spent with a swollen jaw and an upset stomach, unable to eat. The pain medicine she was on made her physically sick. We went back to the hotel (no moose this time!) and she "relaxed" (threw up a lot) while I took the kids around the resort.

First, we stopped at the natural hot springs. While you have to be over 18 to get in (the water gets over 100 degrees), they were able to put their hands in the water. They had lots of questions.

"What happens if a duck gets in the water?"

Then there's a duck in the water.

"What happens if fish get in the water?"

Then I suppose there's a fish in the water.

I'm not sure what their confusion was. We went to the playground to play, and they watched a lady feed some ducks. The ducks that hung around the resort were a highlight of the trip for them. Earlier that morning, three white ducks had followed us all the way from our room to the parking lot looking for handouts, which the kids thought was hilarious.

Thursday, July 19th

A busy day

While there was no moose at the entrance to the hotel, we saw seven moose in the span of 30 minutes on our morning drive to the fingerprint appointment. Alice, of course, was on the verge of throwing up the entire time. The federal courthouse where we had to go was pretty intimidating; empty your pockets and remove your shoes kind of place. Dead quiet, too, which is not cool when you’re bringing four kids along. We had threatened them with certain death (not really, but close) if they made any noise, and the three older ones were perfect. Arwen started to whine while we were waiting, which is dangerous because she has a good set of lungs on her. She settled down well enough, though, and we didn’t get kicked out.

The guy who did the fingerprints was really nice, even if we kept messing things up. You know, they ask you to sit down, fill out this paper and wait for them, but the paper says to turn it into the receptionist when you finish. So, I go to turn it in and they politely remind me to sit down and wait for them (duh). Then I missed the piece that says ALIEN ID NUMBER (or SSN). I got skipped while Alice went first. When it’s finally my turn, the guy asks me to take my earrings out. Yeah, I’d need pliers for that. He must have noticed the deer in the headlights look on my face, because he let me keep them in.

Thankfully, though, everyone was, in true Alaskan form, very polite and pleasant. We found out that they only come up to do fingerprints from Anchorage every 2-3 months. We had contemplated rescheduling the appointment to try and get it for August when we will have in-service, but thankfully we didn’t. We might have been waiting until October for the appointment!

Oh, and Alice only throw up once in the bathroom. YAY!

After the fingerprints, it was time to get Alice some new meds that didn’t make her vomit. Of course, the dentist had the day off. We were able to call his home and leave a message. We waited and were about to give up and head to the hotel for a nap when he called back and called in the prescription to Wal-Mart.

Wal Mart Pharmacy. I’ve had some experiences there. This time was no exception. Apparently, they don’t check their voice mail for call-ins unless someone insists that a prescription should be there. Insists three times. Oh, you’re not going away? I guess we’ll check our voice mail. Oh, sir, yeah, apparently the message was on the voice mail! Who would of known!

Alice, of course, was siting in the car with a swollen jaw deciding between pain and nausea. Yeah, one of those days.

By the time we got the medicine, we didn’t have time to drive back to the hotel before meeting up with our awesome Fairbanks friends B. and K. We took care of some other business; our home study got one of those annoying pink slips from the USCIS and our case worker drafted an addendum that I express mailed to Missouri. Hopefully that will take care of it.

Still, we had two hours to kill with the wife in pain and still nauseous and the kids bored. We grabbed a giant sub, crackers and juice and parked at a hotel, of all places, that had a lot of grass. The kids sat in the back of the rental Suburban and ate, then me and the kids ran around the grass in the on-again off-again rain. They had a blast and were soaked. Alice slept in the car. She spent most of our trip sleeping in the car.

Finally, it was time to head to our friend's house! We had a great time meeting our friend B.’s wife K. for the first time and eating homemade pizza and ice cream. I got to play a mindless fighting game on the PS3 and we watched a Monster’s Inc. in Blue Ray magic.

Blue Ray, by the way, is amazing. Don’t watch it unless you are planning on buying a player and new movies, because it makes DVDs seem outdated.

We left their house around 11pm and stopped at the grocery store for some snacks before heading back the hour and a half drive to the hotel. It took over two hours. Seeing moose in the bright light of the morning is pretty cool. Seeing the dark forms of three giant moose in the hazy twilight of Alaska’s summer midnight sun on a narrow, tree-lined road is not so cool. Especially when I was fighting fatigue. I drove 20 miles under the speed limit. Unlike probably any other state, every car we passed was also doing well under the speed limit. Hitting a moose with your car is not like hitting a deer in the lower 48. That would be like saying a garden snake is like a python.

We survived and finally had a day to relax and take the kids swimming in the pool (twice).  I got to swim in the natural hot spring pool. It was probably close to 100 degrees and extremely relaxing.

Friday, July 20th

We make good on a promise

This day had only one goal: swimming. We had promised the kids that we would take them swimming when we were in town. Macy and Arwen love swimming. Arwen was yelling at me in her half-gibberish, half-intelligent language for a while before I realized she was saying "I'll do it myself!" She didn't want me to hold her in the water. Later, in another fit of independence, she demanded being placed in the water without her floaties. I let her head go under water for less than half a second before pulling her up. She asked to have the floaties back on.

I will do it myself!

Macy went all over the pool with her floaties, and even was brave enough to try swimming some without floaties, which lasted until she swallowed too much of the water. Molly Clara was brave enough to get in the water, even if she freaked out a little bit, which is a huge leap forward. Usually she just runs around the pool refusing to get in and then throws a fit when we leave because she didn't get in. Gavin did excellent playing in the pool without his floaties.

Macy helping Molly to swim

We went swimming twice, hit the playground again, and hit the activity center up twice for ice cream treats and coffee. We also had a light dinner; Alice was able to eat a bite of clam chowder. Both of us got in the hot springs this day.

Saturday, July 21st

Guerilla shopping

You should know what guerilla shopping is by now. It's when you drop $700 in mostly-grocery shopping in a short amount of time because you know it will be three weeks before you're back and since we've already paid for the charter, we have to take full advantage. We filled two carts at Fred Meyer's (aka Kroger back east), checked out, and then I went back for a cart of fruits and vegetables. We also hit the farmer's market, the health food store, the chinese restaurant and Starbucks before running out of time and catching our 5pm charter back into Stevens. Thankfully, this time it was a smooth flight and Alice was able to keep her food down.

Back home! We hadn't left the village at all since mid-April, and haven't been out of Stevens for a non school-related trip since December. We head back in mid August for in service and the beginning of the school year! 

We have survived!

We are still alive although just barely. We survived our first school trip. A week long adventure from Stevens Village to Fairbanks, Anchorage, Seward, and Kenai! When we arrived home yesterday we all crashed. It was bedtime when we finally woke up! We are taking today to relax and tomorrow we are back to work.... and school. Joe just started his Masters so he has catch up work and I am just finishing an apple tech class. I have a project due at the end of this week. SO most likely it will still be the end of this week before I can update about our trip. Here is a few photos to hold ya over until then.

The girls dissecting their cephalopod (a squid)

Gavin and Jacob eating lunch in Denali park

The group in the Challenger Learning Center

Week in Fairbanks

Joe just posted on the adoption blog about our CRAZY week in Fairbanks for inservice. Head on over here to read. It was seriously the most exhausting week...like fall asleep at the computer while making an iMovie project exhausting. Now we are sick again. Surprise surprise! I intend to write about a few of the funnier things that happened while we were there, but I may never get around to it (sorry!). Here are some of my favorite photos from the week instead. Enjoy!

Pushing a cart over snow/ice and gravel is difficult. Therefore, there are carts littering every available space in the parking lots.

Waiting for Daddy during one of our quick guerilla shopping stops.

Fast food but we bring our own drinks

Fast food is a terrible idea when you don't touch the stuff for months at a time. Of course, we couldn't resist! We hit a McD too. We paid for it.

Day 5-8

Leaving Grandma's we had a relatively short 6 hour drive up through Wisconsin into the Upper Peninsula, the closest that the lower 48 gets to interior Alaska. We told the kids to start looking for wildlife; supposedly there were moose and black bears around. We weren't quite sure if there were, but sure enough, one of the kids got lucky right away.

"I saw a whale jump out of the water and splash but it didn't die it swam away forever!"

Who cares if there wasn't any water around. I wish I could live in Molly's world for a while, life would be so much more interesting.

On the drive there, Mom mocks Macy's earlier comment.

"So many amazing things that can be!"

"That doesn't make sense," Macy retorts. "I know sense!"

Gavin must have been listening to us grown-ups a bit more than we thought; as he was trying to buckle in Molly, Thora wouldn't get off the seat belt and he muttered his first audible curse word.

"Dammit, Thora." Mom caught it. Guess it's more of a reminder for us to watch our mouth.

We get to Mom and Pop's northern resort. 3 miles off the main road. It was well over 90 degrees and the mosquitoes and flies were everywhere. Way too far south for me. We stopped down the dirt road to pick some flowers for Grandma and horseflies start dive bombing the car. Luckily, we covered ourselves up in 5 inches of dirt from the road and they lost track of us.

4 days catching up with the family was nice. We hung out at Linden Lake and got a chance to grill out and brave swimming in a lake. Arwen swam au natural, of course, and Macy was a natural swimmer (she went deeper than Dad). Molly got to prove her reading skills in the bathroom.

"I-C-U-P...like the eye can see you going potty!"

We also got a chance to head up to Calumet to check out Alice's Grandpa's childhood home. We looked for Great Aunt Angie's gravesite, too, but couldn't find it in the massive graveyard. (She recently 'passed' after an amazing 100 years!!!)We did find a really nice Co-Op with some amazing health food, which is a bit harder to find in the U.P. than in Brentwood, TN. Of course, it's a bit easier down in the U.P. than the Bush.

We got to sleep in a nice loft area all to ourselves, but we did have to sleep in bunk beds, which was great for the kids and odd for the grown-ups; took me back to the Fort Wilderness/any other church camp days. When it was finally time to say goodbye, Arwen was a pro at waving and shouting to everyone out the window.

Next stop...Ontario, Canada.

Days 2-4 Grandma Waarvik's/Zoo

This is a typical day that I [Joe] remember spending at my Grandma's when I was a wee one.

Breakfast: frozen waffles (oh, how could you let us, Mom?)

Then, of course, we have to go to the Milwaukee Zoo! I've been to the San Diego Zoo; better shade in Saint Diego, but Milwaukee Zoo still tops it.

Here we are waiting for the awesome sea lion show! Have to pay for this one but it's worth it! Unless, of course, someone steals your stroller...which happened to us. I leave our $600 Bob Adventure Stroller outside unattended at the Nashville Zoo over 10 times and no one touches it; leave a rented stroller unattended for 30 minutes in Milwaukee...

Oh well, just a rental!

This guy right here is one of my favorites! Alaskan Brown Bear. We don't actually live by these, A.B.B.s specifically live on the coast (like near Anchorage/Soldotna) and are larger than the Grizzlies (interior brown bears) we live by. This guy seemed friendly enough.

We saw the penguins, other animals that weren't penguins, and, best of all, it was free with our Nash Zoo membership!

Next thing you absolutely have to do at Grandma's is play some Croquet!

Gav's really the only one ready for this game...

but the kids somewhat enjoyed it, even if they don't believe a word Dad says..

Thora had to stay outside or in the kennel while at Grandma's, but she did alright when she got attention.

Finally, you HAVE to watch a movie at Grandma's! What else are you going to do?

By the way, Arwen does NOT pay attention to movies... she plays peek-a-boo with grandma instead.

(I also got a really nice 6 pack of all-Wisconsin local brews, that doesn't quite fit into the "typical Grandma day" for little Joe)

Milwaukee's a nice city and all, just a bit to southern for me...further North!

Terre Haute KOA

Our return to Alaska begins with a night's stay in the wilderness of Indiana, right off the interstate, at a KOA 2-room cabin. The drive itself was pretty uneventful...for adults....
"So many cool things that can be on trips!" Macy shouts out as we pass over a bridge.
The car rode well and we only had to endure about 30 minutes of rain, not quite enough to soak our camping gear, thankfully.
"At least I got a carrot." Gavin interrupted a prolonged silence with this unexplained exclamation.
The cabin staff were super friendly, had warm cookies and chocolates all ready for us, which was good because we just had to endure an hour of Arwen's screaming, extended when Indiana moved forward and closed our on-ramp and privileged us with a ten-mile detour through Terre Haute.
There was a dog treat for Thora and a fenced-in doggie playground with a cute fire hydrant for the boys. Cable tv on a 13 inch television. Breakfast was cheap, simple, and good, eggs for us boring adults and pancakes for the kids.
On a side note, the cafe was playing Live with Regis and NotKathieLee and they played a clip of Jennifer Anniston wearing nothing but a lab coat and her undies. We were of course horrified and made all the kids look away. Molly was in her own world not listening, and I watched as she looked up at the television, pointed and shouted "Look!" while laughing hysterically. Obviously not easily embarrassed.

There was just enough time in the day to feed the on-site donkeys and play on the playground. We give Terre Haute KOA 4 stars, as there was a good bit of sand on the cabin floor when we arrived. *update- due to the quality of the other stays on this trip I am bumping this one up to 5 stars... seriously the sand was just an inconvenience.

We were all pretty stinky and wore the same sweaty clothes for 2 days, but we survived the Wilderness of Indiana.