Birthday Girl!

Today is our Sandy Girl's birthday! She is 11 years old! Wow!! I can't believe that!

I called her this morning and sang Happy Birthday to her and BeBe said she was looking around for me when she heard my voice.

BeBe took her for a birthday walk around the field with her buddies and she had some special treats and a birthday nap. BeBe also took these pics of her today. I must admit, I got teary eyed looking at my four legged babies all the way back in SC. We miss them!

Sandy Girl
The softest dog in the world!
(She always lies with her front paw like that...right Grandpa?)

Bella, Murray, and Sandy girl
Party Animals!

Birthday Song!

(don't mind the jets in the background)

Drive to Seward, AK

We wanted to get out and see Alaska this weekend. It was supposed to be pretty mild and sunny out, so we definitely wanted to take advantage of the good weather. We didn't really know what to do though, so we decided to just get in the truck and drive. We had already driven North to Wasilla, so we decided to go South towards Seward. See the maps below. Alaska is HUGE and I'm still getting my bearings, so I added a couple of maps to help you all understand where we are and where we went. We left Anchorage and hopped on Hwy 1 headed South.

This is Hwy 1. Along this part of the drive, it's a coastal highway. The Alaska Railroad tracks run right along the coast as well. The water you see here is the Turnagain Arm of Cook Inlet.  The mountains ahead are on the Kenai Peninsula.

We stopped at Portage Lake. Portage glacier is up around the bend from this first mountain.  You can see Burns glacier straight ahead in this picture. It's called a hanging glacier. It was amazing!!!

These icebergs had broken off and were floating down the river.

The water was COLD!

We want to go back and take the cruise right up to the glacier.

Go back up and look at the family photo and pay attention to the ice in the water.
The pic of this berg was taken before that one.
We got to see it break apart (as seen in the family pic).

It was VERY loud when it first started breaking apart.
We didn't get that on video, but we started filming and got it rocking and rolling.

Beautiful views!

Cool boat with teeth! Ice teeth?

We left the Portage Glacier area and continued the drive towards Seward through the Chugach National Forest. It's also amazing!

We finally made it to Seward, a small fishing town. It was packed with fishermen and campers.

We saw several Bald Eagles on the drive and B-man got a couple of goods pics of this one below.

Fisherman at Resurrection Bay

This is on the way back to Anchorage looking across Cook Inlet.
Do you see the mountains way off in the distance?

Dall Sheep on the way back to Anchorage.

There were a bunch of cars stopped on the side of the road taking pics.

Alaska Railroad Train!
This was Boo's highlight of the day.
Oh yeah, this is at 10:00 at night. The pics of the sheep were also taken at 10:00 p.m.


It was a LONG day, but a great day of sightseeing! And thankfully, we all slept in today!


I want to say Happy Father's Day to all of the Dads out there and especially to the ones near and dear to us...B-man, PawPaw, Grandpa and Uncle A! You all are so special to us and I'm so glad to have you in our kiddos lives.

The Adventure Continues

Okay, Kat...this one's for you! ha! But, be warned, it's not very glamorous.

When I left you last, we were all about seeing moose. Well, I believe Monday night Boo had a nightmare (his first that I can tell) about said moose. He woke up wanting to know where the moose was and is now afraid to go into the bathroom by himself. He keeps telling me there's a moose in there. We also had to go into the building where the stuffed moose were the other day and he kept telling me he did NOT want to see a moose. Poor guy! He's also had  a stomach bug so we've been laying low. We have an appt to be seen this afternoon.

Lil Bit said, "I ain't afraid of no moose!" :)

Here's the Jeep. Not too bad, right?
The gal we bought it from painted the hood and top purple and tan camo.
B-man already has plans to paint those areas OD green.



And to remove the girly stickers.



Our temporary home.
Fancy, huh?
We're in the unit on the end.

View from our "hotel".

Beautiful!

We've also experienced our first earthquake! Yesterday we were all sitting in the living room and I felt my chair moving and I looked over at B-man and Boo and they were moving on the couch. I said, "uh, I think this is an earthquake." B-man agreed. It lasted a few seconds and felt like we were on a boat. I quickly started searching online to see if I could find any reports of one. And sure enough, it was a 5.2 magnitude quake about 50 miles from here.  More cah-ra-zy!

Thankfully, there were no reports of damage. Apparently, they're fairly common here. Oh good!

We're hoping to get out this weekend if Boo is feeling better to do some sightseeing. It's supposed to be sunny!

And for Grandpa and PawPaw, who would normally be getting cards in the mail from us in honor of Father's Day....I bought them and left them at the store, so they will go out later than they should and will not arrive in time. But, please know we love you and honor you as the great fathers and grandfathers that you are!

If A Boo Bear Sees A Moose...

...he'll probably want to see another and another and another (for those of you who aren't parents of small children, this is my attempt at referencing the book, If You Give a Moose a Muffin).

Let's just say there was a lot of moose talk before we came to Alaska. So, it's really no surprise when Boo woke up in the airport in Alaska that all he could get out through the tears of exhaustion was, "Mama...where's a moose?"

For the next 24 hours all we heard was more requests to see a moose. Oh boy. 24 hours later and we still had not seen one. So, when I went to the store to get some groceries, I came across some stuffed moose and was hopeful that they would do the trick and quench Boo's thirst for a moose sighting. Well, he's three now, and is a big brother and a big boy so, those shenanigans don't work as well as they used to. He was very happy to see a moose, but wanted the real thing as evidenced in the video below.

And then, in the building where the housing office was located, B-man discovered these moose.
They were definitely big, but still not live. So, we were getting closer...

And finally, as we were driving off post, I spotted one!!
These pics aren't the best, but here she is!

Boo was very happy to see this moose. But, now that he's seen one...he wants to see another, and another, and another! :)

In other toddler news, we heard the dreaded three letter word out of our lil guy's mouth a couple of days ago.
Can you guess what it was???

Phase Five Complete!

We're here in beautiful Alaska!! I'll spare you the details of our plane rides. Overall, it wasn't too bad. I'll just throw out some key words and let your imagination run wild. Crying baby, mechanical delay, grumpy toddler due to jet lag, vomiting toddler in the rental car, tired mama.

But, alas we're here and are really excited about the possibilities!

We will be living on post which was not at all what we expected. We got the only house available!! Of course, there's always drama in the housing office, but we got it and will be able to move in at the end of July. So, we're in temporary lodging until then. Not ideal, but hey...there's a cleaning lady and guess what...it's not me!!


We've also been looking for another vehicle to drive while we're here. We left my Jeep in SC so I'd have it while B-man is deployed. We shipped B's truck here. We planned on trying to rent or get a short term lease on another car, but in the end we decided to look for a beater upper JEEP for B-man to drive to and from work and I'll drive his truck. Hey, it's an Alaskan adventure...right? ;) 
We looked at 4 of them yesterday and made a deal on the last one of the day. We'll pick it up next week from the ownner. Be prepared to see some purple camou. The folks we're buying it from couldn't be nicer. They were great and their kids took Boo under their wings and before we knew it they were "pretend" driving in their go carts. Boo was having a blast.

This was our first night in Alaska.
The sun is setting and it's 11:18 p.m.!!!!
CAH-RA-ZY!

BeBe reports that Sandy and Murray are doing well, despite keeping an eye on the door to see when we come back. I'm sure that won't last long and I wonder if they'll even want to come with me after being spoiled by BeBe and PawPaw for six months.

Alaska Bound!!