One of my closest friends from Alaska drove away today. Andrew and I went to the Worrick's home last night for some last-minute hanging out and a quick game of Cranium before heading to bed around 1:30 am, only to get up today and drive back over there to squeeze in some more goodbye's. We prayed together. We cried together. Hugs were passed around. I've been thinking about this moment practically every day for the past month or more and thinking on what to do or say to make this go by easier. The only real thing I came up with that I've been thinking about over and over, a couple of phrases on an endless repeat in my head is 'Thank you for Amy' and 'Bless their journey'. 


Back when I first got here - well, even before that, I prayed earnestly for God to send me a friend. And Amy took me under her wing and has become my first real, life-changing, blessing-in-disguise friend here while in Alaska. She and Shawn have welcomed me and Andrew into their home, into their lives, and have challenged me to ask the hard questions about my life, my faith and how I should be a better wife to Andrew/live a better life (and she probably doesn't realize she's encouraged me and challenged me in so many ways!).

And now they are en route to Missouri and their new base. And I know that God is going to move BIG through them. And their journey will be blessed.

Missing you four already - Amy, Shawn, Devin, Zoey, Maddi & Kia.

We went with the 'prom' theme for pictures at his squadron's Holiday Party.

Unfortunately we didn't win anything..well, our table won the scavenger hunt & trivia questionnaire.

We got a Christmas tree!

Andrew wearing the apron Grammie sent out (and I made for her back when I was probably eleven or so).

Chip was very interested in the tree stand/water.

The 'before'

Andrew christening our bare tree...

...with a Darth Vader ornament.

All pretty with the lights!

And now some presents!

Penguin ornament from Lowe's.

The ornament I got from a vendor at the local craft fair back in October...I gave it to Andrew for Christmas.

Another ornament from Lowe's

More Adventures in the Alaskan 'wilderness'

A lot has happened in the past month. I haven't been blogging much because I haven't really been feeling up to it, and I've been unsure if I should continue on - I mean, does anyone even read this?

A couple of weeks ago I left work and went into the ER for a personal issue. The next day I started not feeling well - very nauseous and had severe abdominal pains which worsened when eating. This went on for about four days before I went back to the ER for two IV Drips and a bunch of medicine. The doctors deemed it 'irritable bowel syndrome' which I know it was not - it is just their way of telling me they have no idea what it is. The pain went away after that night so it may have been a combination of the lack of nutrition from not eating for four days and dehydration.

So everything was grand until Friday of that week (Veteran's day) when we got into a three car accident (our fault) and totaled our car. Estimated damage with basic parts (which have to be new rather than used because it is a pretty unpopular car) to the front alone was $3,000.00 not including labor. It is estimated to cost about $8,000.00 to fix the Maxima. So with two weeks of rental cars and a potential loan going through, I was relatively calm and knew that everything would work out and that God would take care of us.

And He has. Our loan went through and we were able to buy a used (new to us) 2002 Subaru Impreza. It's handled pretty well so far in the snow and ice and we are pretty happy with it.

This isn't actually a picture of our car, but one I took off google.

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house for the first time. Hannah and Carlo Bulanan came over as did David Smith, one of the single guys in his squadron. we had lunch at 1 pm and everyone stayed until at least eight playing board games and talking/watching movies.

I stopped working at Barnes & Nobles the Thursday before Thanksgiving and the Tuesday and Wednesday of the week of Thanksgiving I started Orientation at the Sitka Child Development Center. This past week I was placed into room 114 of the Infant wing, working with 6-12 month olds - and I LOVE it! I am filling in for the regular caregiver in this room, as her newly adopted daughter passed away the Saturday after Thanksgiving and she has not yet set a date to come back as of yet. Apparently I've done such a great job and the kids love me so Melissa (the early morning shift) requested that I be put back in the room for this next week instead of doing the flexible of 'floater' position I was hired for.  I've done some helping out in the toddler and pre-school rooms and I'm not very thrilled so I think that if a position in a room opened up I would prefer to be in the older infants like I am now. Maybe even pre-tots, but I haven't been in there yet.

Andrew and I have had a couple of movie dates recently. We went to see the Muppet's - which was a decent movie in my opinion.I didn't grow up watching the Muppet's but I was amused by most of the numbers in it - especially when Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory showed up in one of the numbers. That probably made the movie for me.

We also went on Friday evening and saw Hugo. I didn't really like it mostly because it was a very slow-moving movie - a slow-moving story. Andrew really enjoyed it though and that's all that matters. I mostly went for him. Besides, he went to the Midnight opening showing of Part 1 of Breaking Dawn, the last book of the Twilight Series. Now that's love.


Last night I had the opportunity to spend some time and fun Fellowship with some awesome ladies from MCHH at The Crow's Nest which is located on the 20th floor of the Captain Cook Hotel in downtown Anchorage.  It is a super fancy restaurant and not something I would go to on just some random day - it is more of an anniversary dinner or to celebrate a new promotion or something big like that. We all had a wonderful time and the view (even in the dark) was spectacular. Andrew and I might go there for our 1 year anniversary dinner.

Lamb Loin I had for dinner.

Myself and Amy showing off our muscles!

All the MCHH Ladies in the Lobby of the Captain Cook Hotel

A couple things I've been thinking about lately is making a 'mini-series' on my blog - sort of like the homemaker blogs that I follow - except these would document neat hole-in-the-wall places we've been such as restaurants with review & maybe some pictures, or maybe a small series on good items to invest in if considering a trip or a move up here - things that will come in handy such as a pair of sturdy hiking boots or a pair of studded snow tires. I guess I want to document our lives in such a way that if someone wanted some honest opinions of things see and do from someone who is currently living here. What do you think?

February 27th 2011

White Cliffs Mansion, Northborough MA

The reception

Andrew helping me off the bar after pictures.

The Bridal Party. Left-Right: Nathanial Sager, Timo Nivala, Jaadin Anderson, Matthew Skinner, Bridget McManaman, Andrew, Me, Krystal Blodgett, Joseph Burley, Erin Loftus, Jonathon Skinner, Kelly Eisbacher.

Probably one of my favorite pictures.

I really enjoy this one too.

Our wedding cake, done by Krystal Blodgett. The rubber ducks were added at the very last minute. Notice the 'man' duck is in his blues!

Dancing with my dad.

For those who read and follow up on our very sporadic posts about our lives, we had some trouble with the photographer and the quality of photos given to us. It is pretty much all taken care of now, but these are some of the better re-done photos we have received. I may post more later. 

We do ask that everyone does not copy and paste these files onto your own personal computers. Andrew and I will be giving out photos to those who want them. Thank you very much. 

Hello from Massachusetts! Let's start back from the beginning. We left for the Ted Stevens Anchorage Airport around 10 pm and waited for Julian to get off his airplane. Once Julian came back to collect his car, we took our bags out of his car and checked in with our airline. We got through security and I was 'randomly' selected for a pat down but there wasn't a female around to do it so the guy just swiped my shoes instead. Our plane from Anchorage to Seattle left at 12:43 am and we grabbed some coffee cake and a yogurt parfait that we shared before boarding.

Our flight from Anchorage to Seattle was approx. four hours and I was lucky enough to have a crying, kicking kid behind me. He did better than I was expecting though and I did manage to get some sleep. We landed in Seattle around 5:30 am and then left about an hour later. I got coffee, a fruit cup and bagel (for the plane) along with some animal crackers and a couple of Cliff bars. So we got on the plane going to our next stop, Newark NJ. This flight was so freaking long. Almost five and a half hours. I didn't really sleep at all. I ate the bagel and cream cheese and the animal crackers on the flight and had some of the juice the beverage cart brought but that's it. We started our descent into Newark and it was so bumpy and jarring that I sort of got sick into the vomit bag that's located in the seat in front of me.

So we asked the stewards if we could be let off first since we had a really tight connection and we were all the way in the back of the plane but they said they wouldn't/couldn't do anything. So our flight from Seattle landed in Newark at 3:07 pm and we thought we would be alright because the next gate to fly to Boston was near where we were coming in...like two gates down.

Wrong. The gate originally told us was now going to Phoenix. So we looked at the board and our flight had been changed to C125 instead of C86. So we ran. RAN. SPRINTED. Through the airport. We heard the five minute final warning boarding call for the connecting flight and I had Andrew sprint along ahead of me and let them know that I was coming. I got there just in time. Literally. The doors were closing. It was crazy. And horrible to sprint through the airport after just having gagged into the barf bag!

Regardless, we made it. But we had to wait for our bags once in Boston because they didn't make it to the flight we barely made it on. But Continental gave us food vouchers so we spent all $24 at Dunkin' Donuts getting bagels and muffins for the week.  We finally got to my mom's new house in Auburn around seven and had gotten pizza for dinner. Then we went to bed at like 10 pm.

Saturday we picked up his dad's car at the hotel because we are using his car all week. And we went to Walmart on the way to Grammie's to pick up some things to do maintenance on some of Andrew's caches. Grammie wasn't home so I just saw Dad and Sam instead. After we went to do the caches and then we headed to his parent's house for Victoria's birthday. Mom came too.

Today, Sunday, we went to HBC for church. Erin came too. Then we went out to Leominster (spell?) to go for lunch at Friendly's before Erin and I headed back to Auburn to get stuff ready for Bridget's Bachlorette party....of which I will continue to right about tomorrow...because I'm exhausted and need to take a shower and go to bed before tomorrow!

So while reading another friend's blog today, I was reminded that being outside, out in nature -despite how cold, warm, snowy or rainy it is - is very therapeutic to me. These past few days I have been able to get outside with Andrew - we played disc golf downtown a couple of times, we've gone to Far North Centennial Park/Campbell Tract (took a wrong turn and had to walk 2 miles back to our car, on the road) and today we went down to Alyeska Ski Resort to do the disc course but it was a flounce. So we decided to check out the hotel instead and  then found a lot of caches in and around Girdwood.  I found most of them - and most of them were nanos! We stopped at Beluga Point on the way back home, snuggling under my sleeping bag to watch the sunset.

It has been a good long weekend.