life in alaska

The other day we were talking about new friends Emmie has made when she was suddenly really sad and said, "I wonder if Esther's given up on me?" She breaks my heart!

She'll start Awana tomorrow night, and I think she'll love Sparks.

Brady woke up around 5 this morning and I heard him say (to himself) "OH! Good Morning! How you a-day? I doing great!" after which he went back to sleep...

Riley is learning things about tundra and glaciers in her science class! And they took a field trip last week which she was describing to me and used the words "and we walked into the boreal forest." I have to say that freaked me out just a bit. It conjures images of werewolves, for some reason.

This morning I was waking up the kids, reminding Riley she has a field trip. Of course, that made Emmie a little jealous, so I told her she will have a field trip sometime this year.
Me - Em, your teacher said your class usually takes a train up to Palmer
Em - (no response)
Me - and the school bus picks you up there
Em - WE GET TO RIDE THE SCHOOL BUS?????
(I wonder if Mrs. Pauls knows they could probably skip the hard part and just load the K-class on the school bus and still have them all wowed.)

Also funny to me: Brady was saying something over and over that I was choosing to ignore because I didn't want to stop what I was doing. "Uh muh. Uh muh. Uh muh" with paci in his mouth. Finally Carson came over, looked me in the eye and said "He wants more." (Sippy cup in hand.)

Life is flying by here in Alaska. The days are shortening, the leaves are dropping, the kids are schooling.

A lot of you want to know how Riley, Logan and Emmie are adapting to school. They are in week 3, and it's the best week by far. R & L are learning to work faster. It's not a homeschool pace, not by a long shot. They are enjoying their teachers though, and making new friends. Emmie, when asked about K, usually answers "I don't want to talk about it" or "you know I don't talk about that." If indirectly asked, she'll confess to enjoying it.

Carson and Brady just got their heads buzzed as a result of a botched attempt (of mine) to trim their hair. Jeff came home and said of Carson, "He kind of looks like Martin Luther." So I buzzed it. They look manly.

Carson likes to speak in commands. "Wipe it." (pointing to nose.) "No, Brady." "Give it back." Things like that.

Brady starts every morning by finding me to say "Good morning, Mom! How you a-day?" He goes on long hunger strikes, then wanders into the kitchen to say "I hun-gee, mom."

Owen is still Mr. Perfect Baby. Even though he's had a cold and kept me up all week. Last night he "checked to see if I was awake" (as Jeff puts it) about every 45 minutes so I'm kind of delirious right now wait am I awake?

We're getting ready to close on a house in about a week, and are very excited to settle in and put roots down. We just enjoyed having Todd and Lance here for Jeff's installment service - both the service and the old friends were a huge blessing to us. We were taken out on a boat with them and two elders from Anchorage Grace to Blackstone Bay, fed fresh shrimp (pulled up, cleaned, and cooked on the boat) beside some glaciers. I couldn't stop saying things like "Oh my word this is crazy. No one gets to DO stuff like this." I'd say Alaska is growing on us.