Comfy sheets

The Z-man got a new set of comfy sheets from Grandma and Grandpa Rubendall. You've got to just love a nice set of flannel sheets on a cold Alaskan night.

ZZZZzzzzz . . .Zach didn't waste anytime breaking them in. He was out like a light in no time. I think that I will have to get a set of flannel comfy sheets.

Got Bubbles

Not too much need for explanation here. Just bath night at the Huntman's. I was in charge of bubbles and of course put in a little too much.

Rub a dub dub, three Huntman's in a tub!

Sammy, not too sure of what to make of all of the bubbles.

Zach was prepared with his goggles and a ton of rubber duckies. I think that they must multiply when we are sleeping. The tub is nice, but far from relaxing when you have a toddler with a scuba mask and an infant who likes to splash . . . and splash . . . and splash!

Fore score and not even a year . . . Sammy doing his best impression of an old President. Bath night was a success, everyone got out cleaner than when they went in. We did have the matter of bubble on the floor clean-up, but it was well worth the hassle. Next time I will try to remember to not use as many bubbles, yeah right.

A quaint drinking village with a climbing problem....

Talkeetna was the model for Cicely, Alaska—the quirky little town featured in the TV show "Northern Exposure. Talkeetna's entire downtown area is listed on the Register of Historic Places. Its wilderness location at the base of Mt. McKinley (aka Mt. Denali) and at the confluence of three wild rivers also makes it a center for outdoor enthusiasts, climbers, and tourists of all descriptions.
Talkeetna is remote—you don't accidentally stumble across it. From Anchorage by road, it's about 115 miles north on the Parks Highway and then another 14 miles down the (paved) Talkeetna Spur Road. It is also a scheduled stop on the Alaska Railroad, about 80 miles up-track from Anchorage. You can fly light aircraft into the small airport at the edge of town. Unless you fancy dog sleds or snow machines in winter, these are the only ways to get there.

Renee and I have not been to Talkeetna in a few years. The last time we were here was in 2005 on vacation, before we moved back to Anchorage. It was a little bit warmer then, but it was pretty much just as we remembered it.


Here is were we stayed, the Talkeetna Roadhouse. We were originally going to stay at the Talkeetna Lodge, a much bigger and more generic hotel. The Talkeetna Lodge was built in 1999 and is now a Princess Tours Hotel (get the picture). Renee, her parents and I spent New Years 2000 at the Talkeetna Lodge. It is a fun place to hang out and have a fantastic view of Denali, but for this trip, I am glad that it worked out staying at the Talkeetna Roadhouse.

The Talkeetna Roadhouse is a popular destination for climbers getting ready to scale Mt. McKinnley. There is a ton of history at the Roadhouse, and the pictures and flags of past expeditions prove it. This warm wood stove is in the front room and proved to be an excellent source of heat for Zach and I while we watched a movie on my laptop the evening after our snowmachine trip.

The rooms are pretty rustic. It had everything we needed to be warm and compfortable. There was no sneaking around this place however, the floors were the real deal, and squeaked everytime you walked on them.

We had an excellent dinner at the West Rib Restaurant. Billy had recomended it to us and I am glad that he did. We just walked the short block from the Roadhouse to the West Rib. Lots of climbing gear in this place as well. I think that I am seeing a pattern to this town.

Here is the view from our room. It was cold the next morning, about 0 deg. out. We all got up kind of late and then headed downstairs for an excellent breakfast. I especially enjoyed the cinnamon roll. We decided to take a stroll around town before heading back to Anchorage.

Here is the gang all bundled up for a walk around historic Talkeetna. It was cold, but we were dressed for the occasion. We walked all the way to the end of Main Street, and warmed up in a gift shop. They had coffee and of course gifts. We couldn't sneak out of there without at least a couple of t-shirts and some Talkeetna stickers. Just couldn't resist, besides we were trying to help the local economy.

This is the main store in Talkeetna. I think that the picture turned out kind of cool. The West Rib, were we ate the night before is adjacent to the store and located in the back.

In June 1923, Harding set out on a cross-country "Voyage of Understanding," planning to meet ordinary people and explain his policies. During this trip, he became the first president to visit Alaska. At the end of July, while traveling south from Alaska through British Columbia, he developed what was thought to be a severe case of food poisoning. He gave the final speech of his life to a large crowd at the University of Washington Talkeetna today boasts that in 1923, President Warren G. Harding had a drink at its bar "and no president since has," alluding whimsically to the fact that President Harding promptly died - of a still unknown cause - after his Alaska visit in 1923.

We left Talkeetna around 1pm. We had a great time and will make sure to include another trip North in the near future. It was an easy, but cold 3 hour drive back to Anchorage. We did have to make one stop, and that was for one of our younger passangers, who needed a restroom break. Unfortunatly, the Glenn Hwy. does not always have a restroom when you need it, so we stopped by the side of the road for the Z-man to do his thing. We were parked next to this tunnel, which of course caught Zach eye, so we were instructed to drive through it, not once, but twice, all the while honking the trucks horn. He will probably remember the trip through the tunnel more than the trip itself.

A cabin in the woods

A friend of mine, Billy, asked a while back, if I would be interested in helping him clear a trail to his Dad's cabin, once there was enough snow. Billy's Dad's cabin is on Swan Lake, and has a front row seat to Mt. McKinley, North America's highest peak. Well, we finally received enough snow (the cabin is awesome, so there was never any question as to wheather I wanted to go or not), so off we went.

Billy had a scheduling conflict as was not going to be able to spend the night. This was to be a short trip. I decided that driving 3 hours north, just to turn around and head back to Anchorage was going to be too much for one day. So I asked Renee if she wanted to come along for the ride, and we would spend the weekend in Talkeetna. This meant that Billy would have to drive seperately (he didn't mind), but this allowed him to take his dog along. I loaded up the snowmachine and packed the car (it looked like we were going to be gone a month), and headed north. The weather was spectacular for driving and we were even treated with a view of Denali on the drive up.

We dropped Renee and Sam off in Talkeetna, were they would spend the day at the Talkeetna Inn, then meet up with Zach and I in the evening. Billy, Zach and I then headed a little further north of Talkeetna to the pull-off to the cabin. From there it was an easy 8 mile snowmachine ride into the cabin. We only had one snowmachine between the three of us, so Billy brought along a cargo sled. The sled is made of steel and is much like a dog mushers sled. This allowed us to carry all three of us with one sled, and also made it easy to bring in extra gear. The above picture was taken on a lake not far from the cabin. Over our right shoulder is Mt. McKinnley and Mt. Foraker.

I started off driving the snowmachine, then traded with Billy once we got closer to the cabin. I haven't been there in 7 years, so I thought it best that he led the last half. This is the view from the sled. The temp was around 5 deg., but it really did not feel cold at all, even from the back of the sled. Zach liked the sled, because he got to ride in the basket.

Ahhh, probably my least favorite part of snowmachining, digging out a stuck machine. Once we got to within a half mile of the cabin, we had to blaze our own trail. The trails up to this point had been well traveled by snowmachines traversing the area. This area has been discovered, and snowmachiners routeenly use this area as a jumping off point to the Talachulitna river. From there, there is access to hundreds of miles of trails.

The cabin is awesome.  Billy's Dad worked for BLM starting in the early 70's, and was able to get this property years ago.  He built this cabin with spruce from the area.  It was cold when we got here, -10 or so.  Once we arrived, Billy fired up the wood stove so we could have some heat.

The view from here is just awesome.  This shot was taken from the front porch of the cabin.  That is Swan lake in the for ground, with McKinnley in the background.  

Here we are, ready for lunch, and to warm up.

Our stay was brief, so the cabin never really got too warm.  The stove however quickly got up to 400 deg.  The best place to eat lunch was right by the stove.  

The cabin has everything, except electricity or running water.  There is an upstairs with 3 or 4 beds.  

Well, with our job of blazing the trail done, and having had lunch, it was time to go.  It got dark around 4:00.  We set back off on the snowmachine, but had a bit of difficulty with the dog not wanting to go back to the car.  We got about a half mile from the cabin and Billy decided to go back to the cabin on snowshoe to try and convince the dog to follow us out.  Zach and I waited with the machine for about 45 minutes.  It was about 0 deg., but we really never felt cold.  I guess it is all about how you dress.  Billy finally got back from the cabin, but no dog.  He made the decision to leave for the night, and come back in the morning for the dog.  I guess that dog was having too much fun at the cabin.  Anyway we made it back to the road in no time, the trail was bumpy from the warm conditions early on and too many snowmachines driving fast over the loose trail.  It had been a fun but a long day, we were ready to meet back up with Renee and Sam in Talkeetna, and get something warm to eat.  Lets load up the snowmachine and head to Talkeetna!

A case of Pretzel Crisps

A major award!

A while back I entered a video contest for Pretzel Crisps. I finally got notification that I had won one of their prizes.

Here is the fruits of my labor. A year supply (12 bags) of Pretzel Crisps. We will be enjoying them in the long months to come. I sincerely doubt however, that they will even last until March!

A warm place to take a nap

Zach found the best place in the house to take a quick cat nap. The weather outside has been cold, so the warmth of the fireplace makes one feel sleepy. An added bonus, you can see the TV from this warm little spot!

O' Christmas Tree . . .

It's that time of year again . . . time to set up the ol' Christmas tree. But first one has to climb down to the crawl space, locate the artificial tree, pull said tree from out behind a spider web infested corner, then squeeze the 5 foot box out of a 4 foot hole, and then locate and pull out all 140 blue tubs of ornaments. Well maybe not 140, but after 20 minutes on your hands and knees in the crawlspace digging out boxes, even 5 seems like a lot.

Once the tree is up it looks nice. It was actually fun rummaging through the boxes to find the ornaments. It is like a trip down memory lane. There were ornaments from when I was a kid living in Illinois, there were some Renee and I bought when we first met, and there were some from the mammoth sale Hallmark had back in 2001. Well that last part may not be entirely true, but I do believe that we have enough Hallmark ornaments that we could open up are own store.

The thing that is probably the most frustrating on a Christmas tree is the lights. Now, I got smart a few years back and zip tied all 2000 colorful Christmas lights to our artificial tree. It took some doing, but has saved a lot of time over the past 4 or 5 years. Now for some reason, I keep blowing one of those tiny fuses in at the end of the last row of lights. I have no idea why, other than the fact that we have a 4 year old running around the house. Hmmm . . . So now, I may have to undo that bottom row of lights to see what the issue is. Wait a minute, I do believe that that sounds like a good "Grandpa project".

We have for a few years now had two Christmas trees. The big one down stairs and the smaller "Star Wars" tree up stairs. The Star Wars ornament collection has gotten big enough, that this year we decided to get a little bit bigger tree, and buy one that would show off the ornaments better. We ordered a black wrought iron sculpture tree from a catalogue. I was a bit skeptical when I opened up a rather smallish looking box. The tree went together pretty easy and the ornaments look nice on it. I started collecting these ornaments back in 1997, the first year they came out. Back then I collected all sorts of Star Wars toys. Now I have scaled back to just the Hallmark ornaments. Zach has fun listening to Darth Vadar on one of the ornaments tell Luke about how he is his father, he should join him in conquering the universe and so on.

Me and R2-D2 standing next to the Star Wars tree. I know, where is the pocket protector?

A mother's work is never done.

Guest blogger Renee - Starting December 5th and ending today, December 10th

Sam had a regularly scheduled doctor's appointment on December 5th. He is now 19 lbs and 11 ounces. No wonder I pulled my shoulder out of its socket picking him out of the car the other day! At the appointment they also found a mild ear infection - so off to Carr's to get some medication.

The antibiotics have been worse than any ear infection ever was. The medicine has upset his whole little body.

Hey Mom.....yes, I know you just fed me dinner of peas and sweet potatoes. It didn't agree with me. But, I am still smiling!

Ahh, a bath, I feel so much better now! Will a smile make up for all the problems I just caused? I sure did enjoy spending the day at home with you.

Hopefully he will be better tomorrow and able to go back to daycare. If not, I will take the morning and Doug will take "sick kid duty" in the afternoon.

How do you say goodbye to an elephant?

Guest blogger Renee - December 10

We love the Alaska Zoo located in Anchorage. It is one of our favorite places to go - in the summer, in the snowy winter, it doesn't matter. The zoo has "arctic" animals from Alaska, Russia, the high mountains in Tibet, etc.......and it used to have one elephant named Maggie.

In 1966, Anchorage grocer Jack Snyder won a contest offering a prize of "$3,000 or a baby elephant". He chose the elephant, a female Asian Elephant named Annabelle. Annabelle was initially kept at the Diamond H Horse Ranch, located in the Hillside area of Anchorage and owned by Sammye Seawell, which had the only heated stalls available.

With Annabelle's increasing popularity, Seawell formed a non-profit corporation to build a place "where the public could visit animals and learn about them." It was incorporated on March 28, 1968 as the Alaska Children's Zoo, which opened in 1969 with Annabelle and other donated animals. The zoo was located on land adjacent to Seawell's ranch. The zoo's name was changed to Alaska Zoo in June 1980.

In 1983, a female African elephant named Maggie arrived at the Alaska Zoo as a companion for Annabelle. In 1997, Annabelle died, leaving her companion, Maggie alone.

In 2004, in spite of mounting criticism, Alaska Zoo officials decided to keep Maggie in Alaska for at least three more years, rather than sending her to an elephant sanctuary in a warmer climate, where she could also socialize with other elephants.

On June 6th, 2007, the Alaska zoo board decided to send Maggie to a zoo or sanctuary in the lower 48 states. The decision was as big as Sarah Palin being a contender for VP. There were those who wanted to keep Maggie in state and were afraid she would not survive a trip and those who felt she needed to be in a warm climate and with other elephants. In the end, at the end of 2007, a huge party was thrown for Maggie. We all cried and smiled as she was loaded into a crate and flown on a military plane to the Performing Animals Welfare Society (PAWS) sanctuary in California.

Maggie is so happy. The residents of Alaska nearly brought down the PAWS website and "elephant cam" site trying to watch her. We sure do love Maggie.

Before Sam joined us, Zach and I would often go to the zoo and run to the far back corner where Maggie could be found. It was "our" thing. We would talk about Maggie and discuss how big she was. I was happy for Maggie, but really sad for Zach and I that Maggie was leaving.

To keep Maggie entertained, she had been trained to paint pictures. An elephant can do amazing things with its trunk.

At Maggie's goodbye party I was so sad that she was leaving. We bought one of three remaining painting from the gift shop to always have a piece of Maggie. They sold all that they had left that weekend. Maggie's painting is now in our entry way and someday will go to Zach's house. A reminder of an elephant that we both love.

Last week there was a book release and signing by the author of "How Do You Say Goodbye to an Elephant?" I got Zach a signed copy and we are enjoying reading it and looking at all the pictures of Maggie, the story of how she came and left Alaska and the artwork that the children made for her. If only everyone could have a Maggie.

Chris, Sarah and Jacob come for a visit

Guest blogger Renee - December 7th

Everyone told me that once you have kids, it is their friend's parents that become your friends. How true that is! Jacob is a great friend of Zach's at school. We met his parents, Chris and Sarah, at Jacob's birthday party....and they have become our friends! Chris, Sarah and Jacob braved the snowy roads to come have dinner with us. Sarah brought some bison burgers with blue cheese....yumm! No one went hungry.

Zach and Jacob check out the snowman that guards the front door. The teachers at Camai Early Learning Center must have nerves of steel, these kids have a lot of energy!

We set-up the jumpy castle in the garage so that Jacob and Zach could burn off a little energy - besides the jumpy castle is always more fun when there is a friend to play with.

Jumping is ok.....but it is even MORE fun to have someone turn off the blower when you are in it and the castle deflates around you! Then, up you go when the fan is turned back on. Jacob and Zach took turns flipping the fan on and off.

Sam at Daycare

Guest blogger Renee - December 8th

Sam loves playing with his friends at Bright Beginnings. He is especially fond of his teacher, Irene. I wish that I could take a nap any time I wanted!

At the end of the day when I went to pick Sam up, he was sound asleep with his bare foot hanging outside the crib. He was so cute that I had to get a quick picture.

Advent Workshop

Guest blogger Renee - Nov 30th

We have been attending church at the St. John's United Methodist Church, near our house on O'Malley Road. The people we have met there have been very nice and welcoming. The church sponsored a children's Advent Workshop for 2 hours in the afternoon on Sunday. The church gym was set-up with 15 or so craft projects for the kids. Zach was thrilled to make a snowflake ornament for our Christmas tree.

Cookie decorating was also a big hit for Zach. He carefully frosted a cookie for himself and one for Daddy. Lots of colorful sprinkles were the key to success. Sam was a little angel and happily entertained everyone around with big smiles from his stroller. He was happy the whole time we were there.

The event was coming to a close and everyone was heading to the sanctuary to sing a few Christmas carols. Zach really wanted to make an Advent log. I work with Mike, the guy in the white shirt above (we attend a lot of the same meetings, he works for our main competitor). Mike was nice enough to make Zach his last customer of the day. They helped Zach to carefully drill 5 holes in the log for the candles we would later put in it. A lady put together a "to go" bag of decorations and off we went to sing carols.

Once we returned home, Doug got out the staple gun and we went to work decorating the Advent log.

What a collection of neat craft items. Zach reminded me several times that he didn't get to do all the events. Next year we will get there earlier to ensure he has time to check it all out. Zach's decorations look very nice on our Christmas tree. He does good work.

And those decorated cookies? They didn't last long.

Time to Change the Oil

November 30th - Time again to change the oil in the truck. I do it myself because it would cost me over $200 at the Jiffy Lube. The truck takes 14 quarts of oil and I like to run synthetic. Our friend Karl needed to change the oil in his truck as well, so I set aside a few hours on a Sunday and put on my mechanic hat.

The floor is gross this time of year with melting snow and grim from the road. I sprung for a creeper ( a rolly skateboard type of thing that you lay on to roll under a vehicle) to keep me off of the dirt. It didn't take too long to get the two trucks in and out. In addition to the oil change, I tried to change the air filter. The cost for the filter was $87 at Walmart . In the end, the filter didn't want to go in, so I will have to take it to the dealer anyway. Now, with the oil changed, I should be good for another 5000 miles.

Let it snow . . . Finally!

Guest blogger Renee - November 30th

We were very fortunate to have clear roads for our drive to Thanksgiving Dinner in Eagle River (40 or so minutes away). Now that we don't need to drive anywhere, bring on the snow! We got up in the morning to quite the pile.....about 16 inches total over the past few days.

Doug started to clear the driveway with the snow blower while Zach, Sam and I followed up with the shovels. It didn't feel too cold, so it was quite enjoyable to be outside in the fresh air. Sam didn't mind going along for the ride.

Zach was a big help in clearing the steps. He just chatted away a mile a minute about this and that and helped to push a little snow from here to there.

It wasn't all work! Zach had to make sure to check out the large piles of snow on the sides of the driveway. Later in the day came the snow blowers driven by a person to clean off the sidewalks and the large loaders for the road. Doug and Zach watched all the action from the second story windows.