Warm Temps and Icy Roads

January, 16

Weird weather is on the attack in the great white north. Last night the winds shook the house quite a bit. We were forecast to have winds that topped 105 mph. I think that the winds only got into the upper 80's or 90's, but that packs quite a wallop.

The winds that we usually get are the warm Chinook Winds. The winds in our case raised the temperature from around -20 F to near 55 deg F. It was really a shock to the system.

This rapid warming played havoc on the roads. Everything was literally a sheet of ice. I had never seen the roads this bad. Both Renee and I attempted to go to work today, but were turned around by the accidents on the hill near our house. After seeing the long line of traffic and feeling the car move sideways on the road while doing 2 mph, Renee and I both agreed that the best course of action was to stay home. This was a good thing as it turned out. Unbeknown to us, both Zach and Sam's daycare was closed. We would have been stuck at home with the kids regardless of being able to make it down the hill.

In the end, this weird mix of weather closed schools for three days. Renee and I had to juggle the kids at home while waiting for the conditions of the roads to improve. The above pictures really tell the story of the roads. They were truly as slick as they look.

Build a thing Workshop

We made it up early on a Saturday to participate in a building workshop sponsored by Lowe's. We've gone to quite a few of these at both Lowe's and Home Depot in the past, but it had been a while since we last attended one of these workshops.

Zach always looks forward to "building" a new project at the store. He is getting better at helping me build the project. And he looks really cute in his little Lowe's apron.

Sam is even starting to get in on the action. It will still be a little while until I trust him to pound the nails while I hold them straight. I still need all of my finger!

I put Sam in charge of reading the directions. He didn't really get what that entailed, so he was put in charge of making sure the bags didn't blow away.

Hard at work. I can see it now. Huntman and Son's carpentry service.

The projects are never too difficult to put together. They usually involve pounding a few nails and maybe a adding a little glue here and there, and of course putting the stickers on the project. The cool thing is that all of this is free. It is in the store's best interest to hold these kind of events. For one, it brings the parents into the store. This is the type of store, for me at least, that is hard to get out of empty handed. And secondly, they are training the next generation of customers for their own home improvement projects. Home improvement projects = $$$ This weeks project is a Time Capsule. We will have to decide what to put in the capsule and where to hide it.

Snow Festival

Winter in Alaska is filled with all kinds of interesting things to do. It helps to beat the winter blues brought on by short days and cold temperatures. Anchorage had some sort of winter festival on the Park Strip on Saturday. I couldn't find anything on the Internet about it, and I wasn't able to go down until Tuesday and by then there were no signs up about the event. So I will just tell you what I know, which isn't much.

This is Chris, one of my co-workers. There are about five of us at work that take a morning walk everyday around 10am. Most of the time we just walk around the Anchorage Cemetery, but if there is something interesting going on, like this past weekend, we will check it out. Chris is standing at what appears to be a long bar made out of snow. It looked well used, so people must have had a good time on Saturday.

This is Karen, another one of my co-workers. Karen is walking through a snow corridor. At first we thought it was a maze, but after walking through it, we realized that it was just a cool entrance to an outdoor amphitheatre made entirely of snow. There was a bon-fire in the middle of the amphitheatre and is was still smoldering. Again, remnants of a good time that was had by all.

This thing was freaky. Chris is standing on a man-made pond in the middle of the park. The weird thing is, in this pond, under Chris, are two Cadillacs frozen in a head on collision, under the ice! The blinkers were flashing on the cars and everything.

The pond with the cars was probably a little clearer over the weekend. The temps had been down to around -20. The day we chose to walk around the temps had started to climb into the upper 20's, that is a 40 deg. difference. In fact, as we were walking off of this pond, Chris and I heard and felt the ice sink about two inches. It was that cue that told us to get the heck off of the ice. I didn't need to get any closer to the Cadillacs. Karen read in the paper that during the Saturday event, the organizers staged a winter "beach party". I heard that there were dozens of people out on the park strip in their shorts and bikini's. They even staged a beach volleyball game. Again it was -20, so I am sure that the "beach party" did not last long. But still, shorts and bikini's. That's Alaska for you.

Here are about two dozen ice "heads" on sticks. I am not sure what the significance of this is, but it looked kind of cool. Each of the heads lit up. We tried to time the walk to get to the park while it was still dark. I thought that the pictures would turn out better. Kind of like the ice sculpture pictures. The sculptures looked better with the artificial light and dark sky. We got to the park strip about 15 minutes too late. The sun was already coming up and the sky was grey. We were going to go back the next day, but we got some really strong Chinook winds that raised the temperatures in Anchorage to around 50 degrees. So we never had the chance to go back. I guess I'll have to put this event into the planner for next year. It looked like it was a lot of fun. I just have to figure out what the heck they call it.

Aces Hockey

Anchorage has very few big time sports venues. This works out well for us, as we are not big time sports people. But on occasion, we do like to attend a local hockey game. The Anchorage Aces are a division two team (I think that is the proper term), that play teams from all over the country. Renee was able to score us 4 tickets to one of their home games, so we loaded up the kids and headed to the arena. Go Aces!

The last time we were at a game, Zach noticed that a lot of people had cow bells to ring during goals or pretty much anytime the announcer would say " Let me hear some noise!!". So we found a bell that we had around the house and brought that to the game. Talk about a happy kid. He loved ringing the bell as loud as he could. Hockey games are great for toddlers, no restrictions on using your outside voice!

I really don't know much about hockey, even thought I used to run the replay machine for the big screen at this arena. We just like the action of the game itself, and of course people watching. Some of the hockey fans are interesting individuals.

The highlight of the game for Zach was the Zamboni. This arena has two Zamboni's. The coolest one is all decked out like a hotwheel race car. Zach waved to the Zamboni driver everytime he would get near our seats.

Sam was getting into the action as well. He didn't have a bell, but he used his lungs at the appropriate (and sometimes inappropriate) times. We left after the second period so we didn't press our luck with the kids. We knew that they can only last so long, and they don't like being stuck in traffic after the game. It was cold (-20), so Renee got the car while I waited with the kids. As the halftime events were winding down, the mascot and his helpers finished up shooting t-shirts into the crowd with their air cannon. Zach was determined to get one (he didn't), and wanted to ride on my shoulders so the mascot could see him and hopefully shoot a t-shirt his way. It didn't work out, and I got in trouble from Zach because I didn't yell loud enough to alert the mascot that we wanted a shirt. I guess that it is hard being 4 and the center of the universe. "How could that big puppet (mascot) not see ME!!!" We got out of there with out too many tears shed, and the promise that next time I would yell REALLY LOUD, and attract the attention of the big puppet (mascot). I guess that's just part of being a dad.

Swimming at 15 below

Even though it is cold out, we try and get out, just so we don't go stir crazy. The Alaska Club is one of our favorite places to go and have some fun.

The South Side Alaska Club has a pool complete with slide. It is usually utilized for lap swimming, but on the weekends, they have a few hours dedicated for open swim. They even turn on the slide.

Here are two of my favorite people having fun in the pool.

Zach must have gone down the water slide at least 15 times.

After the pool, we had a few minutes to kill while we waited for Renee to get ready so Zach played on the rock wall. He is getting pretty good at climbing up the wall and picking his route.

Here Zach is playing on some "old school" exercise equipment. His flashy outfit helps complete the picture.

Really Darn Cold

December 29th - Jan 12th

It was unseasonably cold the later part of December to the first few weeks of January. Anchorage usually has a cold spell this time of year, but it rarely gets as cold or lasts as long as it did.

-15 bbbbrrrr...

I look at this parking meter from my office window at work . I thought that it looked artsy in a rather cold way.

The following are some shots around Anchorage. The temp outside was minus 20.

It eventually warmed up, and in a big way. But that is a story for another post.

H2Oasis

January 2nd, 2009

It has been so cold lately, that when Renee suggested that I take Zach to H2Oasis during my Friday off, I didn't even hesitate in saying yes.

H2Oasis in Anchorage's one and only indoor water park. The park has a pirate theme and has 6 or 7 different areas you can play at. The Park is impressive. It is actually the 5th larges waterpark in the U.S. H2Oasis opened in 2003 and has an impressive 56,000 sq ft. Inside you'll find a wave pool, a 575-foot long lazy river, a Pirate Ship-themed interactive children's play area, two enormous hot tubs, and the centerpiece attraction, a Master Blaster uphill water coaster. The Master Blaster uses blasts of water to propel riders up waterpark slides for a coaster-like experience. H2Oasis will be the first North American indoor water park to feature a Master Blaster ride.

This particular Friday was very crowded. Schools were out due to winter break and I think that the rest of Anchorage was just as tired of being cooped up inside the house as we were. We skipped the waterslides this time, the line was just too long, and we stuck to the Pirate ship, Lazy River and the Wave Pool. Zach spent the most of his time in and around the Pirate Ship. It is pretty cool. It has a few small waterslides in it, a few water cannons and different levels to play on. And after all, it is a Pirate Ship.

We met up with our friend Karl and his daughter Nora. Zach and Nora play well together, although they run around so much it is hard to hold a conversation without totally loosing one or both of the kids. I have Zach put on a life jacket as soon as we get there so I don't worry too much. Plus I enjoy seeing what peaks his interest at any one moment. He's at the ship, now he's in the wave pool . . . Lazy River . . now the ship again . . .

Zach didn't want the raft for the Lazy River, so he just floated in his life jacket. We did this twice before he decided to go back to the Pirate Ship. There are days I wish I had just a quarter of his energy. I don't know what I would do with it, I would probably be able to crush rocks with my bare hands, or scale buildings with out even breaking a sweat, it would be fun for a day though.

With a life jacket and goggles, Zach makes the transformation from little boy, into a fish. The waves in this pool would get up to 3 feet in height. Zach wouldn't mind, even when his feet didn't touch the ground.

Here is a little slide in the wave pool area, with H2Oasis's newest addition, the orange slide in the background. You actually have to walk up the equivalent of three stories to get to the beginning of the slide. The ride is actually Zach's favorite, but with the lines would have to wait until next time.

It was a good day at H2Oasis. We eventually were water logged and decided to head home and grab some lunch. The hardest part of the whole adventure was walking from the heated pool (84.5 deg) to the cold, cold car (-15 deg). It was a shock to the system. But I am sure we will be back again in the future. Aaaarrrrgghh!

New Years Eve

I really can't believe that it is 2009 already. We had a pretty mellow New Year's Eve this year. It was around -20 out so that ruled out all of the outside activities, like the fireworks downtown. The roads were slick, so we ruled out going to our friends house in Eagle River. So we narrowed it down to staying at home.

We had our own fun. We watched Dick Clark ring in the New Year in California and drank some spiced cider to toast the occasion. Zach had his own funny hat that he made in daycare the week before.

Then we got really crazy and had some toasted cheese sandwiches in our new sandwich maker. All in all we had a good evening and the best thing about it was . . . no work the next day!

Ice Sculptures

Well, our Christmas vacation was coming to an end. We had a few hours of daylight on the last day of our holiday with Mom and Dad, so we decided to go downtown and check out the Ice Sculptures.

It was getting cold, but the sculptures were working hard. Some were really starting to take shape, others had a long way to go.

Ice sculpting has to be something that you love to do. For me it is a little too cold of an activity. I can hardly think when I get real cold, and these guys are planning out their creation and wielding chainsaws too! I didn't know what the heck this sculpture was, but I would find out later. So will you.

The downtown square had the sculptures and the Anchorage Christmas tree. The square hosted the downtown fireworks and celebration. The festivities were called Fire & Ice New Years Eve Celebration. Obviously the Ice sculptures were the "Ice" in Fire & Ice, and from the 11 o'clock news on New Years Eve, the party appeared to have fire eaters, fire dancing, and a lot of torches. We wanted to go down for New Years, but it was - 15 that night. Too cold. Maybe next year when the boys are older.

This is what the blocks start out as. It must take a lot of imagination to turn that block into something like . . .

This caribou . . . or . . .

this Swan . . . or . . .

Anchorage, right after the 1964 earthquake (I told you you'd find out what this was). I took pictures of the completed sculptures a few days after Mom & Dad left. They never got to see the completed sculptures, except in pictures. I actually went down to take these pictures on two separate occasions. The first day I went down, the sun had just come up, it was around 10:30. The lighting on the ice didn't look that cool. So, I went down the next day about a half an hour before the sun came up and got these rather cool looking shots, lit up with artificial lighting. What a difference a half an hour makes.

I convinced my work friends to hike down to the sculptures on both occasions. It is not too far from work and Kaladi Bros. Coffee is real close. Making this a good destination anyway. The only problem with walking this far was the temperature. This was the beginning of a three week cold snap. We were walking in temperatures of - 15 to -20. Coffee wasn't a luxury, it was a necessity. The sculptures were around for several weeks as the temps remained in the negative digits for a long time. Then we got a real warm spell ( I'll talk more about that in a later post), and the sculptures didn't fair too well. I walked by this area last week and saw that while the old sculptures were long gone, some new ones had replaced them. Anyway, I am glad that Mom & Dad got to see the sculptures while they were being made. It was a nice end to their trip up North. Thanks for visiting us for the holidays and we look forward to seeing you in October. Have a safe trip!

Christmas Train

Our friends Ed and Georgia, who live in Eagle River, are good friends of ours from back in my Channel 11 days. Ed and I became good friends on a series of rafting trips I covered for the station. We don't see Ed and Georgia often enough, but we always have a great time when we are together.

The one occasion we never miss, is seeing Ed's holiday train. Ed has built up his collection of rail cars, houses and track over the years. The train now over-runs his living room during the holiday season. Zach for the past few years has been able to help Ed "run" the train. This year was no exception. There was only one de-railment this year. It wasn't serious. The injured were transported to a nearby hospital where they were treated and released.

Ed's daughter Molly was down from Fairbanks. It was nice catching up with her and her son Locke. The last time we saw both of them, Locke was two days old. He is quit a bit bigger now, and it was fun to see Locke and Zach playing together.

Here is Dad trying to fix a derailment. We were able to run the train for a while and then we had some lunch. Ed and Georgia have a cool hobby. They are both photographers. There pictures are great. I think that at some point they may be able to make a living off of the photos they take in rural Alaska. Ed shoots these really excellent panorama's. Georgia's specialty is wildlife shots. They shoot many of their images on rafting trips they take throughout the summer. Last year they did several rivers, their longest trip took them up the Marsh Fork of the Canning River, as it flows through the Brooks Range in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Check out some of their photos at http://www.bennettimages.com/

The fun had to come to a close. Sammy was getting fussy and we didn't want to wear out our welcome. I am sure we will see Ed and Georgia this summer, maybe for a rafting trip or at one of their photography exhibits. And of course we'll be looking forward to next years Christmas train!

Christmas Presents

Ahh . . . I am behind in the blog again, three weeks to be exact. In an effort to catch up I will be brief. So, this is Christmas Day. We just got back from Alyeska Resort, and it is time to play Santa and open some presents. Zach is really excited.

This is what it is all about. Having family around for Christmas. It is not everyday that we get to spend the holiday with Mema and Papa. It is also fun to watch Zach, who is so innocent and believes in Santa. He gets very excited to see all of the presents under the tree with his name on them. Sam could care less. He is more interested in the boxes.

As soon as Zach walked in the door, he spotted this snowboard. It is a little big for him now, but in a couple of years after he gets comfortable skiing, he can move into snowboarding. But for now he is king of the slopes.

Santa brought Zach and Daddy a few garbage trucks this year. Because I work for the Solid Waste Dept. at ADEC, Zach and I have a special place in our heart for garbage trucks.

Mema and Papa had fun shopping for Zach as well. I think that Zach may have a future as a Gators fan!

The total count on new garbage trucks for Christmas was 5, this doesn't take into account the extra three that we found on the after Christmas clearance sales.

Christmas was really fun this year. Everyone had a great time and we got to spend it with family. Next year though, I'm thinking Hawaii. While I enjoy snow on Christmas, I think that I am ready to try palm trees for Christmas. I guess I will have to be really really good this year.