More moose and Clamming!!!

Our last day of school... Icecream Social! All grades- K-6 come out to the playground area for icecream sundaes and music (we bring in a DJ!!!!). I think I as much fun as the kiddos... icecream and dancing!!

Mama and twins!

Itty-bitty twins! They were already wandering away from mama!

This is our little guy we've watched grow up this past year. He roams the park across the street as well as Russian Jack a block over. Adam and I were playing softball when he came out, we hadn't see him in awhile, I am so proud of his "antlers"... little nubbins! I sure am gonna miss our little guy! (also- we haven't seen mom.... assuming she has another little one with her, but haven't had a visual on her yet!)

The neighborhood boys checking him out. These kids whippped out CELL PHONES and took pictures of him (kinda ridiculous huh?!?-- they're barely off training wheels!) I was the "mother hen" and tried to get them to move back a bit-but of course they didn't listen to me. I don't think they know how to listen! Our mooser didn't mind them tho- thank goodness!

Disc golfing on a gorgeous day!

Pretty intimidating!

Adam fishing for Kings in the Ninilchik River.. no luck, it was the opening day. ALTHOUGH we saw a massive king foul hooked (hooked in the belly). Chena is sittin next to him, on the look out! She was having a great time swimming!

From our campsite on the beach... waiting for low tide! Gorgeous view eh?

Fellow clammers diggin in the mud!

A waterfall down the beach. Adam and Erin checking out the "catch" we heard about.

THESE are halibut! We had no idea this was possible, but now we know what we're doing next year for Memorial Day weekend! These people were clamming during low tide, then setting their hooks out (huge ocean poles), waiting for high tide and catching these yummy fish!! HOW FUN!!! You can also see the "Skathe" in the water above them.

ANNNNNNNNNND these are hard to see, but they had 7-10 Salmon Sharks caught as well!

Ok... so school is out- I have been busy setting up utilities and all that fun stuff for our new house. Our title was signed and finalized by Friday morning-- the house is OURS!! We have the keys! We have been furniture shopping and now that we know what we "style" we like... we're going to go measure our house and buy some furniture. Then we'll pick out some paint. Official move-in date isn't until June18-19 because of our trip back to Iowa and Adam's residency. Luckily, we have the one month overlap with our apartment, so we can take our time!

The weather has been AMAZING!!! We had perfect weather for clamming this past weekend... we dug up quite a few clams... although we were kinda regretting it when it came time to clean them! We had a pretty good assembly line and got 'em cleaned up fast. Our friend has a good clam chowder recipe- we are excited to try them! It was a Blast! There were 5 couples and a few lil kiddos (3 crazy boys to be exact!--so darn cute and fun!) We also had 4 dogs running around. Camped on the beach, clammed at low tide, fished for Kings at high tide, 4-wheeled a bit, played some boche ball and had SO MUCH FUN!! Erin took more pictures than I did, so I will post those when I get 'em. Also-- Adam took quite a few videos!!

Well... I am headed home to Iowa on Wednesday. Adam will be working all week, GOING TO SEE KENNY IN SEATTLE over the weekend, working some more and going back to Iowa on the 10th for Drew's wedding! YEEEEEEEES, Kenny is back--THANK YOU GOD!!! We are so damn proud of him and couldn't be happier that he is finally back and safe! :)

We're goin on a bear hunt.....

Hey peeps... here is another crazy adventure!
Our friend Shawn is bear hunting this year and we wanted to go along to learn. SO we made a weekend out of it... Shawn, Erin, Adam, and I headed for Crescent Lake cabin in Cooper Landing, AK. This is how it went...... :)
-6 mile hike in to the cabin... no biggy, UNTIL we came to the large amounts of snow that we hadn't expected. (dudes... we expected SOME snow, but not this much!) Luckily Shawn had a pair of snow shoes (intended for the bear hunt) and led us along the trail. However..Adam broke through the snow almost every 4-5 steps and had to crawl/dig himself out of knee-thigh deep snow. Erin and I also sank through, but not nearly as often. The snow went on for the last 3 miles. (and NO...there was no turning back!) Part way Adam and Shawn traded... poor guys!
-Due to the snow... we "lost" the trail and followed what we hoped to be a snow-shoers path on their way to our cabin. We weren't entirely lost-- we knew the creek would lead us to the lake and the cabin was on the lake.
-Also due to the snow, it took A LONG time to hike those 6 miles. We had to take frequent breaks to rub/stretch the cramped legs and to BREATHE! We even had to leave a smaller pack up in a tree and mark our trail to pick it up on the way back. Also--we took turns carrying the rifle..the less weight, the shallower you fell through. So..this resulted in us hiking in the dark. We did have 2 head lamps and flashlights...but our "path" was still hard to see!
-Right before dark we came across the biggest bear tracks any of us had ever seen. I mean seriously... I saw a mold of a grizzly print at the Sportsman's Show--and I was amazed- even took a picture of the mold. WELL...this massive print we came across was not a mold- it was the real thing. Erin and I could actually step in the bear's prints and only cover the pads, leaving the claws sticking beyond our foot! OKAY.. grumpy grizzly just woke up and was hungry from hibernation.... thank goodness the tracks went in the opposite direction! Also-- we had two hand guns and a rifle. We just hope to never use them in defense!
-We made it to our cabin between 2-2:30 a.m. We had all decided it would've been okay to roll out the sleeping bags under a tree until daylight, but kept on trecking on and finally made it to the cabin.
-Well... it was soooooo worth it! We all had to take a lil nap the next day because we were EXHAUSTED and sore. The weather was BeAuTiFuL. Shawn, Adam, Chena, and I went out on the lake to take a peak around on the mountains surrounding us. We spotted 1 bear.. but she had 3 cubs with her--that was a no-go. We also spotted a lonely mountain goat.
-Later in the day, Adam yelled for us to come listen to a bear, he heard one growling on the mountain across the lake. We didn't know whether or not to believe him, because you never know with him. But I could tell he was serious, so I sat and listened. Sure enough--we heard a "RAAWWRRR GRRAWWWRRR" from somewhere across the lake. It was awesome but scary!
-Shortly after that we heard-- Human voices! We didn't understand them at first-- they were Russian. Yup-- 1 guy and 2 girls made their way towards OUR cabin (Shawn and Erin had rented it AND we registered at the start of the trail). It was getting close to dark and the next cabin (which they claimed they were headed towards) was another 3 miles. Also--- the guy bent over to pick something up and his "gun" dropped outta his holster...it was the smallest hand gun I had ever seen.... unless it was gonna pull some "Men in Black" stunt.... he wasn't going to do anything but piss a bear off with his BB gun. So........ we told them to go set up their tent and come back to warm up. (UH..what were they thinking?!?!?.. HA-and we were the ones who came in at 2:00 the night before!) However, Erin is such a sweetheart and couldn't bare to know those girls were freezing in their tent, so she sent Shawn over to invite them to stay in the cabin. (one of these girls was wearing loafers... not hiking boots, not boots, not tennis shoes... loafers!) SOOOOOOOO we spent the night with 3 strangers... Russians... in our cabin.
-Oh--also, the cabin was itty-bitty... it had a wood stove though! There were wooden planks that stuck out from the wall in a bunk-bed fashion. And a little picnic table. We pumped water from the lake or boiled it for our meals/drinks. We had a great time with my friend "Jack D.", playing cards-- drinking vodka and 99 blackberries. Well... Erin drank the 99 blackberries and if you don't know what it is... well find out! Or ask me! "What time is it Erin?" "99 O'CLOCK!"
-Adam fashioned some snow-shoes outta some wood planks and shoestrings... he was determined to "float" on top of the snow! They didn't last 100 yards! But it was a great idea and a good try. Luckily our tracks from the hike in had hardened and made it an easier hike out. We made it out in 4 hours.
*Crazy man Shawn with is hiking pack, hunting pack, and a rifle!

Heading out! ..... I'm wearing the 44 mag!

A little rest after our first battle with snow... little did we know this was only the beginning!

Still smiling!!

Pretty -eh?

This is a picture of the grizzly track... not a very good one because....................it was unfortunate that we came across it right before dark. :S You can see the pad, toes, and claws though.

Mhhmm.. this is my foot next to the grizzly's. This is hard to see... but like I said, my foot fit in the track with plenty of room to spare!

Chena was a tired puppy the next day! She did AWESOME on the hike in, she was as light as a butterfly! It was adorable... you could tell that she sensed our "worry"... she kept checking up on each of us and every time one of us fell, she was right there licking our face and "attacking" the snow that made us fall.... seriously... digging under us!

Goin on a bear hunt!

Our cabin!!!

Me on the lake.... gorgeous day

Okay... look carefully. Do you see the dark circle and trail of dirty snow in the top/center of the picture? The "dot" is their den! Now....at the bottom of that dirt streak there is a piece of rock/grass jetting out into the snow. The 2nd one below that is where the mama and her 3 cubs were. You can kind of make out 2 little dots sticking up. I WILL zoom in/enlarge this a bit and put it on facebook, it is so cool!

Pretty girl Chena...so photogenic!

Adam with his homemade snow shoes... wood planks and shoe strings!

Heading out Sunday morning.

These were tracks from our hike in Friday night. I don't know which boy made these... but geesh, poor guy!

Yup... she's a water dog! And looky-there, her back end looks like she's about to point out a bird!

My shins from falling through the snow so much

Angel mama... she rolls right when we let her out. She HAS to go outside at least once a day or she will just follow you around and miaow until you DO let her out! She also paws at the door. She is going to LOVE our house... fenced in yard...she can come and go out the door as she pleases!

I think that's it. I find it frusterating to tell our bear hunt story because nobody can imagine the craziness of it all. But the fact is.... we could have slept/rested under the trees until daylight and would have been warm enough, we had 2 handguns and a rifle, we had a good idea of where the creek was at that runs from the lake......... we were and are fine. IT WAS AN ADVENTURE!!! Now we know better for next time, the only thing we'd do different is... wait a couple more weeks or everyone bring snow shoes!!!

I only have 6 days of school left!! Adam is in the cardiology rotation. We close on our house the 28th. We will be in Iowa the first part of June. ...... We love you all!

WARNING--graphic pictures ahead!! (but also beautiful)

Hey everyone!!
One of the girls that works with Adam has the hook-ups at a nail salon. They shut down the salon to the public and she invites a bunch of girls to a Pedi-Party!! She also sells "bumbles"--awesome watch bands and other jewelry(chunky beads!). SOOO all of us girls drink wine, eat food, get our nails did, and buy some jewelry! Good times!!!

DENALI!!! This was on our way to Talkeetna. Beautiful eh? And HUGE!!

Another view, from the river. Cool "wisps" of cloud above it.

We went to Talkeetna to celebrate Gretchen's birthday. It's a small, small, small town with Denali flight tours and like 5 bars!

We dropped Daniel off 14 miles before Talkeetna... he wanted to have an adventure and exercise a bit before our night of fun. We bet shots on what time he would come rolling into Talkeetna--Gretchen was the closest and was pointing/yelling-- "GET IN THE CABIN" as he rode by! He had to be in the cabin for it to count! hehe

A swiss mountain dog... close to the bernese but not as hairy! Cutie-pie!

AND HEEEEEERE'S Talkeetna!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alright--those were the beautiful pictures... the graphic are below. BEWARE!!

This is my finger-- after a night in Talkeetna...a town with nothing but 5 bars (need I say more?!?) ...I fell off a chair!

All cleaned up and ready for stitches... 5. My finger was cut/ripped to the bone!


After being in the emergency room on Sunday. I had all 4 of my wisdom teeth pulled on Monday morning! Local anesthitic only! It was a very weird experience! BUT they let me keep my teeth--- apparently the tooth fairy doesn't know my new address! Nah... I kept them to show Adam!

Well.... not much is new. The snow has finally melted and we can see green grass growing! We are getting ready to MOVE to OUR HOUSE!!! I only have 3 weeks left of school. Adam just finished his INTENSE rotation..... thank goodness! Now that he as a little more time away from work--he is busy looking up information for things we want to learn while we're here. We have a huge list.... hunt the big game (starting with black bear), fish for Kings, sockeye, and coho (salmon), go clamming, buying a rifle, smoking meat, hike and camp .... those are just the beginning!

Remember.. we will be home in June. I will be back June 3-13 and Adam, June 10-13.