Yukon Quest

Mama made a break for it and went to Fairbanks all herself and had a blast!  Some friends had rented a cabin along Chena Hot Springs road and hiked out along the Quest trail to watch the mushers go by.

We had the perfect weather for sitting around outside waiting for mushers to go by.  They were about 50 miles into the 1,000 mile race at this point.

This was the only team that I was quick enough to get a picture of.

 

Max was prepared and came with the racers profile and kept track of who was going by.

Back at the cabin for some dinner and a few beers.

Adrian modeling her high class hand wear.

Not sure who brought these, I think they took most of them back home with them. But I am willingly to bet that we will see this same jug at some other event in the future.

Wanna try??? 

A few of us headed back out on the trail (loaded up in Jeremy's snowmachine sled) after dinner to catch our friend, Paige, who was one of the Quest 300 runners.  We got to see her go by and I just heard she placed 5th in the race, awesome!!  Hans Gatt was the first place winner of the Quest. Few more weeks until the Iditarod starts. 

Wyatt is Three

Wyatt turned three on January 6th.  We didn't do too much, we celebrated with cupcakes and a birthday story from Miss Nancy at library and had some more cake at home with the family and Ellen.

So we survived the terrible twos and they were not terrible so we will see what three brings.

The day after we had a moose in the garden.  Wyatt was very excited but the dogs who bark at everything that goes bump didn't even see it!!

A Couple More

Sam finally started crawling right before Christmas and now there is no stopping him. And Mama is really trying hard to remember to keep a closer eye on him!

Everywhere there are little boys there are big messes..

and big smooches...

and cute little buns!!

Nellie endures a lot from Wyatt, she spends a lot of time being various farm animals. Most frequently being a horse but on this day she got to be a goat.

I didn't drink the milk!  I maybe it is time to replenish the farm with some real farm animals.

Happy New Year

We had a very quiet evening at home on New Years Eve, the boys went to bed early and Jeff and I watched a movie.  But we spent the first day of the new year out at a public use cabin.  I skied in with Sam in the chariot and Jeff walked in pulling the sled with Wyatt and all our gear.  It was - 5 on our way in but the temps dropped quickly and it was -30 when we went to bed. We had planned on doing some ice fishing and skiing but it was just too cold to do too much other than hang around in the cabin and stoke the fire.

We did go out to start a fire so we could roast hotdogs just to pass the time.

It was still -30 when we woke up in the morning but it warmed up to a balmy -20 by the time the sun came up and Wyatt was very excited to go ice fishing so we figured we would give a shot.  Jeff went out and dug the holes than came back in to get Wyatt. That kid sat out here on the ice staring at the hole for at least 45 minutes. I went out with Sam just to see how it was going.  I asked Wyatt if he was cold and he said, " Well, Mama its just a little chilly today".  That is an Alaskan kid for ya!  And they didn't even catch any fish.

Despite the cold it was a nice relaxing way to kick off the new year.

Merry Christmas

Okay here I go trying catch up yet again.  We celebrated Christmas at home this year.  And as much as we miss seeing all of our families it is nice to avoid all the stress that goes with travelling around the holidays.  Wyatt was really into Christmas this year and that made it even more fun for Mama and Papa.  He was interested in Santa and we talked about him quite a bit but every time I said something about Santa bringing presents Wyatt would look at the tree and say "But I already have enough presents". I loved hearing that.  Santa can't compete with the Grandma's with the gift giving :)

Heading out to look for a tree.

The big problem with cutting a black spruce for a Christmas tree is that you end up cutting down a 20 ft tree to get the top 6ft.  They are pretty thin. We will plant another one to make up for it!

I didn't get too many pictures of the gift opening, it was all kind of a blur.

The boys would really like to thank everyone for all the great boxes they sent!!

Christmas day we had a bunch of our Alaska family over for a wonderful celebration. We cooked our homegrown turkey and everyone brought a dish to share. It is so nice to have such good friends to share the holidays with when are families are so far away.