KORT TV
28 Jul 2010 1 Comment
by Ingies in Stories about life in Alaska, Stories about living in the bushes Tags: Northway Alaska, television
Pink & Coolness
25 Jul 2010 Leave a comment
by Ingies in Stories about life in Alaska Tags: Pink So What
I was hip for approximately 20 seconds this week. For 20 whole seconds I was 40 and up to speed with recent popular culture.
Thursday night we went out to dinner as a family – which has happened about twice since our house was populated with children.
The restaurant’s background music was from this decade and I didn’t recognize any of it.
Until this song came on . . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaz5tGl5Yho . . . So What by Pink.
“I know this song!” I said to my husband. I didn’t know how I knew it but I was all proud. I felt good. I know a song that plays on an FM station and was recorded within the last five years!
My husband raised his eyebrows and looked appropriately impressed.
But we have children. And they speak the truth even when you don’t want them to.
Says my Roo, “It’s from Alvin and the Chipmunks!”
And with that my husband got a really, really good laugh and my brief fling with coolness came to and end.
Is coolness a word?
Adapting to 40,
D
Pop Quiz
22 Jul 2010 Leave a comment
by Ingies in Stories about the boy Tags: Fashion
Red shoes, red pants, orange shirt.
How is it that these two children, from different homes, wound up with nearly the same outfit today? Was it . . .
a) planned days in advance? They discussed their current wardrobe options and made arrangements last Thursday when they saw each other and then stashed away the appropriate items so they would have them ready today.
b) planned yesterday? After their parents were in bed they learned how to read, looked up phone numbers, figured out how to use the phone and planned the whole thing unbeknownst to any parental units anywhere?
c) a reflection of their mothers’ deep concern with current fashion? The orange / red color combination is very popular with the “going into kindergarten this Fall” crowd.
d) sheer coincidence? It just so happens that they both have mothers who would rather do things besides laundry and the only clean clothes either of them could find this morning were these.
Clearly the answer is b. They are both brilliant you know.
Hope – Day 1
19 Jul 2010 1 Comment
by Ingies in Stories about life in Alaska Tags: Alaska, camping, Hope
I’ve been promising to upload the pictures from our 4th of July trek out to Hope for – well – What day is it today? – twelve days. I’m finally getting started. Part of the challenge was that I took 285 pictures during that 48 hour trip. Really. 285 pictures. I’ll try to spare you the delight torture of having to view them all.
This trip to Hope had been planned since forever ago by my friend J who had the brains to plan ahead and reserve a cabin for the holiday weekend some time last winter.
We like to camp with J and her family because their kids are the same ages as ours. (Read: totally understand meltdowns, insane numbers of pit stops, a reasonable bedtime, time outs, quiet time, etc., etc.) You might remember J’s son G from the post about the wedding.
After meeting up at the Ranger Station on the edge of town and making sure we were all really going the same place we loaded up and headed on down the road.
I took this picture about 5 minutes into our drive. Our destination is across this water there at the base of the mountains.
See those itty bitty white dots on the far shoreline in this picture? Probably not. Trust me, they are there. Those dots are buildings in Hope. It would be a quick 10 minute jaunt over the bridge from town if there were one. But there isn’t. Of course, Hope wouldn’t be Hope if it were just a quick 10 minute jaunt over the bridge. It would lose its . . . uh . . . um . . . unique Alaska charm . . . and become a suburb of Anchorage.
Anyway, so it isn’t a quick ten minute jaunt. It is more like an 80 mile 1.5 hour drive or something like that. We have to drive up around all this water . . .
So we did.
The scenery was beautiful. You’ll have to trust me on that. I had to cut something. If you want to look at great pictures of Turnagain Arm I guarantee you that you can find better ones out there than those I took.
We eventually arrived at our destination . . .
. . . this charming little cabin in a neighborhood in Hope. I use the word neighborhood loosely. Picture an assortment of dwellings in various stages of development built from every imaginable type of material (building and otherwise) scattered through the woods and connected by gravel roads.
We then fed the starving little children. (Our good deed for the day.)
Then we strolled.
I have to say strolled because look at our footwear. If I told people we were hiking we’d get accused of being naïve unprepared tourists.
See what I mean?
Generally speaking I don’t recommend strolling through the woods in Alaska in flip-flops (or Crocs™ or Tevas® for that matter). But as they say, you can take the boy off of the Gulf of Texas but you can’t take his flip-flops from him
It was a beautiful evening for a hike stroll . .
Lush and green.
And very, very prickly.
This stuff is wicked. It’s called Devil’s Club by those of us who don’t know our Latin from our genus. Devil’s Club is everywhere and there is no bushwhacking here because it is evil. It’s covered in thorns that don’t just poke you. They can make you itch and blister.
We saw cool stuff on our stroll . . .
and made a new friend . . .
I don’t know where this sweet little thing lives . . . if any place specific. She was so skinny her hip bones were protruding from her body. She followed us back to the cabin and spent the evening coveting (and sharing) our food. She was dear and gentle and trained (which makes me think someone is lovin’ on her somewhere . . . I hope). And it took all of my self-control and some threatening words from my husband to keep me from taking her home with me.
That evening we hung out at the cabin. Some of us quite literally.
“I’m done now,” says the cute little redhead.
We smoked out all the mosquitos.
Ate S’mores.
Some of us gave in to the pressure of being out of touch for nine whole hours and checked our email.
We put the kids to bed.
And I have to stop now. I’ve reached my self-imposed per post picture limit.
We’ll chat about day two later this week.
Cheers,
D
Tent Zippers
13 Jul 2010 Leave a comment
by Ingies in Stories about the girl
Is it wrong to laugh hysterically when your children are in distress?
Laugh until you cry?
Laugh so hard you all but pee your pants?
Laugh so hard that you are physically unable to help them for a full three minutes?
And then make them sit there while you run fetch a camera to document their predicament?
Is that wrong?
If so I am a bad, bad mama.
This afternoon I rounded my kids up from the backyard to send them off for quiet time. They had been playing in a tent their father set up for them. After they both were in the house it started to rain so I sent Roo back out to close up the tent.
Thirty seconds later I heard, “Mama! Maaaaaammmmmmaaaaa!”
When I peeked under the vestibule, this is what I found . . .
Yup. She sure did. Zipped her hair right up in the zipper.
That was when I started laughing.
And trying not to pee my pants.
And went to fetch the camera.
I made her sit there while I took eleven pictures.
She maintained a very good sense of humor even with her twisted mother laughing hysterically at her and repeating, “Hold still! Just one more!” while snapping away, setting changes and all.
And then I set her loose. Without the aid of scissors.
Laughing hysterically,
D
Message from Roo
06 Jul 2010 Leave a comment
by Ingies in Stories about the girl
So about a month ago life arranged itself so that my husband had the children and I was out doing my thing . . . by myself. Let’s make a note of that . . . by myself. There was no one under five feet tall with me. In fact, there was no one over five feet tall either. It was a momentous occasion.
Anyway, when I returned home I checked our phone messages and there was a message from G . . . short and sweet and to the point.
“I love you, Mom.”
No mincing words here.
This message was followed by a message from Roo. Through the fuzz and static of a poor cell connection I hear her sweet, high-pitched little voice telling me the following:
“I just wanted to let you know that I love you too, Mom and the – the one before this one was from G. This one’s from R. I lo- I mostly just love you – when y – uh – you are actually not crabby ’cause I think I mostly just like happy people. I just wanted to let you know that, Mom. Bye!”
That last sentence was so perky and upbeat it is beyond my limited descriptive ability.
You know I’m saving that message forever . . . and you know I listen to it at least once a week. We’re supposed switch phone companies next month. I can’t let that happen. I’d lose the message.
In fact, if we ever move I’m keeping our phone number and voicemail so I can listen to it and laugh when she’s 14 and 25 and 46 and 59.
Blue Eyes
01 Jul 2010 Leave a comment
by Ingies in Stories about the girl Tags: blue eyes, Roo
Dear Roo,
I found out I was pregnant with you on Daddy’s and my 2nd wedding anniversary. That day also happened to be Daddy’s 33rd birthday. We lived in a tiny house with one very tiny bathroom. The conversation went something like this:
Me: “Happy Birthday, honey!”
Daddy: “Thanks.”
Me: Pause. Pee on a stick. Wait.
Me: “Uh, honey, I think I’m pregnant . . . “
In hindsite I probably should have waited until Daddy was out of the shower to make the announcement so I could see his reaction. As it was all I got was . . .
(Silence.) Prolooooonged silence.
Me again: “Honey?”
and again: “Hello?”
He knew we were trying to get pregnant. He just had no idea it would happen the first time we tried. He was in shock.
That’s ok. Telling Auntie K made up for it. She was beside herself . . . there were happy shrieks, a lot of talking, maybe some happy tears . . . now that I think about it I probably should have waited to tell her in person, too. That way maybe I would have understood at least part of what she said.
But I digress.
I spent approximately 282 days pregnant. Give or take. I know because I kept track of the weeks – and then the days – on the shower wall with finger paint.
And then my water broke.
And then we got to bring home this:
The best prize EVER!
(Some details of the event may have been censored to preserve my dignity and keep Daddy from having to relive the trauma of labor and delivery.)
Ooooo – may baby girl! Where is that box of tissue?!?
And you grew and you smiled and you slept (occasionally) and you screamed (a lot) and your eyes were that common newborn dark blue.
But here’s the freaky thing.
They stayed blue.
Blue!
Not once, not one single blessed time during the 282 days you were jumping around in my uterus; not once during all the “I wonder what she will look like?” conversations; not one single time ever did I imagine that my olive drab eyes and Daddy’s hazel eyes would produce a blue-eyed child.
But they did.
Courtesy of two of your greats, Gran Gran and John. One from Daddy, one from me.
And lest your brown-eyed brother think I’m glorifying blue eyes I had no (read zero, zip, zilch) preference or hope about eye color. I assumed your eyes would be a lovely shade of either green or brown.
I was wrong.
Instead, I’m left in awe of genetics.
Fearfully and wonderfully made.
I love you to your bones, Roo Roo.
Mama
P.S. We told Grannie Pie and Pawpaw you were on the way in the airport parking lot when they came up to visit that September. We pronounced Grammie a grandmother with flowers.