Summer FUN! Fillemans Vist!

Well, we're winding down our summer... it's going WAY TOO FAST! We've had visitors and then, between visits, the kids and I have stayed very busy going and doing. It's been (thus far) a great summer. I'm not ready for the kids to head back to school in less than a month.

Our first visitors this summer, all the way back at the end of May were the Fillemans of Chandler, Arizona. My brother and his family made their maiden voyage to visit us in what was a fairly sunny, warmish Alaska! They were here for about 10 days so you KNOW we packed in the fun stuff. We celebrated my brother's birthday, Kara's start of soccer, Clay's birthday, went to Seward, biked like mad and the kids/dad camped a night in the wilderness. I felt like I did a good job photographing while they were here, but as it turns out, I did a horrible job.

And yet another thing I'm doing a horrible job at: BLOG POSTING! So, in an effort to get this post online, I'm going to just post pictures in no particular order...

I think one thing people expect when they come to AK is animal viewing. Normally, we see animals all the time unless you are visiting us. I don't know why that is!! But sometimes we get lucky. As in our drive home from Seward (or maybe it was to Seward). Anyhow, we were cruising down the highway and there was this little guy. I pulled a uey in the middle of the road and we went back around. Moose are everywhere!!!

We also got to see a bunch of salmon in one of their sanctuary areas... no salmon were killed or injured on this trip (sadly). Although Michelle did get to enjoy fresh Copper River kings on several restaurant outings and she's a convert to AK salmon. I'm sorry kids, but even if the menu says it's fresh, wild caught Alaska salmon, assume they're lying (unless you've confirmed an overnight flight in of fish, and it's in the SUMMER). I hated salmon until we moved here and I'm officially a convert. Reds are my favorite. I digress...

Believe it or not, there were TONS of salmon jumping into this waterfall.

My weird kids waiting in the lobby for their cousins in Seward.

The 4 of us in Seward. My first trip down there. It was a cute little town. I wanted to see some Orcas in the bay but all I saw were some harbor seals and sea otters (not complaining).

Kara and Parker. This girl LOVES herself some Parker Boyd. She treats him like her little assistant and I am glad he was tolerant, he will probably not enjoy her "attentions" for too much longer :) This was before they headed out on their back country back packing trip.

Ice cream in Seward (see how you're getting your own "Around Alaska in 40 seconds or Less" for free!?). GB is really a hoot. I think when he got here, he wasn't feeling me at all.. However, given enough QT on car rides, in grocery carts, in bike trailers, he came around. In fact, at one point, he opted to stay home with me while Michelle went to Walmart. A true milestone! He's pretty funny.. while we were driving to Seward, when he was supposed to be "resting", he announced in a very loud voice "I DON'T LIKE SOUP". That one stuck. I'll keep it alive until he's married :)

The big kids in Seward. I don't remember what Kara's problem was.. not very much actually grosses her out...

Fishing at the Sea Life Center...

The touch tank at the Sea Life Center. The kids LOVED touching sea cucumbers, star fish and the like. This place is cool.

My brother. His second trip to AK in less than one calendar year! WOOT! I don't know if he was really feeling my taking his picture. If you know Mark, you know that he LOVES himself a camera. Almost all of his adult pictures exude a true joie de vivre! Like he is having the MOST FUN EVER and how much he LOVES having his image captured (I'm practically a professional photographer)!! Actually, I think he loathes having his picture taken. We celebrated his birthday in true AK style: sent him off into the wilderness with some freeze dried food, a whole gaggle of kids and 10 miles of hiking. Happy Birthday, come back next year when we'll do a 3 night at Eklutna!!

Speaking of birthdays... the night before, we celebrated with the traditional banana spice cake a la my Gram Boyd. I love the cake, not so much the icing.. Michelle really goes out of her way to make foods that Mark likes. I could take a lesson on that... Just ask Clayton!

Oh GB. I was a hard-sell for you, I know.. but we will be forever bonded over our Eklutna trail ride. I will forever remind you that you don't like soup and I will also take full credit for anytime you tell someone "I. Will. Cut. You". You're crazy!!!!

To sweet Parker I say that I am sorry for letting Kara treat you like her assistant. She does it out of love. You are so funny and I loved how excited you got about visiting the exiled cats in the basement. If I could buy you a hairless cat as a pet, I would.

Davis is the most hilarious kid ever. He has a very refined dry sense of humor. He really says the funniest things (things that I should have written down because I don't remember them like I wish I did). He was at Kara's first soccer game where he offered to go on the field and school the girls how to play soccer "for real" (for the record, they only lost like 2 games!!).

We had so much fun with the Fillemans. I can't tell you, dear readers, how much it means to us when our families visit up here. We go to AZ but our visits are lightning fast and we have a lot of ground to cover so it makes for inconsistent times with everyone. When you come to Alaska, we have (for better or worse) concentrated time to hang out and develop our relationships in really cool ways. I got to spend a ton of time with Michelle just hanging out, riding bikes (in the sun, cold and rain) and that NEVER happens in AZ!! My kids LOVE having their cousins at their house.. getting to sleep in (or not), play the Wii (or just argue), watch shows, ride bikes, hike, camp and fish with them in their normal environment. Many thanks to Mark and Michelle for coming up. I know it was a thrash and that it is expensive. We have lifetime memories from your trip. I loved having Michelle meet my friends and see how I while away my time up here. Clayton LOVED camping with Mark (and I KNOW Mark would do it again... in another life). THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for coming up. You're welcome back anytime. xoxooxox

Happy Birthday, Clay-Clay!

Clay is 6. He was 3 when we moved to Alaska.. that means the boy has lived half of his life up here. That blows my mind. This year for Clay's birthday, his Filleman cousins were in town. He was very wishy-washy about what he wanted to do to party so, at the last minute, we decided to do a movie theatre party. We saw Kung Fu Panda 2 and partied at the theatre. It was a brilliant move on my part as there was no mess, no cleaning for me! I highly recommend movie theatre parties in case you're wondering...

The whole crew.. (where's Grayson?!)

Clay's birthday cake as specifically requested from Miss Kamdon... she's the best. The cake was AWESOME!!! And tasty.

Opening his present from his aunts and uncles... they obviously didn't ask Clayton for his permission.

On Clay's actual birthday, we celebrated with a costco apple pie that I pretty much ruined by attempting a crumble topping. It was a quiet night at home to celebrate our quirky, extremely bright, adventurous, momma-loving son. We love you, Udes.. how is it that you're 6? We are so proud of you.

8 is Great!!

This year's cake creation courtesy of Kamdon.. Kara wasn't as specific on the "theme" this year.. she wanted something beachy or Hawaiian. It was a tremendous hit, as usual :)

So Miss Kara turned 8 about a month ago... blogging slacker, I already know that about myself. She had a birthday of surprises this year.. Her first surprise was a redo on her bedroom. Not that there was anything wrong with Kara's bedroom, but she was asking for more "green" in her bedroom. I convinced my trusty friend Kamdon to "help me out" (come up with a design) and we pulled a "Trading Spaces" on Kara while she was at school the last day. She loves it!! (for the record, I did my fair share of the sewing on this one.. LOOK! This mommy can sew!!!!)

Her second surprise was a visit from her Miss Karen. Kara was really missing Karen and Karen graciously scheduled a visit up here... Kara slept over with Ainsley the night before her bday and Karen surprised her at Jitter's the next morning. TOO FUN!

Kara's last surprise was our Alaska cousin Ashley's surprise visit to her birthday party. I think Kara felt honored that day (despite a mini-drama at the party related to VERY loud singing by a couple of guests whilst Kara was playing Liv dolls with the other 2 guests... small drama, worked out.. Kara cried.. shocker). We did nails at home and then we hit up Simon & Seafort's for an early dinner.. between spa snacks at the house and fancy food at Simon's, the girls forwent the cake!!!! WHAT?! Too funny, 8-9 year old girls. I loved Kara's party this year for sure...

Miss Karen was our most in-demand manicurist for sure :)

I, myself, sported bright blue toes on one foot, orange on the other for 2 weeks!

Kara's friend Olivia.. Olivia moved away about a week ago. SAD DAYS! You will be missed at the counter after school, Olivia.

After Simon's, it was so sunny and warm! The girls BEGGED to go play on the playground by the inlet. This was about 7:30-8:00 in the evening. Got to love AK summer sunshine!!

And so we wished Kara a very happy 8th year. She is so creative, fun-loving, sweet hearted, kind spirited (where does she get all those traits!?). We love you, Lukey!!!!!!! May the next year be even better than the last.

If I Don't Post Now....

If I don't post now (when I should be cleaning the downstairs bathroom... my brother's family is en route), it will be another 2 weeks and I'll have 10,000 more pictures to sift through.... SO, I'm going to try and cram in the next-to-last week of school, the last week of school and Kara's birthday. The last 2 weeks have been a doozie. There are so many end-of-the-year activities, I could scream!!! Mostly they were fun and we've had the most beautiful weather, so all in all, it was a good time.

Let's start with the next-to-last-week-of-school...

Clay had his animal report.. it was on the cheetah. A kindergartner doing an animal report translates out to mom doing the animal report.. except for the horrible handwriting. That was all Clay. He wanted a picture of a cheetah hunting. There are some good ones online. This was pretty much the only one that was appropriate for kindergartners...

Kara's end-of-the-year choir concert. She LOVES choir even though I'm skeptical about her natural singing abilities. Anyway, it was a fun year for her and made her more confident musically and for that, I'm grateful.

Mother's Day fell in there somewhere.. we had dinner at Sullivan's (a favorite of mine) with our friends the Hollingers. They're moving (BOO!!!) in about 10 days and we're trying to squeeze in as much time with them as possible.

Last week of school... CrAaaaaZZZZZZyyyy!!! Seriously. Field Day... outside in AK.. it was pretty chilly that day but the kids had a ball. I was glad that both kids had field day at the same time so that I could multi-task and kill two birds with one field day, as it was.

Field day was followed by an author's tea in Kara's class that night. Kara spent a great deal of time writing books this year. She discovered a love for reading and she read A TON! I love seeing her challenge herself with new books. She loves certain mysteries and she loves Clementine series. The author's tea was my favorite of the week because of how excited Kara was. Clayton was able to make the tea on his way to the airport and to Seattle for a few days.

Baby chicks that had just hatched in her classroom. Poor little friends.. pecking their way out of the eggs to be received by a room full of second graders!! AAAArrrrggghhH!!!

The next day was a kindergarten field trip to the Eagle River Nature Center... Not my favorite place this time of year as it is normally pretty muddy (all the melting snow) which leads to many small birds some people call mosquitoes. They're kamikazee freaky bugs and I hate them! And they're gigantic. However, this year it was warm, dry and bug-free (if you don't count 50 kindergartners).

Clay's very awesome kindergarten teacher.. she was such a blessing and an answered prayer for sure. Clay had a GREAT year and he ended up loving school thanks in no small part to Mrs. Hardy.

The whole group... what a back drop!?!?

Ooops.. Somewhere in there was the kindergarten performance.. sort of a little end-of-the-year celebration.. but not a graduation, thankfully! Those kind of drive me nuts :) Clay's in the top row, middle.

The last day of Kindergarten and 2nd grade at Alpenglow Elementary. Where did the year go?!? My grandmother is one of the wisest people I know. A long time ago, I must have just graduated college, I was commenting on how fast the 4 years had gone. She kind of laughed at me and said "You ain't seen nothing yet". She's right. The years FLY by. So very proud of Kara and Clay and all they accomplished this last year.

Upon reflection... I will give Kara's birthday its own post.. but I will post a teaser.. Kara wanted one thing for her birthday this year. That was for Karen to come from Denver. We told her it wasn't going to work out for Karen to come but that she would have 3 surprises for her birthday.. the first one was a redecorated room. She came home from the last day of school (oh yeah, that's what I worked on in my free time the last week of school... while Clayton was in Seattle) to her new room. She was STOKED! These aren't good pictures, I'll post more later but I like her surprised face :)

Aloha!!

Hello, my name is April and I'm a defunct blogger.....

I don't know where my blogging mojo has gone!! I have, however, had five people in the last week request a post and so here I am, posting ;) You're welcome.

When we last left you, Clayton was in Japan. He was there for about 5 weeks and yes, he was there for the big earthquake and pursuant tsunami. But, no (thankfully), he did not feel the earthquake nor did he have any fallout from the tsunami. He was in Okinawa which is VERY far from where the action occurred. I was glad to have him come home not very long after the event. The kids and I had a pretty uneventful TDY for which I am ever grateful.

Since then, we've said good-bye (I sincerely hope!!) to the snow and ice. Hello and goodbye to break-up (Alaska's WORST time of year)... And hopefully, as I type, hello to a beautiful spring and summer.

To reward ourselves for persevering through another long winter and a deployment to boot, we booked a trip to Hawaii (Alaskans favorite vacation spot, for sure.. costs less to fly to Oahu than it does to get to AZ, by several hundred dollars per person at times). This was to be our first family vacation in a very long time. When Clayton was in Japan, my parents were going to come to AK but we soon figured out that they could meet us in Hawaii for less than half of their trip to AK.. PLUS, Hawaii is much more scenic than AK at this time of year.

SO, since my last post, we've done all manner of things not the least of which was a week to Hawaii...

This is how the AK Johnsons rolled in Hawaii... our rental house had bikes and we made good use of them.. Kara commanded an adult sized, 500# beach cruiser. Turns out, our mountain bikes are like Porsches compared to beach cruises. Also, another friendly tip, don't ride beach bikes if you haven't made good use of the beach showers before riding a couple miles back home. Just sayin'.

Our very awesome rental house in Haleiwa... we decided to skip the hotel scene this trip in favor for more space, more control over our food and quiet :) We were about 1/2 block from Shark's Cove and we basically backed up to Sunset Beach. It was really fabulous.

Clay practicing with his binoculars. He wore them around his neck pretty much anytime we left the house in the car...

Chances are he was checking out on of these guys.....

One of the benefits of being in Haleiwa?? World-famous shave ice. We didn't love it from Matsumoto's this time so we had to keep trying out new places....

So we did another touristy thing and went to a luau at Kara's desperate request. We were far too lazy to go back to Honolulu so we went to the Polynesian Cultural Center's luau. No mai tais but it was still an excellent show even if the premise of the "show" was beyond lame.

I think this is Clay and I riding around on an ocean tricycle. Clayton was surfing way far down on the beach and Clay BEGGED me to rent one. They're a lot more work than you'd think..

Buzz and Billie at Pearl Harbor. They left us at the beach and enjoyed a touristy day with the rest of the old fogeys :)

We spent Easter in Hawaii... We ended up going to a really cool church in a school about 1/2 mile from our house (random) and then the kids hunted money-stuffed eggs in the back yard. They're really feeling the money eggs versus the candy eggs. DUH!

This is how we spent most of our days. Camped out at a beach. We tried out a few.. the waves were still pretty gnarly which made for lots of fun for Clayton, not so much for the kids being in the water. They played for HOURS in the sand, however, and we quite content.

Random back yard grill picture.. also in the back yard, many gecko lizards (who warred, ask Clay about that.. a highlight for him), patio set, 5 bikes, boogie boards and a hammock.

We drove to Ko Olina on Easter night for dinner at the original Roy's restaurant. Clayton, my dad and my dad's GPS were the navigators. I think I should have just used an old fashioned map to get there.. we would have been faster. However, Roy's is reliable for mai tais and such so I got over it quickly :)

Kara being sun aware. One of about 6 people total on the beach (our entire crew) who cared about sun protection.....

Sunset surfing. Someone random. Clayton stuck to the boogie board... he also found out how territorial locals are with the waves. He saw two guys almost come to blows over a wave in the water.. and they were both locals. So he surfed one day at Waikiki and then boogie boarded on the North Shore for the sake of his personal safety..!

I know this won't shock anyone who knows Clayton but he's not really into excursions whilst on vacation. He doesn't really like to spend a lot of money on services (or sights). However, this trip, he took both the kids gliding. They both loved it but Clay loved it more. Which was a surprise to this mom-of-a-daredevil-daughter.

Eating grapes on the front porch with the grandparents... this is what my kids did pretty much every night. Someday they'll grow grape vines in Haleiwa because of my kids!! Most mornings my kids walked to Starbucks with the grandparents. This was good for me because I woke up to my venti iced green tea with 5 (yes, 5) splenda. Good Morning!

One last trip to the ocean before we caught our respective night flights back to the mainland (I assume Alaska counts as the mainland.. it is connected to the MAIN LAND.. would some retailers please take this fact into consideration when shipping to me????)

** Author's note.. I remember why I haven't been posting. I hate blogger. And I hate uploading 10,000,000 pictures one at a time.