So long Alaska!

Well, we moved again! Our time in Alaska was short lived, but a great adventure! Andrew's position was laid off at work, but fortunately, he found another position quickly in Utah. We moved in August, and our last Alaskan summer was amazing! 

So now, while we are learning to love our lives in Utah we are still missing Alaska and all of this:

And yep...we are even missing a little of this!

A record...

I had a goal to not write on the blog for six months, but I just couldn't stick with it...I knew everyone was dying to know what we've been up to!

So, I really need to do a recap because we have had some pretty exciting things around here. Here is a brief recap, and maybe I will go into more details about some of them later.

October- We took a short family vacation to Seward, Alaska...and loved it! Jessica's favorite parts were the pool and alligator (elevator) in the hotel. Jessica wanted to be a pumpkin for Halloween, so after making the first costume way too small, I got it right. Moose loved his costume too.

November- We went to the zoo! And we brined a turkey for the first time ever for Thanksgiving, and ate pie with friends. Oh, but unfortunately  my pump (Brianna) for my diabetes messed up twice and stopped giving insulin right, so my blood sugar was so high it made me feel sick and I got no pie.

December- This was a busy month! So many fun things and late, late nights. We were working on a huge Christmas project...a play kitchen for Jessica. It was a lot of work (mostly Andrew's) and a lot of fun!

January- We celebrated Jessica's half birthday in style...with half a cake. She is thrilled to be 2 1/2 and now tells everyone (well, kids, she doesn't talk to anyone else really) that she is almost 3.

February- We left the cold and snow behind and went to Hawaii for a week with Andrew's parents! It was a great trip, we were roasting and loving the warmth, and Jessica loved spending time at the beach playing in the sand and waves, and entertaining her Grandma and Grandpa.

March- So far, so good. We actually have another very short trip planned to Seward with some friends next week and we are so excited for a break from our routine. Winter gets long in Alaska. We are hoping for an early spring...but if it doesn't happen, we will enjoy our snow castle a little longer.

Don't worry...we will be back before next October. We have been in a we-like-to-do-things-ourselves mode and have been building and making projects, so we want to blog about it. Hopefully soon. Until we do, just spread the word that we are still hoping to adopt! 

Sea Otters and Whales

Obviously, I am behind in blogging. But instead of trying to catch up and tell you everything we've done since July, I will just start with something more recent...we went on another wildlife cruise! This one was a fundraiser Andrew was doing with the scouts, and it was in September. It was actually our second cruise, the first one was in Seward in July and it was amazing and exhausting! It was a 7 hour cruise, but we saw humpback whales, orcas (all three types), sea lions, sea otters, puffins, porpoises, and one eagle. After that, Jessica talks a lot about going on a boat, seeing whales and otters, and says that she needs her noculars (known as binoculars to the rest of us).

This is a random tidbit, but it shows how much Jessica now loves whales and otters. In Andrew's family growing up, his mom would often let them play with some bread dough and make whatever they wanted, and she also made alligators. So, one day, when we were making rolls, I asked Jessica if she wanted to make an alligator out of dough, and started making one. Then, she told me she wanted a sea otter and a whale. I kept working on the alligator and showed her how great it looked and let her help decorate it. Notice the white heart sprinkles on his face? Those are cheeks Jessica added. Even after that, she still wanted a whale, so I made one, and then, she asked for an otter. She is one lucky girl.

Anyway, so, when we told her we were going on another boat, she was pretty excited! This one was in Whittier, Alaska, and to get there you have to go through a  2.5 mile tunnel (which is the longest highway tunnel in North America and the longest tunnel used for both cars and trains...yeah, both cars and trains use this! Crazy, huh?). We were early, so we had a great time exploring a little in the rain. It is beautiful there! We saw glaciers, boats, a gigantic cruise ship, ran around and had a great time...and that was before we even got on board.

this wasn't our boat...we wished it was

Jessica loved it again! She wanted to climb up the side of the boat too. We sat with some friends we went to church with, so that was fun. But, the funny thing was, we didn't see much wildlife on this wildlife cruise. One otter...that was it. And it disappeared pretty quickly. But we did see a lot of glaciers and an amazing waterfall, and really, we were on a boat in Alaska, so it was great. But next time, we're hoping for a glimpse of another whale.

Two Years Old!!!

That's right...we have a two-year old in the house! Unbelievable! 

trying to hold up those fingers to show she is 2...it is a hard skill to learn

Our birthdays are all back to back...Andrew's in May, Brianna's in June, and Jessica's in July. So, with all of these celebrations we've had lately, Jessica learned how to sing "Happy Birthday to you..." And then, we got a book from the library that mentioned a birthday cake, and she kept asking us about her birthday cake. One day I asked her what kind of cake she wanted, brown or white; her response was, "chocolate." Her requested frosting was pink. And she got it! For the record, I would love to know how to decorate cakes; it looks so fun and I get excited about it. But, we don't eat much cake, so, I don't practice much, and this cake was an adventure that I was very worried about. It didn't look so great, my cake pans are horrible, and the cake was lopsided. But, the cake was delicious and Jessica loved it.

Jessica's birthday is on the 4th of July, but we really didn't celebrate much of that holiday this year. We had gone on an all day wildlife cruise the day before and we were exhausted! We slept in, opened presents, skyped with Jessica's birth parents and birth family and enjoyed hanging out together. 

This was the first time Jessica really enjoyed opening presents and then actually wanted to play with those presents. That was fun.

Skyping with Jessica's birth family. She didn't sit still for long. Instead she wanted to show off and go down the slide and race down the hallway.

We ate a delicious birthday meal and a delicious birthday cake and ended the night with some fireworks that were actually all poppers. We bought a pack at the store and didn't realize until we were getting ready to light them that none of them were the kind you can light...just pull the string and pop! It was a little bit of a disappointment, but we pulled out some bubbles and all was well.

May 2012

I wanted to give this post an exciting title, but I couldn't think of anything clever except, "May we tell you about our May?" and that just sounds weird, so May 2012 it is. May was a busy, busy month and I can't believe it is over. We've already posted about a few of our adventures, but here is the major synopsis of the month.

We had our first Families Supporting Adoption (FSA) Activity! Andrew and I were involved with FSA when we lived in Colorado, but they didn't have a group here in Alaska, so we volunteered to start one. It will be a smaller group, but we are really excited to be involved! We started out with a bang...and a pinata to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. I made this, and unfortunately only took pictures when I was building the pinata, and none of the finished, un-destroyed pinata. Anyway, pinatas are a lot of work...but it looked awesome.

Jessica and Brianna seem to be outside every day...except when it is too rainy. But our Spring has been great so far and Jessica loves the toys at the parks and playgrounds near our home. Anytime we walk or drive past some toys (in a park or backyard), Jessica wants to play on them.

Or, we just stay at home and play in the backyard. Playing with water is a lot of fun...and much better than digging up mom's flowers.

Brianna got a haircut...and Andrew did too, although his are pretty regular occurrences, so now, Jessica says she wants to get a haircut all the time. We appeased her with a new hairstyle. I love it! She looks so dang cute! (Ignore the cracker crumbs on her face...it was snack time!)

For Mother's day weekend, we got to do video chat with Andrew's siblings, Hillary and Robbie, who are both on missions for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was fun to see them and chat! Jessica loves making faces on the computer.

Andrew had a week long training in Colorado, BUT, about two days before, he found out he didn't have to go! We were all thrilled! Instead, we enjoyed each other, and helped some friends move.

And, Andrew had Memorial Day off work, so we decided to tour Anchorage. We went to the Alaska Wild Berry Park to see the world's tallest chocolate waterfall...which had around 3,000 pounds of chocolate, but wasn't as big as we thought. (Sorry these pictures are not great quality. We didn't realize our camera had been changed to .03 pixels...)

We also saw some reindeer, got a few mosquito bites, and enjoyed some ice cream! Jessica has been getting spoiled with ice cream lately. The other day when we were coming home for lunch, she looked at me and said, "ice cream time!"

We also did a lot of walking that day, visited Earthquake Park, and went along the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail for awhile. We started the trail at Earthquake Park and noticed that part of the trail was on the beach, so we thought we'd go that way to visit the beach too. Unfortunately, I (Brianna) was looking at the map, and well, I've never been good with directions. Sometimes I forget what way is right and left, so I really can't  even begin to understand North, South, East, and West. Anyway, we went the wrong way...which I realized at the end of the trail. But, it was a beautiful walk, and after we headed back to our car, we decided to drive to another section of the beach instead. All's well that ends well, right?

We love living near a beach with mountains in the background...oh wait, we just love living near the beach!