Being flexible has it's rewards...

In my last post I alluded to the mysterious thing I would be doing for our elementary school. Our school was having a McTeacher fundraiser at McDonald’s and some of us non teachers had volunteered to fill the slots the teachers couldn't cover. I have never worked fast food in my life and I was assigned the drive thru which screamed stress position..like being the goalie in soccer…or the pitcher in baseball…or the mom in the family….oh phhtt....right…ok I got this covered.

Then the call came... in a strange mctwist of events, I was eliminated from my mcposition before I even left the house. I know... unsettling, those people will never know the excitement, enthusiasm, or efficiency I could have brought to the mcteam. Evidently they didn’t need so many volunteers...whatever...so we were free to just show up and eat. So we showed up and realized what a great turn out we had since our family had to park in the bank parking lot next door. We went in and the place was packed….seriously packed….the line was way too long for my crazy hungry crew. The insane look in Charlie's eyes said it all....we headed out, still hungry and a plan for the evening to eat out meant we had to find something and fast. I knew our mccheap-o dinner was out and my evening was about to get a lot more expensive but what can you do so off we went.

We were all looking forward to burgers so we decided on Red Robin and had some insanely GREAT burgers…at a seriously more expensive price; but we were seated, served, and finished in record time so I think it was a great choice…and I’ve volunteered enough to grant myself a pass this once. Sorry kids I know you would have laughed and so enjoyed a shot or two of me being blessed out by a drive thru patron with a jacked up order, courtesy of moi, or a pic of me with the snazzy germ infested headset on….but, alas, it wasn’t meant to be.

We ended up heading to American Eagle since Miles needed more shorts (umm yeah perpetual summer) and got some great deals. I do love a kid who can bargain shop! Then we popped into the Apple store where we all picked out the great stuff we have on our wish lists for Christmas…which was pretty much everything in the store. Sure kids, Santa will probably buy you each your own laptop for Christmas....mmm hmm. Charlie has been having issues with his Blackberry so I am trying to convince him that he needs my iPhone so I can get the newer iPhone….he’s not buying it...literally or figuratively. The kids are all offering to take it off my hands but we all know that’s not happenin!

Ok last stop on the evening tour was to get one of my fave items of the season. We went to Williams Sonoma to get some of this..

Pecan Pumpkin Butter. It’s kinda pricey but it makes me think I’m actually living somewhere with changing leaves and dropping temperaturess. IF I was crazy….I would turn down the air conditioning, put on a sweater, and slather this on toast or make pumpkin pancakes…but who would do such a thing…I mean really….

So our family ended up doing something completely different than we had set out to do Thursday evening, but the one thing I've learned is that being flexible has it's rewards!

Wednesday Night Fun

I know, I know, Wednesday night and fun don't usually go together...unless your a Nowak, in which case, EVERYDAY is fun....mmm hmm...right!

Yesterday it rained here all day again....which is great because we need the rain but it meant that Zach's cross country practice and Brooke's soccer practice were cancelled. After school the homework load was light for everyone and so Charlie made the executive decision (with no complaints from anyone) that we should head to the movies because this beloved book from his childhood.....

has just been made into a movie.....

which may be one of the best animated movies I've seen in a long time.

It was so cute with wonderful little messages for kids and parents. Even Miles and Zach, who are lured to these movies mostly by the promise of popcorn, Icees, and the potential dinner out afterwards, agreed it was a great movie. You know as parents we all love listening to the belly laughs of our children and I had the pleasure of hearing all of my kids laugh many belly laughs last night at this movie. If you can make the time to see it, I think it's totally worth the family time and money spent.

And bonus - when you can manage the movies on a weeknight....there's almost no one in the theatre with you...yay for empty movie theaters. And extra bonus...since it was rainy and cool I was able to wear a pair of jeans and a hoody sweatshirt...this may not seem exciting to anyone else but I'm counting this as a fall/winter day and who knows if I'll get many others like this. Yay for a little change up in the temps here!

Ok I am trying to get back into my regular blog posting. I have so many posts half written waiting for me to hit publish but I have taken on several volunteer gigs (large and small) recently so I am trying to get myself back in gear. And just wait until you see and hear about what I am doing tonight for our elementary school...oh don't worry this will be good for several belly laughs I'm sure!!!

Field Trip

Brooke had her first field trip of the year yesterday and it was a loooooong one. An all day Agriculture Fest at the county fairgrounds. The weather started off nice and cool and didn't heat up until it was almost time to go so that made it even better.

Our first stop on the tour was Judy the wonder cow and her miraculous milking teats (ok her name was Judy and I made up the rest...people should know that lactating is a miraculous thing)...

The older gentleman doing the presentation did a great job and after milking Judy he fielded questions. He must have been doing this a while because there were questions like "how do cows get pregnant?"....."how do we know they might be pregnant?"....and so on and so forth...this gentleman said "well they mate" pretty much to every question and then he kept on chuggin being sure to leave no room for a follow up question regarding "mating"....it was funny to see the parents squirm and giggle. It was also great to see the kids ooohing and aaahing when they saw the milk head into the holding tank. Immediate gratification and they were amazed at how much milk Judy could crank out...told you lactating is miraculous!

Next we headed to sheep shearing...

This particular guy had never been sheared so he was a bit, shall we say, sheepish? .....hahaha...hohoho...heehee....I crack myself up

The kids were very interested in this whole process and they loved feeling the wool afterwards, even if it totally grossed me out. I wasn't the only one, one of Brooke's teachers leaned over and said she didn't now if she had enough hand sanitizer for this!!! Funny!!!

Here's the naked little fellow...

Here is one of the big hits of the day....

Well who doesn't love a cute little piglet. Of course all the kids were petting the piglets and then announcing that they had "swine flu"....they thought that was downright hysterical.....Brooke included...4th grade humor is quite a treat...especially when experienced en masse.

We had a chance to hear about ranch horses.....

And do you see that little cutie on the left? She was like two or three and she was wearing the cutest little boots WITH spurs. Too sweet. Her parents were doing the horse demos.

After lunch we headed over to the actual Agriculture Museum that they have here and enjoyed lots of things there including the blacksmith...

and a great little talk about cotton and how its grown and harvested. Very kid friendly presentation.
We also had talks about rice, corn, beef, and the Dept of Agriculture was out to talk about lots of animals but specifically the coyote problem on some of the ranches.

The last station of the field trip was the seed necklace project. Very cute. The kids loved it and hopefully the seed Brooke has will sprout and we can plant it and she'll have a great little memory of the day.

It was a fun field trip and although it ran 45 minutes longer than I thought, it was so fun to get a free day with Brooke, to meet all her new classmates, and to learn a lot about this area where we now live. Brooke and I ended our field trip day checking out from the fairgrounds and we headed to get some Icees....perfect since the weather had warmed up significantly after lunch.

Super fun day!!

**Pardon my picture quality....my camera was not on it's usual settings and my pictures aren't so fabulous but the situation has been remedied and there is no need to make official complaints.

Amazing...

Amazing to me that 18 years ago today we were married.

I could try to say something poetic or romantic or super sappy sweet but

I think we all know it takes hard work to get here.

What I will say is I love this man more now than the day I married him...

which is lucky for him because he is prone to nonsense sometimes...

I of course am a peach...always...usually...ok, sometimes!!

Remembering...

Taking a moment to pause today and remember that tragic day 8 years ago.

And to once again say thank you to those who, daily, work to defend our country

and make it a safer place for our children.

Flashback Alaska: Arctic Circle

I suppose there are a few things you should know about taking a trip to the Arctic Circle:

• lots of people never attempt this on their own...while others make the trip on bicycles and motorcycles....that is crazy and honestly living in most of Alaska is about living extreme!
• there are tour buses that make the trip frequently and for about $200 per person you can be taken up and back in one day departing at 6:30am and returning around 11pm.
• Charlie is enamored with the pipeline...it's the reason we moved to Valdez (his job there in the Coast Guard revolved around the pipeline, we don't want another Exxon Valdez spill)
• There are only two stops (gas/convenience store) along the way and one of them won't have any gas the day you go
• we first had to drive about 7 hours from Valdez to Fairbanks the day before so we could start this trip
• It was almost 30 degrees warmer at the Arctic Circle than in Valdez...I wouldn't have expected that!
• that after doing this trip we realized how very crazy this was to do!!

So here goes, welcome to the Arctic Circle:

This is where our trip starts and just beyond this sign is where the paved road ends and the gravel starts....for hours and hours and hours you drive on a gravel road....

This is what 75% of the drive looks like and that's the Alaska pipeline, to the right, and it runs from Prudhoe Bay for 800 miles to Valdez, where we lived.

This is what the other 25% of the trip looks like....fields and fields of fireweed as far as you can see....do you see the pipeline? Yes, Charlie we all see the pipeline!

Here's a little video that we made while there. Look how much our kids have changed.

So after about 5 hours of driving we got there safe and sound...grilled some hot dogs...ate some chips....watched out for crazy man eating wildlife (ok that was just me)...took some pictures and about 45 minutes after arriving we turned right back around to make the 5+ hour trip back to Fairbanks.

Here are Charlie and I right before the "Arctic Circle Incident."

Don't we look happy and oblivious?...maybe even confident...we may have even taken turns saying things like:
"arctic shmartic.......the Nowak family did THIS, we don't need no stinkin' tour bus......pppffffttt.......it's just a long, bumpy drive....pppaaahhhhllleeeaaassseee."

Mmm Hmmm...in all our confidence we loaded back into the car and settled in for the loooooong drive back. I volunteered to drive back cause "hello, we are Arctic Circle Rock Stars now, DUH!" We approach the first of two gas stations, about an hour into the return trip, and pull in. Now at this point I just wanna get to Fairbanks and download my pictures and get something good to eat so I pull into the gas station after driving "Mario Andretti style" for quite some time. I see a yellow light come on on the dashboard and my little personal alarm goes off. Then we get out of the car and hear the sickening sound of all the air pouring out of our right rear tire. Yeah I hadn't driven over a nail...I had ripped a nice slice in the tire with some boulder size gravel. All I can say is thank goodness for Chevrolet who gives you a full size, real tire as a spare. And thank goodness for my husband who can change a tire while I buy a snack for the kids and find out that there is actually no gas at this gas station.

We, and by we I mean Charlie, finish the tire change and then proced to the next gas station hoping and praying they have gas. Luckily they do and we fill up and then drive nice and slow back to Fairbanks cause now we have no spare and for the next 4 hours or so there is NOTHING and maybe no one to help. I'm sure everyone can imagine my pure joy (read: freaked out terror) at this point in the trip.

Upon Charlie's insistence we make a few stops on the way back to view the scenery and take a hike in the woods?????!!!???. Let's face it this would not ever have been an idea I had...we know I am a scaredy cat and taking a hike in the woods...in Alaska.... is definately not my thing...but we walked and we saw.....

....moose and I prayed that we didn't see bear...which we didn't...thank goodness for that because if we had been attacked and killed by a bear I never would have forgiven Charlie!!!
We did get to see stuff like this though and it was BEAUTIFUL!!
If ever you go to Alaska I highly encourage you to do the Arctic Circle trip, but may I recommend the bus tour. Had we taken a tour we would have paid $1000 for our family. That sounds quite pricey but when you consider that upon our return we had to replace all of our tires which were completely destroyed by the rough road, and that cost well in excess of $1000. The tour really would have been quite a deal.

I will say this - you can't put a price on this experience and the fact that we can say we have stood, as a family, at the Arctic Circle, if only for a few minutes, on a very long and adventurous day is worth it!!