Fall

Our friend Mollie from Tuscon has been staying with us for a while. This weekend we had a beautiful fall day so Mollie and I went out on the mountain to look for musk ox. It wasn't as warm as Arizona, but we did enjoy the sunshine.

C.O.

Photo of the Day- Tough Sledding

Like most cities Brevig Mission provides a trash hauling service. They also haul "honey buckets" for the people that don't have sewer and water service.

The city workers used to have a special trailer (with wheels) for moving honey buckets, but it has been broken for some time now. The trailer has now been replaced with this wooden sled. It works surprisingly well, even in the summer.

C.O.

The Dague's Visit

Our friends Marlys and Dwight Dague from Minnesota decided they would like to make Brevig a stop on their Alaskan vacation this fall. We were of course very excited to have them and show them around our lovely spot on the planet.

Unfortunately, the weather was pretty awful, rain, cold, fog, rain, cold, fog. In fact, their stay was extended by one day since the planes were not flying due to the conditions mentioned above.

Some people just look like they belong living on the Alaskan frontier.
Don't they look like naturals?

Despite the weather, they came out riding and exploring each day with us. We were able to show them the sand spit near Teller where the seals play, Sunset Creek and the old gold mine buildings that remain there. We also did the basic tour around the village to see the school, church, post office, clinic etc.

Harold and Dwight chatting and walking near the
gold mine at Sunset Creek, about 8 miles outside of Brevig.

We hope they'll come again very soon.

--AnnMarie

Photo of the Day - "Bridge"

This is the "bridge" that I built last week. The two pipes are the water lines that run from the city well to the the water treatment plant. The new road that we were building crossed the pipes and they needed to be protected.

Despite this being a carefully engineered $6,000,000 project, there was no plan for how we should protect the pipes. We had lots of drawings and blueprints that showed every little detail of the road construction, but only one small note on the plans that said "protect pipe"

We looked around town for materials to use and found a big pile of 6"x12" timbers left over from an old tank farm project. We used these to field engineer a solution.

The first vehicle to drive over it when completed was that 40 ton dump truck that you see in the background. The bridge held up to that fine, so I think the typical village traffic of 4-wheelers and snowmobiles will be ok.

C.O.

Photo of the Day - Chainsaw

Here I am at work cutting timbers for the bridge we built. Over the years I have only cut down a few trees with a chainsaw. I have cut a lot of other things, however. The most interesting would be the two days I spent knee deep in a sewage lagoon cutting plastic pipe. Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of that.

C.O.

Photo of the Day - Deck Construction

The construction project that I have been working on this fall is mainly a road building project, but I was hired as a carpenter. I was put in charge of building a snow fence, two small "bridges" , and any other carpentry things that came up.

One of the roads that we were building ran through the middle of someone's house. When they moved the house to make room for the road the old steps were destroyed. This 8'x24' deck is what we built to replace them. It is a big improvement over the old simple steps.

C.O.

Photo of the Day - Boating

I helped a friend haul his 4-wheeler across from Teller to Brevig today. We used his boat, which is an extra wide 20' Lund. You should see what it looks like when we use a narrow 18' boat.
C.O.

Bubble Wrap

The very definition of fun:

Clouds

I took this picture right outside our house looking to the east. I thought the finger like cloud formations were interesting looking.

--AnnMarie

Our Little Get Away

While we were in Minnesota surrounded by grandparents this past July, we decided to take advantage of some free babysitting to get away for awhile, just the two of us. We decided to make the Minneapolis / St. Paul area our destination.

When we were dating, I was going to college in St. Paul so we'd spent a lot of time bumming around the city. It had been a while since we spent time there, so we visited some of our favorite spots and took time to see new ones. We started with breakfast in front of these lovely hydrangeas and continued on to a couple used bookstores in Dinkytown. It was then a short walk through the U of M's campus over to the Weisman Art Museum.

To be honest we were mostly interested in the museum because of the building's architecture. (Though we did peruse the art and had a lot of fun.) Last winter we watched an excellent documentary titled, "Sketches of Frank Gehry". So we are particularly interested in his buildings and thought it was pretty cool we could see one in person.



I'm holding my very own three dimensional representation of the building. =)


Here's an example of those famous Gehry sketches. This is printed on the wall at the Weisman. It's the sketch the building was designed from.

And here's a story about why I love social networking. We were in the Minneapolis area, interested in seeing some live music when . . . I logged onto Facebook. Oh look, there's an invitation from C.O.'s cousin, Max to come up to Maple Grove to hear him play. C.O. hadn't seen him in 10 or so years and I had never met Max in person. So, we showed up. It was a great evening and just the sort of musical event we had hoped to see.

--AnnMarie

Photo of the Day - Lumber

Today we received a shipment of lumber for the construction project that I am working on.
C.O.

Photo of the Day - Fuel Barge

From our new house on the beach we have a great view of the ocean. Yesterday a fuel barge came in to delivery heating fuel to the school.

C.O.

Harold's Wooden Bike

Last summer C.O. built Harold a little wooden push bike.  He was a little to small to really get the hang of it.  But this summer, with the help of a hill/puddle combination, he got really good at maneuvering his bike. He can push himself along at a pretty good pace and, as you can see, balance for quite some distance.  Next step . . . pedals. 

--AnnMarie

Guns n Bikes

Brevig  . . . a great place to be a kid.  What young boy wouldn't want to carry his gun (yes it is real) while he rides his dirt bike.  Something tells me most suburban mom's wouldn't approve.

--AnnMarie

Disclaimer:  I really do love all my suburban mom friends, I just like pointing out the stark contrasts in cultures.  =)

Beautiful Brevig

Brevig welcomed us with some amazing weather.  Clear skies, warm weather (60 - 65) and just a slight breeze. It was a good thing too, since we were driving our 4-wheeler 70 miles back from Nome.  We had a gorgeous drive on the road and we were greeted with the most beautiful view of Brevig.  It is good to be home!

It might be nice in Brevig but I definitely wouldn't call it swimming weather.

On this particular day I was wearing a sweatshirt.  

The kids on the other hand were ready to take  a dip in the ocean.

Believe it or not there are jellies in our frigid waters.  

I assumed they would sting but apparently not.

What odd but lovely creatures.

The forgotten items of Brevig beach goers.

--AnnMarie

Back in Alaska

Most airports in America are very similar. They all have the same type of furniture, the same over priced food, the same people standing in lines. If they didn't tell you what city you were in when the plane landed you might not be able to tell by looking around.

Anchorage is different. I'm not sure what it is, but it might be the way that people dress.

C.O.

The New Do

It was time for a new do.  I have had the same hair style for 11 years running and decided it was time for a change.  I have been wanting to get my hair dyed red, I mean really red, for quite a few years now.  I was reluctant to do it during the time we were adopting Harold in case someone decided red, I mean really red, haired people weren't fit to raise children or something.  But now, the timing was just right.  

My inspiration was this hair was the above photo.  It was sported on Jennifer Garner as one of her get ups from the show Alias.  For those of you who didn't watch every single episode of Alias, she was basically an under cover secret agent girl working for a covert branch of the CIA.  She got to wear all kinds of really cool outfits and wigs on her undercover missions to save the world from disaster.  

The color didn't turn out exactly like the photo but pretty close and I love it!  It feels strangely normal and is tons of fun to have.  One lady said I reminded her of her Strawberry Shortcake doll from when she was a kid. 

I got my hair done at Hair Police in Minneapolis.  It was recommended to me as a place that specializes in bright & alternative hair colors.   It was the perfect!  I was very inspired by all the people that worked there who used their bodies as a creative medium.  So . . . . what do you think?

--AnnMarie

Dirt Bike Fun

On our way to Minneapolis to catch our plane back to Alaska, we planned a stop to see some friends in Cambridge, Minnesota.  The highlight of our stay was the chance to play around on some dirt bikes (having breakfast burritos at Taco John's was a close second, don't get me wrong Jeremie).  

Jeremie races motocross himself and is passing the fun on to his kids by teaching them how to ride at an early age.  Jeremie's boys (ages 5 & 3, I think) are already pretty good on these little bikes.  Harold was given the chance to take the little bike with training wheels for a spin.  He was a kind of nervous at first but once he got going he had a ton of fun.  Thanks Jer!

--AnnMarie

Family Circus

The Liebling Family Circus 

Friday & Saturday in Chisholm.

Show starts at 7:00 p.m. 

 Elephant rides at 6:00 p.m.

For real?  In Chisholm? We took advantage of the opportunity to see some local entertainment and what turned out to be the cutest little circus.  The Lieblings take their show and their entire family on the road as they travel from town to town across America .  All I could think was, "What a unique way to grow up!"  

The show was truly a family affair.  The father was the ringmaster, the mother was their school teacher by day and sold cotton candy and toys to circus goers at night. The three eldest children were regular performers, while the two year old toddled around the center ring in child sized clown shoes.  The little guy was tolerated pretty well by his siblings throughout the show, they just kind of did their thing around him.  Meanwhile, the baby watched it all from the "pack and play" on the edge of the circus ring.  This was a bunch of kids who grew up living and breathing the circus and show biz.  I guess that's why performing for the public came so naturally to them.

This was a pretty talented group of kids.  They were able to juggle, hula hoop, do trapeze stunts & some comic clowning routines.  The Lieblings even had a few animals besides the elephant to add to the show; six ponies, a monkey, a boa constrictor and a lime green chicken.   They had a little bit of everything.

Harold and I enjoyed an elephant ride before the show.  

The best dollar we spent all summer was to feed the elephant.

We experienced everything the circus had to offer.  

We even paid the extra buck to see the lime green chicken.

A clown in training Age 2 &

his brother, the expert fire juggler.  Age 10

Harold's first close encounter with a boa constrictor and a monkey.

--AnnMarie

MN Weather

We had some pretty crumby weather this summer while 

we were in Minnesota.  We had dreams of swimming, basking in 

the sun etc.  But the northland had other ideas for us.

--AnnMarie