Fun with family!

This blog post will be especially meaningful to if you are a relation of Natalie's, because we spent the evening with Grandma Barbara's cousin, Paul Moseley.  Our evening started with homemade chicken and potato soup, fresh berries and garlic toast at home.  Then we changed clothes and went to one of our favorite restaurants, called Romano's, where we met Paul and had cheesecake and coffee, while Paul had a dinner salad.

He told us many stories of his time in Alaska, and about the family members he knew so well.  Natalie and I listened with rapt attention, which was quite easy because he is a witty, lively storyteller, and he also asked many questions about the family and about us.

After a couple of hours together, we parted company and headed back to the apartment.  As I was pulling in, I remembered that we had seen, not very far from our apartment, a building named for Homer Moseley.  I am not sure exactly what the building is used for, but I think it might be some kind of Youth House, because there are always bikes parked out front.

At dinner, Paul told us Uncle Curtis and Aunt Margaret's address, which is also in our neighborhood, and we went to look it up.  It is a very cute little bungalow, and the current owners have obviously done a good job of maintaining the property.

We have spent the rest of our evening packing for our return trip, which neither of us is too excited about.  There is something about Alaska that gets in your blood, and it will be hard to leave this place.  But duty calls...I have not seen Nate and Lily in several weeks, and Natalie must start school very soon. Hope your week has been full of blessings...much love to all!

Our Culinary Adventures!

I have cooked a lot of our meals at home, and we have been pretty healthy eaters this Summer.  There is a very nice market close to our apartment called Nu Sagaaya, and it is a little bit like a Central Market (only much smaller) where they have wonderful produce.  So we have had fresh fruit and salads almost every night.  Last night I made homemade chicken teriyaki, and we added some Vietnamese Egg Rolls from the Pho restaurant down the street for the side (I have not been brave enough to try anything like that!)

But, I must confess, we also like dives (I am apologizing to my mother-in-law right now).  Our favorite restaurant in Anchorage thus far has been Tito's Gyros, on 6th Street, right next to our favorite museum.  As you can see from the photo, it isn't much to look at from the outside, and there is only enough seating for 20 folks (max) inside, but the food is AWESOME!  We have been there several times, and the gyro plate and greek salad are magnificent -- good and hot each and every time.  But the most magnificent meal of all came the other day when we were in Seward.

The secretary at Time For Speech is a gal named Ann, who has been here for 38 years (thus making her the closest thing to a 'true' Alaskan I have met) and she knows a lot about all parts of Alaska.  Her husband grew up near Seward, and so she is particularly knowledgable about that little town.  When she heard we were going, she told us we had to eat at Thorn's.  'Try the Halibut basket, you will love it', she said...so when we got to Seward, we were looking at all of these nice restaurants and making our choice (we couldn't remember the name Ann had told us), and we were about to pick one, when we ran across Thorn's, and I said, 'That's it...that's the place Ann told us about.'  But we went inside, and it smelled like cigarette smoke and we looked like tourists, so we walked back out again.  I was planning on taking Natalie to one of the 'better' places in town, but she said, 'No, we want to experience Alaskan culture, and that is where the locals go, so let's try it.'  She really didn't give me a choice in the matter, so I relented.

We went inside and had a basket of fried Halibut that was caught right in the bay next to the restaurant.  And it was glorious.  Plus, we were the ONLY non-locals in the restaurant (we knew this because they greeted everyone else who entered by name).

We had Alaskan beer, french fries and halibut, and I must say, my wife was exactly right...it was clearly the best choice in town.  Not cheap, but very, very good.  And we got to experience a little 'culture' while we were at it.

However, just so you know, tomorrow night I am making homemade chicken and potato soup and Friday night we are going to one of the nicest restaurants in Anchorage, called 'The Bridge'.  We have a 6:30pm reservation for a window table and my wife has requested that we order Alaskan King Crab Legs.  And so it shall be.  We will get dressed up and hit the town for our last night in Anchorage.  Hope everyone is doing well...our time in Anchorage is growing short...looking forward to seeing many of you in the near future!

An awesome day in Seward...

On Sunday, Natalie and I drove South to Seward, which is one of the places the cruise ships make a stop at the coast.  The pictures you are seeing were taking with a very small Nikon camera we got on closeout at Target.  They aren't nearly as good as the ones we were able to take before, but they will at least give you the flavor of what we were seeing and experiencing.

When we arrived in Seward, we went straight to the Sea Life Center, where we were able to get really close to the birds in the Aviary, like these Puffins.  We also saw Sea Lions and Seals, and Natalie was actually able to touch a wide variety of sea creatures.

Natalie loves all animals, and she had been waiting since we got to Alaska to see the Puffins...and what a thrill to be able to get up so close to them. One regret is that we have seen no whales in our time here.  Apparently it is too warm in the bays and inlets now, which is hard to imagine, because every time we are able to touch the water it is freezing!  But that water is not cold enough for the whales...

The Sea Life Center wasn't huge, but it was very rewarding...one of Natalie's favorite moments of the day was playing a game against yours truly in the educational wing.  Now, my Natalie is SUPER competitive, so this wasn't a simple learning activity...this was LIFE or DEATH! Unfortunately, my wife is also a genius, so I stood no chance.  She saw me do play the first move, figured out the entire game and whooped me...

Then. she needed me to take a picture of it, so we could 'remember it'.  Ha!  I will definitely be reminded of that moment in the years to come...

After dinner in Seward (more on that to come later), we went to Exit Glacier.  Here is a real glacier that you can get within 50 yards of the face of it.  We went and spoke to the Park Ranger, put on our bug spray and took off for the trail, which was rocky, but manageable.

We crossed a mountain stream several times on the way to the glacier, and anticipation was really mounting for us to see how close we could actually get.  The answer is...VERY close!  How impressive it was to be next to this wall of ice. The signs told us that it was alive, and indeed you could see water running through various portions of it and you could hear it groan and moan and heave.

I think it may have been a once-in-a-lifetime shot for me, and I was ever so thankful that we had made it down to see it.  It was a very warm, almost balmy evening in Southern Alaska, but as you approached the Glacier, there was a stiff, arctic wind.  It was amazing!  But, stepping just yards away from the glacier, the temperature rose immediately.  It was a little unnerving to be that close to a glacier, as well.  The only thing that separated you from certain death was a very small rope.  Hardly seemed to be ample protection against the danger at hand.  There was a Japanese family there at the same time we were with a little boy in tow, and he made me very nervous, jumping and running and darting around.

On our return trip to Anchorage, we were greeted with some of the most beautiful sights of our trip.  The snow on top of the mountains is quickly melting, and the runoff waterfalls from some of the points farther South are breathtaking...

We stopped for Natalie's favorite treat (Pizza) at the Girdwood turnoff, which is the only place you can stop between here and Seward.  Can you even imagine such a thing?  Two tourist destinations, separated by only about 130 miles, with NO PLACE to stop between them?  Such is the country you find here in Alaska.

As we made the last curve and began to come into Anchorage, we saw the best sunset of the trip.  The mountains were tinged with pink and purple, and Natalie and I found out what purple mountain majesty really means.

It was the perfect ending to the perfect day...the ONLY problem was that it was 11:30pm when we arrived back at our apartment, and it was mighty tough to get Natalie up for work this morning!  Tonight, Natalie made dinner for us, and we started packing our things and I made reservations for us, in preparation for the trip home to Texas / Arkansas.  After that, Natalie needed a snack...any guesses what she wanted?  Yep, Pizza...so we closed the evening with a pepperoni pizza from the Great Alaska Pizza Company.  Hope you all had a wonderful start to your week!

Chockies?

So, Natalie texted me on Saturday from work that she was really craving some chockies...and I had to text back, 'what the heck are chockies'?  She laughed and texted me back that it meant that she really wanted some chocolate!

Well, I had noticed a small café in town as I had been driving around called Modern Dwellers Chocolate Lounge.  They specialize in chocolates of every kind, and especially drinking chocolate, served hot.  We each had a truffle...mine was an Orange Drop and hers was a vegan coconut caramel, made with coconut milk...plus we had a mocha coffee, made with the drinking chocolate.

They also sell beautiful arts and crafts, as so many places here in Anchorage do, and have some of the most comfortable seating of any coffee shop I have ever been into. Needless to say, it was a hit with Natalie, and it earned me a few 'good husband' points for the day!

And a freebie to grow on...

So, you remember how I told you we met some folks up at Mt. Alyeska who were originally from Texas?  And that we went sledding with them?  Well, they took photos of us, as well, and offered to e-mail them to us.

I didn't really expect to get them, but offered my email address anyways.  Then, when we got home tonight after work, I found several emails from them.  The fellow's name is Van Bridges, and he took some GREAT shots of us!  Here is my favorite and he tells me there are more coming this weekend!

More awesomeness here in Alaska!

I finished up the website today for Time For Speech, and Kathie paid me promptly...what a blessing!  It will allow us to go to Seward this weekend...when high temperatures are supposed to be in the 80's here...

With her husband doing the design, Natalie made it onto the homepage for the website...can you imagine that? ;-)  Here is the photo that greets visitors to their website!  It has been such a wonderful learning experience for us both, and can you believe that we ENJOY spending all day together?  She told me tonight how much she loved having me at her work...and the same goes for me, as well...

Plus, I just have to crow a little bit here (my chest is puffed out slightly)...this photo is of such a capable, powerful and graceful young woman. She is far more than I deserve and has reminded me of the best things in life.  You can also see the delightful necklace we got for her in this picture....it has a pine cone charm at the bottom with a very unique pendant above it.  It really reminds us of the spirit of Alaska.

One of the interesting things we have learned is how often clients cancel their appointments with their therapist, or simply fail to show up.  Of course this is money straight out of the pocket of the therapist and has us thinking about how we would handle that if we were one that situation. They had four clients scheduled this afternoon and only one actually showed up.

Thanks to John and Barbara for their kind card...we received it gladly this afternoon at our PO Box!  This is probably the last call for mail if you wanted to send us some...as of tomorrow, we have one week left in Alaska.  We plan to have an EPIC final week, and hope that this finds everyone as richly blessed as we are.

Be proud...be very proud...

The news is that I am also working for Natalie's boss....retooling and redoing their website.  So, I have been able to hang around the clinic these last two days and get to see Natalie 'in action'.

As the month has worn on, Natalie has been given more and more responsibility...by her boss Kathie, as well as the other therapists.  It is a source of great joy and pride to watch her grow in confidence while working with a clientele dominated by very difficult cases...especially because she hasn't been sure she wanted to work in a pediatric setting.  Nearly all of the kids she is working with struggle with autism, and the setting can be kind of chaotic.

Her boss is letting her lead therapy sessions and also having her do the de-briefing with parents after the child's session.  This can be nerve-wracking, because all of these folks are older than Natalie, yet her boss Kathie is also watching while she does it.  But she has performed like a champ, and I think that this experience has been SO beneficial for her.  She told me today that Kathie was the perfect boss for her!

This is high praise indeed, as Natalie likes to run the show, but she and Kathie have an outstanding relationship.  And it has been so awesome to see it flourish in such a short period of time.  All the extended Berrios and Lohrey relations should be very proud, indeed!

Also, many thanks to Kathie, who allowed me to use her camera to get these photos of Natalie...here is my stuff, camped out on the desk at the Time for Speech Office...it was an added treat, getting to be around my wife for the entire day!