Mid-Winter in Anchorage

It's been a rocky, icy January and February with no new snow and hard, icy surfaces on sidewalks and roads.  Unpleasant walking and not much to ski on, which was okay, because Brian was still getting well and giving himself shots twice a day to get his blood thin enough to not worry about new blood clots.  We got good news that the clots in his lungs were gone about the end of January, but he still had extensive clotting in his legs.  He saw a hematologist at the beginning of February and a cardiologist on 2/11, and it seems the only issue is keeping on the Coumadin for a matter of months - and taking a few more blood tests once he's been off the shots for two weeks to make sure there is no genetic reason that he got the pulmonary emboli to begin with.  He was finally cleared to stop the shots on Wednesday this week, and that was a welcome relief - now the black and blue marks on his stomach, where he's been having his shots for two months, can heal up and fade away!

We went to a wine tasting with Diane and Carl at Crush - a short walk from our house, which is always useful for wine tasting.  It's one of my favorite places, and it was a nice afternoon.

And . . . a trip to San Diego for Brian!  That was welcome too, a little sun and warmth and getting away from the routine here of NOT skiing and not feeling that great.  Brian's niece Suzanne had a birthday, and his two sisters went out so Brian flew down to meet them.  They do look like they had a good time! A whale watch, wine tasting, and pizza birthday party!  Brian had his extra tough thigh-high compression socks for the flight, but I think he bared his legs for the southern California days!

Coming back, we've continued to have good news about Brian's health. And he had another trip on Valentine's Day - to the boat in Whittier this time - it had to come out of the water for the surveyor for insurance purposes.  A winter day in Whittier can be pretty, but it wouldn't be for everyone!

And this weekend, two months after we trucked to the emergency room and this all started, we skied this weekend!  Oh, so nice to be outside again and moving!  It was really great today, 19 degrees and beautiful sunshine.  We still don't have much new snow, but Brian found some good trails on the other side of town that must have gotten a bit more snow than we got closer to our house.  The trails were actually in great shape.  And we're due to have temperatures in the high teens and low twenties and light snow at different times this week - that should be good news.  And . . . we were able to see a few of the dog teams practicing for Fur Rondy races - Fur Rondy starts next week - the big celebration here in Anchorage leading up to the Iditarod!  More about that in a week or two!

First Friday and the End of Vacation

The wind down of Jessica's visit and my vacation 2 weeks from work - and an update on Brian -- resting most of day and going out for short walks is what we've been tending to do -- we watched all 3 seasons of Downton Abbey so we could be ready for Sunday's premier of Season 4.  Then we watched almost all of the 1st season of Breaking Bad, which we never started watching either.  And we went to see American Hustle, which I highly recommend - all 3 of us really enjoyed it!

First Friday Carl and Diane came down, and we tried Orso's first, but it was so crowded that we ended up at Sullivan's.  All 5 of us crowded around a table, and we split 2 appetizers at a time so that we could fit them on the table!  Hmmm . . . oysters on the 1/2 shell, blue cheese potato chips, calamari, and seared ahi tuna -- enough to call it a meal, along with some good wine and music!

 
Afterwards we walked over to the Town Square to try the teacups again, Jessica likes to be twirled in them (and so do the rest of the kids!  Including Diane!)

I have a video of her actually spinning but can't seem to get the videos to load.  The ice sculptures were due to be completed by 4:00 on Sunday, so we had a preview on Friday while they were worked on, and then we walked up to see them on Sunday just before the deadline, which was also the time we had to leave to take Jessica to the airport to fly back to L.A.  Saturday we took a quick trip to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center, but it was wet and icy and windy/wild, so we mostly drove through and saw the elk and musk oxen and wood bison huddled up against the weather - also a lynx, owl, and red fox and Sitka black-tailed deer. 

The dragon in the middle was completed by a 2 person Chinese team - each has a 2 person team, and the dragon won 1st place - I liked the one on the bottom!  All in all a neat display and fun for families to traipse around the Town Square on a Sunday afternoon.  There was also an ice train that kids could play in and unfortunately some bigger kids probably under the cover of darkness played rough with that!  And then there was Monday morning . . . back to work.  

Brian is getting blood checks twice a week and will until he gets the all clear for some stable numbers on the blood thinning.  Then he can stop giving himself shots too, which won't hurt his feelings one bit!  

A New Year and Jessica's Visit

Jessica arrived for a 9 day visit two days after Christmas and a day after Brian went into the hospital - it was great to see her, and the day after Brian got out, we drove to Girdwood, an hour away, took a hike on the Winner Creek Trail and then rode the gondola to the 7 Glaciers Restaurant for a late lunch.  Jessica has the lunch pictures and the hiking pictures, but we did get this one gondola picture riding down through the clouds!

and one of Jessica and I at the top waiting for the return trip!  We had a wonderful lunch with an excellent presentation of all of the food - totally worth the drive and the ride to the top - it's a free ride if you have reservations at the restaurant!

The next day was New Year's Eve, and we generally go to our friends, Carl and Diane, for fireworks and a superb feast of appetizers and champagne that Diane spends an awfully lot of time preparing!  We were all looking forward to it, but Brian was really not up to it and needed to rest, so we stayed home.  Jessica and I walked up to the Town Square for the fireworks at 8, which were really great - see them with the Statue of Liberty ice sculpture here and Jessica modeling the holding of the torch. 

And lastly, a moose is loose on 12th Avenue!  We spied one out of our dining room window, chomping on the trees right from the sidewalk, so Jessica ran down and got the video of him right across the street, from our front porch!  And, I can't get the video to load, so you'll have to take my word for it! No wonder Jessica likes it here.  We had a wonderful week, in spite of and including Brian and I and Jessica all worrying about him and how he's doing- it certainly has us present to how much we love him and love each other.  More on First Friday and more ice sculptures in the next blog!  

and the aftermath of Christmas . . .

Well, a different post-Christmas than we had anticipated!  We had such a cozy Christmas Day, didn't ski since it continued to be zero or below, and went out the next day, much warmer, beautifully groomed trails . . . and 20 minutes out on the trail, Brian called to me and said he had to go back, didn't feel well enough to go on.  Well, that was it.  If Brian wants to go back after only 20 minutes of skiing, there is definitely something seriously wrong - he'd been feeling "off" for a couple of weeks, heaviness in his legs, no zip, now short of breath, the day before we left for Talkeetna he'd had pain in his chest but didn't want to tell me since it went away.  We went straight to the hospital via the doctor's office which I had called on the way - his blood pressure was 180/84, and she sent us on to the hospital, where we were headed anyway.

After a few hours in the hospital, an EKG, chest X-ray and CT scan, Brian was admitted with 2 pulmonary embolisms.  He had a little bit of a scare over night and a temporary trip to Intensive Care when they were taking blood at 4 am, poked around painfully, and Brian's heart slowed to 20s, then stopped for 16 seconds.  They had him back in his regular room within 4 hours, and he spent 3-4 days altogether.

Back home on Sunday!  Now we're taking it more slowly and waiting for those darn things to break up and disappear.  It's pretty hard to watch the perfect snow conditions and groomed trails and take a short walk!  And, we're grateful that Brian is home and recovering and that we have skiing together in our future!

Christmas Day back in Anchorage

Cold, cold, cold!  We had hoped to ski at XYZ Lakes going out of Talkeetna on the way home today, but it was 16 below zero when we got up, and 15 below when we left about 11 am.  We were led to believe (weather.com) that it was going to be ski-able when we got home, but instead, we drove through 25 degrees below, 30 degrees below, all of the way up to 0 - and it never got any higher!  So we dumped the skiing plans and moved on to wine and appetizers once we got unpacked -- and opening our Christmas presents, which we left til we got home today!  After planning the food for our few days at the cabin, I forgot to plan for Christmas, but I had a baguette and made some bruschetta and others with pesto -- we were almost done when I thought to take the picture!

We got a start on the second season of Downton Abbey, but we've got to go back for the rest of Season 2 tomorrow -- I hope WWI comes to an end!  We kind of resigned ourselves to staying in for the day -- I forgot to mention the skiing yesterday - we went up to our friends, Laura and Klaus in Trapper Creek, about 28 miles from Talkeetna - and it was warmer there but still never up to 0 the whole time that we skied -- a beautiful trail through the woods on our back country skis.  But . . . when we got back, Brian had locked our keys in the car.  An hour later, with darkness descending and the temperature dropping WAY down further, we were finally in and on our way back to Talkeetna, but I think that it took overnight for me to warm up again.  If you look in the background of our picture, taken by Laura and Klaus, Denali was in perfect form!

Klaus and Laura with "Elfie" on the trail.

Our potluck dinner at The Roadhouse was a short walk for us when we got back and cleaned up, and we brought a great new recipe - Risotto with Saffron and Butternut Squash.  We met a couple who had retired 5 years ago and bought a cabin off the grid - it was fun talking to them about the life they've created up here in retirement.

Back home today, we made our food courses as we went along and got hungry -- halibut baked in parchment paper with pesto, tomato and shredded zucchini!

Very yummy!  I'd planned a big dessert finish - Roasted stove-top pears with a dulce leche sauce -- but I forgot that I needed molasses so we opted for Christmas cookies and a little red wine to finish off the day.  Tomorrow we HAVE to ski - hoping the temperature comes up, but we can manage zero degrees if it's not two days in a row!  Jessica arrives on Friday!  We got very thoughtful and well-appreciated gifts from all of our family.  Merry Christmas to everyone and best wishes for the new year!

Christmas in Talkeetna (and Brian's Birthday)

We got off to a later start than we anticipated on Sunday for Brian's birthday, driving up to Talkeetna for our third Christmas in a row here - I guess that's getting to be our new tradition!  It was snowing pretty furiously all day, and we made a last minute trip to REI for a replacement headlamp, had lunch at the Middleway Cafe, set the car keys down on the counter and didn't notice -- so an extra half hour walking back and forth until we asked at the counter!  We weren't relishing a walk home in that snow and wind!

We got up here to our cabin at about 6 pm, so no ski that we had expected to have, but here's a picture from Saturday -- no better conditions could you ask for!  Almost 20 degrees, perfect snow, and a late afternoon just before dark ski up to Goose Lake and back from Valley of the Moon park - about a 10K.

A gorgeous day - Sunday we drove up mostly in a snowstorm still, but it was very cozy once we got here.  This is the first time that we stayed at Talkeetna Cabins, but it's easily twice the size as the cabin we rented the first year where we were either at a little table or in bed!

And then there is also a loft or second floor with a double bed and a single bed.  We've had "Irish oats" each morning with dried blueberries and honey, and we brought our pizza stone and made pizza Sunday night when we got here - it was supposed to be Arugula and Goat Cheese Pizza with carmelized onions, but somehow I ended up without the goat cheese, so we improvised - it was really good though!  Should have taken a picture!  What I did take a picture of was the annual Christmas puzzle (which I worked on for 4 hours Monday morning, mostly before Brian got up!  This is one that I gave to my mother last year, and she sent it to me because it was such a pretty one and also nice to do - the pieces are heavier and not so ambiguous about how they fit together!

Once it warmed up "a little," we went out for a ski along the river, across a railroad bridge and onto the Chase Trail - a little disappointing in that we didn't find another trail through the woods and were on a snowmobile trail longer than we wanted to be, but all in all a fine afternoon!  We kept thinking it felt colder than the 14 degrees that it was when we started, and by the time we finished, it was 8 degrees - that was more like what it felt like!  Here is the sunset over the river as we were coming back -- sunset that is at 3:00 or so in the afternoon!

Then it was back to the cabin for a little wine and dinner - Lemon Pasta with Roasted Shrimp - part of the fun in coming is finding special recipes to try - and then a Downton Abbey marathon for Season 1 that we rented to bring up - we've started watching but missed the first two seasons, maybe 3, not sure where we are now!

Today is Christmas Eve - we're going to our friends Laura and Klaus' to ski this afternoon (and it's REALLY cold this morning - 16 degrees below 0 - more than we expected, so hoping it warms up).  and then back to clean up and go to The Roadhouse for dinner just down the road.  It's a potluck with the owners making a turkey and dressing.  We're bringing another new recipe (and the pre-test says it's delicious!) - Risotto with butternut squash and saffron.  Merry Christmas to all, and we'll add more later - we have check out on Christmas Day at 11 am, then we'll probably ski on the way home and end up at our house for another new dinner - Halibut with Spinach Pesto, Zucchini & Tomatos wrapped in parchment paper.

The Winter Solstice & Time for Holidays

It's the Winter Solstice today . . . the darkest and shortest day of the year. Sunrise will be at 10:14 am, and sunset at 3:41 pm, with 5 hours, 28 min, 11 sec. of daylight.  Tomorrow daylight will be longer, for the first time since the summer solstice! Chance of snow today, and very warm for how it's been lately -- up to 31 degrees, so let's hope it stays in the 20s, a much better temperature for skiing!

Indoors, everyone is getting ready for holidays . . . our table is covered with the cards that haven't been addressed, the Christmas candy and cookies that I made, our calendars that we make each year with Alaska pictures that haven't yet been sent . . . and it's the dark, quiet time of the morning that I like to have to myself.

I remembered to start the amarylis AND the narcissus this year, and flowering bulbs make a big difference in December.  We love watching them grow, especially since they leap up inches at a time, it seems!

This was only about a week from the time it began opening to being in full flower.  Now to get a prettier pot!  The quilted salmon table runner came from a wonderful artist in Talkeetna!  We're headed back to Talkeetna for Christmas again this year, beginning tomorrow for Brian's 60th birthday.  We'll be staying at Talkeetna cabins and having a potluck dinner at The Roadhouse for Christmas Eve. 

The paperwhites, or narcissus, I had in front of the television when they first started, and I'd swear that we could watch them grow!  I eventually had to move them to the side on the coffee table, as they are now taller than the TVand very much in the way! 

And then, what do you do on those long winter nights?  Well, one of the things that I did was to copy an artist friend of mine, Herminia Din, an art professor at the university, who has a "Junk to Funk" project to recycle just about anything!  Here is a crocheted purse that I made up based on her designs, made out of plastic bags from two different grocerty stores. 

No new outdoor pictures today -- the snow has been beautiful!  I think we have more snow at the moment than maybe we've ever had here - two decent snows in a row, about 10 inches and 6--8 inches - that's a lot for Anchorage -- we just tend to keep it, and not go back and forth in temperatures as much as upstate New York has done in recent years anyway.  I predict skiing for today, so maybe some nice shots outside next time!  We'll be in Talkeetna til Christmas day and probably travel home Christmas night.  Jessica arrives on December 27 and will stay until January 5 - can't wait to see her too!