Volcano!

I love Alaska. I don't have to deal with "hurricane season" or "tornado season" or any of those other crazy weather seasons. Sure it's a bit cold and we have some snow, but I would much rather deal with that than a hurricane. One thing that we do have to deal with from time to time is a volcano eruption. If you don't live in the "Ring of Fire" you probably don't even know what you would do. Actually it is quite simple, you check the Alaska Volcano Observatory website about a million times a day and if the volcano DOES erupt, you watch the weather and see where the ash is going to go. HOPEFULLY it doesn't go towards you. If it does, you close the air vents to your house, and stay inside as much as you can. (See the AVO website for some better tips...I'm not an expert, I just play one while at school) If you have to go outside, you wear long sleeves and a mask because ash from a volcano is really super tiny glass particles and you probably don't want glass in your lungs. It is all pretty exciting.

So even though we do have natural disasters, I'm almost grateful that they aren't as predictable as hurricanes. I sure wouldn't want to live anywhere that had "earthquake or volcano season". I'll take snow over that any day.

P.S. I almost forgot to tell you. The in-laws came over the other night and Craig informed me that my curtains "looked really weird because one is a different color". Damn. And I thought I was an interior designer in the making.

Moose's Tooth Debacle

Weston is going back to school to get his Masters degree in Project Management. Which leaves me at home one night a week all alone...boo on that. So when Weston called me to see if I wanted to "grab a beer" at Moose's Tooth before he went to class (which is at the UC. A hop, skip, and jump away) I was elated. Of course! Never mind that I don't drink beer, I was too happy to meet my husband.

Anyone who has been to Moose's Tooth (and if you haven't, it might be worth the trip to AK) knows that it is always CRAZY busy. So when I got there and it was the emptiest I had ever seen it I was even more excited. I got a great parking spot (important because my footwear was incredibly inappropriate for the snowy weather...it wasn't snowing when I left my house and I never listen to the weather) I was going to be seated right away, we might even be able to grab some cheese sticks. YES! So when Weston gets there and we get seated I was rather surprised that we didn't get service right away. In fact, probably 6 different servers walked by us at least once and not a word was said to us. Weird. I ordered everything at once since Weston had a few precious moments (cheese sticks, root beer, and a salad). My salad was delivered almost immediately. When the young lady who brought by salad asked if I would like fresh pepper I replied, "no, thank you." Apparently that meant, "Please start putting pepper on my salad." I immediately said "thank you" again to stop this pepper madness. To wrap up this incredibly boring story, even though it was not busy, I think I was more annoyed to be there than I normally am. While Moose's Tooth is delicious, I don't like crowds, so don't frequent it. Moving on.

Randomness:
Why do people log on to the channel two new polls just to say they are unsure? What a waste of time. I would really like to speak with someone who does that. It seems like a lot of effort to log onto a website just to say you aren't sure about something.
I really hope that Mt. Redout doesn't go off. If the ash makes it to Anchorage, schools will probably close. While I love not working (really, really love not working) I DO NOT want to make up another weather day.
My dogs are super spoiled. I woke up to find Frito on the couch with his head resting on a pillow. This is not an uncommon site. It cracks me up that my dogs use pillows.

I finished my curtains. They are ok. I'm not in love with them, but for $30, they will do. Pictures coming soon.

Alaska Zoo

The school district has a program called "Charitable Giving" where it encourages its employees to to give to local charities. It makes it really easy to do, by taking it right out of your paycheck. I decided to participate and now donate part of my check to the Alaska Zoo.

I have always loved zoos, and while ours isn't the best, it is full of wonderful Alaskan animals that need a home. I have recently discovered that the zoo hosts TONS of fun events, especially if you have a family. For example, they have a special Valentine's Day at the zoo event where kids can make valentines for their favorite animals and then (if you are 14+) you can go on a birds and bees tour of the zoo and learn all about animal lovin'. I already made Weston promise that we could go. This is the first time in a while that I have been SUPER excited for Valentine's Day. Then on April 4th (I think) they have an Easter Egg hunt! How fun! I'm pretty sure I need a kid, just to have an excuse to go to the zoo all the time.

So check out all the fun happenings at their website.

Holy Productivity, Batman!

So the past few days I have been amazingly productive. I was rather highly motivated to make some curtains since a certain crazy puppy chewed up the blinds.... I don't especially enjoy having a giant window into my world for other people to see. So after work the other night I went to JoAnns to buy some fabric for my curtains. I didn't want to invest a ton of money in them because I wasn't sure how they were going to turn out. Luckily, they turned out quite nicely. They aren't designer quality by any means, but they suite my house just fine. I am going to make one more panel, but I need to get some more of the lining fabric. It will have to be a different fabric as I bought all of the one that I used. So my plan is to hang the different panel in the middle and then from the outside it will look like a design choice and not a mistake! Awesome.




Then tonight I finished up my charm quilt...that should have been done a week ago. BUT better late than never, I guess! I'm a lot happier with it than I thought I would be. It still needs borders (AH! my arch nemesis...) but I have no fabric for it (hard to believe, I know) so that will have to wait. Then I was on such a roll I put the border on a quilt that I have had done for about 4 years! Do now it just needs to be quilted. One step at a time.


And not to sound like a whiner, because I know I just had a 6 day weekend, but 2 days off is just not enough. I already feel like my weekend is over because I have a few things planned....it is very frustrating to be so exhausted and barely recover before I have to do it all again. I think you should get as many days off as you work...so maybe everyone should have a schedule like firefighters...4 days on 3 days off, 3 days on 4 days off. I could live with that.

Two other random things.
1. Frank Warren (from Post Secret. If you don't know what that is go google it right now. You will be addicted.) is coming to UAA! CRAZY! Feb. 6th, and it is FREE and open to the public. It is also the same day that Weston is having some weird nose surgery, so I'm not sure if I will make it but I would LOVE to go.
2. Wish I could remember what this was....already forgot. I swear some days I am 60 years old. Those flowers Weston bought be are still alive, which is pretty amazing.

TGIF. I'm going to bed.

Being a homeowner

...is most amazing when you come home and find this:




I left Snickers alone in the house while I went shopping. (Weston and Frito went to Wasilla. Snickers would have gotten to go, but he doesn't listen well enough to be in a yard with no fence.) Apparently he wasn't too happy to be left without his BFF Frito. I did hate that blind, so I wasn't too worried about that. I will have to make some curtains now. The door trim I was a bit upset about, as it will take a bit more to replace. So my goal is to have the curtains up by the end of the week so that people don't get to see into my house 24/7.

Back to school tomorrow. It was a nice break, but I guess I should go back to work.

Reading, and other things I fail to do

I have a degree in English Rhetoric. I love to read. I teach reading. But despite all of these things, I still fail to read directions. This often results in frustration and sloppy work. I don't know what it is about directions that allude me. I read them and then I go and do what I think I should do. Only to find out that there was a reason that the directions were written the way they were. THAT is what you are supposed to do. Here are two prime examples from just this week:

Charm Quilt: I am working on my fall charm quilt. It should have been a SUPER easy quilt to put together. A few things became problems. One, I didn't really understand how to cut charm squares. That was no fault of the directions. But then I didn't sew the blocks together right. This resulted in me having to take half of them out and re-sew them. Annoying.

Rhino Sweater: I am working on this kids sweater and I almost have the back completely done. I kept thinking that it looked big, but how am I supposed to know how big a two year old is? So then I had a friend over and she was laughing at how big my sweater was. Turns out I was knitting the FOUR year old size. Hmm....not sure that a kid in kindergarden is going to want to wear a sweater with a rhino on the front. Great. My failure to read has foiled me again.

Hey, baby let's go to Vegas!

Because we are a lucky bunch. ANOTHER day off of school. This is amazing! And we already had a three day weekend already because of MLK day. So I don't have to go to work until Tuesday. Nuts. Unfortunately, it looks like we have to make up today at the end of the year or something. Oh well. I'm sure most kids won't come that day. Teachers have to stay an extra day anyway, so I'm not overly concerned.

Tomorrow I have my first Saturday Sampler class. It is a block of the month at Seams Like Home. It should be interesting. There are a lot of rules, and from what the shop told me they are pretty strict about them. For example, next month to get my block for free I have to bring my finished block from this class. Since my class starts at 9:30 I have until 10:00 to get to class, get my block looked at, and get my hand stamped. If you show up at 10:01 too bad for you, better pull out $10 to pay for your block. Crazy. Not that I plan on getting up and sewing on a Saturday morning. If it isn't done before I get up, I will just pay.

I finished all of the blocks for my quilt last night. I didn't get them sewn together, but I will get that done today. I'm not sure how crazy I am about this quilt. I made a lot of mistakes a long the way and I feel like it looks sloppy. Plus, it is too small without borders so I will have to put borders on. :( I'll get pictures up as soon as I get it done.

What are the odds?

That we would have ANOTHER day off of school? I can't remember when we had two "snow" days in a row since I was in like 5th grade. And it happened today. Because of poor weather (CRAZY weather more like it. 40*F, raining, windy as all get up) school is closed again. I WILL get my quilt done today.

On another note, I really want to see the movie Frost/Nixon. I keep seeing the previews and think that it looks intense and entertaining.

If you go out, be careful.

Icy Roads and Sharks

Because of icy roads SCHOOL IS CLOSED! Whoo hoo. I am pretty excited to get to stay home with the pups today.

I am watching the Today show and they are talking about how in Australia there has been a spike in great white attacks. Yikes! I'll stick with being cold, thanks. They had a guy on there who said he got away by "punching the shark in the face". I have heard that is what you are supposed to do, but wow! That guy is bad ass. I really hope I never have to punch a shark in the face. Even if it would gain me 3 bad ass points....

Introducing Snickers!

I haven't wanted to announce this until I had a good picture, but I figured I probably should tell you. I broke down and got another dog. He is hilarious. Him and Frito have been getting along ok...they play a lot, but they also seem to get on each other's nerves a bit. I think it is a bit of an adjustment for both of them for not being the only dog in the house.

This dog came to me from Alaska Dog and Puppy Rescue which is also where we got Frito. He was originally named Buster, but it didn't fit him. He is very sweet, hence the Snickers. He is 10 months old and they say he is an akita/heeler mix. He is only 45 lbs (so about half the size of Frito) and SUPER furry. Between him and Frito we are COVERED in dog fur 24/7. As long as everything goes well the next couple of days between the two of them, Snickers will be a part of our forever family. I don't anticipate anything going wrong, but I am keeping my eye out. They have pretty much played together until they can't play anymore....

Quilt Fabric via mail

I love shopping online. I can't think of many things that are more exciting than getting a package. (Not really true, but something that would happen on any NORMAL day....) So when I had to order my fabric for my charm square quilt that I messed up, I was a bit excited. So excited I ordered some dinosaur charm squares and the ones I wanted for a Valentine's Day quilt I have planned....for Feb 2012. :) So ANYWAY....I ordered it from this place online I had never heard of called The Quilted Castle. It was awesome. They had everything I needed (and then some!). The search engine worked great. And the shipping is $5 (I think...) to ANYWHERE. Even Alaska! AH! I was SO excited when I realized that even after putting in my address the shipping price didn't go up. And it was pretty fast....about a week. It comes from OR, so not that far away. Amazing. I would definitely check it out if you have some extra cash to burn. The only gripe I had is that there weren't enough pictures. I ordered the charm packs based on the fact that I liked to fabric on top...the other ones turned out to be great too, but it would be nice to see more pictures of the different fabrics. Some of them had other pics...not all though. One small thing in the overall wonderful picture. And it came packaged with my invoice and a nice handwritten "Thank You". I like when I can tell my things have been packed by an actual human and not a machine.

Holy Crap! CLOUDS!

So the past 10 or so days (it has felt like a MILLION) have been sub-zero. The temperature around my house has been hovering around -15*F. When walking the dog, I feel like my nose is getting frost bite. But today, on the way home, I saw the most GLORIOUS sight....clouds. That means the warmer (I would be happy for it to be 0!) air will be held closer to the ground and alas...maybe it will warm up. I think even Frito is getting tired of the cold, which I wasn't sure was possible.

I've never been so happy to see clouds.

Husbands

Are weird. Mine likes to ask me weird trick questions like "On a scale of 1 to 10 how excited would you say you are to be married to me on an average day?" What? Ok. So I say 8. I think that is pretty good. Most days I'm more excited, but some days I want to punch him in the face...so 8 would be a pretty good average. Or so I think. He says..."That hurts. I'm a 12 to be married to you." OF COURSE...it was a trick question. I was supposed to say 15 or something. So now he has been trying to "move up" from an 8. He has been walking the dog for me in the morning (probably more for my safety than anything...he knows I would lay down and freeze to death) and then today I came home to some beautiful flowers for no reason.


I wonder what would have happened if I said 7....

First Day

Back at school. It wasn't too bad....only a one glass of wine night. I started a unit on communication in my Study Skills class which worked REALLY well in one period and made me want to claw my eyes out in another. My last period is just such a whiny bunch. I don't want to do this....can't we take it easy, it is the first day of school....I have homework to work on....we have to do a science project?!?...AHH the list goes on. If they spent half of that energy working instead of whining they would do a lot better in school.

My parents came home last night. It is nice to just have one dog in the house again. Not that I can't have two dogs, but I would like a bigger dog. Maverick barks too much about silly things. I think Frito misses Maverick though. My poor giant puppy. He is so sensitive.

Last Day

So today is my last day of winter break. I had a bit of a breakdown last night about how I didn't want to go back to work. But now that it is not the middle of the night, I don't feel so bad about it. Sure, I will miss getting up at 9 and taking three naps throughout the day....but I can go to work. I didn't get as much accomplished as I should have (no surprises there!) and last night I messed up one of my charm square quilts. I had to order some more fabric online...I just hope it comes in time for me to get it finished and up on the wall of the shop since it is supposed to be a class. I have to head to my parents house and clean up a few things before we go get them at the airport. Hopefully it warms up soon!

Slippers and Pillows!

I decided I should wrap up some of the projects that have been lying around my house for far too long. When making my puzzler quilt I ended up with two extra blocks that I wanted to turn into pillows. So I got that completed today. Took me about 30 mins and now I have two beautiful pillows on my couch. I also finished my dads slippers. They are in the washer now being felted. Pictures of the felted ones later...