Summer Becomes Autumn

Just this past Friday, I fully embraced Fall.  Before that, there were a few days of feeling it in the air followed by a few days of resisting, digging my heels in the mud, and general refusing to acknowledge the season that follows is winter. Something inside of me feels that the only way to slow its approach is to exist fully in the present.  So here I am,  welcoming the new season with an open heart, fed fat from the splendid Alaskan summer.

Dave and I are realizing the newest of our Autumn traditions - having progressed from apples and foliage to green chilies and hot air balloons, we arrive in blueberries. Tart and addictive :)

(blueberry picking in Whittier near Portage Glacier, the bay leads to Prince William Sound)

The tundra displays autumn vibrantly, our first glimpse this weekend while backpacking and exploring Hanging Valley.

End of summer picture wrap-up:

Running on the Upper Winner Creek trail in Girdwood.




Lost Lake Trail Run in Seward - view on the trail and me at the finish line!

A morning harvest from our garden

The Alaska State Fair!  The giant cabbages are the talk of the town. This one weighed 64.5 pounds.

What a handsome devil!

farming

On August 1st we went on a Matanuska - Susitna Valley (Mat-Su Valley) Farm Tour.  A bus took us (Dave, me and our friend Waverly) and 40 other folks to 3 different vegetable farms, a bison ranch and the only active creamery in Alaska .  We got some good ideas, ate good food and had a great day seeing an amazingly beautiful area of Alaska.   New on my list to grow next year: turnips and kohlrabi, both SOOO good raw!  We learned a lot about the history of farming in Alaska as well as the current challenges faced by farmers.  There is so much that goes on behind the scenes economically, politically, and socially!  It really made me want to be more active in the local agriculture movement than just buying produce at the farmers market :o)

This farm was by far my favorite - it was beautiful, organic and cozy/homey feeling.

This farm is a you-pick farm that does a lot of great education for school kids and sells it's produce at a half that at the grocery store! (the pic below is a potato patch tiller!)

This is the bison ranch, also where we had a delicious lunch of local beef stew, mixed green salad, homemade rolls, strawberry juice (!) and rhubarb strawberry hand pies (OMG!).  The view was breathtaking.

The creamery was our next stop.  Although they do not sell products direct to the consumer, they do sell at multiple local grocery stores.  We now buy their milk!  YUM!!!

Our last stop was a larger farm that does sell some produce to some of the local grocery stores and is the largest farm in the Mat-Su Valley.

Things that made me smile

I'm trying to blog more regularly (um, which might not happen)...
I decided that maybe just sharing a few things from the past week (or so) that made me happy, might make it easier to keep on top of sharing/blogging.

So, here it goes - in random order:

a great early morning run with my puppy dog

 the poppy seeds I planted have started to bloom

 exploring a new trail on another great morning run  

same run... crazy fog made the first half of the run seem like we were in a different world!

my first attempt at nasturtium pesto (also planted from seed and is now flowering! YAY!)

and - the pesto is delicious by the way!

 This handsome man took me for a bike ride and picnic along the Chester Creek and coastal trails...complete with wine, first course, second course and dessert!

 Most of you know I love graffiti...the third sign down made me laugh

Hiking Exit glacier in Seward

This past week we went on a farm tour in the Matanuska Valley and this weekend for an overnight kayak trip to Caines Head in Resurrection Bay.  I'll blog about those soon!

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

The weather this July has been cooler and cloudy... but still no rain. It's good and bad.  I find myself wishing for a good downpour, and then the clearing and sun that follows.  But, all the sky does is threaten.

Our 4th of July staycation was AWESOME!  Besides doing a lot of relaxing, some gardening, coffee drinking and playing with the dogs, we also went to the Girdwood Forest Fair.

 
 We hiked to Rabbit Lake (trail head just a few miles from our house).

After a few year hiatus, we busted out the canoe gear and went canoeing at Eklutna lake (about 45 min north of Anchorage) while our friends kayaked.  First trip in a boat for Chuska.  It took him a bit to settle in... but after about an hour, he fell asleep :o).  It felt sooooo good to get back out on the water that we have started planning future canoe adventures.

This weekend was the Fireweed 400 bike race.  Four of us completed the 100 mile ride (aka - a century ride).  It was a gorgeous day for a ride!  I feel lucky to have great biking partners.  We all worked together so well as a "team".  I don't think I could have done it (happily or at the same pace!) without them.

I spent yesterday relaxing and made my first ever batch of kimchi! I followed a recipe that uses red cabbage instead of napa cabbage (traditionally used). It should be ready (depending how fermented I want it) in anywhere from 3 to 7 days.

I also put some garden rhubarb to use and made a small batch of rhubarb jam.  It has a great puckery taste and is such a beautiful pink!  I can't wait to use leftovers to make thumbprint cookies :)

The Midnight Sun

The Midnight Sun has been as awesome as we were told it would be.  I find myself staying up late (unless I really keep an eye on the time) and therefore wanting to sleep later too.  I started using a face mask to sleep because although I can easily fall asleep with the sun still shining, once it sets and then rises again at 3am, my body wants to wake up.... every hour... until my alarm goes off... wondering what time it is.   The flowers popping up in our yard are putting a big smile on my face and the garden is growing in leaps in bounds.

Although I am still complaining that we can't escape "people", I have started to appreciate the magnitude of the wilderness in Alaska and have found I can find some solitude on the trails in the early morning light.

In June we caught Halibut (with our friends Jessica and Zach) out of a Ninilchik on a fabulously sunny and calm day. This is my very first fish!  A cod... which was instantly cut up for bait... but i was still very excited about it!! There were 6 people on the charter - these Halibut hanging here are the largest we caught.  We went home with 48 pounds of delicious fish!

Six of us rode 125 miles from Anchorage to Seward (80 miles to Summit Lake on Saturday, 45 miles to Seward on Sunday) to raise money for colorectal cancer awareness and screening in the Ride For Life, Alaska. There were a total of around 75 folks that did the ride, raising almost $70,000!  We had cool, overcast days (with rain the last 10 miles), swam in chilly Summit Lake and met some great people and cancer survivors.  I had many thoughts of my Dad on my mind as I rode since he is a survivor!  A BIG THANK YOU to all of you who donated to the cause.

This Tuesday before work my friend Serena, Dave and I rallied for an early morning hike up Little O'Malley Peak.  It was one of those mornings that made us all ask "why don't we do this all the time?". We are so lucky to have the Chugach Mountains out our back door.  It was an "I Love Alaska" type of morning.

We were supposed to go camping in Valdez this weekend for July 4th... but a high of mid 40's and steady rain with lows in the 30's didn't sound quite as appetizing as baking cookies, sleeping late, coffee in our pajamas next to our cozy fireplace, hiking and some day excursions exploring around Anchorage.  And so we say Cheers! to the start of our 4th of July, 4 day "staycation"!

Oh yeah - and this guy graduated from doggie school (not quite sure how)....

You Asked For It...

Lots of folks have been asking us for pictures of our house... so here's a 360 view of our main living area and Dave in the kitchen cooking brunch:

and... our neighbor came around to say hello Friday night...