Lots of family stuff...and a little bit of fun trivia :)

A Tale of Three Stories...

Story 1: A long time ago in the central part of Europe, there lived a bunch of people who believed in witches. From what I can tell, it would have been a horribly scary time and place to live. Anyway, according to popular superstition, a witch could gain control of your soul if she was able to obtain something which was once a part of you- things like blood, hair, fingernails...or teeth. Because of this, people were pretty scared to simply throw these things away. They usually chose to burn it instead. The problem with this method of disposal is that teeth don't always burn that well- they are extremely resilient (which is why dental records are often useful in forensics). So, what do you do when a child loses a tooth? The answer? Bury it. Make sure the hole is deep and it is covered well. The home garden was the preferred location. Over time this tradition continued, although the joint phenomena of urbanization and enlightenment thinking changed it into something entirely different...

Story 2: A long time ago in cultures as far-flung as modern Russia, New Zealand, France, and Mexico, people held the belief in a special kind of "sympathetic magic." This was the magic of transference of some feature from one object to another, and often required some sort of offering and/or prayer or song. For example, it was believed that walnuts could strengthen the brain because they look like brains, that courage or strength could be obtained from some animal as a result of sympathetic links, or that a person could be manipulated through links to a formed sculpture or Voodoo Doll. Anyway, out of this belief there grew a tradition in each of these places for children to place their primary teeth in the opening of a mouse hole as an offering; in return, they would grow a new set of teeth that were stronger (like a rodent's).

Story 3:  A long time ago in Scandinavian countries, the Vikings would go into battle wearing good luck charms. Some of the Old Norse writings suggest that human teeth were sometimes used for these charms, obtained by the warriors by paying for them with a tand-fe', or "tooth fee." The fact that this term has survived lends credibility to this story, although I couldn't find much primary evidence. It is true though, that tand-fe' became a thing in Europe, and that there was a small market for teeth for the making of jewelry.

The Convergence Begins...

Over time, these traditions transformed into the still-popular animal fantasies from other countries such as La Petite Souris in France, or El Ratoncito Perez in Spain. These cute rodents leave prizes or money in exchange for primary teeth. And as this folklore made its way to America, it was cross-pollinated yet again with the tradition of a generic "good fairy" (Also from Europe...we think) to make the modern American version of The Tooth Fairy. The earliest mention of this benevolent pixy was in The Chicago Tribune in 1908, although it wasn't until the 50s/60s that she entered the mainstream consciousness, probably helped along by other Good Fairy motifs of the day such as those in Disney's Cinderella and Pinocchio.

It's funny, isn't it, how a little history can give such insight into a popular childhood superstition?

The rest, as they say, is history. Parents have been lying to their kids ever since. (But it's okay, because 97% of kids end up having either positive or neutral feelings toward this deception. And it's fun. This research has actually been done).
________________________________

As you might have guessed, Evelyn lost her front tooth this week. It was pretty loose for a while, and she finally asked me pull it out one night with pliers (I am a dentist, after all). It came out easy and she did well, but then she refused to follow our suggestion to put it under her pillow. It was a cool tooth, after all! She had many fond memories of using it to eat or bite things with, and immediately recognized its potential as a lifelong memento of her childhood. It wasn't as if she hadn't lost teeth before- she had, and she would keep losing them. But this was her front tooth, and therefore special, and nothing we could say or do could convince her otherwise.

But then, she came up with this idea:

(Click on it to see it large)
Dear, tooth Fairy,
Can you just leave my tooth behind, and still give me money? Because I like my tooth a hole lot, but I also like having money from you, it made me almost cry to think about it in fact I did cry a little in church today. Please leave me a little note tonite that says yes or no.
From: Evelyn

Yes, that is a letter to the tooth fairy. And it turns out that she received a response:

Dear Evelyn,
Thank you for your letter. I am sorry you cried and were sad about the idea of giving away your tooth. Of course you can keep it! Losing a tooth and receiving money from the tooth fairy is about celebrating the fact that you are growing up. You deserve a little celebration. I heard you have a cool tooth, and I would love to have a look at it. Please leave it out tomorrow so I can take a peek. I will leave a surprise and I promise I will not take the tooth. Enjoy the excitement of growing up.
Love,
The T Fairy

Evelyn was so elated by this response that she started thinking a little more deeply about the tooth fairy and decided to do something nice- This note was left under her pillow the following night along with her tooth:

Dear T. Fairy (The period after T is in the shape of a tooth)
This is a oreo. You have to try it. Santa gets treats how come you don't? It is like a smoer, if you even know what a smoer is. it is choclet and marshmelows in it and gramh crakers on the owtsides. But, a oreo is marshmelow flavord stuff on the inside and choklet cookies on both sides. By the way I put a choclet chip on top
Love,
Evelyn

What a thoughtful girl. I'm sure the tooth fairy enjoyed the offering.

Besides Evelyn's new penpal, we have done a few other things this week:

Maren got a haircut. This was not a planned event. It started when we looked over and saw this:

Please notice the pile of hair on the floor behind her as well. Yep- she had given herself a mullet.

A Facebook friend asked "Where did she ever get the idea to cut her own hair?" Answer: You obviously don't have kids. It is a well established fact that all children have the genetic predisposition to drive their parents crazy in whatever way they can. Incidentally, this is also why kids are generally cute...survival.

One hour later we had this:

I think it turned out alright. Remember what I said about being cute?

For family night, we became artists by mixing frosting colors on our palates.

Here are some of the results:

"Primary Explosion"- Rachel

"Displaced"- Logan

"Tree, Mountains, and Sky" -Evelyn

"You Decide" -Jack

Mudgy and Millie had their birthday party! For those who are not aware, Mudgy is a moose, and Millie is a mouse. They are characters in a children's picture book published in September, 2008. The story tells about a fun game of hide-and-seek these friends played all around downtown Coeur d'Alene. Since then, they have been adopted by the community at large as local mascots. At the birthday party we met the author of the book, artist who made the statues found around town, and Mudgy and Millie themselves! We also had cake and played at the park. It was a lot of fun.

Can you tell that our kids got themselves ready? Also, nobody has any idea who the little boy is in the bottom left. I didn't even see him there when I took the picture. Creepy, right? Let's just call him "Maren."

Autumn is here. Leaves are falling, and the long sleeve shirts are coming out. I love it! I love it! I love it! Just thinking about it makes me want hot chocolate.

The kids went on a three mile walk today. Jackson wanted to run. Addy wanted to ride her bike. It's crazy every once in a while when you get these reminders that your kids are always watching you, and that a part of you will always live on in them.

Last but not least...the weekly elephant!

School, Birthdays, and a Bike Race- Eventful week for us!

This is a long post, with lots of pictures and lots of content. Enjoy!

BACK TO SCHOOL

I can't believe that we have 4 kids in school now!

First, we have Evelyn. Evelyn has always been a Daddy's girl, and I am so, so proud of the person she is becoming. I feel like her and I have a special relationship- parents with a lot of kids probably understand what I mean by that. You love all your kids, of course, but you feel naturally drawn to some personalities more than others and over time this makes it so you feel closer to some kids than others. I think this is normal, and with me, Evelyn is that kid. I also really hope that this special bond is strong enough to survive the tumultuous years ahead as her emotions begin to outgrow her body (already starting- ahhhh!). But like I tell her every night, Evelyn is MY. LITTLE.GIRL. No matter what. Even when she's big.

I want to be a: ARTIST
Favorite subject: ART
I Love: MY FAMILY AND PARENTS
Favorite Movie: TEEN TITANS GO! (I have no idea what this is)
Favorite Food: CORN FLAKE CHICKEN & STROMBOLI
I like me because: I AM SMART! 

To be honest, Evelyn is sort of having a hard time in school and it makes me really sad. She is super smart and will do awesome in all her classes, but she tells me she doesn't like doing the same things as her friends so she doesn't like going very much. This makes her feel like she doesn't really have any friends, and sometimes this makes her cry when she is all alone. She says that nobody is mean to her or anything, but she just prefers to spend time on her own and people don't let her. The things she likes most are art, math, reading, and science. The thing she likes least is recess or PE, because they make her go outside and really she just wants to stay in and read books or draw. 

As she was telling me all this I was totally brought back to elementary school in my mind, because the person she was describing was ME when I was her age. I was a quiet kid, and it never bothered me except for when it bothered other people. I have spent many, many recesses at a table in the library with stacks of books. I know what it's like to feel social pressure to like the same things as other people, and I know what it's like to pretend that I am enjoying activities when I really wish I could be somewhere else by myself. I hurt for her right now, because I see that it is hard for her. The best I can do (I think) is to listen and let her know that I think she is totally fine and that I am there for her. 

I also do not worry about her AT ALL. She is a fun and interesting and independent person, and can be totally charming in smaller settings or when she feels like she has control of a situation. This will serve her well, and can even become an asset to her as she gets older. How do I know? Because that's STILL me. Because I still pretend to enjoy large group activities when I wish I could be somewhere else. I still prefer more intimate social settings, and I've grown up enough to know that people are different, and everyone doesn't have to like the same things as the "cool kids." This lesson wouldn't make much sense to a 2nd grader though, because the only social time you have in school is on the playground where everyone seems to be "plugged in" except for you, and it can get very lonely sometimes. Don't worry Ev- I get it. My best advice is to try having fun even when you're outside of your comfort zone, and know that it gets better.

Here's some pictures about Evelyn:

Evelyn requested we do an "Art unit" for Family night. This is from the field trip we took downtown to look at museums and galleries. We also looked at architecture and urban art. Evelyn wants to run a gallery one day, and is most interested in "mixed media."

This is an "abstract" drawing she did as part of our unit.

Fishbowls. The lighting made it hard to take a picture, but there are colorful gummy "rocks" on the bottom too. This was Evelyn's idea for Family Dessert Night. She is so creative!

Evelyn brought these home the other day. She said she always wanted a pet, and since we didn't let her get one she was going to start raising slugs in a jar. Yuck! Thankfully, that phase didn't last long.

Next up, we have Adalie.

I want to be a: INVENTOR
My favorite subject: READING
I love: MY MOM
My favorite movie: FROZEN
My favorite food: CHEEZ-ITS
I like me because: I'M SMART

Addy is super sweet, and sometimes her gentle personality can mean she gets looked over. I am sorry, Addy. With a big family, a lot of parenting seems to be about putting out fires (solving fights, fixing "bonks," trying to keep the house from self-destructing, etc.), and sometime this means that the kids who are not fighting, or bonking, or destroying don't get as much attention as the others. We (parents) try not to let this happen, and I think we usually do a pretty good job, but sometime it is inevitable. I love it though, when you get up early in the morning and sit with me on the couch and we talk about stuff. I love it when you grab my hand when we are hiking and we purposely fall behind other people just so we can be together.

Addy is, in a word, awesome. She was a little bit nervous to start school, but after that first day she never looked back! She is one of those people I have always looked up to- she seems to just excel at everything without even trying. It's not fair! Academic learning seems to come easily for her, she plays well with others in big groups and in small groups, and she is at ease talking to people of all ages. If my instincts are right, then I would guess that she will be popular both with her classmates and with her teachers, and that school will be a time she will look back on with fond memories for her whole life. You go Addy! My sweetie girl is growing up!

Nothing to say about this picture- just a nice picture of Adz.

Background: Addy has this obsession with flying. Did you see how she wanted to be an inventor? The reason for this is that she wants to develop human-powered flight in the form of mechanical wings. It was kind of neat for her then, when she got called on in a magic show at the fair to help with the levitation act. Even though this was about a month ago, she still talks about "that one time when I flew!" 

Now for Jackson:

I want to be a: SUPER HERO
My favorite subject: SCIENCE
I love: DRAGONS & MY DAD
My favorite movie: LION KING
My favorite food: CORNFLAKE CHICKEN
I like me because: I ROCK CLIMB

Jackson is cool. There is no other word for it. He is active and ambitious and curious about the world and not afraid to take chances. At all. This is terrifyingly fun to watch! Jack is the kind of person who will do whatever he wants in life, if for no other reason than the fact that he wants it and won't rest until he has achieved the thing he set his mind to. Does he get frustrated along the way? Oh, yeah. Big time. But this frustration seems to somehow fuel his own persistence and desire to succeed. It's almost like he has to prove to himself that he can do things- not in spite of their difficulty, but because of it. He has this crazy internal motivation that just does not allow him to stop. I am so impressed with the things Jackson does- not for their own sake, but for the patience and practice that often go into them.

The hardest thing for his teachers is going to be directing his considerable excitement in a direction that will lead to success at school. The problem with being so intense, like Jackson is, is that things that fall outside the center of his focus tend to disappear altogether. So...how to turn his mind to things like homework? You tell me. If that can be done though, then there will be no stopping this guy.

Jack got a basketball hoop for his birthday. He practices every day, and it is hard for us to get him to come in for dinner. He even wanted to skip cake one night so he could stay out and practice longer! It certainly wasn't me, but somewhere (champ camp, I think) he became very interested in the variety of skills needed in basketball- not just shooting. To his chagrin, other kids his age don't seem to care as much about these "details" like ball handling or defense. He is getting pretty good at dribbling the ball, and loves practicing his passes. He is a pretty good shot too. Could it be that we have a future point guard in our midst?

A preying mantis we found in our yard. Jack was the first to touch him and the bug attacked him! After that, Jack was still the only one who would let it crawl on him.

And finally, Maren:

I want to be: A MERMAID
My favorite subject: MERMAIDS AND SEAWEED
I love: MY MOM AND DAD
My favorite movie: FROZEN
My favorite food: FISH STICKS
I like be because: I'M CUTE!

Maren is a darling, and she knows it. There is something about the timbre of her voice that simply endears her to people, her Papa included. The hardest thing with her, I think, is that she is aware of the effect she has on people for better or for worse. She know how to be cute, just to get an emotional reaction out of people. And she does this extremely well. But she also knows how to draw reactions by being obnoxious, or loud, or quiet. Sometimes I think that she has super powers- not to read minds, but to control or manipulate them through her own actions. Her timing is so perfect, it's scary.

Maren is starting preschool this year and is very excited. She says that her teacher is funny, and she is very proud to have her very own backpack just like the older kids.

Maren has developed a strong liking for elephants. This has become our thing at church- she asks me to draw "funny elephants," and she gives me input along the way. It also serves the utilitarian purpose of keeping her quiet. These are a few of our creations.

BIRTHDAY PARTY

Adalie and Jackson's first day of school coincided with their birthday! This meant that they got started on the right foot with their classmates by bringing cupcakes for everyone (don't worry, we talked with their teacher ahead of time to make sure this would fit in with their first-day-of-school plans). 

We had the party later that weekend, and I think everyone had a good time. Six years- they are getting so big!

They spent a lot of time decorating these cupcakes. They are each different, and each cupcake has a story that goes with it.

At the party we made animals out of pipe cleaners. Here's Addy's horse and my blue lizard.

Castle pinata.

Jack with his cake- Rachel dubbed this "Pops, the middle aged dragon." He's a little overweight and saggy in the eyes, but I guess that just provides a nice contrast to Addy and Jackson's vivacity? At least the kids liked eating it!

Bike Race

You may remember that a few weeks ago Rachel rode in a local bike race. This weekend she did another one- a regional race this time in Spokane, with a lot more prestige and sponsored organization behind it. This one was a 50 miler, and after driving the course last weekend Rachel has been a huge bundle of nerves. There were a LOT more hill climbs than expected, and she wasn't sure that she would be able to hit her target time. Well- she did, and came in exactly on schedule with her goal. Go Rachel! I am so proud.

The obligatory spaghetti dinner the night before

She made it, and she made it in style! The kids and I are so proud of her.

Well...there's not a whole lot more to write. Here are a few more random pictures I have to share.

You may have heard about the wildfires and Washington and N. Idaho. Yeah- this is what it looked like around here for weeks (That is not fog).

After it rained for a few days, this is what it looked like. Much better. Rain is good.

I often walk here on my lunch-break. What a gorgeous place we live in!

Rachel trying to show the kids that the bug was harmless. They didn't buy it.

Have a good week!

Love of my life

My Alaskan cruise experience would not be complete without mentioning this guy:

When this picture was taken we had no idea what was in store for us.  I did not realize how lucky I was to be marrying this handsome man. I love looking at this picture and thinking about how much both of us have changed, grown into ourselves, and discovered each other.

One of the many things I adore about Logan is how awesome of a dad he is!  I loved hearing updates from home about the many adventures he had taken the kids on.  He did an awesome job and he had a fun time doing it.  I arrived home on a Sunday afternoon to find the house completely cleaned, the lawn mowed and beautifully green, the kids happy, and Logan putting the finishing touches on a nice Sunday dinner.  Did I mention that this guy is Super Dad?

Lets rewind the clock to 2007... We began this blog to share information about ourselves for our family and friends as we set across the country for dental school in Cleveland.  Since that time this collection of our life stories has become our official journal as we print them yearly and add them to our growing collection of "The Hazard Chronicles" yearbooks. Back in the beginning it was easy to update every week and keep everyone informed of what was going on in our lives and we fluidly took turns writing our adventures. As time went on life seemed to get a little bit busier... imagine that.  Life became a bit overwhelming and the blog was carefully and lovingly placed on a backburner.  This is when Logan volunteered to become the main writer to keep our stories alive.  Thank you, my Love, for doing such an amazing job keeping our story going.

There is, in fact, another naturally occurring effect of Logan writing the blog every week.  He has opportunities to brag about me, but I rarely have the same....  It is my turn.



When this picture was taken I knew a little bit more about the drive that my husband has to learn and experience the world.  This was taken the month after graduation at BYU.  Logan's final semester was filled with 27 (yes 27) credits of advanced science classes of which he aced each one (somehow while balancing two jobs and plenty of time with me!).  Two of these classes were graduate level courses that he needed to receive special permission to take "just because."

"Life is amazing! I wish I could experience and learn everything about everything. I should probably get started now if I am going to even scratch the surface!" -Logan

OK. He didn't actually say that, but he totally could have!  Those words exemplify him in every way. I have been thinking about this blog for a long time and trying to figure out how to include everything that I want to include.  I have decided that the best way to get a broad picture of Logan is to write down some of his activities since the beginning of the year.

As a reflection of the above quote, Logan really does want to learn a little bit about everything.  He is constantly creating 'courses' for himself in different topics.  Each of these topics involves multiple books and online college courses, as well as written assignments and reports.  He is always enrolled in at least one online college course (he is currently enrolled in two).  This year a few of his topics have been: foreign affairs in Iraq and Iraqi history, micro economics, macro economics, a fascinating in depth study of Hitler and Nazi Germany, and he is currently doing individual studies on the major world religions.  Logan has really motivated me in this area and we are currently taking a course together online titled "Public Policy Challenges of the 21st Century." We study the units separately and then we come together for an evening date on the deck to discuss and debate what we have learned.

A bit should be said about the books that Logan has read this year. He is currently reading book number thirty-one. These books have been a good mix of fiction and non-fiction, and a good many of them have numbered over 500 pages.  Some of his favorites include: "Long Walk to Freedom," "Mistakes were Made (But not by Me)," "Guns, Germs, and Steel," and "The Brothers Karamazov." Along with these books he makes it a point to read the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, CDA Press, and Idaho Statesman every day (he really does- I "test" him every few months and I am impressed with the diversity of subjects he is constantly informed about). News is definitely written with a slant, and it is good to get it from a variety of sources to maintain a balance of views, right?

Physical goals are also important to Logan.  He makes it a point to run at least 35 miles each week, and he does it at a pace that should merit the respect of almost any runner out there. This past year he has spent a lot of time rock climbing.  He is one of the best (maybe the top) climbers at the Kroc Center, and he has met a lot of other climbers and really enjoys his time there. The rock climbing staff is constantly setting climbs specifically for him, and I believe the current climb in his honor is a 12b titled "Logan's Run.".  Of course he is almost always the one to get the first ascent of these routes. It must also be mentioned that Logan (according to him) is currently in the best physical shape of his life.  He has been consistently flashing 5.12's and he has red-pointed 5.13a's.

As winter comes it is natural that he would move indoors, and what better thing to do than to practice the guitar?  During the winter he works out at the Kroc and spends part of his early morning doing self created courses for guitar.  I have been impressed with some of the pieces he has perfected over the past year. I can request virtually any song from him and after about 20 minutes he will astound me with a beautiful acoustic finger-style rendition of my song. Lately, he has taken to exploring the many possibilities of the electric guitar and it it clear that he finds a lot of joy and fulfillment in his music. I love listening to him play!  He has a gift that he has honed.

Logan has also been loving his career with Loftus!  He is especially doing really well in the oral surgery field of his career. This has been an area of focus for him since dental school, and he loves the more advanced procedures like impacted wisdom teeth, implants, bone grafts, and gum grafts. Besides this, he has become the go-to doctor in the practice for Invisalign, and is one of the main organizers for community outreach programs that the practice does. In short, he is loving where he is working and is enjoying his rapidly growing and loyal patient base.  He also enjoys working with the team and interacting with the other dentists.

Our spiritual journeys have been a little bit tumultuous over the past 3-4 years.  We both feel that this is an important piece of the puzzle when it comes to balancing our lives and raising our family.  We have found a wonderful church family where we feel that this part of the puzzle has come together for us.  We are setting down roots and balancing our lives with weekly attendance and activities at First Presbyterian CDA (PCUSA affiliated).

For me, the most important goal I have is to strive to remain balanced.  This balance includes: family time, mom time, wife time, me time, friend time, fitness time, professional time, educational time, and spirituality.  All of these categories are important to me, and I have often turned down good things because I could feel that the balance was off a bit.  I feel that when everything is balanced is when I can excel in each area because they definitely play off of each other.

Logan is a great example to me of finding this precarious balance.  So far I have shared little bits and pieces from his professional, personal, educational, spiritual, and physical.........  These alone are pretty impressive, but it just gets better when you add the amazing job he does with the husband and dad roles.

I must say that my favorite part of this balance is that Logan is an excellent husband!  He is my best friend and I love that we talk about EVERYTHING together.  Every night is a date night and we definitely take advantage of this time together... from dates on the deck (a pretty common occurrence), to Seahawks games on the projector, to talking deep into the night, to reading our book together (probably number 168 or something like that), to an occasional movie.  We definitely take advantage of the time we have after the kids are asleep.  On top of all of that time we make it a priority to go on an out-of-the-house date night at least 3 times a month.  Some of our favorites are: bike rides, festivals, any kind of live music, rock climbing (we actually need to do this together more often!), Broadway plays, walks downtown, hikes, etc. There is always something fun to do where we live.  I love this place! Logan is my favorite person on earth and I love just being with him.

As if that wasn't enough, Logan is an awesome dad!  Every Monday he has a "Papa Day" with all of the kids while I work in the afternoon.  He seems to always have something fun planned to do with them.  We follow Papa day with Family Night.  I love family night!  We have a lot of fun traditions that I hope our kids will treasure as much as I do.  Saturdays are "sacred" in our home because we make it a point to schedule a family activity.  Sundays are one of my favorite days because we have church in the morning, family dessert night (each of us take turns rotating and doing this one-on-one with each kid), and we try to do a family activity on Sunday night as well (family walk, family dance, or something else).  Aside from these weekly things it is also important for us to take each child on special one-on-one dates with us.

With all of this craziness Logan also somehow manages to clean the house early in the morning because he knows a clean house is good for my sanity, keep the lawn green and beautiful, and have a wonderfully positive can-do attitude.  Did I mention that I love this guy!

If you ever think there are simply not enough hours in the day you can ask Logan how he manages. He will probably begin his response by telling you to wake up at 5 am every morning.  Ummm. No thanks, I will try and make do with the limited hours and enjoy that extra hour of sleep...

"Logan, my love, I can not tell you how thankful I am for our little infinity. I wouldn't trade it for the world."

My Alaskan Cruise

I feel lucky that I have such a variety of opportunities presented to me through my profession as a sign language interpreter.  That is a fancy way of saying I have an awesome job that allows me to get paid to go cool places like on an Alaskan cruise. This fabulous job also comes with a lot of confidentiality rules, so lets just say that sometime in the recent past I sailed with Connie, my friend from Sorenson and team interpreter, up the coastline to Alaska.

I was amazed by the "people herding" skills of the cruise lines at the Vancouver port.  People streamed flawlessly through numerous lines and checkpoints for a variety of cruise companies.  Connie and I arrived at the front of the first line only to be surprised with the news that our cabin had been upgraded! We were in a balcony suite on nearly the top floor!  This is unheard of for interpreters.  They are generally resigned to the deep dark bowels of the ship (which I wouldn't complain about on a cruise where I am working), but given the opportunity I would take the balcony any day!

For any of you who have been to Alaska you know that it is a rainforest and therefore a very RAINY place. In the days prior to the cruise I kept an eye on the weather for the ports where we would be stopping.  The days varied between 70-100 percent chance of rain.  Oh well.  I figured it would still be great.  The weather turned out to be absolutely beautiful for the entire time (aside from rain on the morning of our Juneau port.  As the ship docked the sun peeked out and gave us sunshine and beauty in one of the prettiest places I have ever seen (more about that later).

I checked off everything on my wildlife list (except for a bear, but I have seen one of those before).  I saw the northern lights in the distance, humpback whales, a large pod of orca whales, a few dolphin pods, seals, and an expanse of ocean covered completely by jumping salmon.

The client went on a five hour whale watching excursion, and of course we were able to go with him. We were lucky to catch a group of seven our eight humpback whales hunting together.  I learned that there has to be a female present for a group to be able to hunt.  She swims in a circle and creates a bubble ring that traps a school of fish inside, then she makes a sound as loud as a jet engine that confuses the fish.  The other whales are then able to swim up through the tunnel and eat the confounded fish.  Every 3-4 minutes we would notice birds circling a particular area, next a bubble ring would appear, then the whales would surface together in the circular area.  We watched this process seven or eight times at varying distances from our boat.  Such a wonder of nature!  On the boat we had a tour guide who was enamored by the wildlife and you could tell he loved every minute of his job!  Here are a few quick facts that I learned that may come in helpful for trivia one day:

• The tide in Juneau comes in and out every 6 1/2 hours.  When we went on our bus ride to the dock there was an area that was about 300 yards wide that was full of mud and had a steam of water through the center.  On our way back to the ship the water reached the edge of the road.  
• Alaska generally gets over 100 inches of snow, but last year they ony had 24 for the entire winter!
• A whale tail is the strongest muscle in the animal kingdom.
• starfish can regenerate even after they have died.
• starfish are full of sea water and that is why they have their rounded shape.
• Bald eagles can be 3-4 feet tall with a wingspan of 6-7 feet.
• a mouthful of food for a humpback whale contains 1/2 million calories.  Humpback whales eat almost 24/7 during their summer stay in Alaska.

While on the ship we received our interpreting schedule in the morning that included the events and activities that the client wanted to participate in.  The time not spent interpreting was our time to spend however we pleased.  I enjoyed many evening entertainment shows, time in the hot tub, walking around at ports, a little bit of reading, enjoying the delightful buffet, and I even kept up on my cycling training schedule in the gym.  

On the last day of the cruise I discovered the Constellation lunge.  This room spanned the entire front of the ship and offered floor to ceiling window views.  On the first day I noticed a table selling binoculars to the passing cruise guests.  My reaction was that it was an expensive tourist trap that would never be used.  As I sat in the constellation lounge watching the changing scenery I would occasionally glance around and covet the binoculars of the other passengers...

I must also mention that every night we ate dinner with the same wonderful group of people.  I feel very fortunate to have had such a great time.

I think the best way to tell the rest of the story is through pictures.

Connie was a great team and she was a fun friend to have around!  I miss my buddy!

Spoiled rotten with our balcony... This is an early morning picture that just can't quite capture the feeling of serenity and loveliness.

Our first port was Icy Strait Point.

This was the only time we needed warm weather gear.  We were on our way to see the Hubbard Glacier.

My artistic photo of the glacier.  The sun was shining off of the face and apparently it is very abnormal to even see the sun when you are near the glacier.  Often the mountain in the background is completely covered by low lying clouds.

These were my two favorite pictures from whale watching.

Juneau was an amazing town perched on the side of a mountain.  If you look closely you can see a few waterfalls behind me.  I could seriously live here.. If it wasn't Alaska.

We traveled through the inside passage for most of the trip.  Roughly translated this means surrounded on both sides with beautiful hills and astonishing mountains.  If you look closely you can find waterfalls, seals, sea lions, and bears near the shores as you sail through.