Icebergs

Spring at the beach includes Icebergs!  I'm sure they are not Titanic-sinking icebergs (though there may be that kind further out, I don't know), but they are user-friendly, kid-manageable (and manhandle-able), and quite picturesque:

Each year I've been here is different, as far as what order things happen, and when things happen.  But basically the beach is covered with snow and ice, and the ice pack extends far out over the ocean. How far, I don't know, as it's not part of my experience. I think that varies year to year as well.  But at some point, the ice pack that covers the ocean breaks off and floats farther out to sea, to eventually break up and melt, while the snow and ice that covers the beach is slowly eaten away by each tide coming up.

The weekend before last, I made it down to the beach on my skis, which is farther than I've gone yet this year. I liked thinking of it in this way: I skied to the edge of the North American Continent!  (Don't tell Colin and Julie Angus that, I'm sure they would feel one-upped.... ha ha, right, they are only the first people to circumnavigate the world using only human power (rowing, skiing, bicycling).

 Anyway, the dogs had a good time playing King of the Iceberg:

 And Fancy had to jump on and off, on and off each one:

I think Fancy calved that one with her nose! And then they got so hot they partially destroyed one rolling around on it to cool themselves down:

So this past weekend, I decided I had to bring the girls down, as I knew they would have so much fun with  some iceberg play:

 

 

You thought you saw everything in this picture, didn't you?  Well, look again.....

Eeek!  But that isn't even as creepy as this one, that kind of seems like Iris has found a child trapped in ice:

Then Esther decided to use it as her "unicorn":

 Yeah, good times. :) 

Some of the ice formations are really interesting:

Above is ice that seems to have just slid off it down onto the beach. Interesting. There was kind of a lot of that ice around -- on the tops of tide pools and such, where it was just-congealed slush, not hard enough to be ice, yet still holding together. I wonder if there is a name for that kind of ice?

And there's a chance to see cool critters in tidepools:

I haven't ever seen this kind of jellyfish before, and it was way cooler than the camera could capture.  The stripes were kind of iridescent, and I could see little cilia moving like dominoes down those stripes.  Then Draco came and put his paw in the middle of it and I think it got traumatized, because the cilia stopped moving. *sigh*

Yes, we hunt for eggs in the snow....

So when folks ask me about our life in Alaska, a lot of times they follow up stories with, "And you do all that in the snow?" Yes. Our snow lasts a long time, all the way into June most years. So we have to do a lot of stuff in the snow -- Including Easter Egg Hunts!  Well, I guess it might be re-named "Easter Egg Race" since there is little hunting skill required for eggs scattered across a flat expanse of snow.  A co-worker joked that leaving the eggs white would actually create more of a challenge -- maybe we'll have to consider this in years to come. :)

Esther and Iris are awaiting the start of the "hunt"

The colored specks are the eggs laid out.

It definitely gets a good turnout, and this was just the younger age group!

Tuluk is helping Esther find good ones.

Iris's auntie Vicky helped her score some.

Esther's loot -- it's hard to see, but inside one of the eggs was one of those new gold dollar coin pieces. There were also eggs with candy pieces inside, and two with tickets for:

Easter Baskets Prizes! We gave one of the baskets away to a child who didn't find an egg with a ticket.

Easter Beauties! 

Finally! An evening at the Beach

Even though I knew this year wouldn't be the most hard-core we've ever camped, since Iris is so young, I am disappointed at how long the snow has kept us from the beach and tundra. But it's also given me time to take care of projects in the house (like dealing with the fact that I pretty much stuffed everything extraneous in all the closets all year while I was working and taking care of lil' girls), and just being out of work and not having a set schedule has been so relaxing and such a relief that I've just been enjoying life -- and being thankful for the time we CAN get outside. We have our whole lives for hard core camping; we can be laid-back, take each day as it comes, and enjoy our family time no matter where it happens. The beach on June 3:

That said, we had a gorgeous beach evening this week. For Hooper Bay, it was an amazing mix of conditions: in the 50's and sunny (it's amazing how balmy that feels after weeks of 32 degrees and sleet), no wind (that never happens!), and yet still too early for mosquitos. It was Iris's first time on the beach on the outside of my body, and her dad named her after the ocean for her Yup'ik name, so he set her up on his knee and talked to her about her namesake. We watched 4 spotted seals diving and popping up very near to shore, hunting herring. Neat!
Esther and cousin Jasmine, Fancy and Draco, cavorted over the beach and dunes, squealing and woofing in delight, respectively. Fun, fun. Iris tried to figure out if she likes crawling over tundra:Hopefully this week the weather gets warmer (though Yup'ik tradtion says not to think about it, hope for it, expect it, or count on it, because that kind of arrogance, thinking that we have any sort of control over the natural world with our hopes and expectations, will NOT be rewarded. So I'm carefully stating that it would be great if the weather got nicer (that's why Yup'ik people speak conditionally about just about everything ("IF he comes," "IF I go," etc) and then I'm going to forget it and just see what happens). And if the weather decides to be cold and rainy for the next three weeks till we start our summer travels, my closets sure will be organized, and that will be refreshing and fulfilling too. :)

It's a Moth!

Yesterday morning, May 14, I awoke to see fluttering in the long-silent caterpillar cage: the creature had emerged from its cocoon! And it was a moth, a black and tawny brown moth. I had almost given up on it, because it had crawled under the soil in its cage so long ago, and there had been no activity for weeks and weeks. I was thinking, "When do we know if it's dead? When do we just empty the cage and declare it a loss?" Well, I'm glad I was just waiting to see, because it actually worked! We actually gave a little caterpillar a chance at life on the tundra. And I'm pretty sure it will be bird food within three seconds of letting it go, since there are about a million birds on the pond near our house....oh well, feeding the food chain is a good thing, too! :)

Here is a picture of when we first saw it, when Esther and I first woke up (so she looks sleepy):Here is a picture of when we let it go, just seconds before it fluttered(too quickly to catch a picture of it!) away into the warm afternoon:Yay experiments!

Esther went Manuqing!

Now she's done things that her mom has never even done! For some reason, I have never gotten out ice fishing. I think it's just that this time of year is always so busy with the end of school that I just never get out there. But Tuluk took Esther out while I was in school and Iris was with a family friend -- and she caught over 20 smelt (which, those of you who smelt-fished on Lake Michigan when we were kids, those smelt have nothing on these! These smelt are nice-sized fish). And they taste so rich! Iris loved her first smelt, opening her mouth wide for more. :)

Here are some pictures of my lil' Yup'ik girl on the ice:

Wild Spring Snow

The snow this year is pretty wild. Although I am a bit bummed that, by April 12, it hasn't really started to melt yet (meaning it will be here at least as long as it was last spring, end of May), it is pretty cool to walk around and see how deep the snow is. So here it is... aka How deep is the snow? Let me count the ways:

#1: It is deep enough that this house, on the old side of town, is completely buried. The residents have dug a stairwell down into the snow, then a tunnel, to reach the doorway.And from the inside out:

#2: It is possible to stand on a roof next to a chimney without ever walking UP a drift -- just walking ground(ha)-level:

#3: Esther can even dunk!

#4: Esther can climb to the top of the monkey bars without help:

#5: We had to revise the fire escape plan for the classrooms that are supposed to go out the school's back steps:

And for your viewing pleasure, here are some pictures of my Easter Belles:("Mom, do I really have to wear the hat?")

And also of the girls finding their baskets and eggs that the Easter Bunny hid in our living room:Crawling to find eggs:Yeeppp -- Straight into the mouth! Eeesh.