Bear Butt... not Bare Butt!

Our trip to Alaska resulted in hundreds of photographs - the scenery was breathtaking! We spent three days in Seattle before our cruise; were able to spend time with Bren and Sawyer as well as Daphne!John & Daphne in front of the (ABC) gum wall. - yeah, gross - but actually very pretty if you don't touch it!


One of thousands of icebergs we saw cruising up Tracy Arm Fjord. The scenery was awesome!



Mendenhall Glacier and the Disney cruise ship. The Disney ship was much smaller (and willing to risk life & limb of their passengers?) so they could get much closer than we could.


On our stop in Skagway, we did a scenic drive - highly recommend! We were able to stop the bus anytime we saw something, the driver was awesome and pointed out all of the sights and let us take as many pictures as we wanted. This was Emerald Lake which was located in the Yukon of Canada. The green color was caused by the silt from the glaciers.


One of many waterfalls (and yes it was cold - well at least for a girl from Arizona it was cold!)


Snow capped mountains, lakes, and trees as far as you could see!


Our next stop was in Juneau where we did a raft trip. We started out in a lake at the base of Mendenhall Glacier and rafted down about 6 miles of "rapids" - they weren't very rapid - but it was very beautiful.

John & I at dinner the first night of the cruise.


In Ketchikan we caught a lumberjack show (go ahead and sing it... you know you want to... I'm a Lumberjack and I'm okay....) It was very funny and it was amazing what these guys could do with an axe/saw.

And Now as the title stated.... Bear Butt! This was on our scenic tour in Skagway - this "little" guy was just walking right down the middle of the street. I was sitting on the opposite side of the bus and therefore *I* was only able to get a picture of his butt. Luckily John was able to catch this one for us! :-)

Absolute Delight?

Jackson turns one next week and we celebrated his birthday a little early. Can you see the absolute sheer delight on this little boys face eating his cake?

July 2010

Jackson's first time swimming...

Daisy supervising...?

Our trip to the cabin outside of Christopher Creek


Some of the wildlife we spotted.

Wild turkey

Deer

Coming back from the park in Payson - guess we must have tuckered 'em out huh?

Fun day with the family

Robin and Nikolai joined us for a fun day. We spent hours visiting and having fun with our youngest family members.

Here is Nikolai peeking between the slats of the chair.

Jackson "watching" Uncle Jay's telephone.

Jackson laughing at G.G.

Nikolai just plain 'ol being cute!

Nikolai will be 11 months old on the 11th and Jackson will be 3 months old on the 13th.

Here are three of my grandsons... Ryan, Daniel & Nikolai playing with the plethora of toys at G.G.'s house.

Old friends and new memories...

I spent the last week reconnecting with friends at my 30th high school reunion. It was a lot of fun. I missed seeing Dennise, Cindy and Kamei... and especially Claudia, may she rest in peace.


After the reunion, John and I drove to California for a four day cruise to Mexico. We spent the day shopping in Avalon (Catalina Island).





Tuesday morning I woke up early and went out onto our balcony where I was treated by a whale surfacing about 10 yards aft of where I was standing. We were able to watch the whale as "he" swam off.


We spent the day at the beach in Ensenada Mexico. The water was freezing but the sand was spectacular and the company was even better.




Then to finish out the wonderful week we spent two partial days at Disneyland/California Adventure riding rides and pretending we weren't really old enough to have just attended our 30th reunion ;-)

The week came to a close all too quickly but I wouldn't trade any of the memories.

Welcome Little One...

Weighing in at 8 lbs, 1 oz - welcome to Jackson Thomas Vanderpool. Born to Lindsay and Peter on April 13th.

New Year and a New Job!

Ok so the pay and the hours suck, but the title is the right one. I interviewed and was given a part-time job at Home Depot as a Kitchen/Bath designer.

So instead of doing this for myself ... I actually get to get paid to do it. Definitely a step in the right direction.