Christmas & New Years

I didn't spend much time on the computer (with the exception of the times I had to work) while my friends were here but we had some good fun and I had some new 'firsts' while they were here...

first Christmas celebrating with little Avery (for me) since bringing her back from China...

Max giving kisses to Travis for his special plane

Austin

Anna & Rebecca

Avery with her new baby

Duncan's first Christmas in Alaska

Travis chopping onions...

There is a ski resort about an hour away from Anchorage and we all decided to go skiing...but rather than taking multiple cars, we all got to ride together in the "Magic Bus"...

first time riding the "Magic Bus"...

 courtesy of this guy... (thank you Travis)

to go do this....

 for the first time in Alaska...(me in blue, Rebecca & Travis)

This is the Alyeska Resort...it was a beautiful day to ski, the sun actually came out, and we had some great views of the mountain range and water below (you can see the water behind us in the upper left part of the photo).  I hadn't been skiing in several years but it comes back to you quickly and the snow was great.  And before today, I thought "The North Face" was just an apparel company...



Alyeska actually has a 'North Face' that I almost foolishly went down... :)

I didn't want to ride back to Anchorage in an ambulance, so I quickly backtracked and stuck w/ the blue runs...

We took turns visiting each others homes for different meals...one night was at the Smith's for fresh king crab legs direct from Dutch Harbor...

ready to go in the pot...

first time learning how to cut into those crab legs...I broke the handle on the scissors I was using

I don't know of anything that wouldn't taste good dipped in melted garlic butter...and these were no exception!

New Years Eve was hosted by Rebecca & Travis...

lots of good food...

first time getting to try Borscht, a traditional Russian soup made from beets...it actually was very tasty, unfortunately I didn't get a picture of it.

the kids had a good time with their light sabers

there were paper lanterns everyone wrote their wishes for 2012 on and then we released them into the sky...

Aidan is ready to launch one of the lanterns...

And finally, some fireworks to shoot off at midnight - fireworks aren't really any fun here for the 4th of July because it doesn't get dark enough to see them, so they are more of a big deal for New Years...

We only had one close call where the fireworks shot off horizontally instead of vertically and almost hit the neighbor's house. 

My friends have returned to Russia, so the house has quieted down...however, I have one visitor remaining...my mom is now here for a few days, my first 'official' visitor...so far, she has been treated to lots of snow. :)

My 'unofficial' gift from Travis was a new snowblower...he took care of all snow removal while they were here, so I had a reprieve for a couple of weeks...but they left early Friday morning...and I've already 'gotten' to use it twice...it works great though...I've cut down my snowblowing time to about 1/2 my original time of 3 hrs...