I'm over a month behind, so I'm trying to catch up. Here is Days 104 through 110, mid April, the beginning of our beautiful Spring weather and the melting of the snow here in Anchorage.

( pictures past the click )

I had to work Saturday (as always), and since Monday is my normal day off, I get today off for Memorial Day weekend. It has been a nice weekend. A fun hike, good relaxation, a roommate's birthday, I made a moderately successful ice cream cake, and a lovely chance to just chill.

This next batch of photos is from my Kansas City trip.
( year of photos: day 96 to 103 )

Today was so beautiful, sixty-five degrees. One of the first really beautiful days, most of this week has been increasingly beautiful. I happily ran a library errand today if only to spend an extra twenty minutes in the sunshine driving around the city. People were walking in the park, everyone seemed to be just soaking in the sunshine. It's so light, the sun is setting at 11:00pm and it's only April! With the warmth finally returning, I'm ready to see some greenery.

And some pictures, mostly of the interior of the library, because it was so cold and I was so miserable and extremely busy, I didn't do a lot but work.

( Year of Photos, Days 91 through 95 )

That's it for now. I'm stopping here after just a few pictures because the next group is from my Kansas trip. Happy Spring!

So I messed up, I posted these on flickr but not here. We'll do pictures first and random updates of information later.

The photos were all taken when we still had a ton of snow. The last week or so Spring has finally really arrived, beautiful weather, and melting/melted snow. I've got photos of it. I'm going to try to update and get all caught up this week. So watch back lots of time for photos.
( Year of Photos Days 81 through 90 )

It's funny to see these snow photos since I've managed to entirely convince myself this is spring time. Of course just a few days ago was a year anniversary of the blizzard that dumped 18 inches of snow on us. Work is good as always. Busy. We just wrapped spring storytime session and are finishing up summer planning. Should be a great summer.

I'm back in Kansas City, taking my first day to relax and use my parents Showtime on Demand to catch up on The Tudors and organize photos. Later I'm going to try to pull some things off of other drives. In the meantime enjoy some Alaska photos, including from my trip to Kodiak.

( Year of Photos )

Thus ends the photos, for now.

Finally, finally I'm posting photos from Hawaii. I put up an album of facebook that has more/different photos as well. Here we go, with minimal descriptions because I'm tired.

( Year of Photos, Days 62 to 69 )

On Monday I should hopefully be heading back to KC if our volcano doesn't act up. It's been rather exciting, but that is a story (with pictures) for another day.

I know I haven't posted any photos or anything in almost a month. You should follow facebook, I'm there and read that daily now. I've traveled a lot (Hawaii for fun and Kodiak for the Alaska Library Association Conference), but more about those later.

Yes, right now we have a volcano erupting. Mt. Redoubt (pronounced RE-doubt) has erupted six times as of this writing (I believe). None of the ash fall has hit Anchorage yet. However with current wind conditions if it erupts before about 4pm tomorrow (Anchorage time, Wednesday) than we will have probably ash fall in Anchorage. What does that mean? Ash is very hard to breathe, bad on roofs (very heavy) and bad on vehicles. It's especially bad on anything with an air system, a filter, or electronics. At work we have to bag each computer (after turning off and unplugging them) in plastic each night, and since we have a lot of public computers, that is a lot of computers in general. We'd been doing this for weeks since the threat was first announced and they only called it off about a week before Mt. Redoubt actually blew. A watched volcano must be like a watched pot, won't go off when we're ready for it. Since we had weeks of warning, I (we) have spare air filters for car and house, and dust masks for me personally. I'm also now covering my television and laptop at night and when I'm gone during the day to protect them. I will let you know if any thing exciting happens. While we don't know officially know that the library closes in event of an ash fall (and we'd get a couple hours warning), I do know that we'd have to turn off all electronics and shut off the buildings ventilation system. So with no air circulating and no electronics, I'm thinking it would make sense for the library to be shut down. Just hoping. I'd like to take a "volcano day".

And now here are some photos, including one from Running of the Reindeer.
( Year of Photos - Days 55 to 61 )

I'll try to get Hawaii photos posted next, probably just one for the day. Later on I'll share more photos from the rest of Hawaii, more from the Running of the Reindeer, so on and so forth.

Sometimes I plan what I'm going to take a picture of, and sometimes it's all chance and happenstance. Click the link to see what I found this week.

( year of photos continues )

I think the medication is working (cross your fingers) as I'm starting to get better. I typed this up quickly, so there are probably many mistakes, I'll edit later.

I got an extra day off this week due to President's Day. Of course since President's Day is on Monday which is my normal day off, I got today (Tuesday) off. It was so nice, I really don't want to go back tomorrow. So pretty photos, and less than pretty photos, and totally mediocre photos posted for your amusement.

( Year of Photos Days 36 to 48 )

Sleep now if I'm going to make it back to work. I spent most of today trying to do my taxes. I made considerable progress.

Our volcano has yet to explode and shower us in Anchorage in Ash. So no cool ash photos! Here's what I do have:
( year of photos days 27 through 35, click for fun )

And now I must go to work (today is my late day).

Life's been really busy, especially work. But lots of fun and it keeps me out of trouble. When I asked what you wanted to see photos of, you said the stereotypical Anchorage. The stereotype is probably dogsleds and snow and ice. Well I've got snow and ice photos, and that's true. But I'm also just trying to show you some of what I see everyday. Here are some photos I took for my year of photos (plus one bonus photo).

( Year of Photos day 17 through 26 )

I took pictures every day, not particularly exciting pictures, but photos nonetheless. It's been a very tough, busy week, and next week will be even more so. We went from -28 for the last three weeks to above freezing. (I understand the rest of the country has our cold streak now, you have my sympathy.) It got up to 44 the last few days. This included a snow storm in between -28 and 44 and then some rain, and now a huge wind storm. The snow/rain on top of our normal winter layer of inches of hard packed snow on every surface creates some dangerous situations. Wednesday was really bad, the roads were barely drivable, just ice skating rinks, a lot of stuff was closed including the schools. Naturally the library was open, and I made it by driving only about 5 miles an hour. Only a couple of people made it to storytime. Everything was melting and then turning back to ice, seriously dangerous. The library remained open Thursday and Friday, but the schools were closed. Thursday I could maybe understand, but today made no sense. Oh well. The library was a madhouse of kids with nothing to do. It got a bit stressful. I took this evening as a night off, not even going to the gym, I just couldn't be around people at all anymore today. We'll see how tomorrow goes, and then I get a three day weekend. Though I have so much to do to prep for next week that I would almost rather work.

And now on to the photos. They're all bits of miscellanea, random snapshots into my world.

( Year of PHotos, Days 10 through 16 )

And that does it for photos for this week. I'm off to revert to my comatose state.

Many of you have met in real life or via the internet my beloved cat, Jane Austen. (That's her as a kitten in the user icon). Days 7 through 9 of the year of photos are concerned with the pets with whom I am allowed to live. Including a new introduction - Murphy my roommate's yellow lab.

( clicky for pet pics )

Recently I've been having fun experimenting with amigurumi, that is the Japanese art of crocheting cute creatures. Well you can crochet or knit, but I'm a much better crocheter than knitter so that is what I do. Today's picture is the one I've most lately finished. He's a snowman and a gift for someone whose been traveling through the holidays.

( Year of Photos Day 6: Amigurumi Snowman )

I've been working off some free patterns I found online for these guys. I've given them all away as gifts. I just requested some books through interlibrary loan on amigurumi creatures, and I think a few more to practice and I'll be able to free form and create my own patterns. I love making them and they go over really well as gifts. Bonus photos to follow of the other little guys I've given away this season.

( more photos of amigurumi creations )

I am thinking of a monkey for my next little guy. Any thoughts?

Today was my day off, a nice relaxing day. And so I got a daytime photo! This is the view from my back porch through our backyard. The backyard is small but it makes up for it because it opens into a park. You can see the park, the grassy part and then the trees in the bog that the trail loops. It's a great walk (just about 1 and a quarter mile) and a lot of fun. I have walked it and skied it. It's quite beautiful, the frozen bog. I'll have to get photos of it. For now just see the tree line.

( Year of Photos, Day 5 )

And of course two days ago to celebrate statehood, after fireworks we tracked down Snowzilla. There's quite the history of Snowzilla. It is a giant snowman that is annually built in an otherwise quiet neighborhood in a man's front yard. It's become quite the tourist/internet/local attraction. However this year, when Snowzilla was no more than a base, the city left a notice for the owner telling him not to build a giant snowman. This prompted a fury in the public, protests at city hall (of both the human and snowman variety), snowmen protesting just out of town, and other natures of rabble rousing including a few very funny letters to the editor. And then miraculously in the middle of the night Snowzilla was rebuilt. Naturally no one knew how that could have happened. The city gave Snowzilla a Christmas reprieve, but is still threatening to pull him down. Of course part of the problem is that the city has a very legitimate complaint, the guy is running a junkyard out of his frontyard. It's quite the eyesore Snowzilla notwithstanding. But we had fun getting pictures with him. Now the city wants to build a giant snowman for the Fur Rondy festival. So they're telling this guy to tear his down, while stealing his idea. Of course it won't be in the middle of a quiet and peaceful neighborhood.

( here are pictures of Snowzilla and me )

January 3rd was the 50th anniversary of Alaskan Statehood, celebrated with many fantastic activities including the largest fireworks display in the history of the state. We made it despite the -25 weather. (Okay, we watched from a heated vehicle.) It was quite pretty and fun. Then after we had found an open starbucks, we sought out Snowzilla. (Snowzilla photos to follow later.) People asked about "stereotypcial Anchorage" which has a lot to do with snow, igloos (which we don't have) and dogsledding (only certain times a year, though we do have miles and miles of dogsledding tracks throughout town).

( Pictures for January 3rd and 4th )

Today continued bitterly cold. It was -23 when I left for work and -22 when I drove home. I snapped this photo on the way home. All of the trees are covered in frost. It's beautiful as every branch is outlined and encapsulated in it's own layer of frost, forming a white tree. Especially beautiful when outlined against a sunset. This is not a perfect photo, my apologies. It was -21 and I was in a hurry, I was on my way home from work (at 6pm and it's totally dark, it's totally dark at 5pm). I said I would do a year of photos, not a year of high quality photos. I should have gotten a day time photo during lunch when I should have gone out to start my car. (Apparently when it's this cold, it's best to go start your car and let it idle for a while in the middle of the day). Perhaps I will soon.

( photo day two of year of photos )

If you have photo requests, of something in Anchorage, or within my power to get, please ask. Nothing too silly or too minor. Edited to add, I meant nothing is too silly or minor. I'm sure I'll get very silly and minor in my photos before the year is out.

I prefer the term New Year's Goals to New Year's Resolutions because rather than shooting for overarching grand life changes that have a high probability of failure, I am aiming to strengthen and maintain current life trends. So that being said, here are some goals of mine for 2009.

1. Do not get frostbite or freeze to death.
This is not as easy at it seems. Yesterday, I was driving home from work (yes I had to work on New Year's Eve, but the library was closed so as much staff as wanted could take leave, and I got to get some serious work done, bonus, I got to wear jeans and a tshirt), and it was negative 18. Yes that is Fahrenheit. And that is minus 18, 18 below zero. It's seriously cold. Even for Alaska. Well, considering I live in the "warm" part of Alaska. Driving in my car, wearing my extremely serious super thick gloves that I use for skiing, and my fingers were just aching with the cold. Your nostrils/nose hairs freeze. The cold air hurts my lungs and makes me cough. It's funny because I've adjusted pretty well. 20 is my "livable" temperature. 10 degrees I can deal with. 32 is warm enough I don't zip my coat. But -18 is seriously cold. I don't go out if I can't help it. (Which led to me accidentally missing an evening engagement, oops!) So my goal in 2009, is to get better at keeping warm. Particularly with my feet. I have a tendency to wear thin socks and most of my shoes are too thin except for my super warm boots. I need to upgrade my footwear for Alaska.

2. Continue to get healthier, exercise more and lose weight.
As many of you know, in September I joined Weight Watchers. It's been a really good change for me. And I have been doing well. When I have a weaker day, I know how to recuperate and move on without totally giving up. And I don't have to give up my favorite foods, just make good choices and plan for treats. I've lost just about 20 pounds so far. I want to loose more. And I've taken up cross country skiing which helps with the exercise (it's amazing full body workout). I really want to keep loosing weight and get healthier. Especially I want to amp up my exercise regime. But mostly I want to keep up healthy habits more than anything.

3. Get much better at Cross Country Skiing
I love XC skiing. My class was great fun. The group was fantastic. We had lots of fun using movie quotes and other nonsense to encourage each other. For example, when someone nervously said "I'll try", we'd all chime in (courtesy of Yoda), "there is no try, only do or do not". As we'd go down the hill, we'd be reminded to "snowplow" (point the tops of our skis together in a triangle shape) to slow down, but not to cross the skis. This of course led to people on the bottom of the hills (my remembrance, courtesy of Ghost Busters) to yell "don't cross the streams". (It would be bad, that's bad.) But most of the time you were simply exhorted to "ski like Michael Phelps". I do okay on uphills, and really pretty good on the straight flats, even can turn pretty well. Downhill is a problem, mostly because of my huge fear of going fast and feeling out of control. My goal is to work at that. Especially since I want to do the ski for women in a couple of months.

4. Read my Bible more faithfully.
I aim to read every day. I probably actually read (excluding at church) 2-4 times a week. I wish to do much better. And to grow closer to God. This is my most important goal.

5. Take a picture every day
I'd like to take a photo every day, just something that catches my fancy, and log on and share it with you all. I might do this once a week and share a week's worth of photos, or perhaps every day. This seems the goal most likely to be abandoned. But I'll try.

And on the note of the last goal, here is a photo of my bed and things hanging on the wall above it.
( click for photo )

Expect a post at some point with various bits and pieces I never got around to posting about from 2008. And check facebook for some more random 2008 photos.

And I leave with you a wish that I wrote for all my loved ones for 2009.
May 2009 bring you many blessings,
may you never fail to appreciate those blessings,
may the trials that come be borne with strength and grace,
may those trials be swift and few,
and most of all may this year bring you peace.
I love you all.
God Bless.

Recently I decided to crochet a cat hat. I had been intrigued by these directions. With only a few modifications, they worked great. And as the directions implied, cats aren't thrilled with them. I also made one for a coworkers cat. I finally got Jane Austen to wear it with a minimum of complaining and no scars on me.

( click for pictures and captions )

More pictures available on my flickr.

P.S. I have no idea why the pictures are so fuzzy. They weren't so fuzzy on my computer screen - they looked great there. Oh well.

Enjoy! And as I used to do, I leave you with song lyrics not necessarily related to anything.

***************************
Why do I bother
When you're not the one for me?
Ooooh...
I saw the sign and it opened up my eyes
I saw the sign.
-Ace of Base

I'm in Seattle visiting my fabulous sister (michaeljfoxfan). She never updates her journal, but there it is. We (my mother and I) flew in Thursday and just sort of hung out. Yesterday, we went to a chocolate factory, a winery, a library (but not the big Seattle library - that's today), Susan's campus (University of Washington), Microsoft campus (where brother-in-law works) etc. The winery was great. At first I wasn't sure which one it was. And then I realized we were going to Chateau Ste. Michelle. When we got there, I recognized the labels as being a wine I have previously consumed. The tour was interesting (and smelled great) and ended with trying of three wines with some education about tasting/smelling/etc. I have had some of that type of education before, but I always learn more and appreciate more. The wine was really good. Then Susan and I did a tasting with four more wines. Even after tasting portions of only three wines, Mom was feeling it, so she dropped out before the additional four. Susan and I had a total of seven wines (tasting portions). Yummy wines. I bought some Chocolate Port Wine sauce for ice cream/cheesecake that I can't wait to try. Most (all) of the wines are available at my local liquor store. I also got to have dinner with adrinna and meet her boyfriend Ian which was fabulous. It was good to see her. I wonder if there is anyway to consolidate all my people to one place? Except then I'd have no one to visit and I love to travel.

Seattle is just beautiful (by Seattle I mean the entire area since Susan lives in a suburb). It helps that this is (apparently) the prettiest time of the year. All green and mountains and water. I'm such a child of the midwest that anytime I get anywhere near an ocean I want seafood. And we've had some delicious seafood. Yummmm.... Could I move here? Perhaps... I like the pretty area, but I am not sure about the area culture wise. Perhaps though. I need to stay where I am for a while for career reasons, and I just made a Junior League commitment so not now. But this area is a nice calming place.

I brought my camera with me (my pretty new camera) and took (and am taking) pictures. This should also answer the "what does my haircut look like" question.
( clicky here for a couple of pictures )