My first time : Back seat relations.

Verdict : Not that comfortable. But it's such a rush...the fear of getting caught.

Matt and I took a trip down the Richardson Hwy to see the Alaska Range Mtns. There were a bunch of places along the highway to drive off a little bit and see great views. So during it all, I looked out and saw the mountains, beautiful streams (which are still frozen), and .....shit, another car. Its a good thing the windows fog up :) These people were looking out at the pretty scenery (not at us). Matt composed himself and jumped into the front seat. I lay hiding in the back under my coat. He drove away and the people looked at him and just smiled. I think we were busted. They didn't mind though. It was an older couple, but not too old. Most people around here are old hippies and really laid back , so they probably remembered back to their young days when they did the same thing.

I missed the substitute meeting. The directions I got from MapQuest totally got me lost because one of the turns never came. So I was able to find the right place...but 15 minutes late. Instead of making a bad first impression and walking in late, I decided to skip it until next Monday.

Instead, I brought all of my official documents and got my name changed to Kidwell. I just decided to do that today. I've been meaning to do it, but it's just a hassle. One that I could avoid, so why the heck not? I don't know ... it's just a name, but I still started to tear up as I signed the sheet to approve a change. I just have a problem with letting go, I guess. Appropriately enough, Matt and I have been looking for a wedding ring for me that doesn't look like a metal washer all by itself...today we found one and bought it. It's white gold with a satin finish. When we were shopping for Matt's ring, I found one I liked, but decided not to get. Now I have it :) YAY!

Matt and I are working on planning out his vacation time for the whole year. We're not sure if he can go to Eleanor's wedding because he doesn't have much vacation the first couple years here. And we're going to run the Chicago Marathon and do Nick's wedding in October...and not sure where we're going to fit it all in. ...because in late Jan-early Feb of 2009, we're going to EUROPE :) We figured we're going to do it while we're here and during the winter sounds better than wasting our ever-so-precious summertime months gone....so we're going in the dead of winter. Not ideal for Europe either because it gets cold there too, but hey, at least they have daylight there. Also, we'll visit Marseilles and that's on the Mediterranean Sea so it should be at least mild. And anything is better than 50 below that they'll have here! Anyways, that's all for now. :)

The other day Matt and I went out running on the trails near Goldstream Creek. These are right by our house and very easy to get to. It was great to get out where you can't hear the hum of traffic and can actually hear the wind blowing through the trees. This trail is strictly a winter one , since it goes over the top of a swamp and a couple of really large ponds. But for now, I love it. Even though it slows my running down a lot and is much harder, I think it's great!

Today I have the sub meeting. Finally getting back to work. I hope I like it here as much as I liked it in Oklahoma. We'll see. :) I'm saving up the money for our trip to Europe next winter. :) When the sunlight is all gone, we will be going to France :) yay! We'll return when daylight is coming back.

Matt got his first paycheck today, and wow! it's twice the amount of his in Oklahoma. That's great! .... Especially since everything here is a lot more expensive than it was there.

Temperate Alaska weather is long gone. It's back to being cold (for March anyways). It's unusual for it to be this windy too. Typically, there is absolutely no wind in Fairbanks at all. I don't want to go outside. :( booo... wind chill advisory. The wind chills expected are -40 below this evening, just slightly warmer while it's still light out. BOOOO. I think I'm going to make curtains today instead of going running. Yeah, that sounds good. Watch movies while I make curtains. :)

The highlight of the rest of Chris' visit was the Chena Hot Springs. At the end of this 60 mi road into the middle of the Chena River Rec. Area, there's a resort. They have created a very nice swimming area out of the bubbling waters of a natural hot spring. Instead of making it indoors and a swimming pool, it's more like a watering hole--surrounded by rocks and these rocks are covered in snow. It was really cool. It was only 30 degrees outside and we were all in our bathing suits in the water (which was about 100 degrees). It was amazing. Then on our drive home, we were looking out the window to the side of the road and discovered the Alaska Pipeline. Stretching over 800 miles across Alaskan mountains and underground, it goes from Prudhoe Bay (oil fields) to Valdez in southern AK right along the coast. It's really cool that one of the above ground portions is less than 10 mi from our house!! :) Cool hey?

I've come nowhere on the job front. Honestly, I feel so frickin' unmotivated to work that I don't see anything happening soon. I'm keeping myself busy here with a bunch of projects such as painting the apartment, organizing, cleaning, etc. I also throw some fun stuff in there, like Dawson's Creek and running, but mostly it's cleaning up after Matt and Zoey and upgrading things in the apartment. I don't know if Matt is really pissed about me not looking for a job, but he always says that its fine---but I can't help wondering, would he really tell me if he was mad about that? or would he just let it slide? A big part of him is all about avoiding confrontation, so he probably would hide it if it bothered him.

So anyways...I went running today and found a trail not too far off the road. I think it went over a bunch of ponds and through the woods, but it looks like it will be swampy this summer. It was gorgeous. This narrow dogsled/snomobile/walking trail went through the woods and across a pond (like I said before) and I was the only one there. It was gorgeous. Behind all the trees, I could see Murphy Dome looking down on me. It could be in a post card. That's how gorgeous it was. I'm so glad I'm not in Oklahoma anymore. Nature doesn't exist in the city. It's only man-made look-a-likes. Boo.

I'm also auditioning for the Fairbanks Community Band. I haven't played in about a year and it definitely shows. I want to audition sooner rather than later, so I'm not quite 100%, but will be auditioning sometime soon. I figure that it'll take me a few months to be 100% so I should just strive for something less. It's frustrating to look at all the music I used to play all the time with no problem..and then stumble through it all. That part kinda sucks. I guess that I brought that on myself by not playing a whole lot, but it still sucks.

Chris is here for his spring break. We haven't done a whole lot exciting, since I have no idea where the cool things are. We mostly just explore town and watch movies together. Yesterday, we went to North Pole and saw Santa's reindeer. The whole town had candy cane light poles and it really was more hideous than cool. We were trying to go to Santa's house, but it was closed. He must be on vacation. Or maybe that really proves that Santa doesn't exist.

Today, we went cross country skiing. I haven't done it in a long time and was reminded of how difficult it really is. The trail was really icy too so that didn't help me. On top of that, I forgot to bring my arm brace. I was too afraid of falling to enjoy any of the hills. Oh well..at least the view of everything was really pretty. :) I got some good pictures too. We're having dinner with Shaun and Sommer tonight.... should be fun. We're making chicken tacos and having them over this time.

Moving Trip : Part 3

Olympia, WA- Seattle, WA : We had lunch with Matt's uncle Jack and aunt Polly. It was fun and delicious. I'm glad it was free too. Free food is always good. Plus, we had a banana creme pie for dessert. That was soo good. :) We took the car to the shipping place at night and packed all of our stuff into suitcases. We had to hide some stuff in the car because it wouldn't fit in our suitcases, but it all worked out.

Seattle, WA - Fairbanks, AK : Checkout was at 11:00 so we took our time getting ready. The shuttle to the airport went right after checkout so we spent a long time at the airport. They took all our stuff and we seemed to still have a lot of heavy carry-ons. We had to just find a place to sit and settle in there instead of walking around the airport shops. Three hours waiting at the airport later, we finally boarded our plane. Zoey was a good flier. She has been great the whole trip with the exception of one day (good thing we didn't go too far then). Flying over Alaska was so cool. It was very mountainous and we could see a lot of peaks everywhere :) it's about 100 mi south of where we live, called Denali National Park. We'll have to go camping there before we move away.

The apartment was only half finished. This pissed me off big time , especially after being tired from travelling. There was pretty much no reason for things not being done (except the roof--which can only be done in the spring). We sat down and talked the following day and worked out an agreement. Matt and I will do as many repairs and upgrades as we are able to do in exchange for free laundry. It sure beats driving 20 min to town to use the laundromat. One bedroom is green and the other is blue. The movers are supposed to arrive today with all of our stuff, so I'm excited about that. I should call and see when they're coming in. Write more later