Best laid plans....

So Bret and I had great plans of writing a silly Christmas poem to post on the blog before he went back to the slope. He left Friday, and as you can see....no poem. So I'm afraid you're stuck with me again lol lol

Our Christmas break this year was oooooh soooo quiet and ooooooh soooo relaxing. We pretty much did nothing. We went to a couple movies....ate out a few times.....window shopped....slept in....played games with friends....and it was the best xmas ever. We had big plans of going off somewhere, but we really just enjoyed hanging out at home, we even did some home organizing type stuff???? wierd huh. Alas, reality has come back to our lives, Bret went back to work Friday....I had the stomach flu (ick) all weekend and then went back to work today, sigh. The good news is that Lee comes home tomorrow so things should be back to normal soon. Although the little rascal doesn't have to go back to school until next Monday.....oooooh to be 12 years old again.....NOT!

We've got a good foot of snow on the ground now so it's starting to feel like winter, we even made it through the winter solstice, so now we're just gaining light everyday! Yipppeee! I'm hoping to get Lee up to the hill for some more boarding this week, it works great getting off at 12:30, because that's the perfect time for him to get to the hill, so i'll just pick him up on my way. I'm sure he'll be excited to see all of our snow.

That's all I really have to say...I'll write more once Lee gets home and have him update you on his Xmas Holiday in the lower 48....

Happy New Year!

jan

Update

So the search for the helicopter has officially been called off. At this point the belief is that it went down in the fjord which is over 600 feet deep, much too deep for divers. I think there are still some private people who continue to search but at this point it seems that it's over.
This is a very sad day for the famillies most of all but also for LifeGuard, Providence, and Alaska as a whole.

On lighter news we are finally getting some more snow, our first accumulation melted away a long time ago. Today though we've gotten a good 2 inches and it's still falling like crazy. Lee is up on Hilltop as I write this, taking advantage of the new snow and hopefully learning some new skills. Needless to say, he is one happy camper.

The sudden realization that Xmas is only days away, has left me somewhat dazed. Yikes, where the hell has the year gone? It still feels more like Sept. or Oct. to me? Wasn't last Christmas only a couple of months ago? Man if time flies when your having fun, I must be deleriously happy! We will be sending out our usual Calanders again this year, but I fear they may not make it in time for the big day, but we'll try!

As I've mentioned before Lee is going to his Mom and Bruce's for the holidays so Bret and I are just gonna lay low. We always have big plans of going somewhere but in the end money and time bite us in the butt. We've been tossing around the idea that we may go somewhere like Hawaii or Disney World next year and send out a global invite to anyone who wants to join us. I know that we come up with some cool plans and never follow through, but I think this one would be worth the effort....we'll keep you posted, but as I've seen a year can go by in the blink of an eye, so it's comming sooner than I'd like to think.

Bret will be home on Friday. He has a horrible cold right now, so he's really looking forward to getting home for some rest. Hopefully I'll be able to coax him onto the blog to send you all some info,....i'm sure it gets old listening to me prattle on....lol

So that's all for now. I'm just trying to be thankful for everything I have right now, given what the famillies of the missing helo crew are going through!

we love you all!

jan

The body of one of the missing crew members and the back left door of the helicopter were found washed ashore, close to Whittier today.

please say a prayer for the families....the search will continue Sunday for the remaining crew members and patient.

jan

Missing LifeGuard Helo (see previous post)

So the search continues, with clearing weather and more and more services and people joining the search. There has been some discussion about them being near a glacier between Portage and Whittier and the railroad avalanche team are out on their snow machines investigating.

We found out today that they have a weeks worth of survival gear on board so let's keep hope alive for the families. There are several candle light vigils that will be held at 5:18 pm, which was the time of their last known position, and contact with dispatch.

Keep them in your prayers, and all I ask is that only POSITIVE comments be left, as there have been several nay sayers writing in to the Anchorage Daily Newspaper site.

If you want to track what's happening go to

adn.com

and you can see the story as it continues and is updated 24/7. Keep up the faith folks, this has hit Alaska, and Providence very hard, we're a close knit community!

thanks for the thoughts and prayers, I know the famillies appreciate it.

jan

To family and friends

I work at Providence Alaska Medical Center and we are the only level 3 trauma center for the state. We have a flight service by the name of Life Guard, and they have several helicopters and fixed wings that they transport patients with. Monday night a BK 117 helicopter was transporting a patient from Cordova to Anchorage, it had the pilot, a flight nurse, a paramedic and of course the patient on board. The helicopters call in every 10 minutes to acknowledge their location and how the flight is going. Twenty seven minutes before the helicopter was due to arrive at Providence, they missed 2 ten minute checks. Their last known location was over Prince William Sound, just south of Esther island and within minutes of Whittier. There has been no communication from them since their last check in, at which point everything was status quo. Due to poor weather the search has been very limited, but the the fog/clouds did break today for a bit. The army researve, air force reserve, the coast guard as well as several good samaritin fishing boats are out looking for the helicopter as I write this. The emergency locating device was not activated/or can't be picked up. Please keep these folks and their families in your thoughts and your prayers!!!!
While it's been 48 hours, the helicopter is equipped with survival gear and their wilderness training is very intensive. Having a brother that is a helicopter pilot, and having several years of EMS experience myself, this hits close to home. So all I can ask is that you think of them and their loved ones, who are hoping for their safe return.

Thanks soooo much.....give everyone you love a hug today and let them know that you love them. To all those that read this blog, know that we love you all more than words can say, and appreciate you all greatly for being in our lives.

Take GOOD care!

jan

I finally got to go snowboarding!

I went snowboarding yesterday on my new snowboard! We don't have much snow down by our house, but actually there is alot of snow up on the hill in some places. We can only go down one run right now, there's actually four in total. At first I fell for about 2 runs, then I went inside to get a bite to eat, which helped alot. After that I was able to turn better and go faster.

We went through some of the snow makers, because they were right in the middle of the run. The run that we could go on had a bunch of jumps, which at first I wasn't very good at doing them. The people that had been boarding for the past 2 weeks, were getting lots of air and practically jumping over me. By the end of the day, I was going off the jumps myself and getting some air.

I heard some people cheering "go little dude! you can do it!" and when I fell I would hear them say "oooooooh soooooo close"!

I spent most of the day up on the hill. We were thinking about going up at 9 am but it was only 15', so Jan went back to sleep until 12:00, and then we left. I was up there from noon to about 8:30 at night, which was pretty cool. I can't wait to find out who my new teacher is this year! I go up for lessons on Tuesday's and Thursdays. Hopefully I can inform you on how my lessons are going, on Friday.

I'm gonna be taught how to do a 180' and 360' in the air, yahooooo! Can't wait to be taught that.

Love you all! and I'll write to you soon!

lee

Lee must "ride"

So on my last post were pictures of snow everywhere. Now, just 2 weeks later most if not all of the snow has melted and gone away! Lucky for Lee though, "HillTop" where he snowboards, has a good base and they are making snow 24/7. The first 2 weekends Lee had his board he didn't get to try it out due to numerous missing assignments at school. This week however, he caught up on everything and a "riding" he did go!

I dropped him off at the hill shortly after noon yesterday...and honestly I kind of expected him to call by 3 or 4 pm to be picked up. Well by 8pm when I hadn't heard from him, I decided to go up to the hill and see how he was doing. When I found him, and let him know it was 8:30....he simply replied...."I know".....toooo funny! He had a blast and was just doing his thing, it's sooooo exciting to see him take to an activity this strongly. It was a high, yesterday of 28' and the sun is going down around 4:30. We had him dressed to the hilt and he said he stayed warm, which is quite impressive given his "rail-like" build! Today we decided against going as the wind is howling at about 40 miles per hour....it's 35' but it feels alot colder, so he's not out today. He starts his "hot doggers" classes on Tuesday night. He will be going from 4:30 to 6:30 every Tues and Thurs.....I'm hoping he can meet some friends there that he can board with on the weekends, since most of his school friends don't ski or board. We'll keep you posted. Hopefully I can coax him on the blog this week so you can hear it from him....

Bret was home and is now gone again. His new crew is really starting to gel really well together, and it sounds like they all work well together. Despite his grandiose comments about the long hours and cold weather, He really does LOVE this work, and it seems to be suiting him really well. I think he gets back on the 14th and then Lee leaves for Christmas with his mom and Bruce on the 19th...actually like 1 am on the 20th. He's really excited about going to PA to spend time with them, and it's nice the Bret and Lee will have a few days together before Lee leaves, since Bret will be back on the slope when Lee gets home from PA.

As for Christmas for Bret and I, we're not totally sure what we're going to do. I've taken a 9 days off, and we'd like to maybe take a train trip up north to check out the northern lights (which I've still not seen), but other than that we're just going to spend some nice quiet alone time together, which is nice once and awhile.

Work is going really well for me right now. I can't say enough about how great my hours work with life at home with a 12 year old, and physically with the fibromyalgia. My focus has always been to get a "black belt" position with the hospital...but I think i'll postpone that for a year or so, just to get my health on track and Lee settled into Middle school. I hope everyone is well, and we're so greatful that people tune in to see how the Williamson/Carmichael clan is doing. It makes it feel like we're not so very far away. On the flip side of that though, is that you are all welcome to come visit anytime! Our door is always open to anyone who wants to come up here. It is simply the most beautiful place you will ever see (nope no bias here) :)

hugs and kisses to all!


jan

do you take your medicine????

So Lee's rash/reaction, I'm glad to report has pretty much gone away...until yesterday, when he decided to not take the pills and lie to me about it. And what happened???? Low and behold, he started getting splotchy (is that a word?) and red, this morning he woke up with a runny nose and a little bit itchy. We've been through this a thousand times with Lee and I think, that maybe, just maybe, perhaps, there is an off chance that he has finally learned that he must take his meds as prescribed, in order to keep his body in check.....He had his dose last night and this morning so my hope is that he will return home, itch free. Yikes! kids......need I say more....lol





The other big news here is that Lee's prayers have finally been answered

we have finally got our long awaited first snowfall. These pics are the view from our back door and our front door.(oops same pic twice, sorry) Lee is in hog heaven to put it mildly. We had to go see the ski hill the other day just to check and make sure, he wasn't missing out on any snowboarding....I can't be trusted with that kind of info....lol. So Lee is ready to hit the slopes the very "second" that they open up! We'll keep you posted on that one.

Bret will be home on Friday, which is nice since the U.S. Thanksgiving is on next Thursday. We're going over to one of my co-worker's house to celebrate, with a big pot luck dinner. I'm sad I missed the Canadian holiday with my family, but we should have fun next week. The bonus is that Bret will be home for Christmas too. Lee's going to his mom and Bruce's for Christmas but will be home around New Years and will be able to get some snowboarding in before school starts. Bret and I are just going to spend a quiet week here in Anchorage. We had hopes of going to Canada, but it's just to expensive around the holidays...so maybe we'll go to Denali or Mt. Mckinley for a couple of days...take the train through the mountains...it's supposed to be a wonderful trip.

Not much else new on this front though....oooooh wait I almost forgot....Lee's class is selling chocolate bars, in order to raise money to go to space camp in March or April....the cost is 1 dollar per bar. If anyone would like some email me at hobbz4@yahoo.com and we'll pay Lee and you can send us the money and we'll send you some chocolate. He has 100 bars to sell so don't be shy :)

take care

bret, jan and lee

The Itchy and Scratchy Show (no...not the Simpsons)

So poor Lee has developed hives, from the top of his head to the tip of his toes. He woke up on Halloween morning with hives everywhere, we kept him home from school and he and Bret went to the doctor. No problem, just an allergic reaction, take benadryl for the next couple of days and he'll be fine. By the time I got home around 3pm the hives were gone. We continued to give him benadryl through the night, but low and behold he woke up on Thursday covered head to toe again! We washed everything in his room....no for those of you who are asking, we haven't introduced anything new, and no he didn't eat anything new. All through Thursday and overnight the meds were keeping his itching to a minimum so off to school we sent him, much to his horror. Bret dropped off some more medicine at 11:30 and by 1pm the school had called me and said that his hives were back with a vengence and the poor kid was going nuts with the itching. Bret by this time has left for the slope.
So I pick Lee up and make the earlist doctor's appt available, which is not until 5pm. We try an oatmeal bath....no good. We try yet another baking soda bath....does not work. We show up at the doctors at 4:30 and luckily they could get us in. By this time poor Lee is just about in tears, and is constantly checking various parts of his body to see if the hives have changed, moved, gotten bigger, or smaller. The doctor thinks that he has some sort of virus that isn't making him sick, but that his body is waging war against. The kicker is that we have no way of knowing how long this will go on, "possibly several months" was what the doctor said. So Lee got 3 prescriptions, a steroid, an antihistamine, and some thing else. Within 2 hours of taking them the hives are gone. All goes well Friday night and saturday. But suddenly Saturday night at about 12am the hives are back yet again. With not many options to help the poor kid I gave him his meds 4 hours early and that seemed to do the trick. We're now taking meds every 12 hours, but the hives start to reappear after about 10 hours, not horrible though. Today (Monday) so far as of 2:30 I haven't heard from the school so I assume he's doing good, I'm sure he has a ton of work that he missed over the last 3 days....but hopefully we have the hives under control......ack......we'll keep you posted!


jan

Winter is edging ever closer!

There's no denying it now! We had snow twice last week, none of it stayed on the ground but it's definately here. Lee of course is beside himself with joy....just another snowfall closer to getting to go snowboarding. When his PFD comes in we're going to get him his own snowboard and boots; hopefully this week. We found a sports store that specializes in second hand QUALITY sporting goods. It mainly targets families with ever growing kids, so that we can keep recycling equipment that has only been used for one season, before the child has grown out of it. Mailed PFD's are supposed to start arriving this week, so it should be a Happy week for Mr. Lee.

Bret's just starting his second week home. He goes back up to the slope next Friday. This week's plan is to buy or replace his winter gear, boots, coat, hat etc.... At least the company pays for his boots which tend to be the most expensive, next to their jackets. His exciting news is that he "crushed" one of his fingers, last hitch. Luckily nothing is broken....it's just really swollen and purple, but he says it's not bothering him any which is good.

As far as me, I'm just trucking along. Everyone is back at work so I'm looking forward to this week and just being responsable for my job and no one else's. Sadly my feet have started bugging me again, I'm trying not to panic, but I haven't been very successful. Hopefully it's just a bump in the road. keep your fingers crossed for me.

hope everyone is well! take care and drop us a line....

jan

Lee the Cross Country Runner

So here he is folks....our budding cross-country runner. Lots of excitement at the beginning of the race...but working pretty hard in the last few yards....but hey it was a mile long race!!!!

Life has been running along pretty well as of late. Lee is well into his school year and all is well. Everytime he see's even a hint of snow he's ready to jump into his snowboarding gear and rush to the ski hill. To give you some perspective, the east side of town got a skiff, and I mean a sparse amount of snow a week ago ( we didn't get any at our place) and Lee's sure the ski hill is operational. We live less than 5 mins down the road from where he snowboards! It's rather humorous. Lee's about the only one in Anchorage that is actively praying for snow at this point. Most of the leaves have turned to yellow, but some are still quite green and the grass is still as green as can be. Just in this last week it's started freezing at night...so he's getting closer.

By the way HAPPY THANKSGIVING to all the Canadian readers...sorry I missed it. We still have well over a month until the holiday in the states...which never has seemed right to me...it's too close to Christmas....but oh well, when in Rome.....or something like that.

Bret's halfway through his 2 weeks on the slope, he'll be home next Friday. By all reports things are going well. His shifts are Midnight to noon the first week and noon to midnight the next. It makes it kind of hard to touch base with him because I'm either working or sleeping when he gets off...so we don't talk much during the week, but we try to touch base on the weekends.

It's PFD time up here in our great state of Alaska. PFD stands for Permanent Dividend Fund. Way back when the pipeline was put in, Alaska received a huge lump sum of money. So now each year it collects the interest off of the principle. Half the yearly interest goes to the government and the other half is handed out equally to each Alaskan resident....so this year it's just over 1600 dollars each. It's a pretty nice perk for living up here: the bonus is that we're one of the few states that doesn't have a state tax either....I guess it kind of makes up for the added expense of living so far away. Bret's PFD will be here shortly but for whatever reason Lee and I had to appeal ours, so they'll be along sometime in the future...not to sure when. You wouldn't believe all the sales and deals that happen this time of year. It's way bigger than the Christmas rush....everything it just so happens is being sold at right around 1500 dollars....wonder why that is????

My works going along pretty good...we'll be back at full staff by Wed the 24th, which will be much appreciated. Things have gone really well, but I'm looking forward to getting back to my regular schedule and duties.

Not much else to report...hope this finds you all well! take good care!

bret, jan, and lee xxoo

rainy september

Yikes it's almost October! Can you believe it???? It's been pretty rainy here over the past week or so, but life keeps rockin right along. Lee has his second track day tomorrow so we will keep you posted on the results.
Bret's still home for another week, before going off to the slope for more fun with oil. We've mainly been spending our time laying low and relaxing. The leaves have started to turn to gold and red, fall is definately here, no more denying it. We even have snow (termination dust) on the mountains. It seems like it's creeping ever closer each morning as Bret drives me to work.
Lee is totally excited though, because snow means he's that much closer to snowboarding.
Work's been busy, but I came home early today cuz I caught some sort of cold/flu/crud that's been going around the hospital. I just wanted to check in and let people know that yes we're still here!
So I'm off to nap with my puppies and we'll try to update the blog this weekend. Have a good one!
bret-jan-lee

Ok, per my previous post, I found a better way to link my two blogs....just click on the link to the right.
or go to:

http://fms-tiger.blogspot.com

thanks for the support everyone!

jan

So here's the deal, I started a blog on my journey with fibromyalgia the other day. If you click on "view my complete profile" you will see it listed along with this blog. I debated for quite awhile on whether or not to make it anonymous or attach my name to it. In the end I've decided to attach my name.



One of the biggest problems that people with fibromyalgia syndrome face, is the lack of awareness and understanding in the general public. It's not a disease that you can see, but it can be and is devastating for those us who have it. I also would suggest you checking out

www.fibrotalk.com/

this is a website that many fibromites use as a way of sharing information, and supporting each other. It also has really good information for family and friends.

I don't want to push this on anyone at all!!!! If your interested, it's there and check it out....if not just ignore it.

thx Jan

Hey everybody it's me LEE.

Summer was a BLAST.Back to my 5 days of school.

B/O (Band/Orchestra) YES this year i'm going to play the viola .We are going to use one of the violas from school for $40.00 for the whole year.Can't wait until I get the viola.Our teachers name is MR. O'BRIAN. Have a new 6th grade teacher named MS.IBELE. Her name is pronounced like bible only with
an I get it?

CAN'T WAIT UNTIL WINTER YIPEEEEEEE!WINTER???? it is time for me to get back on my snowboard.Can't wait until I get taught how to do a back flip. Yikes!Also i'm going to be taught how to do a 180,THEN! the 360.

Ms.Ibele is our cross country running coach . I'm loving every bit of it.

well thats all the time i have .Hope to see you all soon good night.
LOVE, LEE
Just so you know Lee typed this and spelled everything except "pronounced" all on his own!
3 cheers for LEE!!!!!
hip hip hoooraaayyy
hip hip horraaaaay
hip hip hooooorrrrrrraaaaaay

Ok I get it! I need to write more often...yah yah yah.

Sooooo, what's been happening in the great state of Alaska. Schools back in session, and yes I will strap Lee to a chair one of these days SOON and have him post a message. We've had a few homework blips in the road, but overall things seem to be going well in the land of our favorite 6th grader.

Bret???? you ask....he's back on the north slope! YIPPPPEEEEE everyone is very happy about this. Bret's more than glad to be back doing the work he likes, and we really like the steady, reliable pay check. Stupid bills! He left last friday the 7th and will return on the 21st. He's on a new rig that's in Prudhoe, so he's not back out on the ocean. So far it sounds like it's been alot of job shadowing as his crew learns the ropes on this rig, before the current crew gets transferred to his old rig. Does that make any sense? yikes. What's cool is he sounds really happy and he likes being back on the slope.

My work has been busy this week, since one of my coworkers is off for 6 weeks (she had surger). This has made my life very hectic...my fibromyalgia doesn't like me working 8 hour days, with high stress...hopefully my body will even out soon tho. Either way I have to work so I'll just look forward to my coworkers speedy return so that I can return to just doing one job not two.

September is the rainy season up here, and boy has it hit. Out of the last 5 days it poured for 3 and a half. The plus side is that everything is still nice and green...the leaves will be turning soon though. No sign of termination dust (snow) yet on the mountains, but it won't be long. For those of you that don't know, we call snow on the mountains "termination dust" because it signifies the termination of summer in alaska....which I think is hilarious so I use it as much as possible.

Not much else to report...life has been chugging along at it's usual rapid pace, and all is well. I hope to see MORE comments to the posts, and please leave your name so we know who's writing. Just like some people (mike) have said that I need to write more....so do you! so ha!

take good care, and know that we think of you all often!

jan

So it's almost September and the summer is drawing to a close...at least it is here in Alaska! Lee started school last week and will write something this weekend on the blog....I'm hoping that now that we are back into a routine, the posts will be more frequent on the blog. It's hard to keep up over the summer...at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it....ha ha ha.

Our visit with Karen and Monty was great!!!! We did lots of fun things and took some pictures as you can see. We went hiking in Eagle River, whale watching/boat tour in Seward, trekked around town, and Lee and his grandparents even made it out to the Matanuska glacier. It's always great to have family come visit so that we can share some of the amazing places Alaska has to offer, with them. We had one or two rainy days, but for the most part the weather was picture perfect...no pun intended.

My new job is going extremely well to say the least. It is exactly what I have been looking for! Great hours, Great people, interesting work, and it allows me to be home in the afternoons with Lee. I really couldn't ask for more. It's also really helped alleviate some of the fibromyalgia stress of a full'time....all day job. I can't complain about having all my weekends off either.

Bret spoke to Nabors drilling this morning and they are hoping to get him out on an off-shore rig by next Friday....yippee! He is really missing working on the rigs. This rig is in Cook inlet not on the North Slope which will be a ton warmer for him. Right now it looks like he'll be moved to a rig that works year round in November/December...but as we've found, nothing is set in stone when working on the slope. The construction market has slowed considerably so he is working for a local print shop; screen printing for now. Flash back to the days in Kansas! He is hoping that he will be able to screen print on his two weeks home, since it doesn't look like the construction job is going to work out. We'll keep you posted though.

We're still hoping to get to Canada this December/January, but that's a ways off at this point. It's hard to do any concrete longterm planning until we know where exactly Bret will be in December and what his schedule will be. But for now that's the plan.

The weather here is still beautiful...high's in the mid to high 60's during the day. It's starting to cool off at night though, I actually wore a jacket to work this morning...ick. The sun is getting later and later every morning too...it's coming up around 6:30 now and getting dark around 9:30, which for most folks is alot of light, but for us Alaskans it's getting shorter and shorter by the day.

Everything is still lush and green though. We went to the big state fair on Saturday, and got to see all of the gigantic veggies that won in the agricultural contests....there was a head of lettuce there that weighed more than Lee!!!! yikes.

I hope everyone is well, and stay in touch!

love as always

bret, jan, and lee

Wow is it the middle of July already???? How did we get here? Wasn't it March, like yesterday???? Crazy huh.
So life in Anchorage has been pretty quiet for us the last month or so. Bret is still doing the construction thing on and off depending how busy the week is. Most weeks he works a minimum of 4 days, but this week he has off...so He's leading a nice and laid back life. I started my new job in the Case Management/Social Services dept. at the hospital. I'm one of 3 support staff people in the dept that take all calls and authorizations/denials of insurance claims for our in-patients. So far I totally love it! There are some really great people working there and you can't beat my ours of 6am to 12:30pm Monday thru Friday! Yippee! I know it's only the 3rd day...but my gut tells me this will be a really great fit for me! I'm glad to be out of the NICU as the deaths were/are getting too much for me...it was getting pretty hard to go in and face grieving parents every day....and you can only attend so many funerals for newborns.
Other than that we've just been relaxing. Lee and Bret's parents arrive at midnight Monday and Karen and Monty will be here for a week. We're REALLY looking forward to having Lee home and exploring the surrounding area with Bret's parents. Hopefully we'll be able to do some halibut fishing while they're here. The record was broken this year when a guy caught a 450lb halibut....isn't that nuts!?
We'll be sure to take lots of pics to post on the blog.

keep in touch and we love you all oodles and oodles!

Jan

Let me send out a long overdue HELLO form the Williamson/Carmichael family.

Where does the time go???? Lee is still in PA visiting with his mom and Bruce and by the sounds of it they are all having a wonderful time!
Bret is working as the manager of his friends construction company over the summer while his rig is down. It's been great having him home while the weather is so darn nice. He's doing kinda of a bunch of different things. They are working on getting the business incorporated and comming up with the most effective way to manage their crews, with the summer rush of construction, but I think he's really enjoying it. Once he's back on the slope he will still work with this same company on his 2 weeks off, so it's worked out really well.
As for me, things have been kind of hectic. The job I was hoping to get this summer has been put off until January, but I was fortunate enough to be offered a position in the Case Management department at the hospital. So i will be starting there on the 9th of July. The hours are from 6am to 12:30pm Monday to Friday, which is an ideal schedule for me and my fibromyalgia. Not to mention the fact that It allows us to not need child care for Lee once he's back from his travels. A day here or there with him home alone is one thing but we didn't want to have him spend his summer all indoors, because both Bret and I are working. So now about the time that he's up and moving, I will be comming home and he will be able to go out with his friends.
The weather this last week or so has been nothing short of amazing! Today is the summer solstice (the longest day of the year) which is always a big celebration up here. The temp has been in the mid 80's and the sunset is around 1am and sunrise is 3'30am so it never really gets dark....just kind of like dusk. It's certainly hard to get to bed because we lose track of time so easy, you look outside and think it's early evening and then look at the clock and it's 10pm...very strange, but way toooo cool for words.
We've been spending lots of time on the deck and outdoors taking advantage of this weather, since we only get a limited amount of it.
Bret got an invitation to go King salmon fishing on Saturday, so I'm sure he'll come home with lots of stories to tell.
Karen and Monty are bringing Lee back to Anchorage in July and we've rented a little cabin in Seward for a couple days while they are here...hopefully we'll be able to find a fishing charter to take while we're there. We're definately looking forward to their visit though.
Other than that life just keeps trucking along. I planted my first flower garden ever this year, and by most people's standards it's not very much, but I think it's waaaay cool. We are exploring possible adoption/foster care here, since our plans in Kansas ended up taking a back seat to our move, but we're still in the really early stages of making a decision at this point. We just want to keep the option open and then make decisions once Lee's back home and can participate in the decision too....but we'll keep you posted.

that's all for now folks, we hope you are enjoying your summer's as much as we are ours!

Jan and Bret

WELCOME TO THE WORLD: Graham Andrew and Logan Stewart!!!!!!!!!


Congratulations Karen and Dean, who are the proud parents of these young twins born on June 11th 2007.

I'M A SIXTH GRADER!!!!

A couple of weeks ago I got my report card saying that I was officially a 6th grader. Tonight at 12:30 a.m. I am going to Pennsylvania, but I'm going from Anchorage to Seattle, from Seattle to Houston, then from Houston to PA. I will arrive around 6pm Saturday. The plane ride should be about 18hours. BOOO!

We went to the Alaska Wildlife Center, which was pretty cool. We saw moose, bears, oxen, elk, and buffalo. Also we saw two black bears that were play fighting, like Bailey and Shep do, if you've seen them play fight. The whole family is doing well. Dad got a new summer job as a construction company manager. He doesn't work on road construction, he works on the inside of houses. Like kitchens, bathrooms, bedrooms, and decks.

For the last couple of weeks I have been riding my bike and playing with my friends. We went to see Shrek the Third last weekend. It was not bad, it was kind of funny like the other two. The movie was 2hours long, and a great movie in my opinion.

The weather has been nice and we have barely had any rain. The temperature is around 60 degrees each day wooohooo. Which gives me lots of time to go outside and play. Also because the sun stays up so late. Can't wait to see you all soon.

I am going to my mom's tonight at midnight, then I'm going to Kansas City to see my grandparents on the 9th of July. Then we are going to California to see uncle Darin on the 11th of July, then grandma and grandpa are coming up to Anchorage with me for a couple of weeks. wooohoo.

Love you all, hope you all have a great summer! love Lee

I was going through all of my pictures the other day and I found this digital card from a broken camera. These are pictures of Lee at the go-cart park when we were coming up to Alaska. When we stayed in Bellingham for a couple of days before catching the ferry to Alaska.

I know all of you that know Lee well can appreciate theses pictures!

We will write more tomorrow before Lee leaves to go see his Mom and Bruce!

take good care!

Jan

I thought I would post these pics for all to see; they were forwarded to me by our friends Jan and Gary in Kansas. These are pictures of the town of Greensberg Kansas after a tornado that hit earlier this week. They're pretty sobering and speak for themselves.

Jan

Hello to all!

I apologize for not being as good about keeping the blog up to date recently, but life gets hectic and time just slips by sooooo darn fast.
Spring has definately sprung, as I'm typing this I had to shut the window because they are mowing our lawn right now! Yea! This is good 1. because they mow it for us! and 2. because it's getting green, green, green. Even the leaves are starting to make an appearance. I had the day off yesterday and had ambitious plans to prune the bushes and plant some flowers but it rained so I guess we'll try for Thursday :)
Bret is back home, and work for this summer is kind of up in the air. His rig doesn't operate in the summer after break up, I guess the island that it's on would sink if they did, and that is something they'd probably like to avoid. He has his name in for other rigs so we're in wait and see mode. Luckily for us, he has had a couple of construction offers for the summer as well, and he's working with a friend this week doing light construction. So either way he'll be busy, we would just rather have him working on the slope.
Lee is going to be done 5th grade on the 23rd and then he's off to his Mom and Bruce's on the 29th...at this point we're not quite sure on when he'll be home. He will be in PA until after the July 4th holiday, then he'll go to Kansas for a day or too and fly back to Anchorage with Bret's parents....I think they are trying to stop and see Uncle Darin in California for 3 days on their way. Man I'd love to do the travelling that Lee does. ha ha ha
My work has been extremely busy and my potential job is waaaaay up in the air, which really sucks. Patience is definately a virtue that I have trouble with lol. My fibromyalgia has been pretty bad lately which also contributes to lack of blog updates, but hopefully with the 17+ hours of daylight now, my body will decide to be a little nicer to me....i'm keeping my fingers crossed anyways.
Lee and I will try to get some pictures posted this weekend, Bret probably won't be back on the slope this weekend either so maybe the three of us will get to go explore some of the sights we haven't seen yet.

I hope that everyone is doing well; please keep the comments coming they are really appreciated.

lots of love,

B-J-L

These pictures were taken in Seattle with my mom and grandma for Spring Break. Before I get to the pictures, let me tell you that the St Patrick's Day parade was a total disaster! Because when we got to the parade, it started to sprinkle a little bit. But right about when the parade started rain was comming down like there was no tomorrow. I kept telling my mom that we would have to leave soon so we wouldn't have to stay inside because her leg was hurting.

The pictures are when I was at the Seattle Glass Blowing studio, where I made a little baby dragon, if you look closely into the small ball of glass you will actually see the head of the dragon is red and the body is orange and the tail is a mix of orange/red. The big volleyball shaped glass ball was blown to be whatever, and as you can see it's only orange and red, instead of a dragon body.

My snowboarding lessons are going great! I'm being taught by a future X-game champion! The last 2 weeks he has been snowboarding to qualify for the x-games. He is teaching me how to do a 180 and a back flip.

I got a new ipod nano "SWEET"! Which is grey with a really nice rubber case, which is also very cool. I must thank MJ (which is Jan) for buying me the ipod. When I was flying home I got delayed for 2 hours on the runway, sitting on the plane! We finally took off 2 hours later than I was supposed to but it wasn't a problem because I had my DS and my ipod.

love you all! miss you all! hope to see you all very soon!

Lee

These pics were taken in Seward after a ton of rain.....we had other shots of the waterfall, but they didn't really show how big and awesome it was! Well with a tiny little Bret beside it...you sure get an idea of the awesome beauty that we see every day here in Alaska....the top photo speaks for itself...."oyster anyone?

Hi folks, I'm home from far away! I love the new job, the rig is much bigger. I work on an island 7 miles out to sea, haven't seen a polar bear yet, but I'm still looking. I had to climb to the top of the derrick, it was 150 feet up in the sky. I can now say that i've done it and WON'T be doing it again any time soon. Break up is here and summer is just around the corner. Can't wait, will send photos.

Bret

Hi guys this is Jan....
As Bret said break up is definately here! Yeah! Our temps are haning in the 50's and 40's everyday. We had a couple days and nights of rain, which made quick work at making our snow disappear. There is still some snow here and there but the grass is visible and even getting a green tinge to it.
Our days are getting longer and longer we're close to 14 hours of day light and June 21st is still a long ways off. It certainly is nice to drive to work in the sun and not have it go down until well past 9pm.
Lee is in his last 6 weeks of school and is definately got spring fever. Keeping him focused on his work has been a chore....but who could blame him?! Snowboarding ended this past weekend which is sad for Lee....he has almost perfected his 180' jump...yup folks with only a month of snowboarding under his belt he is starting to learn tricks on the half pipe! Pretty cool huh.
As for me work has remained hectic, and I'm still not sure where things stand with my possible new job. I do my last week of green belt training this month....and I can't wait to get moving on to bigger and better horizons.
I'll have Lee write something about his trip to Seattle this week....we keep meaning to do it...but then the sunshine ends up pulling us outdoors! We'll try to post a couple pics too.

hope all is well! And a big CONGRATS TO KAREN AND DEAN! who are expecting twins this summer! woo hoo!

Love you all more than we can say! stay in touch....we love the comments that you post!

As always
Bret-Jan-Lee

HELLOOO FOLKS......
Yes it's been awhile since our last update. You'll be glad to know that Lee's eye is all healed up with no lasting marks of any kind. It's been a long and busy month here in Alaska. In my last post I remarked how well things were going and then life hit us smack in the forehead again BAM!
Bret came home from his usual 2 week hitch on the slope and was laid off the very next day. I guess he was one of the lucky 300 hundred people that Schlumberger decided to let go due to "falling commodity prices". So we stressed all weekend and got up bright and early on Monday to tackle the not so fun task of job hunting. By 10:00am that very same morning he was hired by Nabor's (not sure of the spelling) Drilling. Isn't the oil business weird???? He had a weeks worth of training and then another couple of weeks waiting for work to start up on the slope. It had been shut down due to cold. Last Friday he flew back up and is working on a "tower" called NorthStar that is actually situated 7 miles off coast in the Arctic Ocean. It's on a man made island and of course this time of year it's completely iced in, so they travel back and forth to the rig by bus. In the summer I guess they either travel by hovercraft or helicoptier. The biggest threat up there are the ever present polar bears, who whole heartedly believe humans to be as good of food as any. Laugh my ass off! So the camp is surrounded by sensors that go off if a polar bear trips it....at that point everyone is to be inside....not that I think they spend a whole lot of time outside anyways.
So in his first week up there, he has yet to see a polar bear, but reports that there are a ton of arctic fox, which are fun to watch. He says he likes this crew better than the one he was with previously so that's a good thing. He has also managed to get himself promoted from roustabout to floorhand....so he's moving up and influencing people. His hours are alot nicer too, he works noon to midnight for his whole 2 week hitch. At the last job he worked one week nights and then switched and had to do one week of days, which was hard on his body. So keep your fingers crossed for him!
Lee is on spring break right now. His grandma Susan and Mom flew to Seattle and the three of them I'm sure are painting the town Red! He left last Friday and will be back on Saturday, I'm glad they get to spend that time together, I'm sure they're having a blast. I'll have Lee update you all when he gets home.
For the past month and a half Lee has been learning to snowboard at the Hilltop ski hill here in Anchorage. So far he seems to really like it and is already planning his trip to the XGames! He's stuck it out on some coooold days (we're having the coldest march on record), and his teachers report that he is picking it up quickly....he's a natural snowboard bunny I guess. The nice thing is that the hill is only 5 min from our house, so we drop him off for lessons and then he boards with his friends afterwards...he just calls when he's done, usually cuz he's too cold and we're up the hill to get him. All in all it's turned out to be a great activity for him.

Things at the NICU have been crazy as ever, we seem to be hovering at the 40 mark (census wise that is) which is really taxing our resources, because our capacity is only 35. This week was particularly hard as we lost a baby that had been with us for over 4 months, and it was quite unexpected. When I dealt with the loss of adult patients it was usually because they were dying of old age, or had done something stupid to cause their own ill-fate, But babies are a whole different ballgame and I'm struggling with this particular loss.....I am very much looking forward to my prospects of working for Operational Excellence.
Speaking of which I've completed 2 weeks out of my 3 week greenbelt class and have a project well underway. I've also had the priviledge of sitting in on some high level projects that were being presented/reported out on to administration. While the prospect of doing this on my own is more than a little intimidating, I'm pretty confident that it is something that I can do and be pretty good at....so keep those happy thoughts coming our way.....
Like I said it's been a cold March, but today it got all the way up into the high 30's which is just about 1-2 degrees celsius. It's sad when 30 seems like a heat wave. ha ha ha There's still about a foot of snow on the ground but the streets are all dry. The bonus is that we are gaining about 7-8min a day of sunlight, which makes a pretty huge difference over a weeks time. We are well over 12hours of light a day now, which just makes things sooooo beautiful. Won't be long until we're out fishing for salmon....or maybe we'll get lucky this summer and be able to go fish for Halibut the big fish! Bigger than Lee even.
I'll try to write more often, but I've been busy with work and my project. Things should start slowing down a little bit now that I'm over the really labor intensive part of my project.
I hope all is well with you! please write comments, but don't forget to tell us who you are!

love you all as big as the world!

Bret-Jan-Lee

OUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi everybody, as you can see I have a big black eye! Yesterday night, I was playing with Jonah and when I was gettting a snowball, I turned around and Jonah hit me in the left side of my face with a snowball. It really hurt. My glasses were bent.

My mom gave me hockey tickets, for the good grades on my report card. So Jan and I will be going to the Ace's hockey game Feb.9th. I got all A's and B's except for Math and Writing.

We went to Fred Myer's and got new glasses yesterday. I am reading a war book about weapons of war.

Love to all hope everybody is doing well. Love Lee

I know that I am partial because they are my nephews, but aren't they the cutest?!
Here is a bathtime pic of Eric (2) and his 1 month old baby brother Tommy.....aaaaaaaaawwwwwww. Again we would like to say welcome to the world Thomas Dawson and we love you ALL as big as the world!

Life in Alaska has warmed up considerably, the last few days have been in the mid 40's which as you can guess has made things pretty sloppy around town. Alot of our snow has melted but there's still a could 2 feet on the ground. Bret went back to the slope today, but we had a great 2 weeks of family time. Work is still busy, I start my operational excellence project manager training on Monday. I have 5 days of class, then 3 more in March and 4 in April...hopefully by then I will know what I'm doing and will have impressed them enough to hire me. Keep your fingers and toes crossed. Next week will be quite hectic as we are actually working on a project while we go to class, so it will be alot of long days. It will be well worth the effort though and I really love this kind of work.

Lee is doing really well in school and has found an adventure series of books that he really likes. He's read about 10 of them and has got to the point that he can read one of them every 2 days....wow...it's very cool. He has also taken up a recent interest in WW1 and WW2. He has been checking books out of the library and watching alot of shows on the history, he certainly knows more than I at this point. It is amazing to watch really, his mind is like a huge sponge and he can tell you the blow by blow events of just about any major battle. For those of you who know Bret well, you can just imagine how the 2 of them will discuss the wars and battles at great length. They've even got several of the battles mapped out on one of their PS2 games and they can play out the whole seen over, and over again. Not really my cup of tea, but it's great to watch the two of them together, not to mention see Lee so passionate about a topic that he searches it out and studies it all on his own. Very cool.

While Bret was home he did the state part of his CDL and now has his official liscence...be afraid....be very afraid! LOL Otherwise life has just been bumping along as usual. It's tax time so we're busy gathering all of our lovely w2's and trying to guess how much we'll get back....lol....

We hope this finds you all well, I haven't been as up to date on this as usual but I knew I wouldn't get to it at all next week so I wanted to check in and keep everyone posted. We're gaining over 5 min a day of sunlight right now and it is amazingly beautiful as always. Bret and I were talking the other day, and it's hard at this point to imagine living anywhere else. A year and a half later, we still strongly believe that this was the best decision we've made thus far. Lee has completely blossomed here, Bret has a job that has huge long term potential, and I'm working towards one of the biggest and exciting career steps I could ever make. If you would have asked us a year ago....we never would have dreamed that we would be where we are. It has been a long and arduous road, but we finally feel like we're making headway and we really would like to thank EVERYONE who has supported us in soooooo many ways, through this adventure. When we first arrived things got pretty icky, but we stuck by it and are on the up swing now.

Thank you sooo much to our parents first and foremost, and also to all our friends and family. It seems in this day and age that we don't say it enough but we LOVE AND CHERISH all of you, and very much appreciate all of your love and support.

TAKE GOOD GOOD CARE!

Bret, Jan, and Lee :)

Hello Everybody, this is Lee's quick news report. The pictures up top are the stuff I got from my gift card and christmas money for Toys R Us. The bottom one is a truck with a control center inside. It also came with army men, and a jeep, as well as extra weapons. The second one is a helicopter that has inside a jeep and it comes with extra weapons and men also. The third and final one is an army jeep with men and weapons. I can set up my own little battle field. I'm hoping to get some extra money to buy some more army men to make the battle field bigger.

It has been snowing for the past 3 weeks, that I have been on Christmas Break. We have 3 ft of snow on our roof so of course we get no satelite T.V. Which is a bummer because on Sunday I was going to watch "1-7-07 at Seven" a tv show on disney channel. We are going to have somebody come out and look at it on Thursday.

Thank you to Grandma Anne and Grandma Karen for the gift card and money for Toys R Us! We hope it gets warmer soon, so I can go outside, and that has been another news report from Lee.

Love to all!

Bailey and Shep!

Happy New Year Everyone!

Hopefully this year will bring everyone lots of love and happiness! New years around here was pretty quiet. That is to say I was in bed by 10pm cuz I had to work the next morning. Bret says he came in and gave me a kiss at midnight, but I have no memory of that. :)

I've included some pics to show you all how are weather is up here. We have set all sorts of records for snowfall already this year. As you can see the snow is soooo high that Lee has been busy digging trails in the backyard so that they can go out. Obviously the snow is too high for Bailey, but it would also be almost over Shep's head with out a path. I'm not too sure who has more fun with the paths, Lee or the dogs.

We have completely lost our satelite TV as the dish has disappeared on our roof, which I think is hilarious. I phoned the satelite company who of course has it's call center in Georgia, and they have no concept of what I'm talking about. "you'll just have to wait for the snow to melt in a couple of days" and "surely you mean 2 inches, you couldn't possibly have 2 FEET of snow on your roof mam" These are my 2 favorite quotes from the handful of calls I've made.

Bret is back up on the slope, but they aren't doing much work because the high's have been -58' which is the same in both F' and C'. brrrrrr. So he has been able to get alot of his educational modules done during work time. In Anchorage we hit a record low of -16'F today which is about -24'C, and it's mighty chilly. I love the snow, but not so wild about the cold. By the end of the week temps are expected to be back in the 20's and 30's which is normal for this time of year.

Lee had a shopping spree extravaganza at Toys R Us just after Christmas, with his money from Grandma's Karen and Anne....His post is next.

Not much else to report, too cold for sledding, but I took this coming weekend off, so if it does warm up, hopefully Lee and I will be able to hit the sledding hill, we've found a good hill that we've been waiting to try out....I'll try to get pics.

Stay warm and have a most wonderful January!

All our love,

Bret, Jan and Lee