Why our money is so worthless and we can’t afford rent or groceries.
I suggest folks do some research and start figuring this out on their own. Look past the political pundits and inflammatory finger pointing and see how national debt affects our currency and economy. Heavens knows that most of us didn’t really learn this in high school.
Examine how unbridled government spending trickles down to you and me. And really cogitate on what we can do about it.
Bread, the source of life. Well maybe not, but for those of us who can’t eat it, it feels a little like it is.
I haven’t eaten wheat (on purpose) for the better part of 25 years. And I still miss bread. Warm from the oven, crusty artisan style sourdough, or toasted sliced bread slathered with butter, pizza bread loaded with toppings, or even better, bread in the form of cinnamon rolls. Oy.
But I digress…
Even though I can’t enjoy eating it I do like to make bread. But with work and all I often don’t have time. Recently I found this post on Pinterest that has awakened my inner bread baker. It’s so easy. And only takes minutes to prep, let it rest all afternoon if necessary and bake right before dinner. Yum! The fam loves it.
Flour, salt, yeast and water Dough ballReady to rise on top of the wood stoveAfter 2.5 hoursFinished loaf!
These little pups are officially 8 weeks old yesterday and their little personalities are starting to be revealed. Consequently, names tend to follow suit. We tried really hard not to name them, made it almost six weeks and then Grumpus got her moniker, then Rudy (Rudolph the Red Nose Pit) but that’s it, no more names I said.
Sooo here we are at 8 weeks and they are just… needing names. Puppy, little girl/boy just isn’t cutting it anymore. Besides, who wants to go through life being called Runt?
Speaking of the runt, she is the sweetest little love bug who wants to cuddle and snuggle and stay that way forever. So, you guessed it, Love Bug, Bug, Bugsie, Bugs for short, is her name. If she had been a male I’d have named her Herbie but I digress.
The little brindled boy, with markings reminiscent of a doberman (sans the brindling of course) was being called Little Iko after a friend’s dog with similar markings & the same name. But I don’t like it. They call him psycho Iko (because our friend’s dog is a little neurotic, not this puppy) so we have to do better. I recalled the two doberman’s who used to be the nemesis of Thomas Magnum on the original series, so we decided on Higgins for the pup. It’s a right proper name for a lad. He’ll grow into it.
Sunday evening our friends came over to check out the pups and decided to adopted one, they chose Rudy! But while they were here they named the little brown boy Scooby, Scoob for short. So it seems that we have more named pups than not.
There’s five left without names. I’m sure they’ll be forthcoming in short order. Two of them are a little bit fluffier than the others, (one female and one male) which usually gets them called Fluffy and/or Fluffball. So those need to be remedied quickly. One is the other tiny little boy who is brown with brindling throughout who is a bit timid. Then one more little black & white female who usually gets along well with everyone else. And Grumpus’s twin brother who doesn’t really have a good name option to go with hers.
What would you name them?
Everyone else got out to play but he prefers to stay and sleep!Passed out from full bellies. Puppy pile.Panda Bear sitting in the chair, staying away from the minions
Old Man Winter showed up yesterday, about 2-3 weeks behind schedule. We had a winter weather advisory to expect 1-3 inches and possibly ice. Well that turned into a good 8″, maybe 10″ with wind.
It’s wet and heavy.
And the power has been out since the wee early morning hours.
The kids were outside yesterday playing in the snow while Dean and I buttoned up the shop walls. We managed to get all the metal on and enclosed, all but the end where the garage door goes eventually.
Yeah! No more snow all over our stuff!
Once we get the woodstove installed we’ll be able to work in relative comfort this winter. I’m super excited.
We salvaged a shelter logic frame from the dump earlier this season and erected it to store our camp trailers and 4-wheelers. There was a good 10″ of snow saging the tarp down so the kids and I worked on clearing it off before chaos and collapse happened.
Now we need to shovel copious amounts of snow away from the walkways and drive. We won’t be getting plowed anytime soon so we must use good ole man/woman/child-power to move white stuff. All while Dean works pushing snow with the loader for our commercial client.
Life in Alaska.
Now we’re inside warming up next to the wood stove. B’H for non-electric heating. Times like this remind me that I need to install a 12 volt power and lighting system with a small solar array. Then at least we could function relatively normally without power.
But that’s a project for another day.
The grader finally came through at 5 pm. At least we could get up the road now if we had too. The oldest kiddo might be able to make it to work tomorrow.
In the meantime, we’ll light some candles and lanterns and play some games!
It’s been a minute, but autumn has fallen and winter is knocking at the door.
The trees have been gorgeous this year, so much color.
Picking Labrador Tea
We’re still getting into the upper 50°s during the day but hard freezing at night. Ice on the animal’s water buckets every morning. We’ve hunted for moose, picked a few berries & some Labrador Tea and photographed a lot of mushrooms.
Lil Bit harvested her garden. She ended up with a good little batch of green tomatoes and some potatoes.
I don’t know how I made it my entire life without being called for jury duty but here I am. August was my second time being on the call list here in Alaska but first time ever being seated on a jury. It has been enlightening.
I’ve always been willing and interested in serving as a juror. For me, it’s not only a civic duty but a faith based duty as well. Heaven knows that if I ever found myself in need of a jury I certainly would want someone (or 12 someones) willing to serve and not doing so begrudgingly, wishing they were somewhere else, and not giving their full attention and due diligence.
I found myself really examining my thoughts and beliefs and actually needing to reconcile a couple of contradictory beliefs. I’m thankful for the opportunity to see our justice system work, mostly the way it was intended to do.
Innocent until proven guilty.
It’s a catchy phrase that we toss around. But before today I never really had to dig deep and experience that reality from a position of judging facts. Questioning myself as to whether or not I truly believed that all those sitting in the defendant’s seat could be, should be awarded that right. Sometimes it’s harder than others.
It’s our right as Americans.
I learned a lot about how our local courts work, the process and people. It was interesting to be sure.
After three days of trial proceedings and the initial day of jury selection, I was invested in the process. Unfortunately I was one of the two drawn as alternates and I was excused before deliberations began. I was disappointed at first, then relieved that I didn’t have to sit in judgement over this person! It’s a heavy thing to be sure.
So next time when the jury duty notice comes around I’ll be ready, once again, to perform my civic duty.
The weather man said to tie down any loose items night before last as overnight Thursday & Friday would be a bit gusty. Remnants if an ex-typhoon they said.
It’s never a good time to have a wind storm when you have an overabundance of beetle killed spruce trees in your area. The wind set a steady tree swaying pace the entire day, kicking up a good gust fairly often.
The power was out for a large amount of Alaskans from Sterling to Willow yesterday morning. They had clocked some 70mph gusts up north. At around 7:20 am ours went out.
Time to fill the woodshed. First time we cut wood without Caleb here. 😥
We managed to cut up about a cord of wood yesterday between two friend’s properties. Thankfully these trees were already down and not a casualty of the storm. We do have one tree down on our place from the storm to dispense of. Overall nothing to complain about. Plus that should fill one side of the woodshed. Now to the other side.
This was the longest outage we’ve had since moving to this house. The biggest inconvenience for us being unable to flush the toilets. Trees were down everywhere, on houses, on power lines, on the roads. A good reminder for always being prepared. I need to figure out a water storage system for this house. And install a couple 12 volt LED lights. And finish that solar generator I bought all the components for a couple years ago. Also time to fix the generator pull cord… I need to make a honey do list.
Thankfully, those dedicated lineman worked overtime and restored our power at 3:21 am. About 20 hours, I wonder if we’ll see a difference on next months electric bill?
Fred Meyer must have been the only store in town with power since everyone was there shopping. It was worse than tourist season.
Alaska on my mind... 