Putting Mother to Rest

We put mother’s ashes to rest last month. She is in the wall along with Stewart now. We are working on getting an engraved plaque for her that will look very similar to Stewart’s, but that will take some time. Everyone was there, and we all talked a bit afterwards, telling stories and remembering her.

A few weeks later, I had everyone over to go through her jewelry. She had a lot of jewelry: I laid it all out on the bed in the guest room so we could all see it and sort through it. Some of it was really nice pieces of turquoise & silver – some was just junk costume stuff. We made sure everyone got something of hers to remember her by, and what was left was donated to the Bishop’s Attic, mother’s favorite second-hand store.

Family Hikes

My niece Laurel asked me to organize some Family Hikes this summer, so I have been putting together various hikes each weekend. People can join is or not, as their schedule allows. This gets me out on the trails again after a long hiatus (I didn’t hike at all while taking care of mother for 7 years), so I am happy regardless. And I get to see my family on a regular basis!

A humorous side note: the one who asked me to organize all these hikes has not gone on a single one yet!

We started the season off with a nice stroll along the Matanuska Lake Trail System. We went at a 2-year old’s pace, with lots of sticks and rock throwing along the way.

We followed that with a hike along the Matanuska River Walk Trail, an easy stroll with fantastic views of the river peeking periodically through the trees.

The next week, Kelly and I walked the old railroad trail from Moose Creek back towards Palmer. You can’t go the whole way any more as the river has eaten away the middle section of the trail. But the portion that is left is still a beautiful walk.

I did the same trail the following day with Katy, but this time we did it from Palmer walking towards Sutton. Henry had fun with his new binoculars and hiking pack – adventuring in the tall grass.

Eklutna Lake was scheduled for the following weekend, and again Kelly was able to join me. She is a fast walker, just like I am, so we really traveled going much farther along the path than I’d ever been before. We treated ourselves to some ice cream on the way home.

The Crevasse-Moraine trail system is not my favorite, by any means, but it is nearby and convenient. We all had other obligations that day, so our hike was a brief one. But we were together, we were outside, and we were moving. That’s a win in my book!

Our most recent hike was just this past Tuesday. Bryan was out of coffee, so Noel and I used that as an excuse to take a little road trip out to Girdwood (about 1.5 hours south) to get some from his favorite little coffee shop. And while we were there, we went ahead and hiked up to Virgin Falls to stretch our legs and give the pups a break from the car. Such a gorgeous hike, with a spectacular waterfall at the end!

Dehydrating Experiment

For Father’s Day this year, Bryan invited his family over for an early dinner at our house. I had to work, unfortunately, so I was not able to attend, but we apparently had a house full of family & friends to celebrate fatherhood. Just doing a quick count in my head, I believe we had a good dozen people over! Each person brought food with them, so we had quite the spread: stroganoff, garlic bread, salad, fruit, rhubarb crisp, and a huge pan full of watermelon slices!

I got home just in time to sample the food and give a quick hug to everyone before they headed on back to their homes. Almost all of them left food behind, so we have a refrigerator full now.

So, instead of letting that huge pan of watermelon go bad before we can eat it all, I decided to do an experiment! I dehydrated it!

At first, I set my dehydrator to 145 degrees and 18 hours, but once that was up, I set it for another 10 hours. Those slices were pretty thick…

But I must say – I love the results! Tasty little triangles of watermelon jerky just perfect for taking on hikes!

Otter, Maw-Maw, and Woof

Our monthly book club meeting was at my niece’s house this time. While getting ready, Katy was talking to her 2-year-old daughter, letting her know that everyone would be coming over. Eloise just wanted to know 3 things: “Otter? Maw-Maw? Woof?” That’s her way of asking if her cousin Autumn, her grandma, and her Aunt Ruth would be there!

So, from now on, we are calling Autumn “Otter”, and my new name is “Woof” (rhymes with roof)! Consider that one of my older names was “Aint Doofy” I can certainly live with Woof.

The meeting itself was a good one. Katy made lasagna for everyone, even making a small vegetarian one for me, with garlic bread and a tasty salad. Strawberry Shortcake with ice cream and/or whipped cream was the perfect dessert, and she even had cut up fruit to snack on between courses.

While eating, we talked about the book we had just read: The Door on the Sea by Caskey Russell. The book is part one of a fantasy trilogy based on Tlingit culture and is being advertised as “the Tlingit version of The Lord of the Rings.”

I liked the book, but it was difficult to read because all the names of people and places and things were all in the Tlingit language, and I have absolutely no idea how to pronounce any of them. Book club members who listened to it on audiobooks said that was no better, because they did not know what the words meant. I probably will not continue with the series but am very impressed with the book as a whole, regardless of the language barrier.

Our evening together ended with Tara letting us know which book she had chosen for our next read. She said a friend of hers has been telling her for months to read Swan Song by Robert McCammon – so she figured now would be a good time to do just that.

Whiskey Infusions

Last year for Valentine’s Day I got him this Whiskey Infusion Kit, but apparently, we had forgotten about it. I recently “found it” again and decided it was time to dig into it and see what it was all about.

The whiskey we chose to use for our infusions was a nice Jameson triple-distilled; it’s got a mellow flavor that wouldn’t over-power the infusions. Jameson holds a special place in his heart as he was able to actually tour the distillery during his Ireland trip a few years ago!

Since there were two empty bottles in the kit, we each claimed one to make our creations with. We each started out with half a vial of the Vanilla Chips, which are currently soaking in the whiskey. They recommend infusing that for a couple weeks before adding in any other flavors you might choose. Since we did that last week, ours should be ready for the following steps sometime next weekend.

He plans to use the Coffee Beans, Orange Peel, and Bird’s Eye Chili for his bottle, while I plan to use the Chai Mix, Cinamon Chips, and Cocoa Beans for mine.

I’ll let you know how it turns out!

 

A Much-Needed Break – for Crafting!

I got to go on a crafting retreat a few weeks ago, and it couldn’t have come at a better time in my life! So many negative things are going on right now, I really needed something positive to counter all of the yuckiness.

I joined a group of 9 other crafty ladies at the Pioneer Ridge B&B for 4-days/2-nights of paper crafting and lively chatter. We all gathered at the B&B on Thursday afternoon and set ourselves up at our chosen table. There was plenty of room for each of the crafts going on: two ladies worked on felting, several had card-making crafts, and a few had sewing or embroidery projects.

Our rooms were lovely, with comfortable beds and luxury baths. We were assigned roommates which worked out perfectly well since we were only in the room to sleep at night. All the rest of our time was out in the common area or the dining room/kitchen.

Meals were handled quite well, I thought. Breakfast was of course provided by the B&B. We were on our own for lunches, but we had all brought plenty of snacks I almost didn’t even bother eating what I had intended to eat. For the dinners, we were divided up into three groups, each group responsible for one dinner. My group cooked a lovely pasta dish, and I was tasked with providing the salad.

As an added treat to the whole weekend, they invited a masseuse to come give full-body massages, if we so desired – and I, of course, took full advantage. She was reasonably priced and was quite good. I will never understand how those people manage to do what they do – she did at least 5 massages back-to-back each day Friday & Saturday! How do her hands manage that?

I had such a good time, and really got a lot done. I am looking forward to possibly joining them again for their next retreat!

Viktor, the Best Little Boy EVER

Viktor has died.

It just breaks my heart: he was my little snuggle-bunny and I loved him so.

He started throwing up, like 4-5 times a day. After about a week, I finally took him in to see his vet. She gave him an anti-nausea shot and sent him home with some pain killers. However, once the shot wore off (24 hours later), he resumed throwing up. I planned on taking him back to the vet the following day but he got so lethargic and unresponsive that I ended up taking him to the ER.

There, they drew blood and discovered that his kidneys had shut down. They immediately hooked him up to an IV with fluids and pain meds. He ended up staying there for three days while I worked with three vets and two specialists, trying to find a way to save him.

The final test results indicated that it was cancer, and the specialist that drove out from Anchorage specifically to work with Viktor said that while they could treat him with some aggressive chemo treatments, it still would only give him probably 6 months.

So, Thursday afternoon, I stopped all treatments & tests and just brought him home for the night. I snuggled with him. I held him while he slept with his face tucked up under my chin (his favorite place to sleep). I fed him his favorite foods. I did everything I could think of to make his final day a good one.

Then, Friday morning at 10:00, I had him put to sleep.

I just want to say, I am so very thankful for ALL the doctors and nurses and specialists who worked with me to try and save him. All of them were so kind and so supportive. Particularly, I want to give a shout out to Dr. Kelly Purdue at the Palmer Veterinary Clinic. She went above and beyond, in my opinion.

Mother’s Memorial

Mother’s memorial service was held a few weeks ago at the Presbyterian Church here in Palmer. It was a very nice service, attended by friends & family members.

My brother Reed stood up and spoke, telling stories of growing up as the youngest of her 5 children. Then I got up and read out loud a few letters that had been sent from people unable to attend themselves. Then my niece Katy got up and spoke of being the grandchild and her impressions of her grandmother. Last to speak was my niece Laurel who said a few words about her memories and then read another letter from a family member who was out of town at the time.

The reception afterwards was downstairs and had all kinds of food to nibble on. My partner had put together a slideshow of all the pictures we could find, from her childhood growing up in New Mexico all the way through her last week at the Pioneer Home. He had it on a repeating loop, so it ran the entire time we were all there, sharing stories and offering sympathies.

Those same pictures have been made into a Photo Book which was printed out (by Shutterfly) for each member of the family. If you want to take a look, I’m sure we’d be happy to share. Just come on over, anytime!

Next up on our seemingly never-ending list of tasks to attend to is the internment of her ashes. We will have a Family Only gathering at the Palmer Cemetery next month where we will place her ashes into the wall, next to Stewart. After that, I plan to have the family over a few times to help me go through her jewelry (those who knew her will remember that she always wore turquoise on her fingers, wrists, neck, ears, lapels, and pretty much anywhere else she could affix them, so she had A LOT of jewelry) and her clothing. Slowly but surely, things are getting done.