Easter

I thought these photos were lost forever! I was so happy to see them in an odd folder on the desktop. :)

It snowed (obviously) so the Easter Bunny had to get very creative, very quick after she realized she was going to leave prints. The snails' pace and fear of getting caught were all completely worth it when Arlie screamed, "EASTER BUNNY PRINTS!!!" a few seconds after running into the yard. All three girls had a lot of fun finding (and then re-finding) eggs.

Hike It Baby Bodenburg Butte

Bodenburg Butte had been on our list for a while and so Andrew agreed to come with us to a Hike it Baby event there. As soon as I saw his face when they announced the "welcome circle" though I knew he was never coming back to a second one. Haha!

It was a challenging hike with a LOT of stairs and a scramble at the end. Not making anything easier was thick ice on the steepest parts and the sharpest corners. Yikes. A few hikers without ice grippers had to turn back early. The girls did great and set the pace for the rest of the group. They really enjoyed playing with the other kids at the top, watching the parasailer, and pretending to lick the chewed-gum-covered log (we agreed to the fake licking, we forgot to warn against the real touching barfbarfbarf). Andrew and I enjoyed the 360 degree views at the top.

OK, Matanuska Glacier: Part 2

I just couldn't let it go with one post. Here's the rest of the photos:

In some places it felt like being on another planet!

Matanuska Glacier: Part 1?

There were so many pictures to choose from I may have to make a second post. Matanusaka Glacier is two hours away from Anchorage and it's AMAZING. It was 1 degree F with a breeze so it was pretty dang cold, we could have stayed longer if the skin on our faces had let us. My hair had pieces of ice in it by the time we got back to the car! We're already making plans to go back when it's warmer. 20 degrees at least. :)

The one picture of Kit looking up with her mouth open? She kept saying, "Daddy, watch!" and then she'd make that face. We're not sure what we were supposed to be seeing but it made us laugh. We have such funny girls.

Weekend Fun: Byron Glacier and Portage Lake

We haven't had a lot of snow this year and it's been pretty "warm" so we took a chance and headed down to Portage Valley to hike to Byron Glacier. Even knowing the weird winter we've had we were still shocked by how there was no snow on the ground and how small the glacier was. After we played around the glacier for a while we headed back to Portage Lake to have a picnic lunch.

The wind pushes pieces of ice from the lake onto the shore, piling them up into the jumble you see above. That's some pretty strong wind!