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| On our way in |
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| Ian with his beginning pile |
We spent the day on an easy hike in a place called Sun Valley. The temperature ranged from zero to five degrees, the sun was shining (but not hot at all!), and the sky was bright blue ~ my favorite looking day. I had a new day pack to try out (Thanks, Ken) and the boys had new fire starter metal thingies to try out (Thanks, Dad). After walking for a few hours, we arrived at a lake, dropped our backpacks, and gathered material for a fire: first moss, then twigs, sticks, branches, and finally logs. It took longer than I like to get it to catch with the scrapings, but it worked!
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| Success! |
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| Hard to capture just how high he was. |
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| Happy Joseph |
Not much feels as good as a fire in the woods when it's zero degrees! We kept them going for about an hour and had some snacks. Ian thought it would be a good idea to climb trees and question my mothering rules. Some of us (Clare and I, actually) stayed by the heat and toasted ourselves front to back. Luke, Joseph, and Addie took it upon themselves to rove about and pick up sticks to toss on the fire. Good job. It began to darken on the hike out and the temp dropped to a few degrees below zero but we felt good from the fire and food.
Facebook tells me that we hiked on New Year's Day last year as well. I guess it's a tradition now. Excellent. No phone service; no internet; no toys. Just us in Alaska. Perfect.
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| She walked the whole thing. |
Then, just as we were settling down and getting cozy at home, I received a text from Rees: Hey Mom, do you, Clare, and Ian want to meet me at the theater to see Rogue 1? So I put my smoky-smelling hair into a bun (Hey, it's Alaska) and out we went again. What a perfect day. The only dark spot was missing John, but he told us that he's doing fine and enjoying Christmas and New Year's pretty well with USO organized field trips (Field trip isn't the correct term, but that's what it sounds like to me). So it's OK.
Big breaths into 2017 and love from the Howells.
P.S. ~ I feel that I should share what happened to a baby of ours. It took me a long time to write.
