Birthdays Present....35~

Yesterday was my 35th birthday--it began with 30 minutes of sleeping in (YEAH!!), followed by a 2 minute birthday recital by Nora and Stuey.
I took the day off from physical therapy, spent lunch with my mom-baby hour that I do weekly at A Balanced Approach. The weather was 59 degrees yesterday-the warmest its been all year!!
Last night Mary Jane had a few gals (and Patrick) over and we shared in some delicious food MJ made and everyone brought. Then we went to Jenny P. and Sara L. college Masters graduation party at a local art shop. It was a lovely venue with lots of people and delicious food. I rolled into bed last night...full from so much yummy food yesterday!! So fun! So far I'm liking 35...
Zoya

Seafood

This week it has been all seafood every night for dinner. On Monday I took the dogs and kids for a walk/bike down Cliffside and we ran into a neighbor who asked if I'd ever tried black cod 'collars'. I had not, and he went inside and came back with a bag of marinating black cod (A.K.A. sablefish or butterfish) collars and a slab of freshly caught halibut. I was thinking - cool now I know what we're having for dinner. And so we cooked it all up on the grill. Black cod collars are absolutely amazing grilled. Too bad you can't buy them at a store.

On Tuesday I bought and thawed some pacific cod acquired from a cannery in town and got home to discover that a friend had brought by some live weathervane scallops. Barbecue time. How do you eat live scallops? We tried eating them raw and cooking them on the grill in their shell. They were excellent both ways. We learned the 'guts' and male scallop milt are not so good either cooked or raw, but that the main muscle, 'clam strip', and female scallop roe are excellent both raw and cooked. Everyone REALLY liked the scallop roe - even better than the big muscle. And it's funny because the only part that people generally eat is the muscle - the rest is usually thrown away. Just think, Perhaps in the future we could create a market for scallop roe in Japan and sell the stuff for 30 bucks a sac? Having tried live scallops I just hope they start to sell them alive and in their shell. We'd certainly be buying them.

On the grill the scallops popped open after a bit and I flipped them and poured a drop of sherry inside. I think butter and white wine would've worked better. But scallops on the grill works really, really well.

On Wednesday it was the Powerhouse restaurant. Not much to say about that except it was excellent as always and included a lot of local seafood.

Finally tonight. Thursday night. Tonight we had canned salmon patties. I mixed up a jar of canned King salmon from last summer with finely chopped onion, chives from the garden, an egg, and one sleeve of Ritz crackers. This is a recipe from the Joy of Cooking. Homemade Tatar Sauce and life is good. Patrick

Melissa's Shower

Last weekend was the baby shower for my friend, Melissa. She is pregnant with her second child, due in late June. I gave her the quilt I made recently of the baby animals. The morning was lovely--the hostesses, Kate S, Anne O. and Katie O, had the most incredible spread of quiches (including a smoked salmon one), sausage, rolls, scones, fruit....There was lovely music, decorations, yummy coffee and drinks....I could go on and on. It was a fun event to take pictures at because the light was wonderful and everything was so picturesque!! :)

Zoya

Photos: Melissa and myself with her baby quilt!
Spread of food on the table.
Jenny M and Melissa
Melissa with the cake
The ladies watched on as Melissa opened her presents... :)

Recent Art Projects

Just a few pictures of recent completed art projects--a baby quilt for my friend Melissa's baby girl. This was my first experience with "fussy" cutting...where you cut the main attraction out of the fabric. I also did the quilting on this baby quilt, which went great. The last 3 quilts I've completed I haven't done the quilting, so it felt good to return to free motion quilting for this one. It went better than I could've hoped...

And a few baby burp clothes with fabric sewed on as an embellishments. Who says you can't make baby burp clothes somewhat cute?! :)

Zoya

Photos: -Front detail shot of quilt
-back of quilt
-Baby burp cloths
-Front of quilt

Last Skate Ski of the Year

I guess I could've titled this post 'Yet More Snow Pictures'. And Zoya does think I have posted too many skiing pictures of late. But today's a significant day - today's the day I put away my skate skiis. After work I went up to the pass and decided to try skate skiing for one last time. It froze hard in town last night so I was hopeful that the crust on the snow would be strong enough to hold me up. And it was - barely. The snow was very soft, wet and slow.

I had to hike a bit to get onto the snow and then it was a slog skating up to the high country because the snow was so slow. I had absolutely no glide. But I did get up there - see bottom 2 photos - and it was quite glorious. The snow is very deep up there and I have a bowl where there is a large area of fairly flat terrain (middle photo). The snow was a bit faster too, and I bombed around in the big wide open spaces and had a hoot.

Then it came time to head down. I angled down across a southeast facing slope that had warmed up in the morning sun, and sank in up to shins. I found if I went really fast I could stay on top but too fast and I could not avoid the alders and stream ravines. It was an exhilarating descent.

I came down onto a spruce tree covered plateau and bombed around a bit more. And then I made my mistake. Rather than heading directly southeast towards the road where the snow had melted out up high (I did not want to take my skiis off and hike if I did not have to), I angled around to the North facing slope and followed the snow down as low as I could go. Then I discovered I was a long way from the road and I had to bushwhack through salmonberries and cross several ravines to get back to it.

All and all it was a fun adventure, and the snow is still good up high. But the time has come to put away the skate skiis. From now on when I hike up the mountain I'll be carrying my downhill gear.

The top picture is a view of the pass from when I finally got back to near the road. The road is just across the creek and on the left. That's Pyramid looming up behind the cottonwoods on the left. Patrick

Yet More Kid Photos

Sometimes I get a little worried about posting too many kid photos. I don't want to slant our blog content too far one way or another. Sometimes I get a little worried about posting too many 'snow and skiing' pictures too. However, the blog is our family photo album and if we don't post good photos then they are probably lost forever. We print our blog every 3 months and also keep the photos we use in it in separate files. The photos that don't make are blog are kept in HUGE files and while edited aren't edited enough to make it worthwhile checking through them. For this reason, if a photo does not make the blog - it is lost forever. Not that that is a bad thing because the good ones do make the blog. In fact, I've actually contemplated heaving all the ones that don't make the blog. Why bother keeping subpar pictures?

Anyway, these photos are all from yesterday. This weekend Kodiak was blessed with sunny weather when it was supposed to rain. In the morning I took the kids for a bike down the bike path with the dogs, and then in the evening we went to Andy and Betsey's reception. The reception was at the Buskin Beach House and I took the kids down to the beach. I had not been there for a while and forgot how wide and sandy of a beach it is. It's a beach that most communities would import and dump sand to create. Patrick

Skiing is Great

It was supposed to rain all weekend - so when it was sunny today it was a big, unexpected bonus. In the dim fog bound days of late when I've gone skiing it usually been up into a whiteout. I climb 1500 feet or so and then ski down following my up track to keep from getting lost. In the white white world of a whiteout my tracks and pole plants are often the only thing there is to see.

So today was an awesome surprise – Sun above and views to the horizon. Today I could have fun. And I did. The skiing was great (see photos). What's funny is that even though the skiing is at its best for the year right now, there are fewer people skiing. Once the snow is gone in town people assume it is gone everywhere. Go figure. Patrick

Visiting Archaeologists

Through the years our house here on Cliffside has been a crash pad for visiting archaeologists. Back before I even lived on Kodiak I used to go to exotic places on digs (this included Kodiak) and various archaeologists would always put me up in their houses. So I vowed that when I had a house of my own that I'd return the karma and put up visiting archaeologists too. And I have. Or rather Zoya and I have.

Early on I think at times it was tough on Zoya. Red hair dye in the shower and inappropriate tighty whiteys flashings come to mind. One time Zoya returned from a trip out East to discover than an entire archaeology field school (20 people plus) had taken over the house and lawn...sleeping bags were everywhere. Needless to say, she was in shock. (We broke up for a short while after that one....)

But in general it has been very rewarding, and I am happy to say that Zoya has met and become fast friends with many of the archaeologists who have visited our home. I love it when I lurk on her Facebook page and discover that she's keeping up with archaeologists that she met through me.

Nowadays, Zoya I and the kids see the arrival of visiting archaeologists as a sign of impending summer. It's the archaeological field season and archaeologists are flocking back to Kodiak. Exactly analogous to when we get our shorebirds and puffins back. Stuey and Nora love it - they view visiting archaeologists as family. To my chagrin, they appreciate the return of the archaeologists far more than they do the return of the shorebirds.

Patrick

Photos:
Top – Shooting a drain pipe rocket on our porch with Don Clark. He is an archaeologist who was actually raised in Kodiak but now resides in Canada.

Second from top – Bob Kopperl does same.

Third – Don Clark and 'Cowboy Don' Dumond at the Zaimka mound site. Zoya initially referred to Don Dumond as 'cowboy don' (to differentiate him from Don Clark) and she is very close to accurate because Don Dumond grew up close to the border of Mexico as a cowboy, and actually used to ride horses into Mexico as a kid (much like the novel 'All the Pretty Horses').

Fourth photo – Visiting archaeologist stalwart Mark Rusk (on right) also known as 'Manny' because of all the help and advice he has given us to help bring up our kids. 'Manny' is to all intents and purposes an uncle to Nora and Stuey.
And the guy on the left is Josh (a local friend-not an archaeologist).

Bottom photo – Mike Etnier, Catherine Foster west, Molly Odell, and I outside the Powerhouse Restaurant this April - the archaeological migration to Kodiak has begun. Patrick

Easter Feast

On Easter, I filled the little plastic eggs with dinosaur stickers and Roxann brought little chocolates for inside the eggs as well. The kids went running around outside searching for the eggs. I decided that even if the eggs had been empty, they still would've been thrilled with just the search for eggs!

Dinner was a prime rib, roasted brussel sprouts, roasted root vegetables, wild rice, spinach salad, gravy, scallop ceviche and gravy. I love having people over for dinner which we now tend to only do on holidays or birthdays. Seems like before we had kids over we would do it so much more often.

Zoya

Stone tools

Lately while at work I have been helping write up the report of our excavation last summer at the Penguq site over on the other side of the Alaska Peninsula. One of my tasks has been to take photographs of all the artifacts. They will later appear as plates in the report. What you see here are all the knives (Bottom) and points (Top).

What's striking is how different they are from similar aged and analogous artifacts from Kodiak (AD 200 to 800). The pictured tools are classic Norton Tradition types while artifacts from this time period on Kodiak are typical of the Late Kachemak Tradition. Partially this is because most of the Kachemak tools you find on Kodiak are ground from slate while on the far side of the Alaska Peninsula where there is no slate all of the tools were chipped from stone. Chipped stone looks nothing like ground stone.

But the differences also reflect culture. The people on the other side of the Peninsula did things differently than the people on Kodiak. They built their houses and tools differently, and probably dressed differently too. But just how different from each other were they? Did they speak a similar language? Was their an ethnic difference between them? They did not live all that far apart and they certainly interacted with each other. But what was the nature of their interaction and how did they influence each other? These are the questions I'll be thinking about as I help write up our report. And to answer these types of questions you have to look at more than just the tools. Patrick

Eggs & Dance

This weekend has been a full one--dance practice on "the Big Stage" for Cinderella, as well as dyeing easter eggs yesterday. Katie brought Sawyer and Natalie over the Easter egg dyeing which wasn't too much of a disaster. Admittedly, I have shyed away from easter egg dyeing in prior years because of Stuey's then-young age. Just wasn't quite up to the egg dye mess and potential for kitchen clean-up disasters. This year the group was the perfect age for egg dyeing!

Stage Rehearsals for their dance class production of Cinderella started yesterday on the Community Auditorium stage. The moment Stuey has been waiting for...rehearsing on the "Big Stage". All winter if he resisted going to dance class, I reminded him that he would be able to dance on the big stage. Nora will be a mouse in the performance and Stuey will be a bumble bee. Can't wait to see him in the bee costume and Nora as a mouse!

Zoya

Life on the Rock

It's April on the 'Rock'. The 'Rock' is what locals affectionately call their island home. I think it might be a tongue in cheek reference to Alcatraz, and the fact that sometimes flights in and out of Kodiak are grounded for days at a time. Or it might refer to our position as a large island in the Gulf of Alaska far out in the North Pacific Ocean.

I see it as a plus that it is often difficult to get in and out of Kodiak. That's why we live on an Island. The sense of isolation creates community comradery - a feeling that we are all in this together. A feeling of community self-sufficiency.

There is nothing like sitting in front of the fire at home while a mighty winter storm sweeps in from the North Pacific. A storm that would make headline news if it occurred in the lower 48, but is a ho hum event here on the Rock. No flights out of Kodiak for days at a time, and the airport seems like a scene from the American Embassy in Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War. Then again it is stressful when traveling home with kids and you get stuck in Anchorage. .. .. Still, nothing like a little adversity to create character.

Kodiak has a lot of character and characters.

Patrick