Tuesday, February 28, 2012

My Daughter Gracie!

Gracie will be 7 weeks old this Saturday, so I wanted to show an updated picture of her. See you soon!!!

Making Progress!!!

Hello Folks,

I haven't been able to post because I have been either busy or sick LOL! Well, the awesome family I am staying near has recently bought more land and they plan on building a new cabin, shop, and barn on it. They also decided that they were going to build a guest cabin for me to call home so I can stop living out of boxes and a duffel bag. I have been given the opportunity to design the actual cabin and create the interior to my tastes. I do need to run my ideas through the kitchen commander, Mrs. Jenkins, but so far my taste is okay. I was thinking a 24' X 16' cabin with a full loft, so I can have a bedroom upstairs, a place to setup my HAM radio gear and create a separate reloading room. I want to do tung and groove on the inside and give it a nice warm looking stain. I'm looking for that warm, comfy, sittin' by the fire on a winter night rustic look! Well we made some headway, Kevin got a hold of a loader and started clearing some of the landing for his shop, barn, and home. He was also able to clear access to where my cabin is going to be. We will actually be across a pond from each other, when all things are said and done. The area where my cabin will be is thick with trees, I asked Kevin if he could try and make the driveway without knocking down any big trees and he was able to do it. My cabin will be surrounded, I just need to clear some that might pose a fall hazard on the cabin. The first picture is of the driveway off of an access trail. You can see that it was all brush and young saplings before the loader got there!


This next picture is what you will see when you get to the end of the drive and turn right, this is actually my drive way.


Now this last pic is of where my cabin will be going. In this pic, the direction you are looking is North West. If you can make out that hump of snow in the distance, that is about where the cabin will go, and the front of the house will face South South East, with a view of the Alaska Range!!! I will be getting more pics, so it will be more clear soon! See ya...until next time!!!

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Right Before Sunrise in the Winter Sky of Alaska

This will be short, I just wanted to post this picture I took at 8:00 AM Alaska Time! The sun doesn't even come up until it's closer to 9:00 AM, and it's on it's way out by 3:00 PM. I can't wait for summer, when you will see it almost 24 hours a day!!!!

Meet My New Daughter Gracie Lee!!!

Good Day Everyone,

It is a brisk 20 below zero, but believe it or not, I am already used to it and I don't need many layers on to be comfortable. When I got here Saturday, it was 60 below and stayed there for several days. It took about 3 days for my cabin to warm up enough so I didn't see my breath anymore. A bright spot in this dark cold winter is my new daughter Gracie Lee!!! She is a Karelian Bear Dog

, females are 19-21" at the withers, and weigh about 50-60 lbs. The males are a little bigger. Don't be fooled though, the KBD is known for its courage for taking on large prey animals, especially in defense of it's owner. It is fiercely loyal to just a few people, but not unsociable to others. Gracie was born 3 weeks ago today, so she just recently opened her eyes. Her momma is comfortable with me now, so I can reach in and grab her when I want. Well until next time!!!

Friday, January 27, 2012

Cozy at The Airport!

Hello everyone,

I am sitting here at the airport, Bradley International, and waiting on my flight which won't depart until tomorrow morning. A great friend, and the conductor on the train I would take every morning, drove me and my 600 lbs of boxes up here. His name is Paul Beebe and he is an amazing artist, he mainly focuses on marine backgrounds, but they are awesome!!! Well American Airlines is going to charge me $1860 to ship whats left of my life to Fairbanks, AK! I hope this is the last time I am going to move, because this is getting old fast. It looks like Tina and her two sons will be picking me up at Fairbanks airport, and from there will be driving me to my new cabin! I found out that Tina's daughter Faith and her friend Amber will be building a fire Saturday morning, and keeping it stoked with wood until I arrive that night. Thank you ladies, that is awesome of you!!! I have news! I am a new father! I am the new dad to a bouncing baby Karelian Bear Dog! She is about 2 weeks old now and I have named her Gracie! Faith has been spoiling her for me until I get there, I really can't wait! I haven't been so excited about something in a long time...I really haven't had anything to be excited about...Well that's it for now, I'm sure I will have more to say in the coming days!!!

Jeff

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Ten Days and a Bowl of Cheerios!!!

Well it's been a frenzied couple of weeks! I have gone through all my belongings, giving away what I didn't need, and throwing away what wasn't worth giving away. It's kinda weird to think about, but I look around and the sum of my life life is in 600lbs packed in 5 boxes and 1 duffel lol! It looks like I will be departing the great state of Connecticut January 28, 2012 1055 AM EST, and arriving at my new home, Alaska on the same day at 1009 PM Alaska Standard Time. It has come faster than I realized! I have 4 boxes and 1 duffel packed, the last box I need to buy and more packing tape! I am going to try to send a blanket and pillow by mail, since I just won't have the room to pack it. Unfortunately, American Airlines loves to nickel and dime you to death. They are charging $350 per box, so to add another box at their rates wouldn't be economically smart. The blanket has alot of sentimental value, and my pillow...I'm attached to my pillow lol! Well there will be more to come soon, this next week will be a flurry of activity!

God Bless!

Thursday, January 5, 2012

And...So It Begins!

Hello Everyone!

I wanted to give an update. These moving companies rape you of your money and smile while they are doing it. Evidently, what I'm shipping, not furniture, just personal effects, is not considered freight! I don't know what the best part is, so I'll list them and you can choose. Don't know why, but conveniently, freight is cheaper to ship than household goods, by thousands of dollars...oh wait, it doesn't stop there, on top of that, there is a minimum of 1,000lbs!!! The way that works, I have about 4-500lbs to ship, but I will have to pay for 1,000lbs. Do you feel the love yet? I have a warm and fuzzy! Well this particular company gave me a run around and 4 numbers later I was connected to their "relocation division" who told me I was getting a deal at $2235 out the door!!! oh boy! What a bargain! Well, would never have imagined it, but it will actually be cheaper to box the remnants of my life and put it through as checked "boxes" Being the genius that I am, sharp as a bowling ball I tell you, I went to home depot and picked up a few boxes to begin packing, and got lucky so I escaped the second $50-75 charge for being over a sum of 62" I will "only" be charged $50 for being at 100lbs per box. I am hoping that I can limit it to just 5 or 6 boxes. I began last night to pack some of the things that I'm going to attempt to bring. I thought I really didn't have much of anything anymore, because I had lost all of my belongings during my divorce. I realize now how easy it is to quickly start accruing things. I tend to accrue books and magazines. I am proud of myself, I was able to let go of all of my magazines into the dumpster. The books on the other hand have a tighter grip on me. I had such a collection of books before my divorce. I had a 4 bedroom home, and one of the bedrooms I used as a study that was lined with custom cherry bookshelves that were built into the walls. Like most career military guy's, I created what we fondly call "The I Love Me Wall" where I showcased all my awards, medals, accomplishments, promotions, and so on. It's all gone now. The best part of my life I no longer have a record of, so it is difficult to let go of these books that are now part of my new library. We will see how many boxes this is going to take, I might need to shave off even more of the weight, so we will see how it goes! That reminds me, I did make two of the last gear purchases before I leave. I got a pair of Black Banta Mickey Mouse boots, good to -20 degrees F. The other is a Carhartt brown Duck Arctic quilted bib. That all she wrote, I mean I wrote, no pun intended...Really... This is going to be the last time I move until I'm in a casket and being moved to my grave!!!

God Bless

Jeff