San Francisco and Back Again

There are a few cities that seem home to so many sights and wonders, no visit there can ever feel long enough. So it always is with San Francisco. We flew down to see Stephanie's amazing parents Barbara and Joe Thibodeau, but we were treated to so much more. Brandon's brother Ryan, along with his wife Heather and their beautiful little man Jack, came out from North Carolina to meet us. Our friend Andi was our native handler, making sure the bright lights and big city didn't swallow us whole. The rest of the Thibodeau clan was also in attendance, as was our friend Regina. We packed every day with something different and memorable, thanks in large part to Stephanie's careful planning, Andi's priceless assistance and our ongoing determination to show the kids the world outside Alaska. Needless to say, we all had a blast.

A quick rundown of the highlights: Chinatown (and having dim sum), the Golden Gate Bridge and Fisherman's Wharf with Ryan, Heather and Jack; the San Francisco Zoo (including a ninja squirrel who stole food out of child strollers, and carousel #1) with Andi and Regina; Santa Cruz's downtown, beach and boardwalk (carousel #2) with Andi; Golden Gate Park, complete with another very friendly squirrel (carousel #3 - hey, Chloe likes carousels); the Exploratorium and new hallowed grounds of George Lucas' operations; and several visits to the awesome beaches of Pacifica, where Barbara and Joe have lived for 35 years (and where Chloe seemed to run from every wave, while Malcolm was busy collecting his own "flotsam"). And of course, spending a lot of precious time with Stephanie's parents. We also took copious photos, as you can see. Therefore, we've cut the blogging this time, and let the images speak for themselves.

And to everyone who made the time for us, thank you.

♥, Calvin, Chloe, Malcolm, Stephanie & Brandon

The Tuckers from Texas come to Alaska

We've been fortunate enough to host Brandon's family from Texas this past week, and everyone's been having a blast. The kids are very excited to see them, especially Adam and Amanda, Brandon's brother and sister. We've taken them to a few of our usual hangouts, like Independence Mine and Talkeetna, and they went off on their own to visit Seward, and to hop a charter cruise of Prince William Sound out of Whittier. They also took Malcolm fishing on the Little Susitna River, and everyone caught their limit, including Malcolm, who snagged a big rainbow trout and two silver salmon.

Calvin is great. He's growing up fast, and is of course the center of attention. The kids can't get enough of him, and usually run to see him when we pick them up from school before they give either of us a passing glance. Of course, we wouldn't want it any other way. His eyes seem settled on blue, despite the fact that the rest of us all have brown eyes (brown/hazel for Stephanie). He's healthy and happy, and starting to interact and smile more every day.

We're now getting ready for our next family get-together, this time down in San Francisco. We'll be flying down and visiting in early August, and we can't wait to see everyone, especially Stephanie's parents Barbara and Joe.

Summer's quickly passing before us. We've decided to go camping at Byers Lake next weekend, weather permitting, and there's still a lot of gardening and firewood preparation that needs to be taken care of. One lesson we learned quickly after moving here is you can never have too much firewood, or start working on it too early. Then there's the State Fair, and more salmon fishing, and Chloe 4th birthday, and before we know it we'll be looking at September and a quickly approaching winter. The seasons change fast, and there's no better time to enjoy the beautiful weather than the present.

Enough of all that. We took plenty of photos, so enjoy. :) ♥, C, C, M, S & B

Calvin Islay Tucker, the World. The World, Calvin Islay Tucker!

Introducing our long-awaited "Blueberry", Calvin Islay! He came into the world at 3:45 on Friday afternoon, after several false alarms over the past week. He weighed 7.5 pounds and measured 19 inches. He is healthy in every way, and has already won the kids over, who can't seem to get enough of him. He's mellow, content and was eating well on the first day. We couldn't be more thankful.

Calvin, of course, is the imaginative six year-old of Calvin and Hobbes. With his limitless visions of fancy, and unique view on the world around him, he was a constant inspiration to Brandon growing up. Islay (pronounced "Eye-Luh"), is an island among the Hebrides, off the western coast of Scotland. It is a quintessentially Scottish place, and the most distillieried area of the country. The smoky whiskies of Islay are Brandon's favorites, and Stephanie generously agreed to the name long ago.

Chloe and Malcolm quickly fell in love with their little brother. They first saw him the day he was born, and we all came home the following evening. Now much of their attention is on holding him, feeding him and generally fawning over him, which he seems to take in stride. Nothing much fazes Calvin, and we're sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop. But so far it's been the perfect experience - eating, pooping, sleeping. Wash, rinse, repeat. In between naps and meals he'll look around inquisitively with his blue-gray eyes. He has a touch of jaundice, but nothing a little vitamin D won't take care of. Otherwise, he's a very healthy, happy newborn.

Life hasn't slowed down, of course. Chloe has taken to dance like nothing before, even more so than Malcolm is with baseball, which is saying something. We love that they each have their special activity, and Stephanie even scheduled her inducement around Chloe's ballet class, so she wouldn't miss her favorite time of the week. Their days are filled with preschool and lots of time outside. They're genuinely happy children; the kind of carefree happiness that only kids know. And summer in Alaska is a magical time, so they're soaking it up.

Stephanie is feeling great. Breastfeeding is going very well this time around. She likely broke her coccyx during labor, but she's already doing much better with just over-the-counter painkillers. She'll start working a few hours a week from home soon, and then will be taking Calvin to the office with her after that. He'll be able to join his siblings at preschool in about a year. And this is the year that Malcolm starts first grade. It's unbelievable how quickly it all happens.

In July we're having visitors. Sandy, Brandon's father, is bringing the gang up from San Antonio - Karen, Amanda and Adam. Aunt Amanda and Uncle Adam will get to see their newest nephew, and they all get to see Alaska for the first time. We also know the kids are going to love being with Adam and Amanda again.

And in August, we'll be the visitors. We're taking the newest Tucker down to San Francisco to see Stephanie's parents, Barbara and Joe, plus the rest of the Thibodeau clan, as well as a few of our friends. And with luck, we hope to be in the Bay Area at the same time as Brandon's brother and sister-in-law, Ryan and Heather, along with their beautiful son Jack. They're going to try flying out to meet us, and to have our kids together for the first time. It's all about family, and we can't wait to get the Tuckers, Thibodeaus and Markheims together.

Finally, we should note that Malcolm has entered into that most hallowed of rites of passage - he's a bike rider! He and Brandon have been working on it since last year, but this was the summer for him. After a few weeks of practice, he finally picked it up on his own, and can now cruise the neighborhood in style, complete with Sesame Street helmet and pads. The look of supreme satisfaction on his face as he rides is priceless. What in the world is more important than riding your first bike? Life is good.

Love always,

Calvin, Chloe, Malcolm, Stephanie and Brandon

Winter FINALLY takes a hike!

ALRIGHT ALREADY, we get the point! We love winter in Alaska as much as the next family, but come on! At the end of April we were hammered with a record late-season snowfall, and just as it had been steadily warm, too. Malcolm decided Mother Nature was on vacation, and Old Man Winter and Santa Claus hijacked the show in her absence. It seemed as good an explanation as anything we could come up with. Thankfully, however, it's finally all behind us now. Spring is most definitely here, and we've started getting busy with all our usual trips, chores and assorted family outings. This time of year in Alaska is magical, and we always do our best to make the most of it.

It's something of a miracle we've survived as well as we have this year, considering the recent superfund site that was our bombed-out home. Once the renovations were complete, we received a "notification of non-renewal" from Safeco, our insurer. We had discovered the hard way that two claims, back to back, landed us on CLUE, a national insurance blacklist database managed by ChoicePoint, the outfit that can't seem to keep its confidential customer information, um, confidential. Alaska law requires a homeowners policy with every mortgage, yet we were faced with losing our coverage in a matter of weeks. And thanks to CLUE, no other insurer wanted to pick us up. We did eventually find a new carrier, though, and life is back on track. In fact, we were somehow able to save money on both our homeowners and auto policies (and with no geckos involved).

The kids are, as always, terrific. Chloe has been loving her new dance class, and goes every Thursday. Angelina Ballerina has likewise become her favorite new show. Malcolm recently started t-ball, and is enjoying every minute of it. Brandon also chaperoned Malcolm's kindergarten field trip to the Alaska Zoo the other day. Both kids are really excited for their new sibling, Blueberry, who is due in just about a month now, around June 17th or 18th. Things are pretty happy-go-lucky these days, despite the recent insurance scare.

Stephanie is at last free of the clutches of her old employer, and with several coworkers has now helped establish a new company, Acacia Personal Care Services. She's happier than ever, and we're very proud of her. She's also feeling great, and has been coasting along this pregnancy. Boy or girl, there's a healthy baby in there, and Mama's doing very well.

Today we took the dogs and had a picnic up near Hatcher Pass. Later in the summer we're planning to camp on the beach in Seward. Brandon hopes to get Malcolm out on the Alaskan Rover, a 54' schooner that sails around Resurrection Bay. We may even buy a (used) new canoe sometime this summer. There's also the Kesugi Trail that Brandon wants to tackle, if there's time between the baby, the kids, the property and (sigh) work.

Oh, almost forgot. We got a new car! Well, new to us. Turns out three car seats don't fit in the back of a Subaru Forester, so we bought a 1998 Chrysler Town & Country. Yes, you read that right - a minivan. However, it's got all-wheel drive and leather and power everything, and has enough room for whatever we choose to lug around. We even managed to sell our Subie on Craigslist in two hours, literally. It may be horribly suburban and dorky, but we love it.

That's it for now. Enjoy the photos! :)

So long, Winter!

Although the difference between Winter and Spring up here is often semantic, there's no denying that Alaskans can feel the changing season, even if a glance out the window still shows snow and ice on much of the ground. As such, we've been getting outdoors a lot lately, with some days hitting 50 degrees. We're also getting busy with our usual host of work projects, like putting up a new fence, cleaning the house and property, and getting ready to start cutting next year's firewood. Speaking of the house, it's coming together very well now. We have new vinyl floors downstairs, and most of the wood trim has been replaced throughout. Now just a short wait for our carpet, and everything will be finished. It will have been a very long four months!

One of our recent excursions included the Alaska Native Heritage Center, where we got to inspect examples of indigenous homes, and even saw one of Brandon's coworkers and her family perform a traditional dance. We also hiked a portion of the Eklutna Lake Trail, located in the Chugach Mountains, between us and Anchorage. It's an easy hike, so we were even able to take our bulldog Emily - not exactly the thoroughbred of dogs. With the quickly warming weather, it's anybody's guess when break up will officially occur. We haven't bet on the Nenana Ice Classic this year, but 2008 seems warm so far.

Malcolm has also started attending Mad Science classes every Thursday afternoon, and he loves it. The workshops are taught in conjunction with NASA. He's a big science buff, and is having a great time with it. Chloe is as wonderful as ever, and had her hair dyed pink again yesterday. Our next blog post will likely have a shot of her new 'do. The kids also had a great Easter, and that evening we all went to a Japanese restaurant for dinner. They ate like champs! Malcolm even asked to try some of Brandon's sushi. They enjoyed it so much, they asked for Japanese again the other night. Looks like we'll have to start making it a regular treat.

Stephanie has started this year's vegetable garden in small planters in the kitchen. We're planning lots of camping and hiking trips this summer, and we'd like to catch a ride on one of the whalewatching ships out of Whittier or Seward. Chloe may join a dance class, and Malcolm wants to try t-ball. And of course we're expecting the biggest joy of all this summer, with the birth of Blueberry, who should be joining us around the middle of June. Both mama and baby are doing great, by the way. Stephanie is beautiful and feeling good.

Finally, Brandon's brother Ryan is a daddy! His wife Heather and he are the proud parents of their first baby, Jack Brandon Markheim. He's beautiful and healthy, and they're all doing very well down in Charlotte. Congratulations, guys!

As always, take good care of each other.

Love,

Chloe, Malcolm, Stephanie and Brandon

Two Months of Living Dangerously

It was the best of times, it was- well, you know the rest. As mentioned previously, we were the unlucky recipients of a pre-dawn (okay, winter in Alaska is nearly all pre-dawn) downpour of water, which had collected in the spaces between our two floors, the result of ruptured heating pipes during a cold snap (again, that's a relative term up here). That was December 23rd. A couple weeks of repair and renovation work ensued, and it looked like our little home would finally be coming back together.

Until it happened again. Some time on Thursday, January 31st, our upstairs cold water pipes in the bathroom burst, again due to recent drops in temperature. The coldest we would see it this month in Wasilla was -29 at the local airport. Stephanie and the kids had done a great job cleaning up much of the standing water and packing our clothes before Brandon showed up from work. That night we hit the road, having contacted our plumber, insurance company, local adjuster and renovation company, and spent the first of eight nights in two different motels.

The latest damage ruined much of the renovation work that was already underway from the first disaster, and the renovators had to largely start from scratch. Now half the floors have been or are being ripped up, and several walls and half the kitchen ceiling have been removed. The upstairs bathroom floor is a raw quilt of jagged splinters, yet the downstairs bathroom is completely without walls, so either way going to the bathroom in our house is a risky venture.

Adding insult to injury, the motel where we spent the majority of our evenings made huge mistakes with our credit card, placing three "pending charges" at different times. The result was to rack up over $2,000 in charges (for a final bill of only $600), which maxed out the card, triggered our account for penalty fees, set us up for a credit rating headache and had Brandon only finding out when he was picking up pizza for the family one night. After enough wrangling, the motel manager corrected the mistakes with our credit card company. However, the Iron Dog snowmachine race, and local wrestling and hockey tournaments are all descending on our little part of Alaska this weekend, and the motel was booked in advance - they were kicking us out, just when we thought our problems were waning. Stephanie had to race to find us one of the remaining rooms in the Mat-Su Valley. After we moved in for the final night, we found out the hard way that the room's heater was broken.

Throughout this past week, temperatures have stayed below or near zero, with occasional wind gusts of over 35 MPH. While Brandon was starting the cars in the motel parking lot one morning to warm them up, the temperature was -19. The next morning was -13. Unable to cook, or even microwave, we were forced to make do with fast food and the simplest of breakfasts. As a certified breakfast family, this has been one of the more difficult aspects. At a restaurant one night, Malcolm ordered breakfast instead of dinner, because he was missing eggs so much.

However, even the most trying times come to an end. Our house is in shambles, and yet relatively clean, so we have decided to give up the road and move back in. Water and heat have been restored, and a cord of seasoned firewood was delievered this morning. We still have a few weeks before our house will finally and totally be back together, making these two of the most, um, exciting months we've ever experienced.

And while in the end we'll be responsible for the deductibles (because the ruptures were two separate events, resulting in two separate claims, we're being forced to cough up two $1,000 deductibles), we will have all new floors, walls, ceilings, plumbing and paint to look forward to. The total bill, including motel and eating expenses, will amount to somewhere over $20,000, all of which, save for the deductibles, is being covered by our insurance company. And not to be overlooked is the renewed appreciation we all have for our modest little home, which despite its many flaws, is a far more welcoming place than any motel could ever be. Malcolm and Chloe have both been superb throughout the ordeal, relishing the motel's cable channels (nothing soothes after a tough day like SpongeBob SquarePants or Fairly Odd Parents), and playing in the occasional jacuzzi bath. We're extremely proud of them both. We were even able to work in an evening with the Moscow Circus last week, who played the Atwood Concert Hall in downtown Anchorage. The kids loved it, and it couldn't have come at a better time for us.

Not to be outshone by bad news was our most recent sonogram of Blueberry, our upcoming daughter or son. Those amazing images, and the news that both baby and mama are very healthy and progressing perfectly, has helped put all our troubles in perspective. We now return to our home, a bit shaken up, but no less thrilled to call ourselves Alaskans, and looking forward more than ever to welcoming our next child into the world.

Love,

Chloe, Malcolm, Stephanie and Brandon