Living in Alaska - Life in the Last Frontier

I can’t believe that Kayla and Colt will be here next Thursday. I talked to Kayla this morning, to get an idea of what sort of things Colt eats/drinks so I can have some stuff on hand for them. We talked about the clothing she will need to bring, but I’m hoping that we’ll continue to have temperate weather (it’s currently 33F above zero) while they’re in town. That will make things much more comfortable for them both, as they are not accustomed to arctic weather. She told me that 40F is cold to her. I told her that 40F means springtime in Alaska. I’m so excited, and I know Steve is too.

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Last Saturday, after seeing a movie with Lisa, she asked me if I wanted to go driving around town. I know she misses those aimless drives with her husband, and I am always a willing participant when it comes to taking a drive.  I had my camera with me and hoped I’d find something to shoot.

Our first stop was the Ice Park, to see how things are progressing. The park is scheduled to open on the 24th. As of now, there are a couple of single block sculptures being worked on, the maze is complete, and a few sculptures - to include a small ice slide - are complete in the kiddie park.

When we arrived, a few men were working on a long slide in the “slide bowl”, as I call it, at the back end of the park. There will be several long ice slides constructed here. Also, a few big machines were harvesting additional ice blocks from the pond too, but I couldn’t get close enough for photos of that.

From the ice park, we drove to the LARS (Large Animal Research Station) to see if any musk ox were in the upper pasture. They weren’t. Off in the distance we could see a group gathered around the hay, while a few more lay in the snow behind the barn. There were also two reindeer in another pen grazing. I thought you’d appreciate this photo of musk ox butts.

Wanting to get a bird’s eye view of Fairbanks, we drove up to the top of Ester Dome, and then got out and walked a little ways so I could take some photos. Denali was visible on the horizon, and the sky was tinged with orange as the sun was making its way down.

I took this pano from the top of Ester Dome. On the right is the silhouette of Denali. The range is on the horizon, and you can see the rolling hills which surround Fairbanks. The white “path” is actually a power pole clearing.

Here’s a close up of Denali. I like how the spruce covered hills look ‘fuzzy’ in this photo.

By the time we left Ester Dome, it was just after 4pm. I asked Lisa if she wanted to go to Silver Gulch for dinner. Since Steve gets off at 5pm and works out that way, I called him and told him to meet us for dinner. We got there an hour before he did, so we ordered some beer “tasters” (smaller glasses) to check out a couple of new brews. We also shared an appetizer of their onion rings, which are really tasty, as the breading is seasoned with bloody mary mix which gives them a delicious spicy kick.

When Steve showed up, we all ordered dinner. I had the prosciutto and ricotta calzone - as did Lisa. Steve had pork chops. We all enjoyed our meal. When we left at 6:30pm, the line for dinner was out the door!  I think Steve enjoyed the looks he got, leaving the restaurant with two women.

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A couple of days ago, a pair of pine grosbeak showed up at my feeders. What a beautiful splash of ruby red color to add to the wintry landscape! I had my camera ready, as I had been photographing the redpolls so I managed to get a photo.

In this photo of a redpoll couple you can see clearly the red blush of color on the male’s breast:

It was very crowded out there. The redpolls are hungry little birds and wipe out all my seeds in no time. They eat much more than the chickadees do, and the chickadees have been staying away, which bothers me. I much prefer the chickadees as they are friendlier. Today, an article in our paper referred to the redpolls as “pigs with wings”. I think that’s a perfect description!

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The roses that Steve brought me have opened up so beautifully. They are still looking very fresh, and I love the way their fragrance hits me as I pass by them. Here are a few photos I took of them this morning. The second photo is available as a desktop wallpaper if you would like to put it on your computer. (Here is the second image below in 1024×768 resolution.)

I was planning to have lunch with my friend Abby on Tuesday, but when I turned the key in my car, it was dead. I knew something was wrong when I opened the door to load my camera gear and the dome light was very dim. I don’t know why the battery drained, but I think that perhaps I didn’t close the back gate on the car tightly enough, the last time I took it out. Fortunately, Steve gave the battery a jump later that afternoon, and brought it back to life.  I’m glad it wasn’t anything serious.

My friend Michele posted a recent blog entry in which she wrote about tracing her lineage and researching her genealogy.  Her entry renewed my interest in tracing my family’s roots, and I dusted off the information I received from my second cousin Tom a few years ago. Tom was fairly certain that our lineage could be traced all the way back to 1615 England, however, there were two or three generations in the middle that were a bit fuzzy.  He hit a roadblock with my great-great-great grandfather.

After reading about Michele’s work,  I began combing online genealogy sites looking for new information. I was very surprised to come upon a family tree that included my Pop Pop (d. 2003) on it! I traced the information back, and this gentleman seems to have the missing links that we were in search of!  I emailed him, but haven’t heard anything back as of yet.  In the meantime, I took down all the information he had posted, to add to my little spreadsheet.  It’s all so exciting!

My mother’s family is not going to be as easy to trace. Her grandparents (and perhaps great grandparents), came to the US during the first of three waves of massive Polish immigration. The first wave of immigrants, arriving mainly from the late 1800s up to the WWI, were considered “za chlebem” (means “for bread”) immigrants. They came to America mainly for economical but also political and religious reasons. This first and large group of immigrants is difficult to account for since they came from Poland when Poland did not exist as a separate country but was partitioned between Prussia, Russia and Austria. So they were registered as citizens of these countries rather than Poland.

I believe my mother’s ancestors were Russian Jews. Like many families, their last name was changed - either to “Americanize” it, or due to a misspelling by those documenting their arrival. According to my mother, the family name may have been Froesche at one time. Here in the US, it is Frost.

I’ve joined some online Jewish genealogy groups in the hopes of finding information. I’ve also contacted my cousin Melessa (her dad is my mother’s oldest brother), in the hopes that her father will have some information he can share with me as far as names, birth and death dates, spouses, siblings, children, etc.

Some of you reading me, may not have known that my mother was Jewish. My father and his family was/is Roman Catholic. When my parents married, they decided that their children would be raised Catholic. My brothers and I attended mass on Sunday, received our sacraments, attended CCD classes, and even attended Catholic school for a short time.  We also celebrated Christian holidays, Mom included.

Since half of my relatives are Jewish, my siblings and I were also exposed to Judaism, Jewish customs, celebrations, and holidays. I think it’s awesome that we grew up learning about both faiths. And being witness to our parent’s strong and loving marriage - despite a difference in spiritual belief - taught us to respect and accept those differences in others.

As the child of an interfaith marriage, I was aware of both my parents’ faiths, and learned the stories of both traditions, celebrated both sets of festivals, and even identified with both faiths. People outside our family may have found it hard to understand, and some might have worried that we would become confused, but it wasn’t like that at all. In fact it was more similar to a child being raised in a bilingual home and learning two languages. I found it quite enriching.

I do hope that my search for my mother’s lineage will produce good results. With each generation I uncover, I find another piece in the puzzle - a puzzle which includes me and my children, and generations to come.