Living in Alaska - Life in the Last Frontier

SEAN STEVEN SMALLEY

APRIL 29, 1992 - AUGUST 15, 2010

Early on Saturday morning, my nephew Sean - age 18 - was a passenger in a vehicle involved in a deadly crash. The driver and another friend survived. A third friend was killed instantly. Sean was brought into the hospital alive, but 99% brain dead.

Late Saturday evening, my handsome and fun-loving nephew Sean was gone. Sean is the son of my brother Steve and my sister-in-law Diane, and the brother of Rachel.  Sean just graduated high school in June and had a promising future as a mechanic.

Please keep my brother and his family in your prayers, that they may find the strength to get through this sorrowful time in their lives.

No words could express the sadness we all feel in our hearts. Rest peacefully, Sean.  We love you and miss you terribly.

ADVENTURES IN TIE-DYE

Several months ago, I introduced my friend Kerry to my friend Deanna. I’ve known Kerry for several years, as she found this blog a long time ago. We emailed each other from time to time over the years and finally met in real life earlier this year.  I met Deanna and family on Nordale Road on April 6th, the second night of the most spectacular aurora display I’d ever seen.

Both Kerry and Deanna have two daughters and they are all close in age. I was happy to read that they all went to Chena Lakes together to enjoy the sunshine and a swim. The girls got along wonderfully, and it looks like Kerry and Deanna enjoy each others company too. I’m so glad I brought them together. You can never have too many friends.

This past weekend, Kerry invited me to join her and Deanna and girls, for an afternoon of tie-dying clothes and a delicious BBQ. When I told her I had tentative plans to help my friend Lori paint her cabin, she invited Lori over to have some food with us too. That was so sweet of her! (Lori accepted the invitation.)

Kerry thought of everything. She had plenty of new tees to go around - to include adult sizes for the *big kids*. She had several dye kits, and plenty of rubber bands too. I couldn’t wait to get started.

I haven’t tie-dyed anything since Vacation Bible School in the late 60s/early 70s. Back in those days, there were buckets of RIT dye and you had to dip each part of your rubber-banded t-shirt into the colors. The dye wasn’t as vibrant then.

Nowadays, the dye is in bottles (much like hair dye bottles), and you snip off the tip to squirt the dye directly on your shirt. This allows more precise placement of many different colors in one area. You can also use the dye (and a steady hand) to draw designs on the shirts, such as landscapes, monograms, and stripes, etc.  But we opted to do it the traditional way, and wrapped rubber bands around different areas to keep the dye from penetrating.

We really had a blast! I felt like a big kid again myself, and couldn’t wait to see the results. It’s not instant gratification though. You have to put the dyed shirt (very wet with dye and water) into a ziploc bag for at least 12 hours to let the dye set. Then you rinse it off with a hose outside (unless you don’t mind dyeing your washtub or washing machine). When the water runs clear, you can throw it in the washer with a tiny bit of detergent.

This is also a very messy project. If you decide to do it with kids, make sure they’re wearing clothes that can be ruined, and rubber or plastic gloves. The dye is permanent and has a life expectancy on skin almost as long as a Sharpie marker does! And even though the directions suggest you can do the project indoors on a table covered with plastic, I’d recommend you do it outdoors, over grass or plastic sheeting, because it will probably stain concrete.

Despite the potential for mess, everyone did a good job of keeping the dye on the project without getting too much on ourselves.  I’d love to do it again. Maybe socks, or a scarf! A scarf would be neat. I wonder if you can tie-dye fleece? I could make a matching hat and scarf.

Here’s my very groovy shirt from the front and the back:

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BIRTHDAY WISHES

Happy 29th Birthday to my beautiful daughter-in-love, Becky! I am so blessed to have her as a member of our family. I may not have carried her under my heart, but I carry her within it now.  Happy Birthday, beautiful Becky. I wish I was there to celebrate with you. Save me some ice cream cake!

GARDENING UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN

When we came home from vacation, we were thrilled to find that Steve’s tomato plants, and my sunflower plants had more than doubled in size. The tomato plants have quite a few tomatoes on them. They’re green now, and our hope is that they’ll ripen before the first killing frost comes. Last summer, they died before we could harvest any fruit from them, despite covering them at night. I think this year, we’ll bring them inside before nature takes them from us. I just hope the cat doesn’t get into them.

I don’t have any photos of the tomato plants over the weeks, but I did have a photo of my sunflower plants taken in early July. I started them from seeds I feed the birds, and everyday they’re bigger and bigger. I hope they flower soon.

WILDFIRES FLARE UP

The Willow Creek fire has been flaring and smoldering since the beginning of the summer. (I took photos of this fire from the Parks Hwy, on the way home from our Seward vacation back in June.) Rain has done a pretty good job of keeping the smoke down, but we had more than a week of hot and sunny weather, which caused it to flare back up again. Fortunately, the wind wasn’t blowing directly toward North Pole, so the smell of smoke was faint or non-existent most of the time. But those days when the wind shifted and brought it this way, it was horrible.

Because of my asthma (and the horrible smell), I had to keep all the windows closed. With the heat outside (mid 80s), the house became quite warm. Keeping the curtains drawn helped a lot, but the last thing I want to do in the summer months is sit in a dark house.

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