Summer Canning

Over the past week, I've dabbled in some canning. When Shawn's parents came, they brought some fresh berries from Oregon. We ate the blueberries fresh, but with the blackberries I decided to make some pancake syrup. I found a recipe on my favorite online site, www.allrecipes.com and made it the other day. Then I water bathed the jars to seal them. Then a few days later I made some rhubarb jam, also from the allrecipes website. We've got quite a bit of rhubarb in our backyard, but I didn't want to use up all of our rhubarb in just one recipe, so I went over to one of Shawn's co-workers and harvested her rhubarb. She has a GIGANTIC patch that she inherited when she bought her house and she never uses it! So I helped her garden out this summer, and gave her a jar of jam--pretty good deal huh?

Up next, some strawberry rhubarb jam with fresh rhubarb from our garden.

Welcome to the Decade, Dear

Yesterday, was a milestone day for Shawn--he turned 30! We all tried our best to make it a special day for him. He had to work, so the real party was last night. But we did surprise him with a giant cookie and some balloons at the police department. We had the receptionist put it all in the patrol/briefing room so he was sure to see it.
Then last night, Lee and Rachel joined us with Shawn's parents for dinner, presents and cake. We all had a good time and I think Shawn enjoyed his birthday. At least I sure hope he did since we all worked so hard (well mostly me, Carly and Diane). Carly has been so excited about Shawn's birthday. She's been making cards for him for the last several days and yesterday she even got Grandpa to help her cut things out. Yes, that's right. She was able to convince him to "craft" with her. I should have taken a picture of it. She also packaged up a nice gift for Shawn to open--her elmo doll, his hat, a book from her bookshelf--you know special little things she found around the house.

This is Shawn opening up a gift that Carly, Isaac, and I all worked on. We filled in the openings of a picture frame for him. A picture of each kid, and another opening for a handprint and a short message--Carly wrote hers by copying what I wrote, "We love you, Daddy."


A new toy for the birthday boy. Shawn is enjoying figuring out his new iPod touch.

A happy man with his favorite meal, sweet and sour MOOSE meatballs.
Shawn you are such a wonderful husband and father. Your family is blessed by you. We're so glad we can celebrate this special day and you. All three of us love you very much--as well as many others. Happy Birthday, honey. We hope to celebrate many, many more birthdays with you.

Picking Posies

I was so glad that I found this daisy patch at Amalga Harbor the other evening. It kept the kids occupied while Daddy and Grandpa filleted halibut and put the boat on the trailer. And it gave me a great setting to get some pictures of them--we can never have too many!

Way to Go Grandma!

Shawn's parents are here visiting right now and they have already gotten a lot of fishing time in. Grandma has had the hot hand lately and has caught several nice suppers. The first was Wednesday, when she caught this silver (coho) salmon.Then Thursday, she caught both of these halibut! One was about 40 lbs and the other was probably more like 15 but we never checked for sure.
Here's Grandpa with his catch from Thursday--approximately 30 lbs of halibut.

The kiddos with Grandpa's halibut.

After we finished up fishing on Thursday we went and checked our shrimp and crab pots. The shrimp one was empty, but we had 10 keepers in the crab pot.

We had crab for dinner tonight with cheese biscuits, spinach, and salad. Yum! And the best part is Grandpa and Grandma aren't done fishing! Hopefully we'll get even more tasty dinners.
(Sorry, Nicole. I know how much these posts about eating crab make your mouth water. Do you have Australian Dungeness crab?)

Contest Winner

The judges (Shawn and I) reached a unanimous decision and are awarding Ben as the winner of the 200 post caption contest. His entry had us both rolling with laughter. So here, for everyone to enjoy, are Ben's captions.

...so the bartender asks the horse, "why the long face?"

Here is my handle, here is my spout.

Read my lips - NO NEW TAXES. Now where's a baby I can kiss?

Congratulations, Ben! We'll send your prize out in the next few days. Let us know if you want something other than a starbucks card.
Thanks to everyone who wrote a comment and entered the contest. Hope you had as much fun as we did. Good luck to you all the next time we decide to host a contest.

Post No. 200--Caption Contest

In honor of our 200th post to this blog, I thought we'd do a little contest with a prize!
Below, I posted three pictures that I took of Isaac recently. So take a look, click on "comments" and post your suggested captions for these pictures. Shawn and I will look at all the "entries" and choose our favorite. The winner will receive a $15 Starbucks gift card--or a substitute like McDonald's, or amazon.com if you're not a coffee drinker or don't live near a Starbucks. We'll announce the winner on Thursday (8/13) morning, so good luck!

Ben's Visit

We had a great time this past weekend visiting with our friend, Ben. Ben and Shawn were roommates at OC and each others best men.
The above picture makes me smile. That trash can may be bear proof, but it's not Ben proof. I really like this picture because it's so clear to me that Ben is the same guy he's always been--fun loving and genuine.
Tuesday we toured Ben around town. We started at the lookout area above to view the glacier with the field of fireweed in front. Then we went to the fish hatchery area and watched the thousands of salmon trying to climb "the ladder".


This picture makes me laugh every time I see it. I know Isaac is poking his head out through an arm hole, but did you see his face? So hilarious! Thanks to Ben for holding up Carly for the picture.
While we were downtown, we stopped for ice cream. It was a hot day in Juneau, so the cold cream was particularly nice.
On our way back home, we stopped at McDonald's to get some drinks. Ben being his lovable self, decided to hop in the play area with the kids. (He decided the rules eluded to parents being allowed inside. Since he is a parent, I guess he thought that was good enough.) Yes, Kelly, it's true. I knew you would like these pictures. It didn't take me very long to realize that Sophie must have so much fun playing with her daddy.

Shawn and Ben went out fishing over night Sunday evening til Monday. They had enough success to bring home a delicious dinner and to pack some for Ben to take back. Here's Ben with a halibut he caught.

The shrimp pots worked! Yum!

They also saw lots of sea life-whales, sea lions, seals, and birds. These humpback whales were very close to the boat. They didn't have the zoom lens that I used the other day when we saw whales.

The boys had a great time together. The last time we saw Ben and Kelly was about two years ago for just a few hours. Kelly and I were both pregnant at the time. And the time before that was probably two years before that over dinner. So having an extended weekend was really nice. Next time, we hope Kelly and the kids can make it too. Thanks for sending him up, Kelly.

A Corn Fan

This summer, we have discovered that Isaac is a HUGE fan of corn on the cob. We've been able to enjoy it many times recently. I've also decided that making him share a cob with Carly is not best for sibling relations, and besides, he can totally eat an entire cob by himself. He actually doesn't seem to care about any other food that we're having for dinner--he just wants the corn. And it does seem that he prefers his corn on the cob rather than off. He likes it either way, but gets so excited when he sees the bowl of corn on the cob make it to the table. Actually he gets excited in the grocery store when he sees me picking out a few ears. Too bad growing corn in SE Alaska is so difficult. I'm sure some master gardener out there could do it, but that's not me. I can do lettuce and rhubarb.