YUCK--the ash has arrived

Here are a couple of photos to show you the ash that accumulated on our vehicle while we were out to dinner this evening. We are here in Anchorage for the weekend and the volcano erupted 2 times today and some of the ash fell here in Anchorage. I'm hoping that it snows tonight to cover the ash. It looks pretty gloomy outside right now. This ash raises havoc with life for sure. Jim and I attended the Governors Prayer Breakfast this morning and the governor, Sarah Palin wasn't able to attend because of the ash situation. She is in Juneau and the airplanes aren't flying with the ash in the area.

volcano activity

My husband and I went out on a HOT date last night after dinner to look at the volcano . We saw a lot of people doing the same thing. :) We were able to see a range of mountains but Mt Redoubt was obscure, covered with clouds or steam. It was an interesting sight with the sun just above where the mountain is located. We all missed the activity by about 3 hours. Mt Redoubt erupted about 11:30 last night. We don't have any ashfall as of this morning but they are predicting that we get some today. A lot of air traffic has been affected. Mt Redoubt is a beautiful sight to see on a clear day. You can be driving in the middle of town and see the mountain in all it's majesty just sitting there---just so awe inspiring. Thank you, God for your marvelous creation!

Mt Redoubt

I heard that Mt Redoubt erupted last night. Actually, I heard it from my daughter, Julie who lives in the Seattle area. She woke us up early this am with a phone call letting us know. :) I had to run to the window to see if I could see any ash on the freshly fallen snow. There wasn't any ash to be seen, so we escaped the ash fall in the Anchorage area for the time being. Hopefully, the mountain will settle down so we don't have to worry about it spreading ash everywhere. My hubby and I saw Mt Redoubt on Friday evening as we were driving up from Soldotna and saw a plume of steam coming from it. The mountain actually looked very small on the horizon but certainly spectacular. Our son, Jordan flew across the inlet with a friend on Friday to climb a mountain quite a few miles from Redoubt. They got back on Saturday, thankfully, just before a major snow storm that flew in. We got somewhere between 6-9 inches on new snow. OH MY, what a way to start the first day of spring!

Mackenzie 2009

Some photos of the time we had with Mackenzie. She loved having her grandpa read to her. The box to the kitchen has turned into her "coffee shop". As you can see, she loves to be styling while in the kitchen. :)

Thank you Lord

Thank you Lord for all your many blessings. We are back in Soldotna , Alaska. We had a wonderful time enjoying the weather in Phoenix and left Jim's mom in good hands and doing as well as can be. God is so good. We flew to Seattle and took a shuttle up to Poulsbo, Wa to visit Julie, Drew and Mackenzie for a few days. Actually, we flew into snow at Seattle-brr and grrr. We got into Anchorage about midnight on Friday night and it was COLD-it had snowed a little that day. Anyways, Saturday and Sunday were absolutely beautiful scenery wise. :) We drove down to Soldotna yesterday evening and drove into a snow blizzard. I hate that. At least it was daylight. It is now daylight until almost 9pm!! That is good news but the temperature here at the lodge was zero when I looked out this am. Global warming just isn't hitting us yet!!! Well, I just thank God for his safety over all the miles we put in again.

Wall E visits Mackenzie

The microwave on Mackenzie's kitchen makes a sound that she says sounds just like Wall E. She was so excited about it and made sure Grandpa and I knew about it. :)

I'm in Anthem Arizona

I was hoping to have a photo of me here in the Phoenix area before I did a post on our trip. I haven't been able to get that done. I keep forgetting my camera. I usually keep it in my purse but it hasn't happened on this trip so far. I will post photos later.
Jim and I flew down here to be with his mom. She is 90 years old and suffered a heart attack over a week ago. She was in the hospital for a few days and when we talked to her, she didn't sound very good at all. We felt that she didn't have much time left on this earth so we came down here to be with her during this challenging time. The doctor's thought that she was at the end of her life. A nurse that was sent to the house after she was released from the hospital said that from the paper work from the hospital it looked like she was near death, she was surprised to see Mel looking so good. She is so thin and frail but surprisingly looking so chipper and is getting up out of bed and walking with the assistance of her walker. She gets out of breath easily and has to hook up to the oxygen when that happens. We've had some good conversations with her. She quoted Psalms 23 and The Lord's Prayer with some help from Jim.
We are totally enjoying the weather!