Puppies!

Eloise had her puppies on April 27th. It was so cute to see her become all motherly, tending to their every whim. It was also funny to see when it was obvious she had just had too much. She'd run off and hide, trying to escape them if only for a moment. We had the puppies for eight weeks and then they each went to their new homes. It was hard to not want to keep at least one of them, but I think Eloise is busy enough for me. Here's a few pictures of the sweet puppies.

I figured it'd be easiest to give them temporary names for the 8 weeks I had them. This is Lucy, the only girl. She was so wild and playful, and so so cute! Her name is now Bella and I'm sure her new family is having fun with the sweet but wild girl :)

Here's Owen. He was the mellow one, but such a sweetie (can't you just tell from the picture?!) His new home is with a coworker of mines' parents. I've heard he is being showered with attention and love. They even kept his name, they just added on to it. He is now Prince Owen :)

Theodore was the wild and chubby boy. He was so playful. Any attention I'd give him would make him so happy he'd be all over the place, showing his excitement. His new owners seemed excited to get him and I've heard his new name is Zip. I'd say thats fitting for the little wild guy :)

Alaska trip

I've been home for a little over two weeks, but those two weeks have been wild, hence my pokey-ness in getting this post up. I was only in Alaska for 7 days, but it was a very jam packed week. I'm not going to go into too much detail cause these pictures will pretty much sum it all up.

The day after I got there, we hiked Flattop mountain, which I was told is the most hiked mountain in North America. It was a nice, sunny day, perfect for a hike. However, the sun was melting the snow, so it was a very slippery hike. I'm a bit clumsy by nature, so add slippery snow to that, and you can just imagine how this hike turned out for me.

Courtney and I stopped for lots of pictures. Alaska is so beautiful, you have to just stop what you're doing and enjoy it.

We didn't climb to the complete top, but we got really close. This picture was taken at our stopping point. With the slippery snow it would've been pretty dangerous to go all the way up. Also, I realized on this trip that working out a lot beforehand would've came in very handy. Courtney runs a lot and was here last summer so she was used to all this, me on the other hand, the rare day I'm not working is not going to be spent exercising, so you can imagine how much I was huffing and puffing throughout this week!

The day after our hike, we explored downtown Anchorage. I was busy shopping and didn't take many pictures, but it was a really neat town and fun to explore!

The next day we went down to Seward. It was a beautiful yet rainy drive. Once we got there we found a neat restaurant - Ray's Waterfront, that was right on the pier. I ordered this Seafood Linguine and it was AMAZING! I'm a seafood and pasta fanatic, and my taste buds couldn't get enough.

We walked along the pier and looked at all the boats. I'm barely visible in this picture, but I had to pose with all the neat boats :)

I thought this ship looked a little pirate-y :)

We tried to go see a glacier, but the road was closed. We settled for taking pictures in front of it instead. The glacier is in between the two mountains, or right next to my left side.

Courtney and myself, being avid Sarah Palin fans, couldn't resist a trip to her town, Wasilla. It was only a 40 minute drive or so. We had high hopes of spotting her somehow, but she is a busy lady after all! So instead, we went and found a place to eat, and my random self decided it would be a good idea to order sushi.... BAD IDEA! I am clueless about sushi and took a bite of plain wasabi (thinking it was fish) and it was absolutely disgusting. Pretty much ruined my taste for everything after. All apart of the experience, right?

I tried to not succumb to the coffee drinking ways of my parents, but it may have been inevitable. When I was younger it drove me crazy how much coffee they drank, and I personally thought it tasted horrible. Years down the road, and after spending days completely exhausted due to my sporadic sleeping problems, I decided coffee may be of great use to me. I've been drinking it for 6 or so months now, so I went to Alaska with the hope that I would find all kinds of neat little coffee shops to go in. My hopes were fulfilled, but beyond that, I was introduced to... the Sludge. The day we went to downtown Anchorage, I was in desperate search of a coffee place. We came across a place called Kaladi Brothers Coffee, and I decided it looked promising. On the menu I saw this drink, called a sludge. It was described as 'coffee poured over espresso' It sounded odd enough and strong enough, so I gave it a try. To make this already long story short(er), I drank that sludge, fell in 'love', and proceeded to get one the next four days. It was my goal of each day to track down a new coffee shop and order one. Here is my beloved sludge I got on the way home from Wasilla.

One night we went for a walk at sunset on a path by the beach. The beach in Alaska is really not a beach, not the typical sandy white beach, anyway. I'm not exactly sure why, but the coast is covered in mud, as you can kind of see in the next two pictures. I was told people have went into the mud and gotten stuck there when the tide came in... scary!

Courtney and I didn't venture too far in, just far enough to stand on this log and take another artsy picture.

My last full day there, we decided to pack full of hiking and seeing some more amazing scenery.

I was trying (or maybe it wasn't so fake...) to look scared while leaning over and taking a picture of the cliff I was next to. I didn't look down long, that's for sure!

Thunderbird Falls

Yet another artsy looking picture (you can't resist when you're surrounded by such beauty!) by Eklutna Lake.

And there you have my Alaskan Adventure! As you can tell, Alaska is gorgeous. The people are all so outdoorsy, but who wouldn't be if this was at your fingertips?! It was a relaxing but busy week. My flight home had me all night in Seattle with a 9 hr layover. That was... not so fun, but it was all worth it. I'm becoming quite the lone traveller! Where will I go next?! (yes, my mind is already scheming... are you surprised?)

Prom pictures

Basically all of the couples that went to prom had professional pictures taken at the studio in town. I felt a little nervous about the whole thing but now I'm happy we got some nice quality pictures taken.

The photographer told us how to pose, and when her instructions for this picture was 'pick her up' I was a little shocked. I was giggling the whole time and after two shots she said "Alright, you can put her down, this isn't really working" (due to my incessant laughter) but we ended up liking the picture and we chose it. It may not be all fancy and posed, but at least it's candid and in the moment. I'd prefer that anyway :)

Prom!

Prom was this last Saturday and it was SO FUN! I was so worried about just about everything beforehand but everything went really well and my worrying got me no where (not that it ever does) I didn't take many pictures so I may post again with other people's pictures but for now I'll stick with the few I took.

Kyle and I 'teamed up' with another couple for the day, us girls got ready together and the boys did as well. They came to get us then the picture taking began. We had a really nice dinner with 20 other couples or so. Grand March was really nerve wracking beforehand but by the time we had to walk, I felt fine and it was even a little fun :) The theme was After Glow, which didn't really make sense but the decorations were really neat - all these tall cardboard buildings with bright colored lights (as you can see in the picture below)

After we walked out solo (like above) we walked out a second time with the lights up and at a faster pace. You can see Kyle in the picture but I'm too short to be seen.

Along the way there were certain points where you had to pause and give people a chance to take pictures.

Jessica and myself. She is Kyle's sister and my very close friend.

This is Bailey, one of my co workers. We get along super well and I really enjoy working with her.

Hailey and myself. It was fun to have a good girl friend at prom as well.

KKAH was all at prom so of course we had to take a picture :)

Britney and me. She is the girl I got ready with and we were with her and her boyfriend basically all day.

After the dance we went over to Kyle's where we watched movies and hung out till 4 in the morning. It was such a fun night and I'm so happy I was able to go!

Next trip destination...

I'm becoming more and more certain of the fact I must really be addicted to traveling. Today marks 3 months home from Europe, and I already have another ticket purchased. This time the destination is... Alaska! One of my friends, Courtney, is going up there for the summer to do an internship with her cousin's church. She told me I should come visit and, me being me, can't turn down that kind of offer! :) So I am going to fly up with her when she goes there and then I'll fly back a week later. We leave May 8th and I'll return May 15th. It'll be a quick little trip but I'm so excited. I'm in love with mountains and trees and from what I hear, Alaska is breathtaking as far as that kind of scenery goes.

Just had to do a quick update with that piece of news :)