22 weeks

I've just been feeling a bit on the larger side these days so I thought I would add some more pictures. My belly pic was taken this morning and the Ultrasound pics were from this past Thursday.

Snake River

The Snake River runs through downtown Idaho Falls. There is a nice paved walkway on both sides for hand in hand strolling.

Pics from the last Month

Most of these are from the drive between Fairbanks and Idaho Falls.

another picture

We finally got this scanned into the computer. It's from back in September before we left Alaska. We hopefully will have another Ultrasound done soon and will post that one also!

Settling in...

We have arrived safely in Idaho Falls! Have had beautiful sunny weather and even a bit of snow in the last week. John started work last week and seems to be settling in and enjoying his new job. I'll let him post more about that. I'm on the job hunt and plan to unpack our few remaining things. It's been a whirlwind two weeks. Around 4800 miles driven and a flight from SLC to DTW in there. Thanks to those who helped out with the packing and unpacking of the truck! Rachel, John, Jeff, Mom you guys were a tremendous help! So were our new neighbors who helped unload our entire truck when we got here and Mom and I hardly lifted a finger. Nice guys! It feels good to have all of our belongings in one place and actually some space to move around in. I will take the camera out this week with me and post some photos of town so you can all get an idea of what the city looks like. We would love some visitors this Winter! We have a spare bedroom all made up for someone just like you!
On the baby front, in case you haven't heard yet, It's a BOY! We are just so excited about it! I've been feeling some twinges but not sure if they are really baby movements or not. As you can see my belly is growing fast! We are at 19 weeks, almost the halfway point and are waiting patiently until the day when we can meet this little guy!

White Bird, Idaho and a visit from my parents...

I spent a couple weeks down in Idaho on a fire assignment. The Poe Cabin Fire to be specific. It was 110 degrees just about every day and I was fortunate enough to have a seat in the GIS trailor with air conditioning and a prime view overlooking the Salmon River. I was stuck behind a computer for most of the assignment, but I did get a chance to fly in a helicopter on four palm-infrared flights over the entire fire area (including Hells Canyon). I'll post a few pics on the flickr site.

My/Our parents and sisters family came up for a visit this past week. We shared most of their marathon tour of Girdwood, Hope, Seward, Homer, Anchorage, Talkeetna, Fairbanks, Chena Hotsprings and Denali. A few of the highlights that we were involved in were riding the air tram up over Turnagain Arm in Girdwood, watching the grizzlies wrestle at the wildlife sancuary, hiking up to Exit Glacier, soaking it up at the hotsprings while a bull moose wondered around a few feet from us, and watching the sun burn the clouds away from Mount McKinley as our bus crawled through the park. Of course, it wouldn't have been complete without my nephew (and the rest of us) panning for gold at Kantishna. There should be a few of those pics posted as well.

We're approaching the end of the first trimester and it seems like every day is filled with new questions and changes. The baby has a healthy heartbeat and both of us are trying to learn as much as we can about this parenting stuff... I'm not quite sure when reality is going to truly hit both of us, but we're definitely aware that some major changes are going to be taking place VERY soon.

12 weeks

So here's an updated belly shot. There is definitely something in there!

well, well

Most of you already know by now that I'm 8 weeks pregnant! We were very surprised because we didn't think it could possibly happen so soon! I don't have a doctor's appointment for another 3 weeks yet. I'm feeling well for the most part. I seem to be tired a lot and nauseous on and off all day. Not much of an appetie for anything which you all know is strange for me! I love all food! I'm keeping it all down though thankfully. I plan on adding pics of the belly every few weeks so you all can keep track of how the baby is growing! Not much to show yet except my normal pudge. We took a few pics the night we found out which I'll include. Hope you all are doing well and I promise to try to update often on here!

Wedding

We had the absolute best day of our lives!
Here are some pics to share!
http://picasaweb.google.com/traciehutchison/WeddingStuff

trip to Girdwood

We took a road trip down to Girdwood / Alyeska resort last weekend. They had record snow in December so there was still plenty left to board on. The bottom was a bit slushy but the top was nice. It was Spring Carnival weekend so there were events going on all weekend. We caught the dummy races on saturday where people made dummy's on ski's or sleds to go downhill. Most of them bit it at the jump but a few actually made it all the way down. Sunday there was the slush cup where folks dress up in costume and race down into some icky slushy water and see who get's the furthest. We missed these shenanigans though as we left early Sunday morning. The drive back to Fairbanks was AMAZING. It was a beautiful clear day and the views of Denali were breathtaking. We stopped off in Talkeetna for some lunch at a cool little pizza place. It was a great weekend! As usual, most of the pics are posted at our flickr site. http://www.flickr.com/photos/hutchison/

countdown

Well, the official wedding countdown is nearing. John and I both spent a little time in Michigan in March and it's been confirmed that we miss our friends and family. Most of the wedding prep is done, we are just getting anxious for it all to happen! I posted some pics on our flickr site from my trip home.

It's getting warm in Alaska, in the 50's most days now. Sunrise at 6 something and sunset I think around 10. It was still light out when we went to sleep last night. It's great to want to be outside! We are going down to Girdwood, which is an hour South of Anchorage this weekend. Hoping to get some last of the season snowboarding in. I think they've got some Spring Carnival going on. Should be fun!

The work day is winding down and i'm outta here!

Oh, the pic is from my last night in Ann Arbor when the gang hit the photobooth at Babs.

Christmas Morning

Well, we've survived the holidays as we hope you did too. The shoppers have been annoying as ever but hopefully the parking lot's will recede. It's been a busy week of eating sweets and hanging out with coworkers. One of John's coworkers had a solstice party on Thursday. That is the shortest day of the year. We gathered for a FANTASTIC fireworks display and a bonfire. The fireworks really blew us away. Last night we went over to one of my coworkers homes for a HUGE dinner. I'm not even sure I'm going to cook today because I'm still stuffed. It's bright and early Christmas morning and I'm wide awake because I forgot to turn off the alarm. Hoping to get a nap in later. Santa was good to us this year as he is every year. We are looking forward to a day of rest and skiing and maybe a movie. Hope everyone has a great Christmas! We miss you!

holiday weekend

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving! We went over to a co-worker's house and had dinner. It was nice to have people to share the day with. John and I both worked on Friday and now we're relaxing, getting ready to run some errands, and waiting for the next football game to start. I'll update more with some new pics soon!
tracie

Is she smiling or crying?

We added a few more pics to our flickr website. Sorry, no exciting updates.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hutchison/

Yowsers!

It's negative six degrees right now! Doesn't actually feel as cold as you'd think though. Everything is going well here. Looking forward to a three day weekend b/c of Veteran's Day. Thank you Veteran's. John starts playing basketball this week and I started yoga last week so it's good to get out and exercise. I think we're going to join the local health club. We took a tour this past weekend and it's gigantic! Has lot's to offer! We also hit up a garage sale and picked up some board games so that I don't have to get beat at Scrabble all the time! Been reading lot's. Just finished a book called The Three Junes and it was really good. One of those where you are rushing through to see what happens yet not wanting to finish it. I just started a sci fi novel this week. Not really my thing but it's interesting so far. Finally picked up my knitting again and I WILL finish a project this winter. That's all the news for now. I'll try to get out and take some pictures this weekend.

Winter starts in October here!

This past weekend Trace and I moved into a new apartment. It's much more comfortable than the last place! More privacy with a country feeling I suppose. It's a smaller apartment on the first floor of a huge log house. It's up in the foothills off the Farmer's Loop... Our view out the front window overlooks Fairbanks even on a cloudy day and we get an amazing shot of the Alaska Range on a clear day. Our landlords are a truly genuine Fairbanks-grown family. They're a really nice couple with two boys that have totally reminded me of myself running around with my brothers when I was younger. They even brought us pumpkin muffins fresh out of the oven last night after dinner!
We're currently sitting back on the couch winding down from the days events. Tracie's reading her crazy novel 'Haunted' and I'm a bit restless, probably half annoyed that the Tigers game was postponed and half listening to our landlord's kid playing piano up stairs. We're both doing very well and happy. We posted some more pictures on our flickr account. The link is in one of the past blogs. Hope everyone is well these days. We miss you!
Oh yeah, weather... It hasn't been above 22 degrees for the past week and the sun rises at about 9am and sets at about 4:30. There is a definite layer of snow on the ground that supposedly won't melt until next spring.

Name that Athabascan Village

We flew over this village on a detection flight last week. It lies at the latitude/longitude of 66.15N/145.48W. It's first inhabitants were called the Dendu Gwich'in, who were annihilated by scarlet fever in the 1880's. It now has an Athabascan popluation of 28 and relies heavily on its small dirt runway for outside supplies and transportation.

it'snowing

We got our first snowfall friday night, two days before the start of October. It seemed strange as Trace and I both love the fall season and have somehow just caught a piece of it this year. The days are still fairly long, but we're losing about 7 minutes of daylight each day. Yesterday we started driving up the Elliot Hwy with intentions of checking out the bridge over the Yukon River, but 30 minutes into the drive we found ourselves in a heavy snow storm and decided to turn around and explore a little closer to home. We found the local ski resort and also a great spot to do some possible backcountry boarding. Seeing the snow build up on the slopes is getting me excited for the ski season! There are some trails just outside Fairbanks that draw quite a few x-country ski members from the US and Canadian Olympic Teams... They seem to be drawn to the early snow I suppose? Lucky us!! I've been running the trails quite a bit and am anxious to possibly ski next to some of these crazy people.
Last night, we saw a pretty decent display of the Northern Lights. They were mostly green in color and appeared as a series of overlapping arches over the city.

Weather!!

It's been raining all day and now the temperature is starting to drop. It seems to be hovering around 32-34 and the rain keeps getting thick and looking like snow but nothing is sticking to the ground. It's not even October 1st! Things are good here. I started work this week and it seems to be going well, looks like it might turn into a permanent job. There are some Oktoberfest events going on around town this weekend and we'll likely check them out. Other than that, we're still exploring and finding new things to do!
We miss you all!!

link to photos

http://flickr.com/photos/98056093@N00/


Here's the link to photo's from our roadtrip!