New Month, new Routines

Hello friends, as you know I am not the best when it comes to update this blog. But the main reason for this blog, as most of you know or will know, is to share my pictures of this wonderful nature and world as we all share together. So, as a new month enters our world I think I will start something new, to keep me and you up to date with my world and nature. I will start posting at least one picture a day, it doesn't necessarily have to be taken that specific day, just something for you to rest your eyes on. I might not write a whole lot about it, other than a few words, cause we all know that a picture can say more than a thousand words.

Every now and then I will probably also write longer blogposts, and share multiple pictures and stories as I have in the past.

October 1st. That pretty little plant that is invasive and has taken over large parts of this town...

The deciduous trees aren't the only ones that are turning brown, the spruce got pretty beat down by the drought this summer, and their needles have turned brown..

That will be it for this time, feels weird with such a short blogpost, but I rather update frequently so you have something new to look at, than updating every 2 months.. :) I hope you enjoy this new routine. I have a hard time holding back from posting 20 more picture, so you will see more.

How Tycho views this world

And then summer arrived...

Since I have been so busy lately, I haven't had time at all to update. I was updating so infrequently as it was before the summer, so yeah, the updates have been closer to zero than anything else. But summer finally did arrive, late, much later than what I have been used to. W left in June to do his PhD in Madison. So we have two cats, Olive and Tycho, but Olive is his cat, and Tycho is my cat (even though i secretly think Olive loves me more...). I had both cats for a while and then I shipped Olive to Madison in August. But I will see her soon enough :) This below is Olive:

And Tycho, Tycho was a stray cat and he lost his ears because of frostbite (like many other cats at pet-pride in Fairbanks).

This summer was so dry, almost no rain all summer, and anyone who knows Alaska knows what that mean, fire.

One of my favorite flowers, fireweed, the color is just stunning when it's all in bloom. I love seeing the color of fireweed, makes me realize summer is here for real.

They say that when the fireweed has bloomed out, summer is over.

This summer did feel extremely short and long at the same time. Short in the sense that I kept busy, and long cause I felt like I had so many things to do, and I missed W of course.

I had a nice garden this summer too, I grew potatoes, cucumber, zucchini, beets, lettuce and basil. The cucumbers did great, mostly cause this summer was so hot.

I didn't do that much hiking this summer, I guess I was too busy. I did get to travel south, to Ninilchik, close to Homer. That was a blast. Not the 12 hr car ride it involved, but the trip itself :)

The sky in the summertime is beautiful, well I guess that is true in the fall, wintertime and spring too....but the summertime is the only time you get amazing colors and shapes even though it is really late at night.

Often times I don't have my "real" camera, only my iphone, but I use it a lot more than the regular camera. And the pictures do come out pretty well there,

Hope you are having a wonderful week!

Friday Theme, In my Environment right now

Ok, so this weeks Friday theme just had to be one day late. I feel like this is something that occurs quite often. It is not cause I don't want to do them, it is because I haven't had time (read taken time). This Friday theme fits right into my life right now,  since that is what is causing me to be late....again. This, my friends, is what I was doing yesterday evening til 8.30 in the evening. Lab work. Once I spent 46 hrs in the lab, straight, cause I just had to finish the experiment and you can't pause it. Research is hard work to say the least.

Or when W helped me out in the field and we left around 6 in the morning and didn't finish until 7 in the evening, and then the 3 km hike, 30 minute ATV ride, and 1 hr car ride to get back into the lab (ate dinner somewhere around there), put everything in the freezer/fridge, Shower and then BED. And it just had to be around 86F that day (30 degrees C), and SUN and we ran out of our drinking water, so exhausted. Hauling soil back from the field, after coring for soil. On top of that, parts of the ground was still frozen that made it so much harder and exhausting.

This picture below (left) is from another day in the field. But I love my job, even though it takes up a great amount of my hrs, especially in the summertime. And it is so pretty out in the field!

W has been gone this week, and since I don't have a drivers license (yet) I have been using other modes of transportation. Like my bike. Problem is, parts of the way is completely un plowed. Anther part of the way gets plowed every now and then. I biked Monday, tires didn't have enough air in them....cause the bike had been standing for a while, and that made it so much worse. Going home, a little better. But still...with the amount of snow on the ground it was like biking in sand. Biked to work again the next day, but then decided to change that mode of transportation.

I decided to give the skis a try, cause the worse thing that could happen is that you run into a moose :) I love skiing, and it is so beautiful in the morning and in the evening. It is not that far at all. Around 2.5 miles, depending on what trail you pick.

And the trails are so beautiful. Skiing in the dark is a little scary though, considering the moose...

But in the morning you can see all beautiful details of the Spruce forest.

The other day I even brought my Canon along on the ride.

We will probably have this snow until april, at least...so a couple of more months. But I do like it. Even when it's really really Cold.

The other week me and W were hosting Super Bowl at our cabin. Weather was just amazing in the morning when we were out running errands.

The day before I made ciabatta bread and chocolate bread for the super bowl festivities! really yummy!

Of course I can't leave out these two for this specific theme:

Have a nice Weekend!!