Monday, August 17, 2009

WOW… I just love this time of the year here at home, the weather is so beautiful again this morning. Flat calm water, slightly overcast with patches of blue sky. Its low tide out, giving this sweet salty smell with a little bit of kelp mixed in. I love how it smells during a low tide on a nice summer day! Let the pups out for their morning outing, I think they love nice weather days too… all three of them come running out all excited and happy, then finally finding a place to do their thing. After letting them run around and have some fun, we put them inside and got ready to bike down to the office.

Once at the office I noticed that my mom had gotten almost everything done except payroll (it was downloading an update). I brought down a ziploc baggie filled with a bunch of alaadikax to share with everyone. My mom made sure to pass them out to everyone. I kept hearing great compliments from everyone asking who made them, they tasted great! I make sure to add a little extra sugar in the kneading process to make it sweeter tasting. I recently found out I love to coat them in a cinnamon-sugar coating! Makes it like a dessert. (what did someone tell me they call them down in Louisianna? started with a B I believe). At least I know that they all got eaten up and not just wasted by sitting around in my house not getting eaten up fast enough! LOL... sharing is always a great thing to do anyways!!

I entered the charge slips that I had with the book from the day before, my mom was wondering how come there were none from yesterday… I grabbed them when the store closed last night and put them on top of the ledger book that we enter the invoice numbers and totals into. If she known they were there she said that she would have entered them in. Pretty quiet morning, mostly town people coming up to cash their checks. We had a couple people check out and people check right back in to the hotel. We’re full once again for the next week or so (weather permitting). This afternoon was pretty much just like the morning, except I received a fax of what got shipped from Seattle this last Friday (the 14th) from our vendors, yay… I ordered yogurt… yogurt sounds good…. The freighter should be here this weekend, also the state ferry should be back for its August run this weekend too (the M/T Tustemena). All in all today was a great Monday. We had a good amount of incoming checks (payments) come in and I got all those entered to the right accounts and mailed the receipts back out. Felt productive and busy all day, this made the day go by way too fast!! (This is a good thing and a bad thing… I don’t like when time just seems to blow by... but it also sucks when it’s dragging… LOL!!) Just before getting off work I went over to the Post Office to get my COD from Wal-Mart paid for, it came in on the last plane we had! Yay, I got our new towels in and some toys for the pups and some hand weights… I’m going to wash up all the towels sets we have now and send them to my younger sister tomorrow.

For lunch we had grilled cheese and my hubby had soup with his. For dinner we went to the café and had chicken nuggets… for some reason I’m craving chicken nuggets… and I don’t like to eat chicken that often if at all!! Tasted great with sweet and sour sauce!! :)

Tonight I’m going to jump on my Wii Fit and get a small workout in. I’ve been slowly getting back up on my game and making sure to stay in shape. Feels great to be able to work out… I kind of stopped once I found out I was expecting because I didn’t know if it was safe or not…. But I was given the go ahead to work out, just not to exert myself…. I have to be able to talk and workout at the same time then I know I’m not working too hard! I was really feeling guilty from not working out and watching all the hard work I’ve been doing just pile back on.

We moved into the other bedroom adjacent from the master bedroom over the weekend. I didn’t want our baby’s room to be one of the cold rooms and the only warm room is our South facing master bedroom… so we decided it was best for us to just move our bed and all our stuff over to the other room – which is going to take a while. We still have to find a rod for the hanger for the closet, we forgot to pick one of those up, but we picked up enough closet brackets to get it ready! I made a double layer closet so I can hang both my shirts on the top rod and my pants and stuff on the bottom. The closet in the m/bdr is too small and we ended up having piles on the floor that we’d “dig” thru to find what we want. So I’m happy that I’ll have a bigger closet though! The view isn’t as great, just looking up the slope of the hill... makes me want to do something with our backyard since we’re looking at it more… LOL!

Ok well until tomorrow, have a great Monday night everyone!! TTFN!!

OH and we got 2 flights in today, right on schedule with their 11:30 and 4:30 flights!! I heard there was a small amount of mail on each plane and a couple passengers (must be people for Trident, we don't have anyone coming in for the hotel!).

Saturday and Sunday, August 15-16, 2009

Had a great weekend. We had some planes that came in... beautiful weather....

sorry I'm getting lazy to be writing my blog and not having internet at home is making it hard to get time to get my blog posted. Blame it on my pregnancy... lol... I'm always tired and wanting to take a nap during the day since I'm up throwing up most the night with "morning sickness". Hard to keep small meals in my stomach constantly... but I have to try...

I made alaadikax (fried bread) on Sunday! I'll bring some up to the office tomorrow to share with everyone!!

I hope everyone had a great weekend! TTFN!

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Another wet and rainy/foggy day in the Aleutians… sometimes it’s a light mist that gets you soaked and at other times there are these HUGE rain drops lightly falling from the sky… there really hasn’t been any wind lately, and if there is it’s a small breeze blowing in from the South. I need to get my lawn cut the next dry day!! The dogs ran out and did their thing, the little guys’ love that we have the light pole across the boardwalk for them to go on! After letting the pups back inside and putting them in their “corners” (kennels) we both headed down to town just before 9AM. The temps are in the mid 40’s.

I got down to the office and got all the charge slips entered in to the charge book, got my music going, then started to get more bank reconciliation done. Pretty quiet morning, I had a couple people come up to make some copies and use the fax machine and about 3 people who needed to pay on their store accounts (can tell they got their bills yesterday, lol). I started to enter May’s paperwork into the spreadsheets, hopefully get that finished up quickly. I think I need to get started on another store order here soon, go see what our Store Manager says we need and go thru our inventory. I noticed we are out of a lot of items that I like to buy… like Medium Salsa to dip chips in!!

For lunch we had Hebrew National Kosher Dinner Franks (hot dogs), my hubby had his with a couple spoonfuls of chili – I had mine old-fashioned on just a bun with ketchup, mustard and sweet relish!

I got back down to the office this afternoon on a mission to go thru our old files and find an invoice from one of our vendors… we are trying to order fishing poles for our store again and we would like to just re-order the same pole order we did last time… but the vendor is being a pain telling us that even with our customer number it is hard for them to look thru all the invoices to know what order we’re talking about… you would think that they would be able to look up our customer order and see all our previous orders… but I guess they can’t so I’m on the hunt looking thru boxes of our old files trying to find an invoice from 2007… hopefully I find what I’m looking for.. But I don’t think I’m looking in the right place because if it was a purchase order and we paid for it by check it will be easy to find… but if it was a credit card purchase I’m going to have to find that box and go thru all the stuff in there! At least it gives me something to do!

I got a couple hotel reservations in for this month, not too busy this month but slowly filling up… hope no one decides to just show up (like usual)…. I hate trying to fit people in and move people from one room to another because they are trying to fit in between existing reservations!... then to find out the City has lazy workers who replaced the cable in one of our big rooms… first they only put a cable long enough to barely make it into the bedroom and not into the living room where the TV is located… then they didn’t even drill a hole and put the cable in the right way!!! You wouldn’t believe how lazy they are….. They just decided to open the window and run the cable thru the window and make it to where the window can’t shut anymore because the cable is in the way… so the rooms stay SUPER cold and no wonder our heating bill is outrageous!!! I MEAN COME ON…. WHO IS THAT “SMART” TO PUT THE CABLE THRU AN OPEN WINDOW, instead of drilling a hole in the building, putting some silicone down to stop any water damage/leaks and putting it in the right way???? So I had to call the City Office to let them know and all I got was attitude back… Hey I didn’t put it thru the window; don’t get mad at me because your workers did a lazy/shit job!! What I don’t understand is that when I originally called to have the cable moved to the living room, I straight told them that the cable CAN NOT be going thru the window because we don’t want the windows open 24/7!!! How would they like if that’s how it was in their house? I would be pissed if I had to keep my window cracked just to have my cable TV! So hopefully they get someone on that tomorrow and get the cable running thru the wall and not thru an open window! I have a guy coming over on a boat tonight so I have to keep an ear out for him so I can get him checked in.

Well not sure what the hubby got for dinner… he did the shopping today since I was busy searching thru boxes of files in our storage area. Hope he got something good or I’m just going to eat cereal for dinner! LOL! Well a couple new TV shows to catch tonight… then Conan tonight after the news at 10:35PM (weird starting time but at least I don’t have to watch that Seinfeld show anymore… I don’t know why people think its funny… its stupid comedy I guess…. I’m not a big fan of it…)…

Well I had a pretty good day… my mom called a couple times with some good stories from her conference! Some funny stuff (I won’t disclose here)…… can’t believe some things some villages will do!!! At least my mom is having a good time and meeting new people at her conference, she should be back here soon – weather permitting!

I'm planning on making some alaadikax tonight!!

I thought my horoscope was funny how on the point it was today... here’s what it told me:
Some facts that you may need for certain projects might prove elusive today, April Dawn. No matter what book, website, or periodical you consult, you'll probably come across some interesting stuff, but not exactly what you're looking for. If the task is not urgent, it might be a good idea to put it off for a day or two. Otherwise you'll spend too much time looking for what seems impossible to find.

Ok well I had a great day and I hope everyone else has a great Tuesday night!! Until tomorrow, TTFN!!

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Well the weather man is actually right on with the weather today. We are having northerly winds blowing about 25-30MPH, definitely no planes today. The temps in the high 20’s. No snow falling from the sky, but the wind is blowing what’s on the ground. Patchy cloudy skies, the sun was actually out all day – drying off the boardwalks. We took the dogs out and they enjoyed running around in the yard for a bit before doing their thing then finally coming inside, we take them out about 3-4 times a day!

I made my way down to the office, didn’t really see anyone on the whole ride down. My mom had already entered the charge slips for the day. She was having problems with the fax machine, it wasn’t sending out faxes for her. So I checked it and they went through good for me, not sure why she couldn’t get it to fax out. This morning seemed to go by fast since I was busy trying to get the internet working, cashing checks and answering the phones! The internet at the office isn’t working, but my internet at home is working… and they are on the same system… so I don’t know why the internet isn’t working at the office – thinking we might have to climb up on the roof and hit the reset button on the antenna.

I didn’t know what to make/get for lunch… so I got the hubby a Dinty Moore beef stew and grabbed a Rice a Roni in beef flavor for me. On my way home my mom told me she made some alaadikax last night and that I can stop by and grab some if I wanted… I surely didn’t pass that up and went straight to her house before going home and grabbed about 6 – I’m going to save those for dinner tonight! I’m going to cut them in half and put pizza topping on them and broil them!! You have to try it, I think it tastes great!!

I got back down to the office this afternoon… nothing much happened for the first hour. Then the phone seemed to be ringing off the hook. Mostly people canceling their reservations for the hotel, since they can’t make it in and they don’t want to wait in Dutch any longer. I had a couple town people come up to cash their checks, a couple of them putting money on their store accounts. Most people are closed tomorrow for Russian Good Friday, but I will be at work. Don’t be expecting me to come in on Monday though! Not only is it the day we observe Russian Easter, but it’s also my 26th birthday!!! The store will be closed this Sunday, but will have regular hours on Monday. The Corp office is supposed to be closed on Monday, but our auditor is supposed to be here this weekend, so we might have to go in for a bit in case there is anything they need help with. But I don’t think we’ll be fully opening the office, we might be there but we’re closed!

Our corp. president contacted me today about a order he was getting done for the parts we needed to get ordered for one of the dryers – I guess the button to turn it on with wasn’t working anymore – and he was ordering it from the same place we order the small laundry supplies to fill our laundry “vending” machine – it’s one that you put quarters in the slide push and it falls in to the tray on the bottom, kind of like those sticker vending machines you find when you walk in/out of most grocery stores (not ours though). So I let him know we needed to order more Tide and Bounce since I put the last of them in the machine the other day when I stopped down at the corp. building. So he let me know not to worry about it and he would order them for me, I let him know we should have a credit with that company – which he wasn’t aware of until I told him.

We happened to get the fax in from one of our vendors on what they shipped to us on the freighter, which is supposed to be in on Saturday. So I got that ready and started to price it before I noticed that it was already 4:30PM, Eva had called me and asked if I was going to shop or not because the store was going to close and I hadn’t shopped yet. So I ran down stairs and got some pepperonis since I already have pizza sauce and mozzarella cheese and those alaadikax from my mom! After rushing to get my one item, the store closed and Eva did up the paperwork and brought it up to me, where I finished up my paperwork. Then I made my way home, picking Eva up on the way and dropping her off at her house (she lives next door!).

Tonight there is an all new Gangland on history channel, and then on Fox Hell’s Kitchen is on once again! YAY!!! Wonder who’s going on the chopping block tonight… I don’t know… none of them seem that great… but they are way better than I am!!

Well, my brother-in-law said he’s not going on the ferry, and he’s one of the only people I trust with my babies – well Roscoe loves him, but Dante is still “iffy” around people and likes to run and hide and bark… but if we do go over on the ferry, I want to get some kulich baked up, but I have to round up some cans from someone, get them baked, frosted and boxed up so I can bring them… not sure how many to bring… I know I have to bring one for Irene, Alvin B, Kathy McG, CB, Alena, Sharon, and Cookie Dough! If I’m missing anyone please let me know ASAP!!!! I need to get these baked up tomorrow at the latest!! Kulich is Russian Easter bread, and at Easter time we make them and share them with friends and family. I need to find out the true background on it and why they do it. I just know I’ve loved this time of the year, both my younger sister and I do!! And making kulich was just something we always looked forward to making and handing out every year!! I can’t wait to have kids and pass that on to them, I hope to show my nieces too since I don’t believe either of my sisters make kulich anymore since they moved out of the village. Most people who move away don’t seem to keep up their traditions… I said most not all… there are still a good amount of people out there who do make it (and I think we all make it different depending on what part of Alaska you’re from)… and I know there are all those like my sister’s, in Anchorage and Valdez, and my grandma, from Washington state, who will wait for someone to send one in the mail (hoping it gets there quickly so it’s still fresh!). I know my mom mails a lot out to people! It’s a lot of work, but it’s worth sharing with your family and friends!! I love getting kulich from other people and trying theirs, since everyone’s recipes are different they all have their own signature tastes, not to mention frosting techniques!!

Well today seemed pretty busy! At least the day went by quickly!! Well until tomorrow, TTFN!!

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Well today seem like a nice day, a little cold with a dusting of snow/frost on the boardwalks. Mid to low 30’s, overcast with patchy blue sky, the sun is already starting to come up before I get up (before 9AM!). We let the dog out to do their thing, I think they like when the weather is calm and they can just run around and chase each other in the yard without the wind blowing them around!

I got down to the office and my mom was just finishing up entering the charge slips in the book. This morning seemed busy with all the phone calls, my mom leaving and the guys painting the doors. They took my office door today to paint it, hopefully should be back up by the end of the day. The first plane came in today around 11:30AM, on schedule. My mom took off on the first plane, today is a beautiful day to be flying. I heard Trident has a lot of people to be flying out, so we’ll probably be getting flights all day today, hopefully they bring mail!

Sharon and Christine stopped up by my office. I let them know I was waiting for them to call me for my Story Corps session. They said they were waiting for me… so I guess we were all waiting for each other to contact each other! LOL… so hopefully if my mom makes it back in time today I will go in and get my session done today. If not I will make sure to schedule a time tomorrow for sure. I would do it today but I have 2 excuses… one we don’t have a door on our office and #2 my mom isn’t here so there isn’t anyone to watch the office if I’m not here. So I have to be here today. Sharon and Christine both brought me gifts: a Story Corps Gift Collection from Christine and some totally awesome sea salt caramels from Sharon…. You do not know how special I feel to be able to get any of those delicious chocolate covered pieces of heaven with a dash of salt! I shared some with my dad, since my hubby don’t care for chocolate or caramel (he used to have braces-so he hates caramel, and he just don’t like chocolate, he says it’s too much for him!) Thank you thank you thank you Sharon!!! OMG I never thought I’d be able to taste her homemade goodies, I must have wished hard!!! :D

Well for lunch today we had Stouffers Meatloaf with mashed potatoes (microwave food again) for lunch. Not that bad, portion controlled so you get full off a small amount – I like that part.

I got back down to the office. I was so nervous leaving my office unattended without a door over lunch hour… there should be only 2 other people who have access to the downstairs door that I locked – the door to the stairway heading up to my office. I brought Dante down to the office with me this afternoon, trying to get him used to being out of the house and around people – he’s still really timid and shy around people when we get out of the house. But when he’s in the house, he’s the boss and will bark and defend his territory, but he hasn’t tried to bite at anyone or thing yet other than Roscoe when they are playing.

At 1:15 PM we had another plane come in then take off, then an hour later around 2:20 another flight in and back out. It only takes 20 mins one way to get from here to Dutch, so when Trident is flying people out it’s pretty normal to have flights every hour. But we’re only really supposed to have 2 normal scheduled flights a day.

People are still a little disappointed knowing we don’t have cash yet to cash their checks. Hopefully my mom makes it back with the cash so that we can start cashing checks once again. I swear I had about 8 or more people come up and ask if we have cash yet or not. I keep telling them to come back tomorrow and we should hopefully have it counted and ready by then. I still had people come up and pay on their store accounts, since they didn’t really need any change back. Then at 3:17PM I heard another flight either landing, then I got a call from my mom to come down and pick the cash up from her down at the plane. So I went down and she told me the bank didn’t have any big bills, so we got all our cash in 20’s, 10’s and 5’s…. looks like people are going to have big wads of cash when they cash their checks now since it’s all going to be in small bills… but cash is cash! Don’t like it then don’t take it right?!?!

Well I think Sharon and Christine have people set up for the later sessions tonight, so I will see if I can come down at 10 and go see them first before heading to work. I can always work thru lunch hour if needed. I want to get my session done, I heard my dad said 40 mins wasn’t long enough for him, so he’s going to hopefully do more than one session. I think I’ll just be able to get that 40 min filled!

We are officially supposed to be closed in observance of Easter on the 13 (Monday) and we’re supposed to be closed on both Russian Good Friday and Russian Easter – the 17th and 20th, but I think I’ll come to work on all those days except my birthday (the 20th)! I have to make our signs for what our hours are going to be, so I have to get a hold of our store manager and see what she thinks- whether or not to open the store or not and if we do what hours do they want to be open for. The freighter should be getting ready to leave Seattle here soon – usually on Friday’s- and will be here the week the ferry comes in. Aww man, the ferry is already going to be coming in here soon, starting up the summer runs down from Homer. The school kids start their trip by heading up on the ferry, so that’s exciting. I can’t believe how fast this year is already moving by…. American Easter already this weekend… I have to find tin coffee cans to make kulich in – hopefully I can find some… if not like I said I’ll make mini ones in regular size canned food cans….

I think I am going to make a homemade chili for dinner tonight. Throw in some canned kidney beans and red beans, brown up some hamburger and chunks of steak meat/onion and throw it all together with tomato sauce and seasonings topped with shredded cheddar sounds great to me. I think I might make some alaadikax to go with the chili!!!

Well today seemed busy, but I like it that way! Hoping the new stuff for our hotel makes it in here soon, priority mail is pretty fast here, first class mail is pretty quick too…but parcel post is the super slow boat to china way to get mail here! The plane is back again at 4:35PM… not sure how many flights they are going to have... I heard they are going to have flights until at least 7PM because my cousin who came over on the first plane is leaving on the last plane and they told her that she’s on the flight around 7. So Trident must have a lot of people to be moving out, once again….

My dad happened to see some nice looking metal tubs that we could use for steam bath in Trident’s recycle pile, so he grabbed them out and brought them down, hopefully can get them cleaned up and see how they fit on the stove. The tubs we have right now have holes in them, so they don’t hold water for long, but long enough for it to get hot and scoop it into your water bucket! Hopefully cook bath tomorrow and see if Sharon or Christine would like to get fit into the rotation of people. We’ll see….

Well I hope everyone has a great Tuesday night! Until tomorrow, TTFN!

I will try to get pix of Dante and Roscoe later today and hopefully post them tomorrow!!

Saturday, April 4, 2009

Well we happily got to sleep in today! Woke up to the sound of a plane flying over the house at 11:46AM… got up and looked out the window and thought “what the hell are they doing here in this weather?!?!” It’s about 48F out, blowing a good 20+MPH from the southeast, good sized waves in the harbor. We let the dogs out to do their thing, they slept in with us... We stayed up pretty late last night… The plane ended up getting stuck here for a bit, the weather went to crap, the fog fell to the water and it was blowing pretty good out still. But at 1:30PM or so the plane took off from here anyways, the weather wasn’t anything I would want to be flying in. We took a couple pics. I heard the people from the hotel checked out and made it out on that plane. Actually I heard it was a plane load of people!

We ended up going back down to the café for the last time until this June, instead of my usual we had breakfast. They are having their closing “party” tonight at 7PM, so we’ll probably make our way back down for that. I heard the plane brought nothing but mail… so we went down to see if we got anything. I was happy to see a couple more of my eBay items had arrived! I got a blonde wig in today, the closest I will get to cutting and dying my hair is a wig! I have a red one, but this blonde one is better looking – has bangs.. lol.. I wore it down to the “closing party” down the café. People were doing double take, wondering who my hubby was with. They thought someone came in on the plane… LMAO!! There was a pretty good amount of people who showed up, the café was pretty much packed full! Always good to get out and mingle with everyone!

For dinner tonight I made pizza. The freighter came in so we have some new stuff down at the store, including everything you need to make homemade pizza. So I made a half Hawaiian-half pepperoni pizza, and fried the rest of the dough up to make alaadikax!

I ran down to town a couple times and got my Wii and my lil bro-in-law’s Wii registered with each other as friends, now we can send messages on the message boards!! If anyone else has a Wii please register me as your friend, my email address should be found on my profile page- email me your Wii number and I will send you mine! Then we can send messages on our Wii’s!!!

Ok I hope everyone has a great Saturday night!! Until tomorrow, TTFN!!

Pix:
What the weather looked like when the plane landed.. I tried to get a shot of how big the waves are....

The plane taking off.....the wind calmed a bit, but the fog is low!

Me - at the cafe for breakfast :)

Me walking to the store....

Pix from the "closing party" at the cafe (came out kinda blurry, I was moving :P )

Me as a blonde.... and with bangs... lol..... I would never do anything to my natural hair.. that's what wigs are for ;)

Sunday, March 22, 2009

Yay, we slept in today! Felt good to finally sleep in!! We woke up just before 11AM, and immediately walked the dogs. Weather is still snowy then clear then snowy. Temps in the low-mid 20's, the sun is out but offers no warmth - just bright blinding light. The dogs went out and did their thing then came back in, they don't like to play when it's cold out.

We didn’t do much today, sat around the house and watched a lot of TV. I did some wish listing and bidding on ebay. Trying to find the perfect dress for the wedding I’m going to this summer. Pink and orange is the theme colors, so I’m going to find something cute in pink and just have orange accents in like my hair or jewelry. :)

I fried us up some more alaadikax and my mom brought up some salmon fish pie. So we ate on that today. Didn’t really make any plans for any meals today, whatever we find to eat when we get hungry today I guess, plus all the alaadikax I just made!

Well I hope everyone had a great weekend. TTFN...

Alaadikax - Fried Bread

I usually double up this recipe:

2 packets of yeast
2 tablespoons of granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/4 cups luke warm water
2 tablespoons of shortening
6-7 cups of flour

I like to mix the yeast, salt and sugar in a large bowl, then add the water. I melt the shortening in the microwave, then stir it in with the yeast mixture. Mix until yeast is dissolved, then add 2 cups of flour and mix thoroughly. Keep adding flour until dough is easy to handle. Then kneed on a floured surface until springy (about 2-4 mins). Put dough in a lightly greased large container and let rise for 45-60 min or until doubled. Punch dough down, and shape and fry. I like to use an electric skillet set at 375F. Brown on one side, flip and brown the other side. Set on papertowels to soak any extra grease.
Enjoy!

Hope this was easy to follow.... any simple bread recipe in a cookbook will work, it's practically the same thing, just fried.