Three weeks later...

Well, I have easily-accessible Internet access for the first time in three weeks!

We've had a busy past three weeks including closing on our house, moving out of our Vancouver apartment, going on a wonderful 10-day Alaskan vacation with my parents, moving into our new home in SLC, receiving all of our belongings, which were scattered around the country, Keith starting his new job, and finally starting to settle in.

I wish I could have filled you in along the way, but since it wasn't possible, first a recap of our Alaska trip.

Our cruise left downtown Vancouver on July 2 and it was a little bittersweet sailing away from our adopted city. It had been rainy and/or very overcast for over a week but the day we sailed out was beautiful. Highlights of the trip (brainstorm list), followed by a few photos, include:

Gorgeous Alaska scenery (when it wasn't raining and clouded in!)... Luke had lots of quality time with his Grammy and Grampa... Luke established himself as prince of the ship-- all of the staffers knew him by name... We had a July 4th visit with Uncle Bill and Aunt Janey at their waterfront home (and to the 4th of July parade) in Ketchikan... We sailed very close to the Hubbard Glacier and saw lots of calving, including a HUGE chunk of ice, which fell into the water and caused a large wave!... Keith and I enjoyed a rainforest hike in Juneau and saw the Mendenhall Glacier... We also enjoyed "the world's longest zipline"-- which was really cool!... Alaskan crab... We learned about the different types of Alaskan salmon... We spent an afternoon at a dog musher camp, where we were pulled by a dog team and learned about the Iditarod... We stayed in a lovely resort in the village of Talkeetna, where we were fortunate to see a perfect view of Denali National Park and the entire Alaskan range, including Mt. McKinley, which is apparently only seen about 10% of the time... We took a flight seeing trip in a small plane over the range, circling McKinley--it was stunning and Luke slept the whole time... We enjoyed a trip through interior Alaska on a glass dome-topped railroad... We wrapped up the trip with a day in Denali.

And one low light -- on the last day of our trip, while in Denali, Luke came down with a high fever. After a trip to the local health clinic, the doctor determined that he likely had an ear infection. We'd never seen him so lifeless, the poor little guy. He has never been sick like that, so we were a bit worried. But after a few days, he started feeling better and now he's back to normal.

So, the trip to Alaska was a really nice way to wrap up this stage of our life before settling down in Salt Lake City. It was a great experience.

Now that I'm back online I'll start posting about the house and settling down in SLC, etc.!