I was thinking that today’s blog was going to have to wait until tomorrow as, well, that is only in a few minutes. But I wanted to at least share a few pictures. This first bit is from our drive from Anchorage to Portage Glacier visitor center.
We took a short one mile each way hike to Byron Glacier. There were avalanche warnings and we thought about the bear spray and bear bells we did not yet have for hiking. This made us think about Grandma Owens and Great Grandma Brown who I’m sure would love to know that we were hiking in bear country with out them. Don’t worry Eve sang the whole time at the top of her lungs there was very small chance that we would catch a bear by surprise. The glacier is receded as the last several winters here have been short on snow and more mild temperatures, but we could get to the snow, we just felt like we shouldn’t hike to the glacier with out the sign-suggested avalanche training. So we stopped short when the snow started and enjoyed the glacier from a distance.
Glacier girl to the rescue. After our invigorating hike we piled back in the car and passed out the left over pizza from the night before as we made our way south to Soldotna for a play date withe the Shoemakers. We picked up some drinks to eat with our left over pizza on the way and made a picnick lunch out of it (totally Jen’s good idea). Our kids warmed up to eachother quickly and played well together. We got to meet the new family addition baby Logan he is almost a year and not supper babyish any more but still it was the first time we had been able to meet him.
We went on a walk down to the river. And the kids made busy about throwing rocks into the swiftly moving water. 
We so enjoyed their company. It is fun to watch them all run off in pairs each with a playmate and no one left out. Luke was my favorite to watch, and Logan’s long eyelashes were pretty awesome too. Jen and John have such good kids they are a joy to be around. It was sad to say goodbye but they needed to get Lyla ready for her jazz recital and we were needing to push on to Homer to find our formerly Cambridge friends/family. The view in Homer is amazing we could hardly take our eyes off the mountains and glaciers across the bay so beautiful for sure. We arived after discovering that google maps isn’t the most accurate tool in these parts it for us close (with in 1.5 miles or so) but it was far enough away that we didn’t find the place in our own. Matthew jumped in his jeep and met us and we fiollowed him back home. Sakota visited shortly after we arived it was so good to see her. We headed into town and visited Ruth at work, tested the pho in Homer and it passed the test for dinner, and then the kids ran off some energy at the park. Now this park has a view!!!
We played at the park until Ruth got off work then met up with her at the house. She made sure to give the kids a hard time and do they felt right at home. We talked and Hannah braided Ruth’s hair before we knew it it was almost midnight. This whole not really dark until after 11:00pm thing will be a whole new beast. Good night all many thanks for your prayers and much love to you from Alaska.
Owens Endeavors 