'Damvalance'

It's been a weird January.  The temperatures rose above freezing and about 90% of the snow has melted.  It feels like it's "break-up" time but everyone is trying to remind ourselves that we have 4 more months of Alaskan winter left.  Watching the lower 48 deal with the cold has been a bit humorous.  Schools are closing for temps that are barely below 0.  In Birmingham the entire city shut down because it snowed 2 inches.  Cars were stranded and kids slept in their school gyms because no one knew how to deal with it. haha.  In Valdez, AK, they had a "Damvalanche"  which was a huge avalanche that covered part of the road on Thompson pass.  The snow blocked the river that runs next to the road and caused flooding.

Here is video that shows the entire canyon.  The water has slowly started to recede but DOT says they're not sure how long the clean up will take for the road to re-open.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acUoAZiyMv4

We're hoping that it starts snowing soon so we can get back to this…...

Photo Courtesy- Ben Mayer

Hatcher Pass - Photo by Ben Mayer 

Turnagain Pass - Photo by Ben Mayer

Huge icicle from the house.   It'll poke your eye out!

In the meantime, Kristen has been practicing with her new cannon camera.  

This was from the little pink camera.  It does a pretty good job for a 'point and shoot' camera. 

Kristen flew down to Seattle a few weekends ago and found a wedding dress.  You guessed it, it's a white dress.   She met up with her mom and Brittany and stayed with the Delphs.  They had a great time shopping and eating out.  We're just hoping it snows soon so that we can make it through the rest of the winter.  That's all for now!