Iron Dog 2012

This week we had the awesome privilage to get to watch the Iron Dog come through Galena. It is one of the most amazing races in the world. It started in 1984 and is a race over 2000 miles. Miles of some of the roughest, most rugged terrain and some of the harshest winter conditions in Alaska. The racers are made up of two person teams on very impressive snow machines. Not only do they need to know how to drive them in all terrain but they must be able to fix them on the trail if they break down. They trek across Alaska starting in Big lake up to Nome and then across to Fairbanks. Galena is one of their checkpoints. We got to see a few teams arrive and leave out of Galena. I even got to get my picture taken with Tyler Huntington who is from Galena and a 2 time winner. I guess I am still a tourist but hey gives me something to blog about. Back to the Race. The racers are still in route to their destination so I can not tell you who is the winner but I hope to get to meet Todd Palin and a few other racers as the return through Galena to Fairbanks. But until then, here are some pictures that Keith took of some teams coming into Galena. Tyler Huntington Team #6 arriving in Galena

Cheering on the teams

Friends and Family cheering on Tyler Huntington

T. West Team # 6 Tyler's Partner arriving.
I love this shot. Keith did a great job getting West on the turn.

Tyler Huntington and T. West Team #6

Valentines Dinner

With the help of a church group from out of town, the Young Life group from Galena has put on a Valentines dinner every year. This was their 10th year and it was AWESOME!! The youth did an amazing job of decorating, serving and babysitting. It was nice to get out with my husband and have a date. No kids, no interruptions, great food, great conversations with friends and dancing... can't get much better then that!

I was glad we got to come because the youth used my oven for the afternoon to cook a prime rib. The aromas coming from my oven were amazing. I had to endure 5 LONG hours of smelling Prime Rib cooking. If I would not have been going to the dinner, I guarantee that a BIG chunk of that meat would have been GONE!! It smelled AWESOME!! And tasted great too! Plus we had shrimp( I got to eat Keith's helping since he is allergic....To bad for him, but YAY for me!) potatoes, green beans, grapes, cheese, really good bread and Delicious red velvet cake! Oh and some wonderful marion berry apple cider or something yummilious. =) All was YUMMY! It was nice to dress up in a dress, I even wore dress shoes(as opposed to my Mukluks which is my winter standard boots) I remember the first year I got here the day before the dinner and I thought it was sooooo cold! (WOW I HAVE BEEN HERE 2 YEARS!)

Thanks Young Life for putting on a really nice dinner. It made my Valentine's Day very special!Me and My Valentine!

180 loads

*Be warned this is a totally RANDOM POST about the life of Tabitha Ramos !!*

Have you ever bought laundry detergent and on the box it says 60 loads, or something like that? I always wonder when manufacturers put things on packaging if they really mean you are getting "20% more free" Or if you seriously can get 60 loads out of a laundry detergent box. While shopping last year, I decided to actually put it to the test. Well since we buy in bulk, we buy the BIG boxes of laundry detergent, so therefore it would take a little longer to test my experiment then just getting a 60 loads box. I know you are all thinking I must be hard up for entertainment if I am counting and measuring my laundry soap, but it made laundry a little more fun and for me laundry is right up there with doing dishes. I HATE DOING DISHES AND LAUNDRY! But to make it fun I started my new box that was marked 180 loads. Every time I did laundry I measured the cup exactly to level 1, then I marked it on the box with a big mark. It kind of gave me great joy to be able to mark off 5 loads in a day! OK I know I am a little bit weird. but hey I get it from my mom! And those of you who know her would TOTALLY UNDERSTAND!=)=) I love my mom!But back to my laundry story.=) It took me about 8 months to get through my big box of laundry detergent but I finally did and I can say I was SO EXCITED to scrape out the last bit of soap into the measuring cup. Mark it off girl! So I did and then I got to count up all my marks and come to find out.... 180 loads! Yep after precise measuring and marking every load I learned the manufacturers actually were right (at least on this one). Glad I didn't have any major loads where I would have had to use more soap or it would have thrown off my counting for sure! hahaha OK I know "Tabitha must be losing her marbles if she is writing about 180 loads of laundry." It made laundry more fun and I actually conserved soap. Which up here is important. So try it! Measure your soap! You might get a kick out of it like I do!=)=) Stay tuned for my measuring shampoo!=) hahahhaa Have a Great Friday everyone!

140 degree difference!

I am sorry for not writing sooner but it has been kind of gloomy and cold and I have had no motivation to write anything. Actually I have had no motivation to DO anything with this cold weather. It has been 2 LONG weeks of record breaking, EXTREME cold weather. Our friend Chris made the observation that it was 100 degrees below freezing, and there was a 140 degree temperature change from inside our house to outside. At those temps for long periods of times, things just stop working and our community has had a hard time these last weeks. Thankfully Keith and I have not had most of the trouble that others in town have. My friend Shell summed up the feeling of these weeks very well. She said "It feels like life in on pause, till the weather warms up." And that is so true. Most people stay home and try to keep their houses from freezing up. We try not to go anywhere that is not necessary. So life appears to slows down as we wait and pray for warmer weather.

Here are some things that happen when the weather reaches 100 degrees below freezing!

~Vehicles don't work. So walking becomes the way to get around town. Thankfully we have a heated garage so our truck will start but we don't take it out much and if we do we don't turn off the engine. Our trips are limited to very short ones. To get cars started again, many people whip out the hair dryer and warm up the battery and starters and can get it warm enough to start!

~Tires freeze flat! Then it is quite funny trying to drive with a tire that is flat on one side. Kaden thought we were on a Mary-go-round. Up, down, up down. We were giggling all the way home.

~ With trucks not working means the Water and Sewer truck don't work either. Therefore placing us back in the same situations we were in a few weeks ago!

~Heated Garages become Ice Skating Rinks. In our garage we have a mat with raised edges to catch all the snow and ice that melts off our truck. Well our garage got so cold that the water that hit the floor froze inside that mat. So we came out to take Kaden to school and he was so excited that he could "skate" or slip around in the Garage. Did I mention that my garage is heated? I am just glad my house is on the second level so we have the garage to be our insulator. If not that frozen floor would have been in our living room!

~ Water pipes freeze. Meaning you either use an out house (at -68, your bum might suffer from frost bite) or you can use Honey Buckets. If you don't know what a honey bucket is look it up. There is NOTHING sweet about them! But with frozen pipes you make do and then you bring out the hair dryer to see if you can thaw the pipes to keep them from busting.

~ Heating fuel starts to gel. Most everyone here in Galena have a fuel burning heater in their house, us included. At -55 degrees that fuel becomes a gel and WON'T flow through the pipes to heat your homes... BIG PROBLEM! No heat means cold houses, cold house mean frozen pipes and busted pipes and cold fingers, toes, and everything COLD! To keep the gel from gelling, people become very resourceful here in Galena. I didn't know that those pocket hand warmers that you use while hunting would be useful for something other then warming up your hands but apparently they are hot enough to melt the gel into a liquid and allow fuel to heat houses. If you wrap them around a certain area of the pump. And heated blankets become more then something that you put on your bed. Yep you wrap them around your fuel tank and it can keep the fuel just warm enough NOT to gel. And Space heaters come in handy too. ANd you whip out your hair drier to warm up the fuel lines.

~ Propane freezes. Actually that freezes around -30 but at -68 it really is frozen. And most people here in Galena have Propane stoves.Meaning when the propane freezes you have to be resourceful in meal making. Crock pots, electric skillets, George Foremans become your way of cooking. Praise the Lord we have a electric stove, which our neighbors sometimes bring over food so they can use it. Shell says she can sometimes dry clothes and the dryer vent which is right next to the pipe heats it up and defrosts it. And others get out the hair dryer and heat up the lines. I am going to write a book-"100 different ways to use a hair dryer"!

~School becomes optional. Yes, in the Lower 48 you have snow days, here we have EXTREME COLD days. As I mentioned above vehicles don't start, which includes buses. And when buses don't start, they can't pick up or drop off students. Kaden has not missed any days and neither has his whole class of preschooler..... ALL 4 of them have made it every day! So proud of those little kids. =)

~Exposed skin gets frost bite very fast. My face and hands are cracking with just a little exposure. It amazes me how fast your cheeks freeze. We were getting wood for our fire and 5 minutes outside made my cheeks and hands numb and dry out. And I was completely covered! The only thing I was not wearing was goggles. I am very thankful for my Satin hands set from Mary Kay because my hands are finally getting back to normal.

~ You know what the one thing that happened that really surprised me? No excuses were made to attend church. Yes on Sunday, at -68 degrees we still had church. Only one car was parked outside but the church inside was pretty full. People WALKED, IN THE COLD, UP TO 2 MILES, to go to church! I love our church and the people in it. I love the fact that even though it was so cold we still would fellowship and have a wonderful service. I grew up watching the Zambians walk 20 miles to go to church, some even leaving the night before and camping on the way so they could attend worship service. And here we see people walking in the extreme cold to attend worship. It makes me proud of my friends and family. And it makes me strengthen my resolve that NO MATTER WHAT (unless we are sick) will I ever miss church due to a sorry excuse such as "oh it is raining" "oh it is to cold" " oh the church is always cold" "Oh there is football today" Oh I don't think many people will be there" "oh I don't really feel like going today". ALL those excuses should be thrown out the window! No excuse is so great to not be celebrating God!

With all the cold, it really has been a crisis here, but Praise the Lord the weather hit -32 today. I was singing the song from White Christmas all day "We're having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave, the temperatures rising, it isn't surprising can can." Yes as I said I never thought I would say heat wave with the temperature -30 EVER! Even though it is suppose to drop again this weekend I will enjoy the warmer temps and hope that the weather man is WRONG and it stays in the 0 degree zone for a while! Feburary is HERE and that means March is around the corner which also means warmer spring will be here in a few more months. YAY!! Here is a chart to show you the records that have been set this winter!

I borrowed this picture so I can take no credit for it.