Camp Redington has it's first guests from the website

3/4 inch rusty "pail" with painted wildflowers

1/2 inch pot of natural dried wildflowers

This is my first chance to use the internet except to quick check my mail for a week. Been gettin' great comments here and it sucks that I haven't had regular access lately. I'm so not prepared to give up the internet and hope that whatever happens we can all somehow still get online... think that's possible?

2ml painted bottle with untouched wildflowers

1 inch mini pot with handpainted wildflowers,

1/2 inch bear and cub

2 inch clay pot with painted wildflowers

1 inch mini handpainted wildflower bouquet with eagle

Fireweed and yarrow grows everywhere in the yard

Drying racks made of duct tape

Ron, Corina, me and Nordica made a big dinner for our camp's first guests. Our friends Jewel and Brenda have perfect timing.

Snap peas almost ready to be stolen off the vine

New minishelf I made out of the one that plopped into a water pot overnight, fell apart at the seams in the morning. My alteration holds 9, 2ml bottles, and now I'm gong to soak all those cute, dinky, useless shelves and rebuild them all to fit my bottled flowers.

new all Alaskan mini roombox

Chitina smoke keeps moving up our road. Copper's rising again too.

Smoking Garden

Host of the year

Our first "official" Camp Redington guests E and Ray, lovely, lovely folks who may just inspire Tim to actually open someday. Even though the email at CR's website is bad, E tracked me down via this blog and reserved their space. We had a lot of fun with them, fed them moose ribs their first night and Copper River Reds tonight when they came back from McCarthy. Today they drove Tim's 4 wheeler and then we shot my guns, a first for both of them. It was great to meet such open and friendly people who were interested in meeting us after they read the site. It meant we could totally relax around them, smoke, swear, have dirt on us, whatever... they didn't come to change us or judge us, just to enjoy meeting us. I liked them a lot, and we all got to see how easy and interesting it is to meet people who come here because we're so different.

The garage sale grill in action, and yes, I lit it myself this time!

Weather, News & Entertainment from Kenny Lake

Alaskans love their music!

3rd Annual
Music Between the Ranges
July 17, 18, 19, 2009,
11 mile Edgerton Hwy
Kenny Lake, Alaska
www.musicbetweentheranges.com
www.betweentheranges.com

One of the things that hooked me on Alaska when I came up in the 70s was all the great music. Most nightclubs still had live bands (in the age of disco), there were lots of piano bars and honkey tonks (I was a can can cutie at the Palace Saloon in '79), and in the summer there were glorious outdoor music festivals. The old Solstice Festival in Fairbanks out on Chena Hot Springs Road and the old Talkeetna Bluegrass Festival were my favorites. Both events drew musicians from all over the state and the quality was consistantly top notch. Even after the mainstages shut down you could wander from fire to fire and listen to the small groups of pickers who played all night long. Of course most events eventually went big time, became over organized and their Alaskan hometown charm faded, but here and (somewhere up near Healy) the tradition of low key, music lover's festivals is making a revival. I didn't go the last 2 years, but this year I get 2 free tickets to Music Between the Ranges because I'm going to help with their advertising and websites!

What happened to our summer????

Big winds all day yesterday and it was the day I set aside to finish the roof and walls on little gertee. Made for a challenging makeover but I finished most of the exterior coverings by midnight when it got a little too dark to see. Insulated and covered the entire western wall (no window) and made the eastern wall completely screened and covered it with cut pieces of canvas I can roll up (if it ever gets warm here again). I'll get partial morning sun through the trees and have shade in the afternoon with a nice breeze flowing through ... I am dreaming of 80 above!

Outside temperature at 3:00 am

Took the inside thermometer outside,
had to see if it was really 20 degrees.

Gerteeville update

Gertee prototype at 3 am this morning.
Trimmed the new roofcover and installed the woodstove

Fred makes sure insulation is properly installed

Mini flower arrangements

Fresh wildflower mini bouquet

Dried and hairsprayed wildflower mini bouquet

Miniature willow basketweaving

Anika stopped by to see if we want to ride her horses.
She's always looking for riders if that sounds fun to you!
She stayed to show me how to weave a mini willow basket.

Starting is the hardest part because you slice the stems
and have to weave branches through the holes.

Alaskan Gardening for novices

My first Alaskan vegetable and flower garden

The garden plot (or a miniature graveyard)

This is going to be very interesting to see what I can grow. Our growing season is so short most locals use greenhouse starts. I was able to plant snap peas because they can withstand frost, but have to wait until June to plant the rest. I've got what my neighbor said is a very "different" assortment of seeds and not what Alaskans normally grow. It's not even an exotic mix, maybe it's all the peppers that aren't so popular up here. I grew lovely peppers in Vegas. :) Next year I need a gertee greenhouse.

I'll be trying:
Carrots
Radishes
Green Onions
Lettuce
Zucinni
Summer Squash
White Lisbon Onions
tobacco
herbs
assorted peppers

The only additive I have for the soil is the ash I mixed in and the veggie/coffee slop I poured into the space all winter (no idea if it will help or hinder either). Put the dirt into mounds on a slight slope so it has good drainage anyway. Two robins moved into the cottonwood tree I almost cut down and have been picking in the dirt, so I'm assuming there's something live in the soil, although I haven't seen one worm yet.. no beetles... just gnats, flies and skeets and LOTS of spiders this year. Very few bees and no wasps yet either.

Feels great to have my hands in the dirt, it's coinciding with getting over this virus and I feel healed. I am still very amazed at how much better I felt this winter having my EarthPad and how much more endurance I have for heavy chores in sub-zero temperatures. I'm 52 years old now and I'm very grateful for my good health and strength. My teeth may be falling out but my bones and muscles are still in pretty good shape. Sometimes I do wish I'd have started this lifestyle in my 30s at least, but 20 years ago I would never have imagined this is what I'd be doing in my 50s. It still looks like madness to the people who knew me when I lived in houses and I have come to realize that the ideal gertee set-up needs to include plumbing. But I'm glad I know how to live without it just in case it beomes something we all have to do. I keep thinking that even if I end up in a concentration camp I can see myself building gertees in there too.

It is such a reward to feel the sunshine and watch the earth come alive again. So many more bird and animal sounds at night now, can't always recognise them... eep. Not too many bears out yet, Tim saw a griz by Tonsina and his grandson and dad saw one when they were out flying around the other day. My biggest animal concern lately has been the horseshoe rabbits but the fox family living under the Community Hall pretty much took care of that for me.

Started a new webwriter contract for kennylakechalet.com, another venue in our growing city. I'm trying to just keep going in spite of all the dire predictions and worsening conditions around the world. It's not even like I have any hope that the global government will fail to assume power. I don't know how much longer I'll still be free to do whatever I want, say whatever I think and go where ever I can afford to go. But I've been blessed with some of the best conditions for living independent of government intrusions, and I think I have an obligation to be present in every moment that I have left as a "free" woman. I hope all of you have found a way to live and love in spite of your knowledge and pain. I don't know what else to do anymore. I create in order to become closer to my Creator.

Here's a real gift somebody created:

Egg box wax firestarters with sawdust fill,
an ingrediant I forgot all about until
sister Kathy reminded me. Makes the
wax go further and it burns longer.
One "egg" will get a fire going quicker
than any way I've ever seen, and when
it's fifty below zero, every second counts!

Beautiful Graveyard on Old Edgerton Hwy

Here's a new article by Mary Rizzo that will ring familiar to many of you. I haven't spent much time on forums but I sure admire the people I know who can hold their own on them.

http://palestinethinktank.com/2009/05/13/israeli-%e2%80%9cpeace%e2%80%9d-discussion-groups-common-pitfalls-and-how-to-recognise-them/