4th of July

I may just have to go to Juneau for the 4th of July celebrations. I just read that the community across the water from Juneau is going to have Miss Alaska 1958 as their Grand Marshall. She's the mother of one of my high school friends...a friend that died (she "drank herself to death") in her early 30's. Jill was always obsessed with her weight and physical beauty...I didn't even know her mom was Miss Alaska. I feel like I should honor Jill's mom, I can't imagine having a child die a sorrowful death.
Here is Miss Alaska, Stuart Sliter, getting Casey Stengel's autograph when she did a tour of the states when she was the reigning queen. When I knew Mrs. Sliter, she was the wife of a commercial fisherman, mother of 3 kids and usually hosting a party of some sort. Their house was a lively, rough and ready place that I loved to visit.

a little solstice

We all walk in the same places. It's been a few weeks since these tracks showed up down by the golf course, Ive been meaning to get a picture to share before the rains come. Small moose, small bear and average woman feet.The cabbage before.

Nancy Pearl shushing the cabbage that is overwhelming her.

A potato flower! Now that there are flowers, the tubers are forming under the earth...magic.

a rose is a rose

Most of the edible berries in southeast Alaska are roses of some sort, the rest are the Vacinnium family like blueberries and bog cranberries. The roses have big showy flowers the Vacinnium little bell shaped flower.
This is the flower from a raspberry in my yard, 5 petals, many stamens, flowers on last years' cane and has prickles.
This is a Thimbleberry flower, 5 petals many stamens, flowers on old cane and no prickles. Fruit is like a raspberry but in my mind the definition of pithy. Mushy and little flavor. Great big palmate leaves (like a maple) Aggressive pain in the ass weed that spreads in a sneaky underground rooty way.
Salmon Berry flower...see a pattern here? 5 petals, many stamens. Fruit is raspberry like but sometimes red sometimes yellow. Colors might be an adaptation to keep birds from eating the ripe fruit, the yellow ones don't look 'ripe'. Some people (thimbleberry lovers?) don't like the fruit, it can be watery and sort of flavorless if it's not ripe.
Last but not least by a long shot is strawberries. Everyone else in this story is a tall showy plant that flowers on old woody canes. Strawberries live close to the ground but have that same 5 petal flower with many stamens. The only fruit I know of with the seeds on the outside...and oh so tasty!

I'll snag a picture of the wild roses that grow around here, generally called Sitka or Nootka rose, they have the same flowers but a wonderful rose scent that the others don't have. Bees frequent the Sitka rose and the strawberry, but usually it's flies on the other flowers.

Some bead pictures to share

The doll is on high quality cotton, with leather 'boots' and leaves from the silk flower department at a Joanne fabric store.
The beads are sewn to pellon dyed green then the whole thing is sewn to hand dyed wool felt.

Yukon road trip

Just back from a short road trip to Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon (territory/province?). I sort of forgot how close Canadian Tire and a movie theatre (it's Canada, ya know) is to Haines. At least close in the summer months, the road is passable but scary in the winter. It took me about 5 hours to get there even with miles and miles of slushy snow falling.

Part of the trip was to meet up with my sister and part of her family at Takhini hotsprings. 2 days of bobbing around in a swimming pool full of hot water...very nice. Weekend camping during the warm months in Canada is, however, not peaceful, not nice. I forget how inconsiderate people are and how just plain LOUD campgrounds are on the weekends. Friday night it was drunken teenagers with fireworks. If you looked at the Wikipedia article, you'll note that the area is essentially an arctic desert...fire danger levels high all summer. Saturday night it was a site right next to ours that included the thundering feet of small children running laps around our site as well as an unending supply of modern country "music". Must remember not to camp on the weekend at Takhini, no matter how nice the water is it can't make up for noisy sonsabitches.

The other part of the trip was the visit to the city...specifically Canadian Tire to buy a reel mower for my grassy grass. I'm pretty sure the gasoline powered neighbors wonder what the hell I'm up to with my push mower in the summer and my hand operated shovels in the winter. Bob cat dude did come over and cut down the forest of dandelions in my front yard while I was push mowing my way through the side yard. But, ya know...the first mowing of the forest was going to be seriously hard work, I appreciate the help summer or winter!

On the drive back, I saw a black phase red fox. Very cool animal, all charcoal black except for a white tip on it's fluffy tail.