Getting Settled

I can FINALLY report that I am a homeowner!! This is such a relief and I feel like I can finally start "living" here if that makes sense. I'm no longer a vagabond in this strange and beautiful place. Now that I have an actual address, I can become an official Alaskan resident. One perk of becoming a resident is the state gives each resident a portion of the state oil and gas revenue every year. A cool bonus, but I won't start getting my annual checks until next year after I've been here an entire year.

I've made some more progress on getting settled into the house. I think I've found a spot for everything in the kitchen! There is much more counter space than I had in my apartement, but the corners make it a bit hard to utilize the cabinets to their fullest. I put some lazy susans in the cabinets to maximize the space, especially with the spices. I also found the cutest owl coffee mugs and stand on clearance that look great on my counter! It's fun to cook in the new kitchen. I just resubscribed to Cooking Light magazine and they email me a recipe a day to help give me ideas and recipes that are easy and healthy.

Owl mugs

First breakfast in my new home as a homeowner!
Egg white, turkey, veggie scramble

Chicken, black bean, and veggie tostadas! One of my daily Cooking Light recipes

Orange beef and veggie stir fry, another Cooking Light recipe

Recipe borrowed from Ali - Cajun Sausage Egg Casserole

One crazy thing about the kitchen is I have a gas oven. This definitely freaked me out the first time I used it. I preheated it and ran upstairs to finish folding some laundry and came down and heard the very faint sound of flames and slight smell of gas. I didn't know if I accidentally turned on the gas range instead. So I ran over the oven to turn it off and actually saw the reflection of flames in the oven (like you would under a gas grill). For those reading this who have a gas oven, laugh away cause I probably sound like an idiot haha, but I had no clue such a thing existed. I immediately took out my manuals and googled gas ovens and started feeling better that it was a real thing. And that reminded me to make sure to get a fire extinguisher the next day. Good thing natural gas is so cheap!

I'm starting to get super organized thanks to some Pinterest ideas, such as getting a large binder and putting all my user manuals in it for easy access. This has especially come in handy with the excessive amount of instruction manuals for all my new appliances in the house. I've also got my office pretty well organized. It's nice to have all my files and documents finally put away rather than scattered everywhere. And I'm still really liking my new desk. Sadly my cubicle at work doesn't accommodate my diplomas so I hung them over my desk. And of course I've got my shrine to Brett Favre and the Packers on display!

Binder of manuals - thanks Pinterest!

Each manual gets its own sleeve

Completed office ( had to close the blinds due to glare)

My finished desk! Love the glass top

Packers wall in the office

I finally have cable / internet up and running! I got a Tivo box which is great because I can turn on my Pandora while I'm cooking. Jason came over to help me hang the TV on the wall above the fireplace. It looks great cause the wires were already prewired through the walls so no cords have to hang down. The internet is pretty strange here.. I had to sign up for a limited data plan, similar to a smart phone. I've never heard of places having unlimited internet, so it was a little difficult to figure out which plan to choose. I decided to start with 60GB to test out the first month.

TV mounted above the fireplace

The living room still needs a little organizing, such as an area rug which I finally picked out this week. It should arrive soon which will tie the room together and make it feel more cozy. Hardwood floors will be chilly in the winter for sure! It's nice to have a little half bath downstairs off the living room instead of having to run upstairs. I'm quickly remembering the pains of stairs haha.. it was nice having a one story apartment for the past 3 years! I still need to figure out what to put in the front entry way. I've never really had a need for a coat rack or a "mud mat" for guests to remove their snowy dirty shoes... so that's still on the list of to-dos.

Half bathroom downstairs... if you haven't noticed yet, my fav color is green

Jewelry corner in my bathroom now complete
with my new necklace holders!

It's been raining quite a bit here and the temps are starting to lower slowly, but as mentioned before that doesn't seem to stop people from getting outside and enjoying the day. It did clear up one late afternoon to go berry picking! I was super excited for this activity, however the "short hike" to the berries ended up being over a 3 mile round trip excursion. I didn't make it to the blueberry fields, however we did pass lots of little raspberries bushes. The wild raspberries are so little and cute! I've heard of lots of blueberry fields from coworkers that are closer and don't require long hikes, so I'll be checking those out soon hopefully!

Hiking to the berries

Wild raspberries

Berries and flowers along the trail

Itty Bitty Berries

My pickings... I ate a lot on the hike back to the car!

With all the rain, I've had lots of time to get the house together and organized. However, its still not complete... I can't believe its taking this long! I've just about finished the upstairs, but I still have some work to do in the living room, kitchen area, entryway, and garage. So photos of those still to come.

Nook at the top of the stairs

I'll be spending a lot of time reading here in the winter

My puzzle table! Katie will like this :)

Guest room all ready to go for whoever wants to visit!

I went to lots of concerts back in Texas, so one thing I knew I would miss moving up to Alaska was live music. However, I already made it to my first concert up here! O.A.R performed a couple weekends and although it rained, it was a lot of fun. I use a website called Songkick that syncs to my itunes account and lets me know when any artists I listen to will be in the cities I've selected. I used to get a weekly summary email of all the artists on my itunes coming to either Houston or Austin and it was a little depressing when I changed my city to Anchorage and almost all of the shows were wiped clear. However, I got a Songkick email this week, only the second once since my O.A.R. notification, and it just so happens to be for one of my favorites... Matt & Kim!! I've seen them in concert 4 times, twice in Austin and twice in Houston and they never fail to disappoint. I couldn't be more excited that they are heading all the way up to AK in September, however it will be so weird seeing them without Hayley, my faithful concert buddy and fellow Matt & Kim lover. We've been to all their shows together.

Double rainbow at O.A.R.

Raining at the concert but having fun at O.A.R.

Cool panoramic with the double rainbow

Matt & Kim concert in Austin with my concert buddy

I've been on a couple recent adventures such as fishing in Seward, playing with sea otters, and kayaking in Whittier! However I think I've exhausted this post with house stuff so I'll write again soon with my adventure stories!

So now for some Alaskan facts, mostly related to transportation. First, there are a lot of traffic circles here. There is one in Houston that always gave me trouble on Washington and Westcott, but I bet I'd be a pro at it now since there are so many here. It still gets a little tricky when there are two in a row and I go all the way around the second one to make a left turn... it just feels like I'm driving in loops!

Along the lines of traffic, the red lights here are so incredibly long. I'm used to the "walk" symbol on the crosswalks counting down from 15 seconds max. Here they are 45 seconds! So it really stinks if you just miss the light, cause you will be waiting for awhile. Luckily though, my commute to work is only 12 minutes! It's a nice change of pace from the 25-30 minute commute I had in Houston. And it makes the long lights not seem too bad :) There is a lot of construction on the roads everywhere around town. Everyone keeps telling me there are two seasons here... winter and construction! It seems like every road has been under repair from the last winters ice damage at one point or another since I got here.

I still don't have my AK license plates. The title company back at the dealership in Texas needed proof that I lived in AK and didn't need to pay sales tax on the car. However since it took forever to close on my house, I've been unable to provide proof of residence since I was still using my Texas drivers license. So hopefully I'll get that sorted in the next month so I can get rid of my paper plates. I did finally get my AK drivers license, which required an online driving test! Thankfully since I surrendered my TX license, I did't have to take an actual road test, just the computer test. I took a couple practice ones online and averaged about an 80 so I was a little nervous since I had to get an 80 to pass (16/20). I actually missed 4 of the first 10 questions so the last 10 were a little stressful! Luckily I just barely passed and they printed my new license on the spot. Stephanie is now an Alaskan!

Moving Into My New Place

So it's been about a month since my last update, a couple of reasons for that being it's taking forever to close on my house so therefore haven't been able to get internet set up to post anything. Currently, I'm "renting" my new place until an unnamed terrible bank (starts with Wells and ends with Fargo) can get everything finalized. I could spend the next hour or so writing about all the reasons I've grown to hate Wells Fargo and home buying in Alaska, and all the anxiety it has caused, but I've complained to quite a few of my family and friends on that topic over the past several weeks already! It's just been rough going through this for the first time and every step of the process something is "different than usual." So the fact that I don't know what usual is, is a stressor for sure. I'll leave my complaining about Wells Fargo to that and move on to more exciting things.. and hopefully my next post will have the best news ever, that I'm finally a homeowner!

My shipment of things arrived much earlier than expected, only taking about 4 weeks to make the barge trek to Anchorage! It wasn't supposed to get here until early August and ended up being ready for delivery July 19th. However, instead of this being exciting news, it was super frustrating because not only was I still homeless and unable to move into my new place yet, I had to think about how all my clothes and things were sitting in a warehouse somewhere in Anchorage, just waiting to be unpacked! Haha, its been hard living out of a suitcase for so long. After some major negotiating and essentially demanding, I was able to convince the builder to let me move in early and pay a daily rent (1/30th of my monthly mortgage payment) until I can close. One positive about this whole ordeal is I'm learning to be much more forceful and demanding to get things done rather than letting people take advantage of my nice and timid nature. So long Sweet Stephanie haha!

I got the key on Wednesday morning, July 23, and spent the entire day checking off my boxes as they were taken out of the crates and directing the movers to which rooms they belonged in. I didn't even get to unpack a thing since I was on a red eye flight to Houston that night for a meeting I was coordinating the next day. My trip to Houston was very brief, but I did get to see my friends for an evening of Mexican food and margaritas! And since I won't be able to make it back to Texas for my dear friend Angelina's wedding, I was super excited to be able to help wedding craft with her a little bit before hopping back onto the plane to AK.

Leaving my new place in havoc after the move-in

So much to unpack!

Fun times with my Houston ladies at Ninfas!

Angelina's wedding signs

Fast forward till now about 2.5 weeks later and I'm making good headway on moving in. I've unpacked all my boxes and slowly begun organizing where things should go. Disclaimer to my future husband - I have a lot of stuff and will need my own closet that is the size of a normal full size room! I managed to utilize all 3 of the closets in my house for various clothes / shoes. I really don't like to shove things away where you can't see them cause then you forget and will never wear them and that's no good. So might as well utilize all the space you have :) Pictures of the closets below!

I have too many shoes

My main closet

Guest room closet aka my shoe closet

Office closet aka my coat closet

I'll start sharing some photos of my house room by room as they are completed, but there is still so much work to be done! Every time I accomplish something there are 3 more things added to the neverending to-do list I keep on my phone. I make a trip to Target, Bed Bath and Beyond, Home Depot, or Lowes daily it seems to either return something that doesn't work or buy 3 things to try. My receipt drawer has gotten ridiculous!

But I've made some really exciting purchases so far, such as a great new desk and file cabinet to start organizing all my moving paperwork, bills, and important documents. There was an option to pay a 3rd party service to assemble the desk, and I seriously debated if I wanted to pay $60 for someone to assemble it or just do it myself... I decided I should just do it myself, however this required a drill. So I made a trip to Home Depot and fumbled over to the tool section and was completely overwhelmed! I had no idea there were that many drills to choose from and what on earth all the pieces were for and different models.. so I called RC, my brother, to walk me through the basics and ended up with a cute little "starter" drill to help with my basic projects (such as my desk and hanging things on the walls). I really love it, and use it at every opportunity I can, even if its something I could easily unscrew with my hands haha. I'm like a small child with a new toy at Christmas.

My new tool!

Putting together my desk

One project that went a bit south was the shelf I hung in my laundry closet... I got a new washer and dryer in a fun blue color but didn't have any shelves to store all my laundry and cleaning supplies . So I got a basic shelf, a stud finder, and leveler and marked out the holes perfectly in the horizontal direction. After using my fun drill, it is smack dab in the middle of the closet and perfectly straight! I was so proud of myself for being such a handywoman and stepped back to admire my work and realized that the shelf was much too high! I was so focused on the horizontal direction that I completely forgot about the vertical... Nailed it! However, after showing one of my friends what a dummy I am, she brought up the fabulous point that I can now put hangers along the shelf for things to dry and not touch the machines. And a step stool next to the washer will solve the problem of reaching the cleaning supplies. Live and learn!

New washer and dryer

My amazingly straight and centered shelf

Oops too high...

The one room that is finished in my bedroom! I'm so in love with my new bed!! Its beautiful reclaimed wood and its huuuge. It's such a difference going from a double to a king. I really wanted to have a functioning bathroom, closet, and bedroom so those were on the top of my list as I was unpacking / organizing. That way when the rest of the house was overwhelming, at least I could close the door and have an escape somewhere that was put together. I got awesome new stuff in Houston before I left so I could put all my old stuff in the guest room / bath. The only thing I'm waiting on is my new jewelry holders to add in the corner above my storage cube. I got the idea on Pinterest to hang necklaces on old doorknobs. I thought I could get some great Anthropologie knobs and make one myself. However, with all the other projects I have on my to-do list, this crafty one was going to be far down on the list.. So I did a quick Etsy search and found a great shop that had tons of jewelry holders similar to my Pinterest inspiration. So I messaged her asking if she could make me some in neutral colors (white, gold, clear) so as not to distract from all my fun bright necklaces. She was great and made them super quick and they are enroute to AK no! She was nice enough to take some photos before she mailed them :) Can't wait!

New bedroom furniture including a standing fan since there is no AC here!

Obsessed with the reclaimed wood

Happy bathroom

Lots of space

Closet... at max capacity

Necklace holders!!

Can't wait to get them

One of my favorite things in the house are the windows on the stairs

Guest bathroom all finished.. Becca and Laura will recognize that trunk :)

I've done a couple fun activities in the past few weeks, but not as many as I would've liked due to unpacking, traveling to Houston, unpacking, a couple rainy weekends, oh and unpacking! But I did go to August First Friday, in which a band plays outside downtown on the first Friday of the month and there are several food trucks and a beer garden. It was fun, but my favorite part was seeing all the flowers downtown. It really is amazing how vibrant and big all the flowers are here! I guess since they get so much sunlight in the summer, they simply flourish.

Flowers downtown

So bright

I also went on another hike along the water with Jason and Erin and we found a few spots to stop and enjoy a beer and take in the views. The trails are so green and the leaves are massive due to the sunlight. I've never been to a jungle or rainforest, but it feels like I'm in one on some of these hikes. The view was also spectacular in Kincaid Park, where Erin and I played a round of frisbee golf. Some parts were very jungle-ly and others had great views of the water. I'm excited for winter because all the trails in this park turn into cross country ski trails!

Hiking with Jason and Erin

Another beautiful Alaskan summer day

Mushrooms

Walking through the jungle

Funky fungus

Break time, not hard to enjoy these views!

So green and lovely

Stump chair

Scenic frisbee golf

Another recent activity was floating the river this past weekend. Now being from Texas, I was quite intrigued when "floating the river" was mentioned. Of course I'm thinking swim suits, innertubes, floating cooler full of beer, and sunshine galore! So as you can imagine, I was quite confused how we were going to float a river when the forecast was 55 degrees, overcast, and a chance of rain. It was explained to me that weather can't stop you here, cause its unpredictable. You have to go for it and do activities no matter what or you will always be sitting at home. So the float was on rain or shine! And I was willing to give it a go. It would involve rafts rather than innertubes, rain gear rather than swimsuits, a paddle rather than sunscreen, but a backpack / small cooler of beer was the same. Oh and the theme was pirates (people like to dress up in costume here apparently!) I was not sure what to expect exactly, but it was quite entertaining. People were dressed up in all types of costume, forget just pirates, and ready to float regardless of getting wet! It ended up being in the high 60s, a lot warmer than originally thought, and there was no rain! However, the creek was a little low so there were several booty bumps against the rocks which was not super awesome. We ended up losing 3 rafts due to pops on rocks, the last of which was the one I was in! Prior to our pop, we did survive a tipped raft when I accidentally navigated us into a tree limb. It was definitely an interesting experience and by the end I wanted a hot shower, but it was fun nonetheless. At least I can say I floated the river here in Alaska!

Prepping the rafts

Entering the very shallow river

One of the nice calm float spots

Float break

We were a pirate themed raft crew

Boots filled with water post raft flip

We may be soaked, but we finished the float!

I thought I'd start sharing some things that are different in everyday life here in Alaska compared to Texas, to give everyone back home an idea of what its like here. First of all, there is no sales tax! So tax free weekend is year round, on everything. However, little things are much more expensive since they have to be shipped further. However, when buying electronics and expensive things, it makes such a difference! For instance I got a waterproof camera, a TV mount, my desk... all things over $100 and paid nothing in sales tax which was quite exciting :)

Another thing is that the entire state is the same area code - 907. This is a flashback to when I used to dial my friends in grade school and didn't need an area code for the local calls. If you use a local phone here, you only dial a 7 digit number. Also, when I'm giving my phone number in the store or to a service provider, I always have to specify "Area code 214..." before starting the number or they just automatically type in 907 first.

Also, it is essential to have blackout blinds on the bedroom windows! Its pretty difficult to go to sleep in the daylight, so they make a huge difference. They also make it kind of tough to wake up cause the sunlight isn't pouring in, and its kind of like a cave. Sadly, the sun is starting to set earlier and earlier since the Summer Soltice has passed, I snapped the shot below this weekend of the sun setting around around 10:30pm... which in a few months will turn into 4-5pm :( I wish the midnight sun would stay year round! I noticed several other things that are different here in Alaska, so I'll keep adding a few to all my posts here on out.

Sun is setting earlier and earlier

Blackout blinds that are either top down or bottom up..
Pretty nifty for privacy, while still letting in light when opened from the top

I'll end today with a photo of my new glasses! I've realized that my vision is not as great as it used to be and I really should be wearing glasses when I drive. I got prescription sunglasses last year for that very reason, since I'm always wearing sunglasses in the car. But since it has been a little rainy here, and to prepare for the winter where it will be dark always, I decided I should get a pair of real glasses for driving.. It wasn't a problem in Houston since I always knew where I was going and didn't depend on reading the street signs. But here, I'm still learning the streets and I struggle a bit to read the signs as far in advance as I know I should be able to! But don't worry, I've been wearing my sunglasses whenever possible of course :)

My new hipster windshields as Jason called them haha