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Hot Coco and snuggies during the start of the race

Today, was the ceremonial start if the Iditarod. I had all intentions of taking the kids to watch. Until I while up this morning and it was -1°. I know we live in Alaska and cold is something we are going to have to live with and we can't stay cooped up in the house all winter. I just feel like -1°, dealing with 10, million people and parking would be a little much for me. But I decided to ask Kayleigh if she wanted to go or not. I told her the temperature and asked if she would rather so and see it in real life our just watch it on TV. Her answer, "Let's stay here and watch it on channel 2. If it were in the teens I would want to go, but it's too cold right now." Have I ever mentioned how much I love that girl? She is such a mini-me.  So we watched the start on TV and drank hot chocolate.  When we were watching it, I felt a little sad that we didn't go down there.  I know we will still have at least three more, so it's not that big of a deal.  But it looked like such a great experience.  How many people can say they've been to the "last great race on Earth"?

We went to the Arctic Oasis again this afternoon and I actually got a decent work out in.  I think getting cardio in will be my big problem while Nate is gone.  Spencer always seems to have to go the bathroom about 10-15 minutes into my workout.  Then by the time I get him taken care of all my cardio motivation is out the window.  But weights, I can start and stop, since I need some recovery time between sets.  So I don't think getting in a good weight lifting session will be too hard.  Thankfully.  I am thinking about starting yoga again.  I can't go to classes like I used to for obvious reasons.  But I was messing around on the TV and our on demand section has a whole bunch of yoga videos.  I think I am going to try to find time to do that.

 

When we came home, I pulled into our cul-de-sac and saw this guy...

BTW, I think that red thing is our kids shovel.  I hope he didn't step on it

  He is our friendly neighborhood moose.  We've seen him three times this week.  I think I need to name him, but what is a good name for a moose?  Maybe I will name him Bullwinkle.  That will give me an excuse to buy some old school cartoons and make the kids watch them.  Unless one of you have a better moose name.  Earlier this week he was out there when I had to take Kayleigh to the bus stop.  I was a little nervous because moose are dangerous.  Most people think they are safe and I have read a lot about people here trying to feed them and then the moose gets aggressive and trample someone.  I've also read that more people die in Alaska due to moose attacks than bears.  Today the kids wanted to go out and see him so bad that I let them.  I of course gave them the ground rules. #1 BE QUIET  #2 BE QUIET and #3 if I tell them to go inside they need to run as fast as their little feet will carry them.  So we stood outside and watched him eat for a little bit.

 

Then the kids wanted their pictures taken with him.  This was as close as I would let them get, due to my paranoia.

I loved this one so much I had to make it XL!

  The kids were so excited that he was eating off a tree in their friends yard.  They tried to call him over (in whispers) to our yard so they could sit in the living room and watch him eat.  But we had no luck.  I'm sure if he sticks around he will be eating off our trees as soon as they start of get some new growth on them.  You can't tell from these shots, but he is pretty thin.  I imagine its a hard winter here for them.  Next time I see him, I will try to get a shot that shows how thin he is.