More progress...

It has been a good week, here in interior Alaska!

Needless to say, progress has continued just not as fast as it did over the weekend.  In fact, Monday was a down day.  I watched the Daytona 500 that ended with the horrific crash by Ryan Newman.  I felt bad for the winner as he was unsure of how to celebrate.  And I felt bad for the young drivers who were also involved in the crash as they appeared really shaken by what had happened.

Tuesday and Wednesday were shopping days.  Rob is staying with me this week since Kate is in California.  So I have someone to cook for which is fun.  I got things so I could try new recipes.  Nothing like having a guinea pig in the house! 

I feel like I am constantly cleaning up and organizing.  It is draining and fulfilling all at the same time.  But I am looking forward to doing some sewing, now that I have found my good sewing stuff.  I also know that I need to get other things done first.  I think it goes back to having to get my homework done before having fun!!

One of the things we came across was a large box of bathroom stuff.  It was basically stuff that had come out of the linen closet and the small cabinet that I had in the bathroom in Parkesburg.  The storage in my new bathroom was already full.  It was not quite as much storage as I had in Parkesburg.  So, I ordered another little cabinet from Amazon to put in an unused corner of the bathroom.  It arrived on Friday, so I spent the day putting the cabinet together, sorting through the box and finding spots for everything.  I rearranged where things are living and I have been able to have a couple of things on top that I did not have space for, so I am pleased with the results.

This is my bathroom on the lower level.  It has been recently updated.  The little cabinet fit right in that little corner.  I have my apothecary jar with bar soap in it so the soap dries out a little and lasts longer in the shower.

Closeup of the cabinet.

This is my shower stall.  It is a tad on the small side.  But anything too big seems a waste of space to me.  It works for me.  The tiny glimpse of the door to the right goes into the sauna.  I have not yet used it.  This was not a feature on my wish list when we were house hunting, but it came with this house.

I am going back in time in the near future.  When the Nintendo Wii came out, Rudy and I got one.  It was such fun to bowl, play carnival games, fish, etc.  But one of the most fun things I did was to play Animal Crossings.  It was a delightful game where I assumed a character who built a home, watered flowers, earned bells that allowed my character (Ginger) to upgrade her house and buy clothes and furnishings.  But the fun thing was that via the Wii Speak I could go to visit my friend's (Marji and Debby) village and we could each be at our homes, but together in the game.

In time, we all got busy, life happened and then Wii disabled the Speak device.  I gave my Wii sets away... one to a friend and one on my free table as I was preparing to move here.

After getting into the house here and getting the kitchen up and running, I began thinking about what I wanted to have in the house to make my days in Alaska fun.  I thought about getting a new game console, but I just was not happy with the games on the Xbox or the Playstation.  The games were too dark or too violent or too sports themed.  But Nintendo has the Nintendo Switch console.  it is a small screen, handheld console with controls on either side.  The games are geared more to kids, cartoony, less violent and thinking.  You can also connect it to your TV, so instead of a tiny screen, your screen is only limited to the size of your TV.  And, in doing my research, I found that this coming March, they are releasing a new version of Animal Crossings.

Since Christmas, when I bought my Nintendo Switch, I have been adding controllers, buying a game or two and have pre-ordered Animal Crossings.  If any of you are interested in the Animal Crossings game, here is a link to the Nintendo release of the new game information,  I watched it and it brought back such fun memories.  I am so anxious to get my hands on the game.  And I am hoping that I can once again find friends to visit and who will visit me.  If not, I will still enjoy playing the game on my private island.

For the last two days, I have been using water and electricity like crazy.  I needed to wash all of the towels and bedding that we found over the weekend.  I have also been cooking more, with Rob in the house, so the dishwasher has run almost daily... yesterday it ran twice.  I love, love, love having a dishwasher.  It allows my kitchen to stay neater, tidy and ready for cooking.  About the only bad thing is that I am still learning where I put things when I set up the kitchen.  But having recently touched every item in the kitchen, I know that it is at least in the house, so I can just keep looking until I find what I need.

We have been enjoying above zero temps for almost a week.  There has been some snow shedding, but when I have been outside, I can wander around in just a simple hoodie and not feel cold at all.  It is amazing how warm 25 above feels after 35 below!!

It is also amazing to see the roads that I now drive on compared to what I would not have driven on in Parkesburg.  Now I have mentioned before... I think... that when it gets as cold as it does here in Alaska, they cannot use salt as it stops working when it is too cold.  So the road crew here just plow and scrape.  Many evenings, you will find groups of road graders out literally scraping the hard-packed snow of the main highways.  I had assumed that as the winter moved along, the snow would pile up on the highways.  I have been delighted to see the color of the asphalt showing on many of the main roads.  Intersections are dicey.  With traffic crisscrossing, they might have hard-pack that is not able to be scraped all the way down. So they can test my traction-control on Miss Gaddy.  But the roads that are not main roads will have a layer of hard-pack that does not go away.  I have found that with studded tires, I can easily maneuver those roads.  You do not speed, you do not rabbit start, and you anticipate the need to stop, but I have stopped fearing going out on roads that would have had me staying home in Parkesburg.  You learn to do what you need to do!  Not that I am a seasoned Alaskan driver, but I am doing just fine for the length of time I have been here.

I hope you have a nice weekend.  I will be doing more sorting, putting away and all.  Chat at you later.