 2000 was a short year for Don, Barbara and Grace in Fairbanks, Alaska. At least it seemed to fly by pretty quickly for us. We are all doing well, thanks to GOD! (SMILE)
Don had a busy year. Besides his job at the Fairbanks North Star Borough, he took computer classes at the University of Alaska in the Spring semester. Then he took some of the tests he needs to pass to get his Microsoft Certification (Netware Engineer). He spent a lot of his �free� time studying. He still found time this summer to start repainting the exterior of the house. It looks great! We changed the exterior trim color from a brown to �stormy� blue. The rest of the house is white. He also refinished the interior window trim. It all looks great!
I (Barbara) am still working my part-time job at the City of Fairbanks Federal Credit Union . It is still the perfect part-time job! (SMILE) I seem to be able to fill up the rest of my time with WAY too many other things! I am still working on our Family Tree, and would love to hear from those family members who have not already shared family information with me. I also love to make web pages on the Internet and I am MUCH better at answering my E mail than I am in keeping up with �real� mail. We didn�t get a garden in again this year. Hopefully next year we�ll get one planted. Our weather was pretty �wet� this summer, and a lot of the warmer weather crops didn�t do well in any of the local gardens. I did manage to get a little �pantry� closet finished under the stairs this summer. It is only 3 feet by 6 feet with a sloping ceiling, but it was a lot of work! It took me most of the summer, chipping away at it, sheet rock, mud, tape, paint, floor, trim and light, but finally it was finished and immediately filled with �pantry� stuff. It looks pretty good, I think! (SMILE)
Grace has had a busy year as well! She finished her first semester at the University of Alaska, here in Fairbanks, just before Christmas last year. She made the Chancellor�s List! She thought she had done okay, but that was better than she expected! She took more classes the Spring 2000 semester and found it wasn�t quite as easy as the first semester. Of course I don�t know that it would have been easy for anyone! (SMILE) She took Speech, Japanese Culture (Junior level class), Japanese Language (2nd semester), Anthropology and Library Skills. This semester she is taking Japanese Language (3rd semester), Geography (with lab), Math Applications and Voice and seems to be doing better with fewer classes. It took me 6 years to get my degree by doing fewer classes each semester. Guess she�s like her Mom! (SMILE) Grace is working at Kmart now. She left the pharmacy tech job when the pharmacy was sold and went through three owners in just a few months. During the summer she was working at the theater again for a while, then worked at a Coffee cart making lattes, mochas, etc. She liked that job as she got tips! (SMILE) It wasn�t many hours though, and was in North Pole, so she left it when school started in September. She is working 30+ hours a week at Kmart now.
Here�s a quick rundown of our year. . .
At 7:00 A.M. on New Year�s Day with �30 degree Fahrenheit temperatures (COLD), we had to rush Grace to the hospital. She awoke that morning with post-operative bleeding in her throat, from the tonsillectomy she had on Christmas Eve. It was pretty scary, but they finally got it stopped. . .
A big cow moose came into our back yard early one morning during that bitter cold spell. We didn�t know until Spring that it had come over the neighbor�s six foot chain link fence and bent the top rail. That had to hurt. . .
In March a yearling moose came running through the yard, from back to front; I think it was running away from school kids. It bent the top rail on our five foot front fence when it went over it. . .
We awoke on Father�s Day to find that our pair of cockatiels had hatched an egg! We never expected that, as they have set eggs several times over the last five years with no hatchings. Sadly, the mother �Smoky� died 5 days later, but the daddy �Bungee� took over the task of raising the baby. It is now six months old and the cutest little thing! It�s name is �Baby Smoky� - we don�t know if it�s a male or a female yet. We will know after the first molt. So we still have three cockatiels (another female is named �Ticki�) and we have only 14 Zebra Finches. They are all getting pretty old. Several have died in the last year. Only ten males and four females remain. (They are in separate cages - no more babies) Grace has two gerbils and a teddy bear hamster. That�s all the pets we have. . .
~*~Baby Smoky at 4 weeks old~*~
We got a CD-Writer for our computer. Now we can permanently save our photos and files to CD. We are also getting an Olympus Digital Camera for Christmas. I can�t wait to try that out. . .
Grace got her own car (we traded our 1984 Camry) - a 1990 Toyota Camry, white with black trim, sunroof, low miles; a really nice little car. Plus the radio works! Hahaha She has ordered a personalized license plate for it. . . �PANDAH�
We haven�t seen any moose around town yet this winter, though there have been some pictures in the paper. Since we didn�t have a garden this year, they may not visit our yard. . .
Don and I will be visiting family in California in February and March 2001. Grace will be in school this time, so won�t be able to come with us. . .
GOD�s blessings to you in the coming new Millennium!
We love you! Barbara, Don and Grace
Hope to hear from you!!E MAIL: [email protected]ICQ #: 28319754
(Photos � 2000 Barbara Logan)
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