Alaska!!!

We had such fun in Alaska! The only thing that could've made it better was if Truman could've come. But we had such fun.

We got there in time to take what we thought would be a quick drive up to Fairbanks. It was not quick. And there are a billion and one moose on the roads! We saw at least 6 on our drive up there and more the rest of the trip! 

We saw the very faintest trace of Northern Lights on our way up. I wish, wish, wish we had seen more!

The first morning we were there we went and saw the Trans-Alaska Pipeline and it was really cool and crazy! It goes all the way from the north to the south of the state and there it was! It was so cool! 

We also went ice fishing and it was the best! We caught 5 fish and one of them was a delicious salmon!

We went back to our place and cooked up the fish and they were sooo good!

We went to North Pole, AK! It was such a cute, fun little place. Every kind of Christmas and Alaska souvenir you could want. I loved it. 

And THE Santa. Cus we were at the North Pole, you know.

They wree having their annual ice festival there and the ice carving was CRAZY! And horrifying! 

Look at this train. Look at this smoke. That is all ice. Crazy.

And they had Santa's real reindee there! They were such interesting animals!

The next day we drove down to Denali and did some snowshoeing. That was fantastic! There were fresh moose signs all over! I was sure we were going to run into one of them.  

We spent our last day and night in Anchorage and that was so fun and so pretty.  

This was the lake by the place we stayed at (Mormons owned it, so that was awesome too!) This picture was taken at like 930 in the morning. Still so dark! It was just wild. 

In Anchorage I ran a 5k! My 16th state! It was a fun race through a cool forest. 

After the race we went and finally, finally caught our long-awaited glimpse of Denali! It was the BEST! You can't even see it, but we could! 

We went and hiked a loop of Flattop Mountain, upon which we saw another moose and which was exhilarating and beautiful. 

Then we took a drive out to a wildlife conservation center and the drive was absolutely amazing. So much of our driving up to this point had been in the dark and very bleak and unchanging, but man! This was incredible. 

And the place where we ended up was wild! ICE!

We went to see the Anchorage temple afterwards and it was so cute. But the highlight was definitely that the stake center in whose parking lot the temple resides was hosting a nativity showcase, which included the best live nativity I have ever seen. It was a highlight for sure! 

We made it happily home the next morning and were so glad to be reunited with Truman. Burton was a champ on the whole trip and we were so grateful we could take a fun adventure. Thank you Mom & Dad!!!