A year has past.

Wow. I seriously neglected this blog for far too long. But now I'm back and ready to try and maintain it. For now I'm just going to post a few photos from the past couple of months. 

Hiking East Glacier--

Hanging with mom--

Begging for food at the beach---

Snuggling Dad---

Eating a stick on the boat---

Sleeping. A lot. 

Last Days of Fall... Been busy!

Dang! It's been awhile since my last post apparently. It's been a pretty hectic couple of weeks for aly's mom. School is coming to a close soon and I have been working hard to finish out my classes. Starting Monday, April 30th, I plan on having a more consistent rate of posts:) that's my goal anyways!

It hasn't been a terribly exciting week adventure wise for Alyeska. But she has

 been getting some pretty great lounging in. Here she is plopped down on top

of her dad, Jeremy Lavender. I told her to give him some snuggles and this is what

 we got. She's such a dork but terribly adorable. 

Here's Alyeska Lounging with her brother, Spenser Johnson. Spenser just got done editing together an awesome video with footage from a week that our friends Zoe and Darius were here to ride! Zoe visited us from Canada and Darius came from Washington. It was their first time here in Juneau, Alaska and they both had a blast. You can access the video by going to Jeremy's tumblr and clicking on the photo of Spenser and Aly or you can access the video straight from AK Livin'. 

©Jeremy Lavender 2012

On April 19th, Alyeska, Jeremy and I took a trip out to 

Fish Creek Park. When we went out to Fish Creek park with Spenser, 

we took the path to the left of the creek. But this time 

we took the path to the right and it took us out to this nice little

 sunny patch of water where we got to hang out just the three of us. 

©Jeremy Lavender 2012

Jeremy tried really hard to get some good photos

of Aly but she was too riled up and wouldn't sit

still for more than five seconds which unfortunately

isn't enough time to get a photo of the brat. Here she

is up on the trail that we came from. She looooooves

to run back and forth and up and down. Probably

one of her all time favorite pass times.

©Jeremy Lavender 2012

Spring Has Sprung!

YESTERDAY Alyeska and I went on a nice little walk with our roommate Spenser. He took us out to Fish Creek Park, a place that Aly and I had never been before. Needless to say Aly had the best time ever running circles around the two of us. The trail started right off the side of North Douglas Highway and eventually takes you out to the beach where there are some pretty fantastic views of the mountains, the Mendenhall Glacier and the valley.

 This is a super old, abandoned boat that is right off the beach line. I won't lie though, the first thing I noticed was daffy duck. Not the fact that it was painted onto the side of a boat! Aly absolutely did not want to sit still for this photo. She wanted to go play on the beach. [Photo By: Spenser Johnson]

 There were so many great views out here!! Aly and I cheesin' for the camera! [Photo By: Spenser Johnson] 

 RUN, ALY, RUN!! [Photo By: Spenser Johnson]

 This photo was taken on our walk back to the car. She was oh so tired but kept running her heart out! When we got home she was pretty much dead to the world. 

Aly likes to eat grass. But what dog doesn't?! 

and TODAY! We went on a walk with our friends Lynzey (human) and Phantom (dogfriend) out at the wetlands by the airport. We had gone out walking with these two once before, but the dogs didn't really do much playing... or acknowledging each other for that fact. We were super excited to see them actually play with each other today though! They ran through the grass, water, mud, you name it! Phantom seemed to be looking for giant puddles of water to wade into just for the fun of it! Aly was really enjoying the extensive amount of mud that the wetlands had to offer and decided that running through all the puddles on the mudflats was the best idea to get her energy out. Unfortunately I neglected to grab my camera for this epic journey, but next time there will for sure be photos to go along with the story! 

Lazy Days

It has been such a great couple of weeks here in Juneau, AK! Alyeska has been soaking up the sun as much as possible. Her favorite place currently to bunker down at is the screen door at the back porch. She also has been enjoying perching herself on the arm of our couch and staring out our big windows. She hasn't quite figured out the concept of the screen door yet though and keeps having head-on collisions with it when she forgets to pay attention. 

One of her favorite tasks in the morning is waking up her favorite overnight guest, KGB! Keren has finally accepted the abrupt wake-up call and just goes along with it now. But that's okay, because most mornings Keren is rewarded with a delicious plate of bacon to get her day going!!

 Sometimes they decide that going back to sleep is the better choice.... cuddle buddies! <3

 Ever since we got Alyeska we have battled with her when it comes to eating her food. She is probably one of the pickiest eaters I have ever encountered in the dog world. She will not eat by herself. She does not like science diet ( though I don't blame her ), and salmon flavored food is about the only dish she will accept with goodies being mixed into it. Brat. Since we buy her the expensive food, blue buffalo, we tried to see if we could get her to eat the chicken flavored food since it was about ten dollars cheaper. So we bought a 30pound bag and found out that she is indeed a big ol stinker. She finally finished the bag of food and is now happily enjoying her slamon flavored food again. I have also found that she is really picky about where she will eat her food unless you are standing right next to her. I did an experiment where I took her food and water outside to see if she would eat it by herself out there since she seems to be fond of the fresh air. Well luckily for me she went for it and has been eating her food like a good girl ever since!

Alyeska is waiting at home patiently for her mom and dad 

to return so that she can give them all 

the love in the world! 

And so that they can do the same:) 

Meet Alyeska

I know most people won't even bother reading this blog, but in all honesty that doesn't bother me at all. I have created this blog in order to follow the growth and development of Alyeska Lavender-Kamahele. 

My boyfriend Jeremy Lavender and I moved to Juneau, Alaska in the fall of 2010 so that I could attend the University of Alaska Southeast (UAS). --Below is a photo of Jeremy Lavender soaking up the views of Yakutat, AK through his favorite medium... His camera! We had a three hour layover in Yakutat on our journey to Juneau. We made use of this time:) --

When school came to an end, we had to make the decision of whether or not we were going to relocate back to Anchorage for the summer. I put in an application at the summer camp I worked at the previous year and got hired on, so we started our trek back to our homes in Anchorage. The entire year that we were in Juneau we longed for a dog companion of our own. The streets and beaches and trails here in Juneau are full of amazing dogs and we knew that we were going to have to get one sometime in the near future. During the entire summer home we frequented the pound and bulletin board not completely serious about getting a dog.... but also not opposed to the idea if we found the right one. 

--This is Jeremy and I pre-Alyeska.--

Well, we did end up stumbling upon the perfect dog for us and we started the adoption process with the Humane Society in Anchorage. BUT HOLD ON! It wouldn't be the perfect situation if they didn't make us work for her. 

The Humane Society requires that you provide the name and number of your landlord or the owner of the property that you live on. Makes sense, they don't want dogs to end up right back at the pound, giving them a false hope of potential love. Well, considering we didn't live in Anchorage permanently anymore that posed a problem for us. We left the pound with dampened spirits but did not stop fighting for this dog for one minute. Once we finally got the all clear from our friends parents and the pound, we rushed back to fill out the adoption papers! BUT WAIT! When we arrived a family was already filling out her adoption papers:( 

Lucky for us they ran into the exact same problem with the landlord issues and decided to not to worry about it until they finished filling out the adoption papers. The lady taking the papers could no process their request without their landlords permission and the instant that they walked out of the doors of the Humane Society, we were handed adoption papers and our newest adventure was about to start! 

Unlucky for us, Alyeska's previous owners neglected to get her spayed (resulting in carrying god knows how many liters of puppies, let's pray the poor girl only had to go through it once!). Once we got her fixed the next problem that presented itself was getting her to our next destination.... She was not able to fly, so she had to get loaded up into the vehicle and start the trek back to Juneau with Spenser, our roommate, and myself. We traveled through canada until we got to Haines, AK where our great friend Bruce Bauer let us stay for the night while we waited to get on the ferry to take us on the last leg of our journey! 

--Post-Surgery Alyeska all cozied up in her kennel waiting to get to her new home!--

We finally arrived in Juneau and met up with Jeremy after we got off the ferry. Our next challenge was going to be finding housing for all of us. We spent the first week and a half sleeping in Spenser's dads driveway, waking up and going to the rec center to situate the car for the day and using the facilities to shower and wash up for the day. That was probably the toughest week we have had to endure. We finally could not take it and our wonderful wonder WONDERFUL newly found friends Tim, Lisa and Cedar invited us to live with them on their beautiful tugboat The Challenger. Living on The Challenger was probably one of the greatest experiences I have had here in Juneau. Our cabin was relatively small and we had no running water, but we made it work! We eventually found out what we could and could not plug into the outlets in our cabin (we blew the circuit multiple times and ended up in the dark for an extended period of time. hehe. whoops!). Living with the Miles' really gave us an opportunity to bond with our new dog, who was still a little weary of the entire situation that we had just thrown her into. She was stuck being so close to us for the first three months of owning her that we have created the kind of relationship that we had only dreamed of having with our baby girl. 

FINALLY! We found a home in North Douglas that was willing to rent to young adults with a dog. MAN! What luck. We have been happily living in our duplex for a few months now and Alyeska is happier than ever. 

If you want to know more about how Alyeska is doing and what she is currently up to in life, then visit this blog frequently! 

--Lounging in Haines, AK--

 --Satisfying an itch somewhere in Canada--

 --Car Living--

 --Our Cramped Sleeping Quarters--

 --Such a beautiful face. Both of them:)--

 --This was our house. EEK!--

 --In case you haven't noticed, her favorite place to lounge is on top of piles of things.--

I dedicate this blog to our amazing dog, Alyeska Lavender-Kamahele.

Born March 12, 2009

Adopted August 14, 2011

Living life to it's fullest everyday.