Thank you for sharing your beautiful wedding !! May you live happily ever after !!

Oh, I love all the photos and the story of your wedding day. So unconventional it was wonderful. So nice of the whole family pitching in and helping to make your day so special. All the wonderful things that were made by members of your families is awesome. Your final picture is also very endearing, you with your grandma. It is so nice of you to share so much of your life with us who are strangers to you. It makes us feel special too. Here’s to a very blessed and wonderful married life.

We had so much fun celebrating with you Wilders and are so glad we could be there. Love you all!!!!

Thank you for sharing your special day!! Every word and picture is awesome!! How wonderful is your families, talented too. And those totally darling girls, love. Thanks gain. God bless.

Congratulations you guys from both Jon and I (and Grover)! Your wedding looked so beautiful and more importantly meaningful, it was a treat to read about, thanks for the blogpost.

Hi Alex Wilder !

What a fantastic, warm, creative, loving event! Thank you for sharing! You have a way of showing us all what a blessing your life is, and help others to feel that too about our own lives, living simply and free. Many congratulations to the Wilder family 🙂

Beautiful photos. So glad your shared for wedding day with us. I bet it was a wonderful experience that will forever be important to you and your family. You have such a talented family helping you out. Sending you many well wishes for a happily ever after!

How exciting to have your wedding just a couple days away! I hope it turns out the way you always dreamed of. Can’t wait to see pictures.

I tolerate dirt but I do not enjoy being dirty. When my hands or body get dirty when I’m in the garden I am just fine, but I need to wash my hands and change my clothes when I come inside. Over the years I have become a little less of a clean freak and my garden has helped with that. As for my oldest son, he can’t stand being dirty, sticky, etc. I had always dreamed of having that wonderful picture of your naked baby covered in spaghetti but I never got that picture. He will not eat with his fingers or hands. Simply won’t touch it. He has to eat with a fork. I’m hoping my second boy will be different. Who knows, he may change over the years.

Congratulations, Alex! I meant to comment on your announcement posting and never quite got to it. Why? I was most likely playing in the dirt. Wishing you a fabulous wedding day and many happy years together and Mr. and Mrs. Love the photo of the girls… adorable as always!
Love,
Beach Farmgirl, Deb ( aka earth pig, as my hubby lovingly calls me)

I pulled weeds, cut lettuce and purslane for a salad, and picked green beans this evening before fixing dinner for my grandson and myself…dirt is all part of gardening, for sure – I don’t have any problems with dirt… I have 3 sons and 6 grandchildren…I’ve seen plenty of dirt!! I live on a dirt road, so my truck is always dirty…no way out of it!!

Congratulations on your wedding! Are your girls going to be the flower girls??

I must confess, I too am a dirtbag!

\How do you know what clean is if you don’t get dirty? Nothing like dancing toes in wet mud.

I am a fat woman who works hard, and I enjoy my showers. They take 7 minutes, and I feel so much better afterwards. It is just in me to do this. I get itchy and have very oily skin and hair, and I really don’t like to be smelly either. As a fat woman, that is a natural side effect of the extra weight. So I’m careful to clean up when I’m done.

That being said, I have gone into stores dirty, but only in the country where everyone else is also dirty. I will say my hands are ALWAYS clean and that I garden 95% of the time with gloves on because those danged cuts take too long to heal and are painful.

But I have to ask…why is weed pulling the only thing the organic farm is using to fight weeds? I have always used pulling as a last resort. I cover cover cover…either mulch or newspaper or cardboard. The only weeding I ever need to do is very close to the plant, and those are easy. When my mom and I ran our CSA, we weeded, yes, but it was the LAST thing we did after deploying other methods (newspaper and cardboard were our go-to most of the time).

Congratulations on getting married! I bet you are super excited. I can’t wait to hear all about it.
Loved seeing all your pictures and hearing about your exciting bachelorette. I’m sorry it didn’t turn out as planned, but I think because it didn’t it will be more memorable for you. It sounds like you will have to plan another trip by yourself to get some more you time in. It’s important. I had my first me day about 3 weeks ago. Now I understand why it’s so important. I haven’t had a day away from my boys since the days they were born.
Have a wonderful Solstice!

Congratulations! And, I very much enjoyed your adventures here, and your photos throughout! Please do write a whole blog entry on the soil blocker. 🙂 I have one I haven’t used in a long time and need to get back to it.

Thank you for sharing these great pictures. Your girls are beautiful.
Marilyn

Great post!!!! Congratulations on your up-coming marriage!!!! Looking forward to the pictures and then some from the farm. We are having a HOT summer but cooling nicely at night, sounds like a little thunder/rain might happen soon, we sure can use the rain. Love those babies of yours. God bless.

Congratulations Alex! I can’t wait to hear news of your wedding!

I loved reading this blog post (is there any blog post you write that I don’t love?) and even though it is absolutely nothing I would ever do in Alaska (I’m such a wimp), I sure loved reading about your hike. I have hiked and camped in the Grand Canyon but there were no bears to be worried about! 🙂 I’ve done some hiking in Alaska a few years ago with family that live there and honestly I was just constantly worried about the bears. I never could relax. But the next time I go back to visit Alaska, I’m going to let those fears go!!

Happy farming… can’t wait to hear all about your summer.

– Dori, the Ranch Farmgirl –

P.S. Those girls of yours…. so precious!

Beautiful photos Alex. I didn’t know about the other two seasons – the break up and the freeze up – but that would make a lot of sense to have them as distinct seasons, they have such an impact on life in Alaska. Living in Australia and especially here on the east coast, our seasons are so moderate they seem to just slide on into each other. This past summer was super hot with heat waves coming though often. Yuk! It was too hot. Loving autumn now with the cooler temps and sunny days.
Your hair style is gorgeous on you, shorter and curlier. Just had to mention .
My husband and I often watch a couple of tv shows on Alaska. One is wild frontier and the other is on the family that lives on an island and they are creating their own town – I’ve forgotten the name of it. I’ve also watched ‘Ice road truckers’ and so have seen a little of Anchorage on it.
You certainly live in an amazing place. It’s on our bucket list to visit one day.
Love reading your posts, wishing you an amazing spring
Denise

If you burn with wood, this is the hardest time of year. Too warm during the day to keep a good fire going, but freezing at night to be ready with a few embers to get the flames a going. Sometimes we just wear extra sweat shirts til about noon when it is warmer outside them in the house. I think it is good. Makes me think about how it is for animals to adjust. Warm during the day and freezing at night. Or close to it. I live in New York near Lake Ontario, where the lake slows down the melting, and keep fall warmer longer. It is just what we get use too. Anyways the calendar says Spring and the garlic is coming up and spring onions. Yep, it’s coming!

Hi Alex,

Wow did this post ever bring back memories of visiting Alaska in April one year. I was so shocked at the slush and muck. And sadly, I thought it was really ugly because all the “break-up” was black and dirty seeming. I’ve since realized how beautiful it really was, it’s just that I left Arizona in the blooming and warm time! 🙂 My brother in law is so good to text pictures of what Alaska looks like each day! Yesterday his picture was skiing in Mt Alyeska and it was GORGEOUS!!! Seeing the picture you posted of Cook Inlet made me miss being there actually. As my brother in law and sister in law live above Cook Inlet and have that view. Alaska really is such a gorgeous, gorgeous place and I need to get back there for a visit very badly.

Loved seeing pictures as usual, Alex. Nice you could have Easter with your family. Little Opal is just growing up too fast.

Can’t wait for your growing season to start and follow along with your farming.

Hugs,

– Dori, the Ranch Farmgirl –

That photo of Ava and Opal is adorable.
Marilyn

This is my church, I thought. This is my solace and reprieve.

Amen!! Thank you for articulating what I have felt in my life !! Being outside is everything 🙂

I love silence. I am an extrovert, but with some introvert in there that recharges in silence and peace. I usually get this in the mountains. It may not ever be completely quiet – there is the sound of the wind in the pines, and the crackle of water flowing under ice, the occasional call of a winter fowl or in late winter, the huffing of a bear out of sight but definitely not out of hearing! But it is where I find my peace, and my solitude, and my silence. It can really clear my head and heart, which I need so desperately in my busy life.

Side note: this is the time of year when I stop sleeping. Not completely, but as soon as mid-February hits and we are getting more sun, and through early November, I sleep as little as 4.5 to 5 hours a day. I am not tired, or sleepy, and I function fine. I sleep deeply through December, January, and February, getting 8 hours but never really more than that. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I realized this was my “normal” and that there was nothing wrong with it, that this is just how my body deals with nature.

Alex, I loved every word of this blog. Wanderlust!!! My mom always called my dad a Gypsy because we moved so many times and as a child I traveled across the US many times between the east coast and the west coast. The old Route 66 was our road for many a year. I loved traveling and seeing the many sites and towns we drove through. Our route changed over the years and we traveled the higher Interstates across the US. It was an adventure for a young girl growing up ‘on the road’ sort of. I saw many places I would have loved to stay in and spend some time but we were always moving on to new places until we reached our destinations where members of our families lived. Traveling around in the late 40’s and 50’s in old cars and pickups across miles of lonely roads, through deserts and small towns and mountainous areas and valleys was to me a great way to live. But I was just a young child and memories are distant but welcome today. Thanks for stirring up a memory of a time past of a safer and friendlier world than we have now. May many more adventures await you.

Thank you for sharing your story. Walking with you let me experience something I never could have otherwise. You are a charming tour guide!

Your adventure sounds like an amazing experience. I’m glad you shared your stories and personal journal. It’s very interesting to hear what others experience and how they experience those moments. I definitely agree that children change our experiences. Many things that I use to do are now altered because of my boys. Just getting out of the house is a whole new experience with boys! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for the superb trek! May this have raised you high. Love them babies. God Bless

What a treat to read parts of your journey and what a journey it was. Thank you so much for sharing. All beautiful memories to last you a life time, a place you can always revisit in your day dreams, truly a treasure.

Alex, what an amazing adventure! Thanks for sharing!

Thank you for sharing your adventure. I don’t know if I’ll ever do something like this, but it was a real treat to read and see all your lovely photos.
I’ve found life is really an adventure, with some big deviations and smaller deviations from the planned path, but all life and character building.
If you have more adventures to share, please do.
Take care from Australia

We are having such a cold winter in Idaho that I told the postmaster we need an Alaska zip code! Have had unheard-of -22F! Inversion (warm in mountains, cold below) with fog which paints every twig white has treated us to that awesome sight many times this winter. Even the icicles “had sweaters on”. My winter activity is taking hundreds of pictures. And hot chocolate! And boring family and friends in warmer climates! Love your stories.

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY OPAL. Wishing you a year of fun and blessings.
Marilyn

Brrr… I got cold reading about hoarfrost, snow and 20 below…brrrr… My favorite winter activity is reading a book, wrapped in a blanket, inside where it’s reasonably warm!! I am NOT a snow bunny…snow is beautiful to look at (through the window!!)… I live in West Virginia where we sometimes get snow that lasts a week or so – one winter the ground was covered from December to March here where I live, but that’s rare. We basically have two seasons here: mud and dust!! Right now, it’s MUD…rained off and on for days and is overcast today.

Dear Alex,

I loved this post so much. And now I’m thinking I really need to come visit Alaska in the winter time again. It’s been years and years since we’ve been there in the winter! It is so completely gorgeous – I love your pictures. And I’m SO GLAD y’all are getting a good winter this year.

And I’m totally looking forward to following along on the Iditarod (my favorite sport to follow!!!) and I hope its a really good year for all the mushers with the snow! Better than mushing on rocks, huh?

Happy Birthday Opal! Where did the year go?

Hugs,

– Dori –

Merry Christmas Alex and family. Glad to read you’re all well again and what a gift from Mary Jane. Have a wonderful Christmas

My husband and I lean toward a more vegetarian lifestyle but I found your post interesting in that you are working on making a dream (of being a butcher) come true. I’m sure your friends were extremely grateful for your help and others probably will be so as you grow and learn. Your post encourages me to pursue a dream I have: I becoming more familiar with herbs and their properties and uses. To me, herbs are fascinating. Ancient people relied on their herbal knowledge to get on in life whether for health or for spicing up their foods. God gave the herb for mankind to use and that’s another reason to pursue a study on herbs. Thank you for sharing how timely the emergency food came to you when you and your family needed it most. Your family’s guardian angels appeared to have been whispering in Mary Jane’s ear! Have a blessed Merry Christmas and a memorable winter. Each season has its secrets and I enjoy discovering them as the year cycles around.

I couldn’t kill a chicken but I have helped butcher deer, rabbits, etc. My sons and my late husband hunted and did the “deed” – I help after that! So far this year, my sons haven’t gone deer hunting and I wish they would! Canned venison is the best “fast food” I can think of!! 3 days of deer season after Christmas, so there is still hope!! Merry Christmas!!

As I read this and look at the fabulous pictures we are having our first real snow storm. For a minute there I forgot. Thanks. The final picture – wow.

My husband and I are eating dinner talking about your blog
My husband and I were in Kauai at the same time as you wee and spent many days walking on Anini Beach
You don’t happen to be the ” Alaskan Mermaid”??!!!
Looking at the pics my husband took of you sure look like your pic on your blog!
If I had known it was you in the sand done up as a mermaid– I would have chatted ! Love your blog and Mary Janes magazine!!

Oh be still my heart!! what a glorious trip you had and thanks so much for sharing it through words and pictures. My dream trip just came true. God bless.