magical sitka

we landed and it is more beauiful than we ever imagined. we flew from portland to seattle in a teeny tiny airplane that we got to board by walking up the big white stairs outside the plane, when we went to board the flight i turned to spencer and anxiously squealed "spencer we get to board the plane like JFK and jackie!"

that is something i've always wanted to do and i got to do it, i was so excited. we seriously feel like we've gone back in time 50 years. from seattle we flew to ketchikan alaska then on to sitka. i was the only girl on the flight to sitka that we could see. when we flew into sitka we were mesmorized by the forrest right on the edge of the ocean, there were little islands with huge houses on them that had docks that i just fell in love with it was so breathtakingly beautiful. we made our way into the airport and much to our excitement the airport was about 2000 square feet covered in mounted game, fish, elk, deer, moose, bear, and more fish. our landlord picked us up and took us for a tour around town. spencer made sure he took us by the skate park and i tried dropping hints like "so we can see whales from the car" and "i just really want to see a whale" our landlord just agreed with me and told me that i could see whales from the car and taunted me with telling me how awesome the whales are, it was classic. we went grocery shopping and a gallon of milk was 6.50! so we bought some cereal and milk and skipped home. our apartment is huge, we feel like we are living in a mansion it is sooo nice, very retro and perfectly our style. this morning we went for a hike for about an hour into the national park right down the road, on our run there i saw a huge bird flying i told spencer it was a bald eagle he wasn't convinced until it landed in a tree right in front of us! it was HUGE we were loving it. we ran to the national park that is dazzled with totem poles. we were a little scared to venture; a wooded forest, bear warnings everywhere and one lonely park ranger staring off into the ocean puffing his cigarette, we hesitated at first then just went for it. we went to a russian memorial, crossed a beautiful bridge over the pink salmon filled river, marveled at the mossy forrest before us just drinking in the beauty of this place. i love the russian feel of sitka, it reminds me of pictures my dad would bring home from st petersberg and moscow. there is a church at the end of the street we live on that you can see from basically anywhere in sitka, it's beautiful and very russian, and

we love it the front room

the dining table and awesome chairs

look familiar??? jeanies stairwell.

how can i not feel like a queen in this powder room

welcome to club swalberg