John and Em's Story: 11/15/14

Well the cat's out of the bag, John and Em are going on an adventure to Juneau, Alaska! That's right we're moving to the beautiful town of Juneau on the south east peninsula of Alaska. We're SO EXCITED! If you're not familiar with the geography of the state, you can see Juneau on the map below. As you can see Juneau is surrounded by ocean and mountains, but has very few roads and there are no roads leading into Juneau so you can only fly or take a boat to and from Juneau. Wild right? Juneau is a temperate rain forest on the coast of the Gulf of Alaska so it rains quite a bit and is actually warmer than many parts of Alaska, the climate is similar to Seattle. However it is MUCH smaller so you don't get any traffic and in our opinion much prettier :) Juneau is surrounded by mountains that are covered in snow year round and absolutely beautiful. Juneau also has a ski resort that gets snow in the higher elevations, although it rains a lot it snows enough to have lots of fun. Snow shoeing, skiing, ice skating and even ice climbing! This beautiful part of Alaska is called the valley of the Glaciers because there really are a lot of glaciers that have run/bike paths leading straight to some of them from town! How awesome is that?! Mendenhal Glacier is a huge, beautiful glacier on one end of Juneau that has ice caves underneath we can go explore and the glacier lake freezes over in the winter. Locals ice skate on it, instead of a man made one! In the summer time this place is so incredibly green (more green than it is now) surrounded by beautiful mountains and has an ocean full of whales and some of the best fishing in the world. The locals say that after a year, you'll think of whales like we do cows because they're around so often. That is so freaking COOL and I can't imagine getting sick of that sight. The little wannabe marine biologist in Em is ridiculously excited! Juneau also has an awesome running club that puts on a lot of events all year including a marathon and triathlon. Everyone she spoke with up there participates and encouraged her to come join them. There's even an Ironman nearby :)

Although Juneau is known for much less sun than the average place in America and gets a lot of moisture, it is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen when it clears up. How do I know? Well as some of you recently found out, John and I had the opportunity to fly to Juneau a few weeks ago because an old coworker of John's asked if he'd still be interested in Alaska (when John and I were in Poky, he applied for an internship up there, but it didn't work out). His prior coworker had given John's name to Hecla mining company in Juneau because they asked him who would make a good cost analyst. Isn't my husband awesome?! So John applied and after having a successful phone interview they scheduled an onsite, but insisted that Em came because they wanted to make sure that the whole family is on board for this experience. Well that only helped sell Em on the idea and on the last day of the interview at dinner (did I mention they took us to sushi) they offered John the job! While in Juneau, Em set up a meeting with a few people from the school district to discuss potential job opportunities and to give them her resume. That went really well and Em is going to have a lot of opportunities up there. She is getting her final semester of school (student teaching) all set up in Juneau and she's waiting to hear on a few jobs :) Did we mention over the summer they had sped, PE, and adaptive PE jobs :D After talking about it for a while and trying to defend staying in Pullman we decided that it just didn't make sense and that this was way too good of an opportunity and an ADVENTURE. We said "Why Not?" we're young, with no kids or a house holding us back so let's do it! It's going to be quite the adventure and will take some adjusting, but like the locals say you just embrace it and love what Juneau has to offer and you'll love it. Thank you to our friends and family that have been so excited for us and shown their support, it means the world to us. We know some aren't real thrilled, but we are and we know this is what's best for our family at this time so that's what matters! The memories we've made in Pullman and the relationships we've built will stay with us forever. Em wishes she could take her kiddos with her, but technology will have to do. Em's department even chose to support her from Juneau by flying her to San Diego to present at the national CEC conference in April, even though they has already planned on it from Spokane. What an amazing department! Em really knows how to pick em ;) John will be starting work on December 1st and jumping on the ferry November 26th. His new job is going to move ALL of our stuff for us, and it'll be an adventure just getting there. We'll drive our cars to Seattle to jump on a ferry and take a 2 day trip to Juneau with the pups and TJ and then get the rest of our stuff a few weeks later. John is going to fly back down for Christmas and then we will take the kids and Em's car to Seattle and jump on the ferry. We'll be there before New Years! We'll be back in Pullman in May for Em to graduate with her masters! We couldn't be more excited and blessed to have such an amazing opportunity and are looking forward to this great adventure!