July

It's salmon season! 

July has flown by (almost literally with a pilot-husband ;) but we've had time to make some pretty big Alaskan memories (is there any other kind?).

Probably the most memorable has been our first salmon season as residents! 

Because we have now lived in Alaska for over a year and are considered residents, we are allowed to net as many salmon as we can eat in a year...for free!

 A salmon that had been swiped at by a bear. Rare sight!

We were able to share a net with some friends and took turns picking the net on different days since none of us were free every night.

Our first evening was a beautiful one! The lake was calm and the sun was out. The other two nights were a little wet and chilly, but that just added to the experience. :D

Overall we harvested about 42 salmon, with our biggest catch being 22 in one night. 

I had absolutely no idea what we were doing, so I was very glad that Jonathan did! :) After the first night I caught on and was filleting right alongside Jonathan and our good friend Jael who netted with us. :)

Filleting salmon wasn't the only new skill I mastered with this experience; we went all out and bought a pressure canner to can our own salmon with. I'd never actually canned before, but it turned out not to be quite as intimidating as I had thought. Time-consuming, yes, but still relatively simple. Now we have 3-dozen Ball jars stuffed with yummy salmon to enjoy all winter long!

Aren't they so pretty?

We didn't can all of our salmon - the majority of it we froze in meal-size packages for easy dinners.

One night of netting = sink-full of salmon fillets

This is about a 1/4 of the salmon we froze.

Lots of hard work, lots of fun, and it pays back all year long! We are so blessed.