Long Overdue.

Hey all!  Sorry that I haven't updated in far too long and there is no excuse!  My apologies!

Wow, well since my last update:

Halloween-  Dance and In School Carnival!

Thanksgiving break and Feast!

CHRISTMAS BREAK-- and my adventure through the airports back to good Ol' OH.

My return voyage with OSCAR!!

and the application of a new school program called Connected School.

Halloween Dance!

Wrestling in Kwethluk

Wrestling Team!

Missing Chair Game- 20 ppl!!

Life here is slow, and for the first time in nearly 8 years, I'm enjoying the slow pace!  The river is frozen, and so is the landscape. 

Sunrise, close to 11/11:30

 Driving on the river! 

How do you supply power to 7 houses and an entire school?  A generator the size of a mid-size truck! and 150,000 gallons of diesel fuel, that's how.

Heres the river at "high-tide" where you can see the "overflow" where water comes up along the river bank.  This creates trouble when trying to enter & exit the river.

Christmas was a much needed break where I got to see family and friends.  I ate chipotle and ate out as much as possible!  ALSO I brought Oscar back with me :)

It's a little cold for him, but he's got an assortment of sweaters and a set of booties!

Looking forward:  I am leaving for Anchorage for an RTI conference this weekend!  And I have a Spring Break coming where hopefully Abigail will be able to make it up here!

I will be taking a photo walk here soon again down to the river with my new lens (courtesy of my father) .

Hopefully next time I will write sooner!

Long over due. Napakiak. Anchorage. Food. Friends. Scenery.

I know it has been quite awhile since I have updated!  But it has been quite busy busy busy!  Lesson planning, traveling, meetings, and in general living up here in the bush!

Home cooking.  We cook every meal up here (Obviously with the lack of restaurants.. haha) and therefore it has expanded my creativity in the kitchen!  I have started to bake bread! 

First braided italian herb and parm. bread!

Homemade from scratch (stuffed crust) BBQ chicken Pizza! The only thing not from scratch was the BBQ sauce and the cheese! 

Homemade open face Chicken burgers!  Instead of beans (used as a typical filler) I used riceoroni, the garlic and herb kind!  With sharp cheddar on a slive of homemade bread.  

Yes the planes out in the bush can be held together with gum wrappers!  Just goes to show that you can fly with almost anything!

4 airports in Bethel.   These are the primary ways of transit between the villages.  Talk about putting Atlanta and O'hare to shame..

 My roommate Curtis holding a Duck which we are going to roast for dinner soon! (Yes he shot and de-feathered it himself!)

My hunting has been strictly limited to house mice.  Yes I got him with my meat cleaver.  Mouse traps are overrated.  (My count is up to 10mice so far)

 I ordered a DDR pad!   Now I can do it on my smart board. =]  Believe me, its the small things.

 Trip to anchorage with Steph to see her dad and to have a taste of civilization.  That is the Alaska railroad!

Here in Alaska, we follow all directed signs.

 No shortage of breath taking sights.

I MOVED IN TO MY HOUSE!

Living room!

Kitchen:  2- water distillers.  I've been drinking the water since I got here, and am fine... other people are more paranoid.  And yes, my trash can is a blue tote that I found.

Bathroom 1: There still is no curtain... we rely on the steam to fog the window...

Bathroom 2: The sink is OUTSIDE the bathroom.  Kinda cool.

My Bedroom!!!  

Closet and such. 

Heres the front door to our house!

Side view to our house! (Snow Oct 9th)

The back yard..

Here's a picture of my daily commute. My stairs to the school door.  Traffic can get bad...

The school parking lot.

Steph obviously working really....really hard.

Curtis ALSO working... hard?  (Football is on his laptop)

 Remember what I said about the breath taking sights?

 Snow Oct. 23

Sun.

Set.

Mmmm.

Now thats an Alaska Sky.  (No photoshopping)

One of my favorite Raw pictures.

The river on Oct 23rd.  The ice bank is over a foot thick here.

Thanks to the sun, the river is purple.

Things here go at their own pace.  The days seem to drag but the weeks seem to fly.  Halloween is right around the corner... and christmas break is only 8 weeks away!  

School and being a teacher here has provided challenges that I never thought possible.

There has been a lot of time actually getting to know myself, which has been nice.

Just a few things I've learned so far:

-Students know how to make messes.

-They also know how to clean them up.

-How to catch mice.

-Not to roll and braid bread after it has already risen.

-You can fall into what seems like grass, but is a hidden tundra lake.

-Students will never stop making you smile.

-Problems with a "big-boy-job" are the same when I was working in a restaurant.

-Even some adults aren't grown ups.

-I really do know a lot about cooking.

-I've seen WAY too many movies.

-You can buy milk that doesn't need refrigerated.

-Up here, what ever the price, it's probably worth it.

-Alone time is important.

-Too much alone time is not good.

-You can't be too organized.

-The taste of fresh caught Salmon!

-How to gut a fish.

-Small planes can land just about anywhere.

.....Much much more.

LONG: Nature, glacier, puffin and more, whales, sails, Kenai and fjords.

Hello again!  It certainly been awhile since I have written!  It has been so hectically busy with planning, learning and still living in my principal's house with all of the other new teachers.  

First off:  School has been challenging me in ways I never thought it would.  The students, their behavior, organization, district hoo-plah, long distance, singularity, developing relationships, planning planning planning planning, oh and planning?

The first two full weeks of school were hectic and crazy.  My Schedule is still changing, my house still isn't done and the light grows shorter ever day.

There has been two deaths in the village and we close school early when these happen, for the funeral.  Their death-customs are quite unique.  They actually lay the body in the families house [not embalmed] , while people come by and visit from all the different villages.  

I have been invited to steam and I am waiting for the call to go! (google it if you don't know what it is)

Randy took Steph, his son Carter and myself on a little trip into the Tundra!

Carter being Co-pilot! 

Tundra Cotton!

Tundra Mushies!

Low Bush Cranberries!

Inlet to 'Pissed off Lake'

Not grass, but moss.  And its squishy!

(Nearly devoured up to my knee)

The Boat

Flat for dayyyyz.  

Those views that just could never get old.

Labor day weekend has come and gone which means that MY PARENTS VISITED!!!

Thursday afternoon, before labor day weekend, my parents arrived in Napakiak.  People said they were going to pick them up from the "airport" but no one went!  So they walked to the school and arrived sometime between my Gym class and History.  I was stoked to see them!  We had dinner that night with Randy/Trish at their house. 

Then they came to the school for our Friday-half day.  It was nice that someone had the opportunity to see what goes on, day in and day out.

Friday night we left for Bethel, had real food, and then to Anchorage!  Upon arriving at our hotel Dad and I walked quite a distance to the gas station... because, naturally, I was "thirsty".   Saturday morning we lackadaisically got a moving and got a car, to head towards Seward.

First Stop on the Road!  

Mom and Dad! 

Ghost forrest

The view for lunch

Exit Glacier!

 Mom and Dad hiking on the river bed at Exit Glacier

REAL LIVE MOOSE!

 Seward: Gulf of Alaska

My Loft bed (4ft clearance)

 Seward Harbor sunrise, boarding the Fjord tour

Just Beautiful!

Orca!  (Killer Whales)

Breach!

 Volcano!

Just kidding its just the clouds!

Ice floating!  Beautiful Green water!

Glacier!

The color of the glacier has to do with the amount of pressure that is at each point.  The more pressure then the more compact the ice is which doesn't allow the entering light to scatter as much so it appears to be blue.  Some glaciers move as fast as your finger nails grow, and others move inches of several hundreds of years.

Calving!

Calving is when chunks of the glacier falls off and into the water.  The sound is absolutely surreal.  It can be almost deafening.  It sounds as powerful as thunder.

Dad and I at the Glacier!

Little sail boat between the pass!

Sea Lions.

Saw a young Peregrine Falcon dive bomb a hoard of gulls and they exploded into a defensive frenzy. 

Bait Ball

This is a school of fish that has been rounded up by diving birds (Alcids), which provides an more precise area for other birds to snatch a fish up.  The Whales will hunt for these 'bait balls' 

As close as I could get to a humpback!  About 30ft. long, majestic, beautiful.

A Puffin!

District Wide inservice:

After arriving back in Bethel on Monday (Labor day).  This upcoming week was the LKSD DWIS, and since educators since the dawn of formal education have become efficient and we acronym-ize everything.  The Lower Kuskokwim School District District Wide In Service.  It has been 4 days of seminars and meetings.  I'll admit I thought at first it was going to be one of these weeks that I had to buy eye-stilts to at least keep up the appearance that my brain was focused on the seminars.  HOWEVER, it has been very worth while.  They presented a lot of food for thought.  

It has been a great week in Bethel, but I am ready to go back and keep working on class room and begin planning and putting some of my new ideas to practice.  

If you care to google somethings I would highly recommend looking up Hands on Equations and also Seward, Alaska.  

Final Note:  The tile for my house is at the village!  Hopefully I will be moving into my house this weekend!  I will try and update later on this week with somethings that I am planning on implementing with my classes.  Oh, and I'll be rearranging somethings as well (again).  I will be returning to Bethel for another inservice two weeks from today!