Back to the Daily Grind

Coming back to teach after the first quarter has ended was a little stressful! I came back to Kotlik to discover that my long-term substitute was horrible and taught my students nothing! But thankfully, my partner teacher, did a lot of work in my classroom to help keep my students learning a little bit. My students basically lost an entire quarter of the school year. I came back to school and had to conduct parent-teacher conferences on my forth day back at work. Despite all the stress, I am thankful to come home to our new little addition.

Isn't she adorable? Going back to work is so easy when you have a job in a place like I do. I go home each day for lunch. I walk to and from work, which takes literally one minute. I don't sit in traffic for half an hour to an hour each way. I have an amazing husband that watches our daughter while I work. He is so amazing! I come home for lunch or after school and he's playing with her and ready to tell me all the cute things she did that day! What a life!

Over 100 Degrees!

It's amazing just how a few degrees can make such a huge difference in my comfort level. I do not like being in 90 degree heat but the difference between 100 degrees and 105 degrees will take your breath away! Just walking from your car to your door in 105 degrees is like being punched in the stomach and melting all at the same time. I grew up in Las Vegas and never grew accustom to the heat. It is simply unbearable! My advice for anyone visiting Las Vegas in the summer is to stay inside as much as possible. Or spend a lot of time in a pool.

In Vegas for Summer

This summer has been an adventure on its own. We came back to Las Vegas for the summer to spend time with family and give birth to the newest addition to our family. I am due in the beginning of September and will have a long, hot summer. When we left Kotlik in May it was around 30 degrees F and when we arrived in Las Vegas it was around 100 degrees F. I can't wait until the weather cools down but I know it is a long ways away! I will definitely be posting more as summer progresses. Sorry I haven't been posting as often this year as I should have. I will stay on top of the postings more!

Christmas Caroling in bush Alaska

Our village used to participate in Christmas caroling years ago. People fondly remember children going door to door, singing songs to the adults and elders. Then for some unknown reason, the tradition disappeared. No one remembers why the children quit singing, but they did. So this year a few of us teachers and adults got together and decided to bring it back. Well, we decided on a Tuesday that we were going caroling on that Thursday. It didn't give us too much time to plan but we wanted to do it before it got swept under a rug for another year. We made plans, got candy canes, made flyers, made announcements, got hot chocolate and cups, etc. and then Thursday came. After school the weather started to get a little windy. Then it got real windy and cold!!! Well, we planned on caroling, so we WENT caroling! We were freezing and getting blown around in the middle of a blizzard, but by God we were caroling. We decided to only go to a few elders' houses but ended up going to more houses than planned. The children loved it and we enjoyed the time together, bringing some cheer and holiday spirit to the community. When we came in, some of the children were sad that we didn't stay out caroling for longer!

Some of the group after caroling drinking hot chocolate and warming up before going back out into the blizzard to go home. We met and departed as a group from the school.

A few of my students that joined us caroling waiting in line for some delicious hot chocolate, being silly!

We had a great time together doing something to bring some joy into peoples' lives. I felt so happy being able to plan and participate in such a fun event. The children were also very happy and enjoyed doing something "new."

Until my next adventure,
Jacqueline

Winter Life...

Well the days are definitely getting shorter, dawn comes up around 11 am and sunset is around 4:30 pm. The days are short and the cold is really setting in. I fell in love with a little puppy a few weeks ago and no one seemed to want it. I talked to the "owner" and they wanted $80 for it. They wanted the money even though they never watched it or took care of it. I tried to take care of him but I had to give him back nightly. Ethan was in LOVE with him.

Well a few days after we fell in love with the puppy, the owners decided to let it run free again and it got trapped in an abandoned building. It ended up freezing to death. We were all very sad when we heard. Living out here, animals simply do not have the same value as they do in the Lower 48.

On a lighter note, one night Ethan was watching Glen measuring his body fat for his workouts. Ethan grabbed the calipers as soon as Glen put them down and tried to take his own body fat measurement. It was too cute to not take a picture!

I will keep blogging my Alaska adventures. Until next time...

Walking the Path of Subsistence

Many of the people in the village live by subsistence, or living off the land through hunting and gathering. The other day our pastor called my husband up and asked him to help him set nets in the river for fish. My husband took our s son while I was in school to help set nets. They had fun chopping holes in the ice of the river to put nets in to catch fish. The next day they went back and pulled the nets. They caught a TON of She fish. I don't know what their technical name is, that is what all the people in the village call them. The pastor gave my husband two fish for all of his help. My husband came home and put them on our porch until we could get around to cleaning them.

Here are the two beauties waiting to get cleaned.

Later, after dinner we decided it was time to clean them so we could get them out of the snow before the local dogs came to eat them. I started cleaning the first fish while Glen was doing the dishes. Good set up, huh?

I couldn't believe how much blood those fish had in them when I cut into them. I never really thought that fish had much blood, but apparently they do! When I was pulling the guts out, I must have cut into the stomach because small fish came tumbling out onto the table from the stomach. Some were partially digested while some look like they just got swallowed before our fish was caught! Yum!

Growing up we rarely went fishing, maybe once or twice in my childhood, and we never ate what we caught. It was strictly catch and release. I had never cleaned a fish until we moved up here. Thankfully our neighbors took us under their wing and showed me how to clean a fish. Now I feel much more comfortable cleaning the fish. There is something deeply satisfying about catching and preparing your own meat and fish. It really helps you feel in touch with your surroundings!

Till my next adventure...
Jacqueline

Alaska's Storm of the Century!!!

When moving to a new location the last thing you ever think is that you might be a part of the biggest storm to hit that location in over a century. Well, I am glad to say that I actually witnessed one of the biggest storms to hit the coast of Alaska in a century. It actually wasn't too horrible where we are located. Kotlik was right in the middle of two raging storms, one to our north and one to our south. We got some wicked winds and some crazy flooding but everyone in our village was safe. Many had to camp out at the school because their homes flooded or their housing was unsafe during the 80 mph winds. Glen walked through those winds to and ice storms to go to the post office and pick up our new parkas. When he returned his face was wind chapped. Poor guy!

Here's a picture of me in my new parka by my new lake house!

The front door to our house has some great cracks around it and the storm pushed all kinds of snow through the door. We hung a blanket to try to keep the snow to a minimum in our mud room. As you can see quite a bit of snow still managed to make it into our house. We had a few inches of snow in our mud room by the end of the night.

Our school sits above the ground a few feet and the flooding made it to our school and started a little lake and some rivers around the school.

The river was frozen over when the storm hit but the flooding caused the ice to lift up and keep freezing. The boats were all on land before the river originally froze, now they are in the middle of a giant ice river. The river rose about ten feet from its original position. It was quite an experience to see everything changing because of the storm.

I can't wait to see what lies in store for me this winter. Till my next adventure posting...

Jaki :)