You would think that in over a month one of us would have found the time to make at least a quick post. I'm sure there was some down time in there, but honestly since we have been back from Minnesota we have been on the go 100%.
Our first week back was spent readjusting to the time difference. I felt that it was much harder this time than when we came in the summer, but that could be because we are on a more strict schedule than we were in August or that I am pregnant. Probably a combo of the two. Our first week back I was asleep and out for the entire night at 7:30 pm. Makes it really difficult to get things done at night!
We are still tutoring every Monday-Wednesday after school. It's hard being at school for another hour each of those days but the kids really do get a lot out of it. For many of the kids there, the snack they get at tutoring will be the last food they get until lunch the next day. It's also a quiet place for them to get work done and to turn it in so it doesn't get lost between home and school.
Last weekend we had a birthday party for our friends Loren and Tara. Their birthdays are only two days apart and it was nice to have an excuse to have people over. We had soup, homemade blueberry spice cake, upside down pumpkin pie, salad and bread. As hard as it was to leave Minnesota at Christmas time, it will be hard to leave Nome whenever we choose to as we have made so many wonderful friends. The people that we have met have truly been the highlight of this adventure.
Last Sunday Andrew and about 8 other people went out to make a hole in the ice to drop a crab pot down. It took them 3 hours to make the hole in the ocean and they said it got to the point that they couldn't hold the auger anymore as the ice was too thick (3 feet). Everyone came back with smiles and they seemed to have a good time. Thursday night Caleb and James (friends of ours) were able to pull up a crab and it was AMAZING! Tasting fresh Alaskan King Crab just minutes after it was caught would be well worth the trip for anyone. It was so sweet and wonderful that you didn't even need butter. I'm hoping they are able to get some more this weekend!
This week we were all busy with Rachel's Challenge coming to Nome Beltz. Rachel's Challenge is a program that was started by Darrell Scott the father of the first person killed at Columbine High School (Rachel). 6 weeks before she died she had written a paper in school about her ethics and how if one person went out of their way to show kindness to another, it would start a chair reaction of kindness. It was a very powerful presentation on what hatred can do and what kindness can do. Many of the students were crying.
Andrew went to Anchorage on Wednesday evening with three other teachers for a conference on Smartboards. Anchorage has been having a warm spell (much like the entire state so there is hope for you down in the Midwest) and has had flooding in the streets from all the rain. Mix that with 80 mph winds and you've got a mess. School was cancelled Wednesday-Friday for all Anchorage schools. Their conference was cancelled on Thursday so he with all the other teachers had a free day to go shopping, out to eat and general relaxation. They were able to get in on Friday and were able to learn quite a bit but will have to go back in February to finish off the training. I will pick him up from the airport today at 1 pm, assuming the weather cooperates and that we don't get any more rain like we had last night.
This weekend we will spend trying to get ready for the coming week. We had something going on every night this past week and have neglected a few housekeeping things (dishes, general pick up etc.). We also were able to get a dresser and bedside table from the district office. They had some extras sitting around and they offered it to us to use in the baby's room which is wonderful. I hope you guys all have a wonderful weekend and that it will start to finally warm up for you guys. I do have to tell you though that Alaskans are laughing at the national news coverage of the cold weather down in the lower 48. They think you guys are a little weak :)
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Sunday, December 14, 2008
4 Days
Outside the snowing is pinging on the windows, and Nome is in a blizzard warning. I would be lying if I said I didn't want to have a snow day tomorrow! We had a lazy weekend, nothing that HAD to be done which in my opinion is the best kind of weekend. Saturday morning we went to a small craft fair. Andrew bought some coffee from the Ski team that was selling Nanook Joe for a fundraiser. Saturday night I went to a Christmas party out at our friend Erika's house (the one with the honey bucket). It was a really fun night decorating cookies, eating lots of food, and doing a white elephant Christmas exchange. Apparently in Nome white elephant means nice gifts (which I knew before hand thankfully). I brought some caramel corn, caramels, and English toffee that I made. I got a really pretty piece of pottery one of the other girls made. Someone else got a onsie for a baby that said "Future Nanook" that she had no use for so she gave it to me.
We have a 4 day week this week, and leave on the 9:39 pm flight on Thursday. We travel to Anchorage, leave Anchorage at 1 am, get to Portland, OR at 5 am, and leave Portland to Minneapolis at 6:37 am. Hopefully we will arrive in MN at noon on Friday. We have started to pile stuff into a corner, getting it ready to pack up. Hopefully the week will go quickly as we are both quite excited to be coming home. We both are looking forward to seeing everyone and I am looking forward to being in a place with more food choices. Nome is somewhat limited as far as gluten free foods.
Some of you have been asking how I have been feeling lately: thank you! I am feeling better lately. I haven't thrown up since Thanksgiving which is wonderful. I have a doctor's appointment in Plymouth for a week from this Monday. We are hoping that the doctor says that everything is AOK with the baby.
Safe driving to those in the storm areas. I have heard from a couple people that it is pretty nasty down there.
See you all in a week or so!
We have a 4 day week this week, and leave on the 9:39 pm flight on Thursday. We travel to Anchorage, leave Anchorage at 1 am, get to Portland, OR at 5 am, and leave Portland to Minneapolis at 6:37 am. Hopefully we will arrive in MN at noon on Friday. We have started to pile stuff into a corner, getting it ready to pack up. Hopefully the week will go quickly as we are both quite excited to be coming home. We both are looking forward to seeing everyone and I am looking forward to being in a place with more food choices. Nome is somewhat limited as far as gluten free foods.
Some of you have been asking how I have been feeling lately: thank you! I am feeling better lately. I haven't thrown up since Thanksgiving which is wonderful. I have a doctor's appointment in Plymouth for a week from this Monday. We are hoping that the doctor says that everything is AOK with the baby.
Safe driving to those in the storm areas. I have heard from a couple people that it is pretty nasty down there.
See you all in a week or so!
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Busy Busy Busy!
Most weeks Erin and I sit around and say, "Did anything happen this week that we can write about?" Well, this week there has been quite a bit to write about.
There were 9 volleyball teams in town this week for the regional tournament. Because there were so many teams some of them had to be housed in classrooms. Because I have a such a large classroom the Barrow team slept in my room. They kept the room clean and their stuff didn't disrupt my classes. But the fact that games were going on all day on Thursday and Friday meant that the kids were whining, "We want to go to the volleyball games, we want to go to the volleyball games." Sadly Nome came in 4th and are not going to State :(
On Thursday our refrigerator, which was supposed to be new last year, started over heating. Little did we know this was the beginning of a very loooooong weekend. The Assistant Superintendent put in a work request and personally told the maintenance guys to give us a clean, working refrigerator. On Friday afternoon we came home to a covered in MOLD! It was disgusting. Needless to say the Assistant Superintendent was piiiiiissed. He did however go above and beyond by spending about 2 hours helping me clean the fridge. I spent another hour taking off the doors to the refrigerator and the freezer, and putting them back on so they opened the right way for our kitchen. The temp. of the "new" fridge keeps going up and down drastically but it seems to be leveling off. AND, the problems just keep on coming, when they turned the cold water off so they could un-attach the ice maker from the old fridge they didn't turn it back on and broke the lever to a point where we can't get it to turn on either....sigh. It's been a long weekend.
Ending on an uplifting note, we took some time today to put up our Christmas decorations. It looks very warm and cozy in our Nome apartment. It smells amazing too, Erin and I made caramels and toffee Saturday night, they're pretty damn good if I do say so myself.
11 more days and counting till we come home to see everybody! We can't wait. It's 1 degree here and the sun is only up for about 4 hours, but it's home.
There were 9 volleyball teams in town this week for the regional tournament. Because there were so many teams some of them had to be housed in classrooms. Because I have a such a large classroom the Barrow team slept in my room. They kept the room clean and their stuff didn't disrupt my classes. But the fact that games were going on all day on Thursday and Friday meant that the kids were whining, "We want to go to the volleyball games, we want to go to the volleyball games." Sadly Nome came in 4th and are not going to State :(
On Thursday our refrigerator, which was supposed to be new last year, started over heating. Little did we know this was the beginning of a very loooooong weekend. The Assistant Superintendent put in a work request and personally told the maintenance guys to give us a clean, working refrigerator. On Friday afternoon we came home to a covered in MOLD! It was disgusting. Needless to say the Assistant Superintendent was piiiiiissed. He did however go above and beyond by spending about 2 hours helping me clean the fridge. I spent another hour taking off the doors to the refrigerator and the freezer, and putting them back on so they opened the right way for our kitchen. The temp. of the "new" fridge keeps going up and down drastically but it seems to be leveling off. AND, the problems just keep on coming, when they turned the cold water off so they could un-attach the ice maker from the old fridge they didn't turn it back on and broke the lever to a point where we can't get it to turn on either....sigh. It's been a long weekend.
Ending on an uplifting note, we took some time today to put up our Christmas decorations. It looks very warm and cozy in our Nome apartment. It smells amazing too, Erin and I made caramels and toffee Saturday night, they're pretty damn good if I do say so myself.
11 more days and counting till we come home to see everybody! We can't wait. It's 1 degree here and the sun is only up for about 4 hours, but it's home.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Thanksgiving Week
It's very cliche-y but this by far my favorite time of the year. We have so much to be thankful for this year, it's nice to have a holiday to remind ourselves of that. Thanksgiving plans as of now are dinner at our friends Tara and Loren's house (Tara is a teacher in the Junior High and Loren is the president of the Wells Fargo). There will be a bunch of teachers there and should be a fun day. We may stop by another friends house for breakfast, but we will see how the cooking process is going. We are bringing the turkey and an assortment of gluten free goodies (which sort of seems like an oxymoron). It will be a short school week Monday -Wednesday, and then Wednesday after school, Andrew and I are chaparoning the Junior High Sadie Hawkins dance. It's bound to be a good time :)
Last night we went to a house warming party of a teacher, Erika and her boyfriend Tyler. Looking around the room at all the people there, it seemed that there would be very few places in the world that people would all be wearing their snow pants and boots, eating moose meat kabobs, playing with sled dogs, carrying babies in their jackets to keep them warm and quiet, and enjoying every minute of it. Outside there was a huge fire and people playing bean bag in the dark. The most unique part of the evening was that if you needed to use the restroom, you had two options. 1. find your favorite quiet place outside and become one with nature or 2. use the honey bucket inside which was a big 5 gallon bucket for you to squat on. There is running water in the house, but no sewer or septic tank.
Here is a short list of the things that we are thankful for this year, feel free to add your own:
Jobs in the same area that we both find challenging and enjoyable
a new baby on the way
safe and clean housing that is affordable
family
new friends that make living here worth while
old friends
our health, and the health of our families
a childhood that was 'functional' and stable
an education that allows us to experience new things
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone! We hope to talk to lots of you Thanksgiving day at the various celebrations.
Last night we went to a house warming party of a teacher, Erika and her boyfriend Tyler. Looking around the room at all the people there, it seemed that there would be very few places in the world that people would all be wearing their snow pants and boots, eating moose meat kabobs, playing with sled dogs, carrying babies in their jackets to keep them warm and quiet, and enjoying every minute of it. Outside there was a huge fire and people playing bean bag in the dark. The most unique part of the evening was that if you needed to use the restroom, you had two options. 1. find your favorite quiet place outside and become one with nature or 2. use the honey bucket inside which was a big 5 gallon bucket for you to squat on. There is running water in the house, but no sewer or septic tank.
Here is a short list of the things that we are thankful for this year, feel free to add your own:
Jobs in the same area that we both find challenging and enjoyable
a new baby on the way
safe and clean housing that is affordable
family
new friends that make living here worth while
old friends
our health, and the health of our families
a childhood that was 'functional' and stable
an education that allows us to experience new things
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone! We hope to talk to lots of you Thanksgiving day at the various celebrations.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Long week
Happy weekend! It feels that the closer you get to a holiday break, the longer the days go. One more full week and then a half week until Thanksgiving.
It was a stressful week at school. There was a bad stomach flu going around so lots of students and teachers out. There is an extreme subsitute shortage so other teachers have to fill in whenever possible. In addition, one teacher's wife had a baby, and another had to leave for a family emergency.
In the junior high we had 3 students arrested for distribution of marijuana which is really sad at such a young age.
Saturday we hung out with James and Amy. We went to a different resturant which I dubbed the Ding Dong of the extreme north. Very small town diner that had great food.
Andrew took his kids on a field trip on Thursday to a financial fitness seminar. He and the students said it was good information, but the lunch was the best part of the day. It was too much information in one day for them. There are so few options for field trips for kids up here that you have to jump at the opprortunity when possible.
Good news for our friends Caleb and Sarah. They have been moved out of the dorms that the school owns, and into the apartment building! No more shared bathroom and kitchen for them. They are both excited to have their own place and we are excited to have them as neighbors.
It's our week to cook dinner, and then our Sunday night assigned time to do laundry.
Hope everyone has an excellent week and is gearing up for Thanksgiving!
Erin
19 degrees
It was a stressful week at school. There was a bad stomach flu going around so lots of students and teachers out. There is an extreme subsitute shortage so other teachers have to fill in whenever possible. In addition, one teacher's wife had a baby, and another had to leave for a family emergency.
In the junior high we had 3 students arrested for distribution of marijuana which is really sad at such a young age.
Saturday we hung out with James and Amy. We went to a different resturant which I dubbed the Ding Dong of the extreme north. Very small town diner that had great food.
Andrew took his kids on a field trip on Thursday to a financial fitness seminar. He and the students said it was good information, but the lunch was the best part of the day. It was too much information in one day for them. There are so few options for field trips for kids up here that you have to jump at the opprortunity when possible.
Good news for our friends Caleb and Sarah. They have been moved out of the dorms that the school owns, and into the apartment building! No more shared bathroom and kitchen for them. They are both excited to have their own place and we are excited to have them as neighbors.
It's our week to cook dinner, and then our Sunday night assigned time to do laundry.
Hope everyone has an excellent week and is gearing up for Thanksgiving!
Erin
19 degrees
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Long Time No Post
Ok...it's been a long time since our last post and A LOT has happened in the last few weeks. To start with, we completed the Junior class carnival. It was a hell of a lot of work but we had a really good turn out. The students were able to raise about $3500 in one night! Between Erin and I we spent over 30 hours in four days setting up and tearing down all the booths.
We had our first conferences of the year. They went pretty well. I had about 25 out of my 80 students represented, which I was warned would be the case. And Erin had 36 out of her 58 students represented....Erin wins! The sad thing is that this was the highest turnout the school has ever seen.
I went hunting for Ptarmaigns today. What do you mean you haven't heard of them?!? They are the Alaska state bird, and the hunting season for them is 7 months long. They turn white once the snow hits, so they were very hard to see. I did hit one with the shot gun and our friend James hit one with the 22. The hunting laws are very strange up here. It seems that everybody shoots first and then decides if the animal is in season later. It was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to going hunting for these chicken sized birds more this year and next.
We are very, VERY, excited to come home for Christmas and have bought our tickets for the 18th of December and will be home on the 19th! The flight down will be quick but on the flight back on the 3rd of January we will have a 14 hour layover in Seattle, ouch. Our list of things to do when we're home keeps getting longer and longer, as does our list of things to stock up on. Nome is expensive.
Oh, one more thing...I almost forgot. WE'RE PREGNANT! Erin is due on June 15th, which works out great for us as teachers. We've been to the doctor and everything looks good, we got to see the heart beat and everything. We are planning to come home in July to visit. Erin has been feeling like crap for the past month and a half. She is anxiously waiting for Thanksgiving so she can have a couple of days to rest.
Sarah Palin is back in Alaska and still making headlines. It appears that maybe she will run for the Senate position if Ted Stevens (don't even ask!) gets elected and booted from the Senate. One funny thing about the Presidential election was that the polls in Alaska were still open for another 1 1/2 hours when they announced Obama had won. Poor Alaskans.
Just over a month until we get to see everyone again. Good luck to the Wayzata Trojans football and volleyball teams at the State tournament. We will talk to everyone soon!
Andrew
Temp: 15 Degrees
We had our first conferences of the year. They went pretty well. I had about 25 out of my 80 students represented, which I was warned would be the case. And Erin had 36 out of her 58 students represented....Erin wins! The sad thing is that this was the highest turnout the school has ever seen.
I went hunting for Ptarmaigns today. What do you mean you haven't heard of them?!? They are the Alaska state bird, and the hunting season for them is 7 months long. They turn white once the snow hits, so they were very hard to see. I did hit one with the shot gun and our friend James hit one with the 22. The hunting laws are very strange up here. It seems that everybody shoots first and then decides if the animal is in season later. It was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to going hunting for these chicken sized birds more this year and next.
We are very, VERY, excited to come home for Christmas and have bought our tickets for the 18th of December and will be home on the 19th! The flight down will be quick but on the flight back on the 3rd of January we will have a 14 hour layover in Seattle, ouch. Our list of things to do when we're home keeps getting longer and longer, as does our list of things to stock up on. Nome is expensive.
Oh, one more thing...I almost forgot. WE'RE PREGNANT! Erin is due on June 15th, which works out great for us as teachers. We've been to the doctor and everything looks good, we got to see the heart beat and everything. We are planning to come home in July to visit. Erin has been feeling like crap for the past month and a half. She is anxiously waiting for Thanksgiving so she can have a couple of days to rest.
Sarah Palin is back in Alaska and still making headlines. It appears that maybe she will run for the Senate position if Ted Stevens (don't even ask!) gets elected and booted from the Senate. One funny thing about the Presidential election was that the polls in Alaska were still open for another 1 1/2 hours when they announced Obama had won. Poor Alaskans.
Just over a month until we get to see everyone again. Good luck to the Wayzata Trojans football and volleyball teams at the State tournament. We will talk to everyone soon!
Andrew
Temp: 15 Degrees
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Fall weekend
It was so fun to talk to everyone at the lake on Saturday night! It sounded like everyone was having a great time and made me feel a little homesick! Saturday we went to an Art Walk were different artists in town were having their studios open to the public. There was a group of 8 of us that went and was lots of fun. We even bought a couple of Christmas gifts. Today we were busy doing school stuff and the Junior Class carnival stuff. For whatever reason Andrew and I thought it would be a good idea to sponsor the Jr. class. Hey, it'd be a great way to get to know the kids we thought. It has been fun and nice seeing the kids in a different setting, but lots of work. It's especially hard for us to plan this carnival as we have no idea what its supposed to look like or what exactly is supposed to happen. Its the big fundraiser for the kids for prom in May. We both will be happy when next weekend is over!
The week ahead will be tutoring Monday-Wednesday afterschool. We both have our first principal observations this week as well. Any extra time will be spent doing carnival stuff.
Still no snow yet :( It's been very cold, but no white stuff yet. In my opinion, if it's going to be cold it might as well snow. It would at least cover up the dust that is everywhere.
Hope everyone had an enjoyable and relaxing MEA weekend. Talk to you soon.
Erin
Current temp 25
The week ahead will be tutoring Monday-Wednesday afterschool. We both have our first principal observations this week as well. Any extra time will be spent doing carnival stuff.
Still no snow yet :( It's been very cold, but no white stuff yet. In my opinion, if it's going to be cold it might as well snow. It would at least cover up the dust that is everywhere.
Hope everyone had an enjoyable and relaxing MEA weekend. Talk to you soon.
Erin
Current temp 25
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