Love these kids!

The past few days have been gorgeous. A little windy but really nice... a little more like spring time!

 

I've got some pictures to share from the past few days.

 

 This picture doesn't do it justice. The sunrise this morning when I was leaving for school at 7:15. Both the sunrises and the sunsets never fail to amaze me!

The elementary kids on a field trip today. We went down to old village to compare and contrast the old school to the new school. Mrs. Manning is a pretty awesome teacher! Behind where the kids are standing, is where the old road ends. That road used to go the whole way out and around to the old houses that I've posted pictures of before. Due to the erosion and the beach moving in, just like many of the houses, the road has washed away.

Love these kids!

This morning on my way into school I passed a swan hanging out in the swamp. The other morning, Jeff had pointed out to me that the swans were back in town and there were quite a few pairs around the swamp beside the school. It's nice to see them, makes it feel more like spring with birds around! So, after talking to my dad this morning and telling him about the swans, I went out to try to get some pictures. Needless to say, it was cold and I couldn't find the swans but I did get to see some more of the sunrise. I love how this picture turned out! Hopefully I'll be able to capture the swans at some point.

One more of us today down at old village with the beach in the background. They're pretty awesome kids who have stolen my heart!

 

: )



Sunny Saturdays are the best : )

I'm sad to see another weekend go here in Port Heiden but it was a good weekend at least. This past week was not quite spring weather in my book. It snowed every day and it was windy... it was a really interested week weather wise. One minute it would be sunny and you could see out the windows and the next minute, you couldn't see two feet out and it remained cold all week. I guess that's just an Alaska spring and I'm sure I haven't seen the last of the snow. Needless to say, we didn't get out at all this week because of that so when Saturday rolled around and it was nice, it was necessary to take advantage of the sunshine!

 

 

Friday night was a movie night at the school and so the kids got to come and watch movies in the classrooms and buy candy, popcorn, soda, etc from the student store. While that was going on, it was adult night gym so a lot of the guys in the village come to play basketball on those nights. I floated around throughout the night, socializing of course : )

 

Saturday, I went out on a ride with Jeff and Heiden. But I forgot my camera, which I know is the second time which is probably a record for me. So I'm sorry that there won't be any pictures but at least you can hear about it. Maybe we'll head out that way again so I can take some pictures. Just since last weekend, the beach got all clogged up with ice again so we couldn't ride down the beach and the tide wasn't good for crossing North River. Instead, we went out towards the volcano and a ways out there's a place called Caribou cabin. It's a tiny little one room building - very tiny with a woodstove and two sets of little bunkbeds and some old things that looked like mattresses. Apparently, it used to be used for hunters that were hunting the caribou. They would stay up there in the cabin. Now, it's not really used for much I don't think other than people hanging out. It's not in the best condition, that's for sure. And the out house out back is missing it's door and who knows what was in that, I didn't look too close! It was neat to see the peoples name's carved into the wall and the little table that was in there. That took a little bit of time to get out to that cabin - it's in the middle of no where and it sits up on top of a hill surrounded by alders so it's hard to see. It's quite a maze to get up there!

 

After we left there, we kept driving towards the volcano and away from the village. We had to cross a stream a few different places and we drove out through a ton of alders... we saw a lot of different tracks and even a rabbit! It was nice to just hang out and enjoy the weather by a stream. Kind of reminded me of home. :) We did some hiking up the hills to get better views from the top. Again, I wish I would of remembered my camera so that I could share the pictures with everyone. As you can imagine, the views were pretty incredible, as usual.

It was a good Saturday that ended with some movies on the couch! I stayed up late and woke up in the middle of the night a few times to try to catch the Northern Lights because it was a perfect night for it, but there was nothing to be seen. : ( Other than a beautiful sky full of stars... I'm beginning to think that the Northern Lights might be one of the only things I don't experience while I'm here in Alaska. I've still got some time... we'll see! If not, I guess that just means I'll have to come back : )

 

Today is my gram's birthday and I got a request from her to put some pictures up of the school and some of the kids. I don't know why I didn't do this earlier in my time here, but here are some pictures for you gram! Happy birthday : )

 



When you first walk in the store.

Back room of the store.

Suprise! I'm bringing home a puppy in May : ) I'm just kidding, I wish I was. For a little while, I debated about it because there was a puppy that didn't have a home. But they're all accounted for now. One of the families in the village, their dog had puppies (they're about 5 weeks old right now, I think) and two of the kids brought theirs into school the other afternoon. We love when these cute little guys come to visit. I might have a slight obsession.

This picture is a neat one, I think! It's Pennsylvania in Port Heiden. This is from when Dr. Bazley from Kutztown brought up some of her students to see the schools in some of the villages for a week. So there's all of us Kutztown people and then Kasie and Derek who are Penn State people. It's pretty neat we could all be here and we were posing with this huge mural that an artist came and did with the students in the school last year. From what I hear, every single student in the school painted something on this board and it's all the things they love about Port Heiden. It's hanging up in the gym now and it's pretty amazing to see. : )

The library after Kasie and I have spent many hours organizing it!

The wolf can now be displayed and our Spring decorations! Check out how organized those books look ; )

And those!

Some of the kids during iPad time after they finished their work!

 

I was literally being attacked and he thought it was hilarious! 

: ) First graders and kindergartener!

Of course I have my fair share of time with Mr. Tate! He's getting so big!

Some days I go into the Elementary room in the afternoon for a short while. We work on handwriting and listen to Kidz Bop... sometimes we sing, too : )

High school room!  

Kasie in her room being productive : ) 

Kasie's room - counselor! 

Main office

 

In my next post, I'll have to post a picture of the elementary room, preschool room and middle school room. I don't have pictures of them for some reason! But now you see where I spend my days : )

 

 

It's a gorgeous night in Port Heiden and this view never gets old... : )

 

 

Time flies when you're having fun ; )

Time really is flying by... my original three months are over and if I were on my scheduled flight, I would be home at this point. I know I've said it before but that's just crazy to me! I never thought I could go away from home and from my family for three months, and now I'm staying even longer... who am I? : )

 

 This past week was a weird one. As I said before, it was state testing week so that took up Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and then Friday the older four kids had to do one last test so they were the only ones in school and only for a few hours. Kasie and I spent all day Friday, until about 7 cleaning it up, organizing it and decorating it! We still have a lot to do but it's looking better already... here's part of our decoration.

 

 

We also got to spend a little time with Tate so his momma & daddy could head out on the four wheeler for a bit since it was such a nice day. He likes spending time with his aunts. ; )

 

Taking a little break to enjoy the weather with Heiden!

 

Later than night after dinner, Derek, Kasie, Jeff and I went out to the beach to make a fire. That was pretty awesome. Those who know me know I love the beach and bonfires so a combination of the two is pretty much my favorite! It was a really good night with really great friends. I didn't take a ton of pictures, but here's a few.

 

Jeff and Derek searching the bluffs for a good spot for the fire...

We ended up on the beach.

 

Yesterday, I took their four wheeler out for a little ride down to the beach by old village and walked around a little bit... just enjoying the weather and the clear blue skies. It was a little windy which made it chillier than it looked but it was gorgeous. I just sat down by the beach for a little while... I'm getting spoiled having the beach right here. I may need to move to a beach now. ; )

 

 

Earlier in the week, Derek and Kasie took me down to "the point" which is where the ocean goes into a bay almost? I think at least! That's where they find all of their beach glass. We enjoyed the weather once again and walked around finding some really pretty beach glass!

 

 

With the weather getting warmer, I'm being told that the bears will be back out soon - we'll see how soon that is. The sun is also staying out later and later - recently it's been about 10 pm that it's completely down, but it's still pretty bright at that point. When I leave the house in the morning, it's pretty light out now, too. I love it!

 

I got my weekly two hour skype session with my parents today and even had an hour long one with my brother. I miss them.

 

I don't think I've said it recently so I'll say it again, thank you all for the random cards and packages, they all make me smile when I get them. : )

 



Salmon, steak and sun... a good combination!

Easter dinner may have been the most successful night of cooking I've ever had. After we got back from town on Easter, Kasie and I decided that it would be nice to make a nice dinner so that we could eat with Derek and Jeff. We, as usual, went a little over board and got very excited to make steak, salmon, mashed potatoes, peas, corn and asperagus. Needless to say, we did pretty darn good. I wish that I could say that I have a picture but I forgot to take a picture of our plates so I only have two...

 

Steak - I kept these on too long and they weren't quite bloody like I was hoping for but they were still good!

 

Salmon

 

After our dinner, we decided to head out on the four wheelers because it was only 8:30 so we had at least another hour of sunlight. We went down to old village and then walked down the beach for a while - the tide was negative so the beach was huge and the sunset was amazing! I stole these pictures from Kasie - I didn't have my camera so she took these and they came out incredible. We were able to walk along the beach until about 10.

 

 

 Aren't Kasie's pictures amazing?

 

 



This week is testing week... state testing all week. And then starts my new schedule doing some new things with different kids.

 

It's crazy to think that this weekend I was scheduled to go home. Time is flying by up here!

 

Yesterday after school, Kasie, Derek, Alecia and I (and Heiden) went for a walk down to the old village and walked down the beach again. It's been so warm - close to 45 and sunny! We have to take advantage of it. Today it's sunny out there but there's a strong wind which I'm assuming is making it feel a little cooler.

 

Looking out over Goldfish Lake towards the mountains

Heiden was enjoying our walk, too : )

Love this view!

 

 

 

 

I'm thinking tomorrow I'll take another stroll down the beach if it's nice, I'm keeping my fingers crossed : )

 

  

 

Happy Easter!

My first Easter spent away from home. I do have to say, I'm missing home and my family today! It's not quite a holiday without them. At least I get to spend it with a good friend : )

Kasie and I had dinner with Glenda here in King Salmon last night when our flight came in and then spent the night here. Today we fly out at some point to head back to Port Heiden!

It's been a crazy weekend, to say the least. After I left here on Friday to head to Anchorage, Kasie and the new student teachers that she was in town with, picked me up and we had a late dinner and got to visit. Yesterday morning I got things taken care of that I needed to and was able to enjoy town a little but with Kasie after we dropped the girls off at the airport! We had McDonalds and of course large fountain sodas... So good! And did some shopping, tote packing and mailing! We made a trip or two to some bead stores to get new beads for beading the glass floats. DANGEROUS. But those beads are all so pretty. So now we have a large amount to choose from. ; ) Then it was time to fly on out. I'm very thankful Kasie was in town when I needed to go up there. I don't know what I would of done without her!

When we were driving down the highway, we had to stop to let a moose cross. The poor girl looked so scared and didn't know where to go. Thankfully she made it back to the side of the road with the trees! It was pretty neat to see how close we were to her. Also, at one point Kasie and I needed a knife for packing totes and we both whipped ours out of our pockets... We thought that was pretty intense, hence the picture, haha! Along with real milk and fresh fruit!! There's also a picture of the Bering Sea as I was leaving Friday!

Just a few to share!

Happy Easter, everyone! ENJOY time with your families. : )