Another fun Friday assembly

 We have 112 students registered this year. Being a small site, it gives us certain opportunities. One of those is the chance to play games where most of the student body gets a chance to participate if they want to.

 Last year, many of our Friday assemblies had the theme of Minute - To - Win - It. The favorite was using straws to move M and M's. We played that one over and over and over....

 This year the games have focused on silliness. In this game, the partners had throw a ball into their partner's hat.

 Sometimes these assemblies have guest speakers like the Village Police Officers (VPO's) to come and talk of safety concerns. Other times a class may have a skit, special game, or song to share.

These assemblies take place at 1:00 after the last lunch session. They always include the weekly drawing of the award/reward of a "Pop Slip" given out to one student per grade level. These slips are written up continuously to encourage positive behavior that students have exhibited. They are worth $3 and can be used for a soda pop and treat at the two stores in town.

The barge showed up!

The fuel barge showed up in the late evening and stayed through the day. It was pumping heating fuel and gas into the large tanks at the fuel tank farm. With it so long, I would have been curious to see it navigate the small meanderings of this little river, the Piktikmaluk. There's a whole lot of back and forth between here and the Johnson River.

These barges are the energy life lines of the villages. They travel up and down throughout the summer delivering goods. The year before, the village of Nome received all kinds of attention as their fuel barge did not make it that far north due to a large storm. Then the area froze up.  A Russian tanker was hired to get fuel to them.

The tugboat maneuvered the barge and is now heading downstream back to Bethel. I am told when it arrived it was very low in the water. I never did hear how many gallons it offloaded. Right now gas goes for about $7.30 per gallon and heating fuel is about $8.00 per gallon.

Out for a walk with some little friends

Got up early one morning and walked out to the sewage lagoon. Not such a great place to walk to, but it is the farthest the boardwalk will go. Found a few little friends to keep my company.

The pipe carries the waste water from the laundromat in town. They have washers and dryers, one toilet, and showers.

We pulled a few toys out of the water that had been submerged for quite some time.

Then these two showed me a plant that had gone to seed. They were trying to open the pods to show me that I could chew on the seeds.

Unfortunately, the pods had opened awhile back, and seeds had blown away. The plant stalk was pretty beat up, so I couldn't tell what kind of plant it was.

A spring activity into summer is looking for eggs. When a little girl finds her first set of eggs, a celebration is had. In the old days it was a big party just like when a boy would get his first seal.

Out for a walk

 I think we are all scientists at heart. We like to look and say, "Oh, cool," when we find something interesting. That's what scientists do.

This brother and sister are often out exploring early in the mornings. They've shown me young fish in ponds, various larva, nests, broken eggshells, and the youngest told me that dragonflies eat mosquitoes.

 Fun cloud day later on. Does it look like it snowed?

First snow, time to move the snowmobiles.

 Like kids everywhere, we teachers completely lose our students at the first sign of snow. We all run to the windows, exclaim, some run outside and try to catch the snowflakes on their tongues. What some forget in all the excitement, is that winter is V..E..R..Y long out in these parts. I am sad to say goodbye to Fall already.

 We were asked to move our snowmobiles and sled out of the shed to make room for the items not needed in the new preschool. The school received a grant to start a preschool this year, which we are all very excited about. It will begin in November for the three and four year-olds.

What that meant for us at the moment, was moving our machines with no snow in sight, as what fell the day before had  melted. Here Eli has maneuvered his snowmobile out and down the boardwalk. We pushed the sled out easily on the boardwalk as the runners were slippery. We had to lift the back part due to the skegs.

Starting up the snowmobiles inside is stinky business. Yuck. We were fortunate to have a place to overwinter.

This was too close for comfort and so had Eli, much braver than myself, rev up the machine and get it moving out of the shed. I was afraid I would overshoot and end up in the grass.

Now, to keep it on the boardwalk and get it to another place on the other side of the school....Much easier to sit up on the knee and steer, than sit low.

Following Eli to the other site in front of his house....

We had to get enough momentum to get up the slight incline and turn to come up and over the hill. My belt has no studs so did little damage to the boardwalk wood on the incline. Now Eli's on the other hand.....

Up and over-looks easy enough, wasn't. It's a pasted on smile....

Home for now.