Football Season!

The start of fall means the start of football season. This weekend Chris and I were able to go to the Boise State game at Colorado State University.



It was both our first big football game. There were a ton of people, but also a large group of Boise State fans. There was plenty of blue in this green and gold world. It was a great game and a blast.

Summertime

Summer is just too short. Week starts in one week, but we did have some great trips this summer.

We did get the chance to visit the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. It was fantastic. We were able to go up to the very top and see the surrounding city.

This is the view from the top. It was amazing to see so far.

In South Carolina, we were able to go walk around the Naval aircraft carrier called the USS Yorktown. It was amazing to walk around a ship that used to set sail around the world.

Going to camp in Colorado was also a good time. The sunsets over the mountains were beautiful.

School starts in less then a week, but the adventures are still going to come.

The last day in Alaska....for now

Because Nome is south of Brevig, the ice is already starting to melt.

This picture was taken at 2am. This is as dark as it will be for the rest of the summer.

To finish off the year in Alaska, a bonfire was created on the beach. Songs and fire and the Alaskan sun. What a great ending.

24 Hours of Daylight

May 15, 2011=24 Hours of sunlight. During the summer months in the Arctic, the sun goes 3-6 degrees below the horizon. Although the sun does go down, the rays of sun are still seen throughout the night.



At Prom, May 14, Native Eskimo singers came and allowed the students the chance to Eskimo Dance. It was so fun to watch the kids come out and dance to the music.


Native Eskimo art includes beading and sewing. We have been stringing beads in first grade for the last quarter. I became interested and created my first beaded barrette! I think it turned out pretty well. A new hobby is coming around.

May

The ice is starting to break up. The blue water can finally be seen underneath the ice. The ocean is still frozen, but the ponds are melting.

For the last week of school, I took the class around the community to take pictures. They thought it was the funnest thing ever. Here is just one of them.



For the first time ever I took a walk on the frozen ocean. It doesn't look any different then the surroundings but just knowing that it was ocean made it feel really cool.

We went walking on the beach where the pebbles are starting to show again and found this fire. There was no one around and it was just blazing away.

The ice is starting to break up. This is a view of one of cracks in the ice. It goes down a couple feet.

April Snow Showers!

It is April, wow, and we are still getting loads of snow and having 60 mph winds and blowing snow. The picture above is the result of what happens when you leave a window open and then leave to go to work. We did leave the window open, but it was beautiful outside and by the time we got home, the snow was blowing with 50mph winds and it just happened for form a small snow pile in our house.

The icicles on our house. They are quite fantastic.

I have always loved to crochet, but have found several websites where there are patterns for animals. These are the creations I have made with yarn!

Arts and Fun

The Inupiaq Eskimos have many types of artwork. In school, the kids get to experiment with the art form of beading. The Native women in town bead barrettes and earrings, but the kids get to make bracelets or necklaces.
In science we learn about the states of matter. This day we got to play with mixing liquids and solids and blowing bubbles! Lots of fun.


The video is a 360 view of the Arctic tundra not far out of Brevig.

Winter Weather

During the last few days, the weather in Brevig has been the worse I have seen yet. Blowing wind and snow up to 65 mph and snow drifts five feet high.
Even with all of this, school does not close.

I woke up on Wednesday morning to take the dogs out and opened the door to this....



I decided that I would take the dogs out later.
We shoveled the stair three times and each time it was that high.

One day of school this week we had so little kids that we decided to combine the entire elementary wing. There was only about 20 kids the whole day. The weather was so bad that not many people wanted to go out in it. I don't blame them. I could barely see my hand in front of my face.

Fun with no Sun

Living in Brevig is like living in a different world. There are no roads, no cars, and no places to go to hang out. So, to cope with this, our neighbor has collected tons of games. This is one of them. Probably the most confusing and detailed game I have ever seen. It took us three hours to play the first half, but it was so much fun.

Having the entire village on one power source can be a blessing and a curse. In this case, the whole village was in a power outage for about two hours. There are several reasons the power goes out up here, but all we need to know is where is our lantern! I love it. It brights up the whole room with a push of a button!

Chris and I got new glasses while we were down in the lower 48. We finally got them and showed them off

Little Dribblers is a basketball team comprised of 3-6th graders. The Coach is as tall as the players, and he is on his knees. It was quite a sight.

This weekend Little Dribblers played in a tournament against Diomede. Diomede is an island that happens to be the closest point in the United States to Russia. The people who live there are unique in their own way and live the Eskimo way of life. They still go whale and polar bear hunting. The only way to get to the island is on crab boat or helicopter, except for the winter because they have an ice landing strip that is built on the frozen ocean. It is a place I would love to go, but scared to actually visit because it is likely that I would get stuck there because of the weather patterns.

100 Day of School

The puppies are getting bigger! They are getting to be big enough that they take me on a walk.

I made homemade noodles finally! They turned out great and I even had a sharp knife to cut them with. Its called and ulu and it is used by the Eskimo women to cut seal skin.

First grade celebrated the 100th Day of School! We had a lot of fun.

We wore our hats all day and did 100 piece puzzles.

We also made a wall of 100 hearts with things that we were thankful for.

Putting 100 stickers on our 100 day hats.