With the bad days come the good......

I woke up Monday morning ready to start my second week with my students. I thought things would go a little smoother and jumped right in to our routine... I was wrong. My students had an extremely tough time listening and following directions all day long. After P.E. when things hadnt gotten better we had a "come to Jesus" meeting (which my friend Jana has never heard of) and had a talk about how to act during the day. It was the first time I had to use my "stern teacher voice", but I think they listened since today was much better.

We started doing "spy masks" in the hall which was an idea one of my friends from college presented as a class assignment. It's where the students create a spy mask and wear them in the hall to remind them that they are not to talk or move, but to try and stay as invisible as possible. They have absolutely loved them so far. We have still had some issues of talking in the line, but it will get better. :)

Yesterday we got an email about fresh food at Dave's store (which is one of the three grocery stores here) and I jumped in the van. We drove down to the store to get some fruit and vegetables not realizing how much they would cost. When you go without fresh food paying a little bit more for the good stuff when it comes in doesn't seem so hard. So I got a bag of oranges, red and green apples, Avocados, chips, gatorade mix, wafers, and two hamburger helper meals.... Grand total?? 70 dollars!! I steered away from the diet coke and have only had ONE in the past TWO days!! (headaches for this girl) It's time to kick the habit and so now i'm drinking water and gatorade... Isn't so bad after all. :)

Sammy and I decided to start working out yesterday as a good "stress reliever"... All i'm going to say is that I'm definitely feeling it today. It was tough for me since I haven't been as physically active in a long time... Sammy however could run a marathon today. HA! Guess we will just have to stick with it (and by we I mean me).

Tomorrow as most of you know is my BIRTHDAY!! It's my first one from home to where I don't get breakfast in bed and woken up to my family singing happy birthday. Yes I'm almost 24 years old and not ashamed to say I love those things. :) Well my very sweet "family" and most of the staff are having a breakfast potluck at our house (Which means LOTS of cleaning tonight). I'm excited to be able to enjoy a night with the people I work with playing board games and just enjoying where we are.

I'm trying to get better about blogging more often so they may not be as long all the time, but they will always have pictures.... Enjoy! :)


These are pictures of my classroom! :)

Just for my MOM! :)

I am not the best at updating things like a blog, but due to my mother's request I will. :)

Last weekend was spent in the classroom moving boxes, tables, desks and everything imaginable at least 45 times. I wanted it all to be perfect for my first day. The first day I knew was going to be rocky to say the least, because not only was I in a new school doing my first year of teaching, but also a new culture. Lets just say there were things I would quickly wake up. My students have been hilarious this week and definitely kept me on my toes. In the Lower 48 (don't I sound like a legit Alaskan) the students would call me Ms. Rhoads or ma'am.... Not here. They refer to me as Teacher or Sarah and oddly enough I like it. When I first heard that's how we were going to be addressed I thought it was kinda weird, but thought oh well. Every once in a while I'll catch myself refering to myself as Ms. Rhoads, but then look out on the blank stares of my students and know they have no idea who i'm talking about.

We have slowly been getting more and more food in the mail along with other packages. Which if you live in a place where mail only comes by airplane it's like Christmas every day. For some reason tho the locals get my roommate and I confused quite often which sometimes is sad. Thursday I went to the post office to check my mail and was greeted with a package slip which made me excited. I walked up to the counter to hear, "Oh I'm sorry that was for Sammy." Ha ha. Things like that are common and definitely keep this life interesting. I was worried that there maybe times where I would be bored, but that has yet to come and I highly doubt it ever will.

This past week I got my first case of being a little homesick. My dad emailed me that my grandma was on TV and to go check it out. She was on the news for helping out at a homeless shelter for a birthday party. I don't know why, but I started to tear up a little. It's almost been a month that I left AR and I absolutely love it here and so glad I made the journey, but I'm allowed to miss home a little right?!

The aides in our class are the most amazing ladies and I can honestly say I couldn't survive without them. There is one lady Anna who is so sweet and always telling me, "Sarah you lose too much stuff", Which if you knew me that is the most honest thing anyone has ever said. She is constantly cracking me up and speaking to me in Yup'ik. I know a couple of phrases and words, but nothing to write home about. The other day she was trying to find my keys to unlock the door and held up the keys and said, "This one?" in Yup'ik. I said, "I think that's it". Her response was, "Sarah I speak to you in Yup'ik and you catch on so quick!" Ha ha! I had absolutely no idea what she said, but apparently made a great guess.

One habit i'm trying to kick is the Diet Coke one..... Touchy Subject!! When they charge 14 dollars a case it makes it a little easier to not need them so much, but my headaches tell me otherwise. We have knocked the habit down to three a day which is still crazy expensive. I've officially run out so we are going to see how long we can last without them. Keep your fingers crossed.

My roommate and I had our first trip to the cafe this week for tasty deliciousness. Some of you may think it would be like P&C Diner or something other Ma & Pa store. Not even close! One of the kindergartners here her parents run the store and she greeted us with shrills of how much fun her day was at school. The cafe has two tables that can hold four at each so it's quite small, but the food was amazing. They serve chicken fingers, cheeseburgers, and pizza...... So not a crazy selection, but after cooking every meal (or Sammy cooking them) it was HEAVEN! I had a milkshake for dessert and the lady laughed at my smile. It's the small things that make you happy.

Friday we were invited to watch an Eskimo dance at the tribal council. The dance was held to welcome the new and returning teachers. We walked in and there were about 6 drummers with large paddles with blue tarps stretched over them with sticks. I saw some of the ladies that come to the school and went to say hi. They were so excited to see all of us and the fact we had come to join their event. In their culture if you do not have dance fans you are to wear gloves to cover your hands. All of the teachers brought some on the chance we would get to dance also. After a couple songs of the most amazing rhythms and dances I've ever seen they invited us to join. The first couple of songs we tried we werent the best at by any means and catching on was a hard job. Each song means something different and tells a story. Cheryl, our assistant Instructional Leader (principal), would ask one of the elders what they meant and then come tell us. The last song we did we started to catch on. Anna was in front of us so we watched her to teach us the moves. Once she saw we caught on she started dancing and getting crazy. I almost cried from laughing so hard at how much she enjoyed doing this and asked her after if she would teach me her moves. She just laughed and said, " Sarah you are crazy!"

Tomorrow starts a new hopefully more organized week with my kiddos and I can't wait. This week is going to be exciting, because we have early release on Wed (Which is also payday and my BIRTHDAY), early dismissal day on Friday and out on Monday for labor day. The days go by so quick here and just trying to get the most out of every minute at school is tough, but so worth it.

The staff last night had a bonfire and I got to go out into the Yukon again. It was FREEZING to say the least.... I quickly ran back and put my boots back on. The weather has stayed in the forties/fifties for the past two weeks and I am in love. RIght now I would be sitting in the humidity of AR wishing it would get cold. (In a couple of Months I'll be begging for that humidity I bet). The staff is something that I enjoy the most about being out here. They are some of the most unique, crazy individuals I have ever met, but we have become a very dysfunctional functional family. We have a little too much fun, but we deserve it in my mind! They have become some amazing friends to me and I'm so blessed to get to spend the year with them.

Well I'm heading off to my house, because we still don't have internet and it's getting dark outside. Write soon!

My crazy dysfunctional functional family! :)

Accidents in the Yukon are cold and not fun! Ha!

The Cafe! Yummy Food! :)

The Slough

Eskimo Dance - This one was about the kids playing!

Sweet Anna!

The Yukon at the Staff Bonfire!

I enjoy my walks to school with this kind of scenery! :)

From Anchorage to Alakanuk

Sunday was D Day and it was time to fly off to Alakanuk. I strongly dislike flying and got to endure my first experience with bush planes. NOT FUN!!! But thankfully i have amazing friends like Jana and Sammy who were extremely supportive and limited the amount of times they laughed at me. We took one plane from Anchorage to St. Mary's which is a medium size barn. From there we took a small (very small) plane to Alakanuk and even though it was tiny I loved being able to see everything. After we landed our very sweet Assistant Instructional Leader (Assistant Principal) picked us up and had dinner waiting on us. Throughout this whole experience so far i have met some of the most amazing people that have been more helpful than i could ever imagine.

Beauty!!

Payback sucks!!

Can you tell I love flying??

My sweet friends making fun of me. :(

Welcome to the Bush!

Monday started our inservice and it was long and exhausting. My brain was already on overload from the info we got the week before and lack of sleep. We did inservice from 8 to 3:30 Monday and Tuesday. Each night I tried to work a little on my classroom but only made it worse each time. Finally on Wednesday we got to have two work days in our room. I'm proud to say that it no longer looks like a tornado hit it but like a place where children can learn. The teacher left so much stuff in the room that i shouldn't have shipped anything up here, but i'm glad I did. It allowed me to put my touch on the room and now I have a dinosaur themed room. As of right now I'll only have 12 students, but i foresee that going up or down many times before September.

Sammy and I were offered positions to do an after school Learning Lab that starts in Mid Sept. It'll be for third and fourth grade and i'm excited. It'll be fun to job share with her and get to know more students than are just what are in our class. Best part..... We get to go to Anchorage for four days for training. I'm excited bc that means we can get things we need with out giving up our first borns college tuition. Ha ha. We are currently fighting with a bush company who has all of our frozen food and wont ship till we send more money ONCE AGAIN. UGH!!!! It has cost so much money to get food out here and it is taking forever. It'll be worth it tho.

The highlight of the week so far has been that after four days we finally get HOT SHOWERS!!!! So excited!

Everybody in the village has been so sweet and getting to know the locals has been amazing. They have let us try foods i would have never guessed and been such a help with setting up the classroom. I would seriously be lost without them!!

The kids have started to come up to us and ask our names and what grades we teach. They are so hilarious and keep asking us if we want to race. They have more energy than anyone i've ever met.

We are headed off to go sight see. Write more later! :)

The Big Move

August 3rd came quicker than I expected, but has been the most amazing thing I have ever done. We left LR and headed off on a never ending flight to Anchorage. Once we got to Anchorage it was obvious the shorts I had packed would not ever see daylight. We decided to start the first day off with some shopping and just driving to the sports store the sights were breathtaking. The mountains are everywhere and make Pinnacle Mtn look like an ant hill. I got the last minute things that the lovely website decided to not ship to my village and boxed them up. That makes a total of 20 tubs, 2 orders to drugstore.com, 2 boxes, and a huge bush order from Costco. This move was a little more than what i had anticipated, but from what i can tell 100% worth it.


My parents and brother stayed here until Monday morning then headed back home to AR. I couldn't imagine coming up here and not having them see it also. They have been a huge help through out this whole process.

Sunday night I had a staff orientation dinner and got to meet my new roommate. Her name is Sammy and she is absolutely hilarious. From day one we have gotten a long and am so excited that we have become friends. Everyone I have met has been absolutely the nicest people ever. There is always someone around to talk to or ask questions. The staff that is going to my village are an amazing group. They are all eager to offer ideas and come from all over the US so this year will be far from boring.

I found out I will be teaching a 1st/2nd grade split and have 13 kids in my class. This is VERY different from the 20-25 you have in most classes back home. Our training started Monday and has been nonstop ever since. They have given us information about our curriculum, technology, and culture that we are about to head to. All I can say is that there are going to be many challenges and struggles, but it's going to be a year i'll never forget. I had my first adventure with Sammy doing a bush order and I now have a new appreciation for having the luxury of weekly shopping. We got all of our fresh food that we will need for a while. Hopefully it will last us quite a while, because it was EXPENSIVE.


Once I get my pictures put on my laptop i'll upload them up to my blog. I hope you all enjoy getting to read about my new life and remember care packages with Diet Coke are ALWAYS welcome! :) :)




This is where I will be living. Below is a closer look. :)