I'm loving life ... that's all :)

Hey everyone,
This week has been super busy as usual! Rachel and I have a busy day today making rolls, cookies having some kids over for battle of the books, going to the cake walk, birthday dinner for Diana and then a birthday party for one of my students, Floyd.  It feels nice to have plans for once! We were actually up very early this morning compared to most weekends! We looked outside and saw the most beautiful sunrise thus far in Elim. Also, the ocean looked a bit frozen so we decided to go for a walk, try out my new jacket and take pictures! What a wonderful start to our morning!

Last weekend I was out with Rachel taking pictures at the beach, we went walking for around 2 hours. It was nice, except for when Rachel told me to jump across the stream from the land to the ocean and I told her I didn't want to but I tried and FAILED. My feet were soaked... but I survived! We took lots of pictures. So, get ready for all of the pictures I will be posting!

Teaching is going great! We have our days, but that's to be expected! We went on a leaf hunt outside this week so that we could make leaf collages. The kids had fun but it was mighty cold! The wind here has a way of making you REALLY feel like you're in Alaska. We also had Sheldon come in this week to read/tell cultural stories to our class. It was great to hear some of their stories and the kids really enjoyed hearing them as well. He taught us how to count 1-5 in Yupiik. Which, I must say is very difficult. I wrote down some of the articulations so that I can remember them and come home and tell all of you. Mom heard them already because I made Grace get on the phone with her and say them. :)

Well, I really just wanted to get on here and post all of these pictures for all of you. If you have any questions about them just leave me a little message and I"ll tell you about them. Oh and one more thing. All of the bears in town are starting to freak out everyone in the village. They killed the mother bear and her two cubs who had been in town for the last week. It was bound to end bad eventually so they took care of that situation. Last night there was another adult bear on the beach, men were out with their guns trying to see if they could get a shot. It's sad really, they just shoot the bears and put them in the dump. I wonder why they don't use them for fur or anything but I tend to not ask too many questions because I know that they are just trying to protect the village. It's not like everyone has vehicles, most of us walk around and the fact that bears are so close to the roads is a real threat to those who walk everywhere, especially the children. Just thought you'd be interested to know about that.

Until next time, Enjoy my pictures!
Sammy

 Climbing the cliffs

 A boat that was smashed against the coast when we had storms

 our homemade pizza... mmmmm

 leaf hunting!

 aren't they adorable?!

 Haley and I

 Sheldon and his cultural story telling session

 Floyd's fifth birthday!

 Our beautiful morning sunrise walk/ some pictures taken from my back porch

 Look ma, I'm an eskimo :)

 frozen ocean... well the start of it anyway

 frozen bond/river that goes into the ocean, Kaylynne was walking on it and the village is behind it

 

Northern lights and kids piled in the truck for school pictures /\

 My new jacket.. works amazing