A week of EXCITEMENT!

Holy cow! A whole week full of awesomeness to fill you in on. :) I think my last post was about the girls finishing the basketball season up, right? So, we made it back from Chevak just fine. I was the unlucky character who got to bring back 8 of the boys team. However, I must say the boys are entirely more entertaining than the girls are on plane trips. At one point I heard a loud chuckle so I turned around and see one of the high school boys holding his ball shoes up to the air vents. I laughed and asked what the heck he was doing. He just giggled and said he was drying out his shoes.

Sunday was a fun day of relaxation and sub plans. I was obviously excited for my birthday, but got plenty of work done. I was supposed to leave on my birthday for Mountain for the district science fair. However, as it goes in this area of Alaska, the weather was bad so we were postponed until the next day. So, Jana and I did our class then took off on our Ski Doos. I decided that even though the post office ruined my afternoon, apparently God still loved me because we got some fresh powder. We played until probably 9 PM and finally decided it was time to eat some birthday dinner.

You know you're in Alaska when your birthday dinner consists of moose, fake mashed potatoes and canned vegetables. :) At home I would've taken myself out for some Mexican or Italian food. In the bush, I have tasty home cooked meals. :)

We headed out to Mountain on Tuesday morning. I was excited to see my MOU friends. The kids were great during the presentations and were easy to handle. However, basketball coaches are MUCH better at keeping kids quiet than these chaperones were. Holy moly, I was awake until after 2 in the morning because some kids were running through the halls and sumo wrestling next door. Sure makes for a grumpy Sammy Jo! However, it wasn't a completely terrible time in MOU. I was able to go have dinner with Jamie--she made DELICIOUS chicken taco soup. Then we got to go watch part of a movie with Sam and Joshua. Good company and a good movie make for a good evening.

Wednesday we had the awards ceremony for the science fair... My 3 cups of coffee really multiplied my normal ADHD tendencies. I couldn't sit still for the life of me. We have one student going to the state science fair in Anchorage. So excited for her!! I got back from the science fair just in time to take my kids out for recess and early release. They were not too happy that I was leaving them again last week. It seems as if I haven't been with my kiddos at all for 2 weeks! Holy cow.

Thursday we had inservice and I was able to handle my exhaustion decently. Nope, I take that back. I was delirious all day long. I was singing and dancing through breaks and put my heart and soul into a respect song the IL wanted our staff to practice...

Thursday afternoon Jana and I talked a friend John into showing us how to get to Mountain. However, the MOU crew didn't know we were coming. After a 3 hour rough ride over hard pack bumps and ice chunks we made it to MOU. We were hungry and it was getting dark. The surprised looks on the faces of our dear friends was awesome. :) It was fun to hang out for a day and a half with them.

While in MOU we had all sorts of adventures. We saw some sweet Northern Lights... Shared some laughter... BSed with the human resources guy about hunting, basketball and guns... Climed the "mountain" which really is more like a hill-- Think Devil's hill in Paisley... Rode ski doo's down to the spring for water... Rode ski doo's up the hill... More movies and laughter...

Surprise visits are awesome, but sometimes a little bit of local knowledge is needed... The gas station in MOU has apparently been closed for a while... Pump isn't working. Oopsie, should've looked into that Thursday! But the tapped the line today. It was like the new clips from big cities when there are gas shortages... We pulled up to the station at 1015 this morning. I counted and there were 2 pickups and 18 snow machines ahead of us. And the pump wasn't working... Great.... Our plan B would be to drive 20 miles to St. Mary's with gas cans until we've got enough in the machines to get the machines to St. Mary's then head home from there... However, we waited it out and by 11:30 we were at the pump. It took us about 4 hours to get home today. We took a different route coming back and it was awesome. The majority of the trip was awesome powder. There was also some rough ground to cover--some bumps that cause a girl to catch some sweet air! I thought to myself probably 100 times that it felt like I was driving on clouds. I realized today that there is nothing more peaceful than cruising through fresh powder at 45 MPH and talking with God. What a calming feeling.

Now I sit here at midnight--time to change clocks. I'm hoping my phone and computer will automatically update because I am not sure if I jump forward or go backward... I am looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow--likely the first night of sleep that lasts longer than 5 hours all week. I've got a busy week ahead of teaching, report cards and sub plans.

HOLY COW, didn't realize I hadn't mentioned that I finally made the decision to stay in Lower Yukon School District for another year. I signed my contract on Tuesday and turned it in. While it should feel like a complete weight lifted off my shoulders, I just still don't know how I feel about it. I also put in for a transfer to other schools within the district. Right now my worst case scenario is returning to Alakanuk, and having that as my "worst" option isn't all that bad. :) I should hear from HR this week about any positions open in the district. Jana and I are going to try to stick together regardless of where we teach next year. That makes the decision to transfer much easier knowing that I will have one person I know and trust with me from the beginning.

I think that sums up this week. I'll keep you posted throughout this week on new developments in my life like where I'll be next year, my awesome summer plans, etc.

There are more pictures on facebook. I just don't have the patience to download them then upload them to my blog. Maybe tonight I'll find the time. :)