New News

Airline tickets are bought. Wow. That was a big step. Yes, we've sent off the contracts and such but actually getting the tickets.... after more than a year of watching prices dip and soar.... It's a relief to finally have them in hand now. We leave DFW on August 4 at 2:56 and fly to Seattle. Then it's on to Anchorage where we're supposed to arrive at almost 10:00 that night. Of course, it will feel like 1:00 in the morning to our bodies.

We'll spend three nights in Anchorage and then on to Bethel for 3 days of teacher inservice. We'll fly out to Kasigluk on Friday.

Our school district will pay for $1000 moving expenses for the Mister and for myself. That is going to help out tremendously. Not all districts help with moving costs. Plus, we will get an advance on our pay, to be held out in May. We also get laptops for each of us at inservice so we don't have to ship our computer if we don't want to. However, we think we'll go ahead and ship it in the fall for the kids to play games.

Thoughts about groceries --- Some teachers wait and buy all their food in Anchorage or Fairbanks in August and then ship it out to the bush. My thoughts are.... this is my first time in Anchorage and I want to look around. I don't care about spending my days in the stores. So, we'll be ordering most of our stuff online and having it shipped ahead of time. I'll go to Mr. Prime Beef that week and set up an account. Then they can ship our meat out when we really get to the village. I'll let you know how this all pans out later.

The Boy and the Girl are excited about the class list we received today. The Girl will be in junior high ---- yes, her daddy nearly flipped! --- and there are 14 in grades 6,7,and 8. The Mister has 20 on the roll and I have 16. However, as our principal wrote --- this may all change until May 17 of next year! Be flexible. Be adaptable.

We attended a Winters family reunion last weekend. So good to see people. Our beloved Windstar had a major arterial attack of some sort and died on the way to the party. We will miss her terribly but hey --- how many people can say "our major mode of transportation has died but it's okay, we're moving to Alaska and there aren't any roads there anyway?!" Still, I wish we had gotten to Bates earlier and got to visit more. Don't forget the Sanders' reunion next month!

Pictures Have Arrived

We received pictures of our village this week. Apparently, the playground is out our front door. The village clinic is out the back. Our building is very close to our house. It's the red one. The house is about 1200 sq. ft.

We will be renting from the school. The new housing went in about 2003. I don't know who is in the picture by the stairs. I assume it's one of the people who currently live there. They were so nice to send us some pictures of the house and school. I plan to ask that the handrails be added before we arrive! The present occupant asked that they be left off so the dogs wouldn't get tangled up in them.

Our house in Oklahoma is up for sale. We've had 4 lookers in the last 2 weeks but no takers. We will close it up in June and spend July with family.

Everything we own just about is for sale. We will have to mail any boxes to the village and that comes to about $45 for a 50 pound box. The house is furnished and the occupants are selling us quite a few things. That way they don't have to ship them "outside" (that's Alaskan for the lower 48!) We are shipping dvd's, games, kitchen supplies and clothes. We will order food from internet companies as well as shipping stuff from Anchorage in August. Also, most of our cold weather clothes will be ordered after we get on site.

Okay, this is enough for one day. If you wish to comment on the different posts, just click on "comment."

We're Moving...

To bring everybody up to date ---- two weeks ago the principal from a small village in Alaska called to let us know they would be sending out our contracts that week. We've received the packets and most everything is back in AK where it needed to go.

Where are we going? To Kasigluk/Akula. Find Anchorage on the map, go west 400 miles to Bethel and then northwest about 20 miles. It's a village of about 600 people. There are about 100 students, K-12. There are 9 teachers.

What will we do? Melissa will be teaching first and second grade --- combined class. Joe will be teaching fourth, fifth and sixth grades. We "think" he will have mostly kids that are below grade level in their performance. We will be working in the Lower Kuskokwim School District. See:
www.LKSD.org

How will we get there? We will fly to Anchorage and buy groceries to ship to Akula. Then we will fly to Bethel for teacher orientation. After 3 days there, we will fly in a Cesna plane to the village.

Summer plans: We will stay in H. until the end of June and then go to W. and stay at my dad and C's place while they go to AK for a cruise. Then we will probably fly out on Monday, July 30 from Dallas.

Keep checking this blog for further updates and pics and such. I really intend for this to be a way to keep family and friends informed about our great Alaskan adventure.