Mountain Village

     People have often wondered what it looked like where I first lived when I go the teaching job in Alaska.  Mountain Village is a small Yupik Eskimo village of about 750 persons located about 450 miles west of Anchorage on the north bank of the Yukon river in the Yukon Delta.  Mountain houses the district office of the Lower Yukon School District, a school district of 11 villages covering an area roughly the half size of the state of Louisiana.
     Travel in the summer is either by boat or plane, and in the winter by snow machine and plane.  There is only one road in the entire district which links Mountain Village to St. Marys, 18 miles away.  Pitkas Point is also along this road.
     The school in Mountain, when I was teaching there, had a staff of around 20 to 25 including all teachers and support staff.  The school had an enrollment of about 250.  The high school had four to five teachers.  I taught Business and Social Studies, there were also a Shop/Science, Math/Home Ec, and English/PE teachers.  Total enrollment in the high school had a low of 37 and a high of 86 during my seven years there. 
     The picture on top is a view from a plane when I was off to another village as the chaperone for the basketball team.  For orientation, the view is to the north.  The original runway used to be just to the right out of the picture.  The frozen river is at the bottom.  The line of houses to the left/west, is along the side of the "mountain" which is the dominant feature of the local terrain and is the last significant earth feature before the seacoast.  The location of where I lived is at the lower left point of the red line.  To the northwest of that location you can somewhat make out the school with the clearing in front of it.
     The other picture is the housing unit, duplex, of which I lived, sometimes with another teacher, sometimes not, depending on the number of other teachers that were single or with families.  We sometimes had to double up.  In our contract, this particular housing unit was classified as "B" and had a base price of $480 a month plus 10% of our salary.  In effect, the school district charged us about $2,200 a month for rent.  And this was from 1989 to 1997.  This did include all heating fuel, electricity and water.  Which actually was a pretty good deal considering that at that time regular gas was $1.75 a gallon, milk was nearly $6 a gallon, potatoes were $10 a bag, etc. 
     I still can't believe that I had the nerve to accept the job and fly sight unseen from Michigan all the way out there, but it was one of the best experiences ever.  The memories are really quite something.  I could type away for pages.
     There are a couple of other pictures that Bert and I have so I will try to find them and give some brief descriptions.
     Happy spring.  We are up to almost 14 1/2 hours of daylight but still only about 50 degrees.

Three-Seam Pillowcases

     I've had fun making these.  I had bought all of this fabric on sale at Walmart several years ago.  I was planning on being earth-concious and making draw-string bags for Christmas Gifts instead of using wrapping paper.  Well, that time has come and went several times over.  Then I ran across a blog posting showing how to make three-seam pillowcases.  So cool, so easy, and it used up all of the fabric and now I have eight pillowcases to donate. 
     But, the possibilities are endless.  Instead of using a small border between the body and the edging, what about a piece of lace?  Or silk for the edging? Or . . .!?
     So, off I go to attack another pile of UFO's and make a dent.  I'm on a roll and having fun and getting lots of sewing done.
     Spring is trying to arrive here but it is having to claw it's way here.  We've been in the low 40's here and there by the afternoon, but yesterday we got a couple of inches of snow.  The highway was treacherous this morning and slow-going.  Still lots of snow in the yard so we are weeks away from outside spring cleaning.
     State conference is over for another year.  All of the students were so helpful and understanding again this year and the adivisor stepped up to the plate and the public served as judges.  Thanks to all.  Computers were my nemesis this time.  Sometimes I do with for the days of typewriters.  My students did really well and one will be traveling to D.C. with me next month.  It should be exciting, especially since our opening ceremonies will be on the Mall in front of the Washington Monument.  How lovely spring in D.C. should be.  I'm really looking forward to 60's and 70's. 
     Well, off I go.