"LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!"

"You can't stay in your corner of the forest (even if you sticky tack it up yourself- Rachel aside), waiting for others to come to you; you have to go to them sometimes."
~Winnie the Pooh
Piglet, Pooh's Little Instruction Book

WWF's Got Nothing On Quinhagak WrestlingOur Quinhagak Wrestlers took first in our tournament this weekend. We had 3 other schools brave the weather, fly in and camp out at the school. Of course in Quin we don't skimp and it was nearly 5 star accommodations for the lucky visiting teams. Everyone pitched in and cooked up some great eating. There was a phenomenal fan turn out! The whole village lined the mats to cheer on our local heroes. There was definitely an excitement in the air, it has been 20 some years since Quinhagak hosted a wrestling tournament. Friday night the matches went on until 10pm. They resumed Saturday morning at 9:30 until 1 pm. Every wrestler was able to have at least 3 matches. I'm a wrestling fan now. Absolutely. We have some incredible athletes, several of whom will make the long trek to Anchorage this week to participate in a tournament there. A big deal for our kiddos here. Keep them in your prayers please!

Across the Winter Tundra


Saturday after the tournament ended, Ani and I seized the sun shiny freezing weather and hit the snowmobile trails with our skijoring attire. We weren't alone as you can see some of the kids pulling each other around on snow go. We covered about 4 miles total!











Joring on What's Left of Our Bering Sea Beach

We jored down to the beach as far as we could anyway. The tide has continued to push the massive ice flows further up on the sand. The disintegrating beach made our joring attempt short lived but an adventure nonetheless. What a gorgeous view, eh? Ani was enjoying it too.



A Happy Birthday Party Quinhagak Style!
Pauline invited Steph, Jim and me over for her granddaughter's birthday celebration. Steph and Jim were out buzzing around on their well deserved fancy new snow go so they missed out:) But I joined in the on the fiesta. Here in Quin birthdays are a big deal. Everyone is invited to come feast at the family of the birthday-ee! Pauline and her daughter spent hours preparing a meal fit for royalty complete with salted salmon and herring eggs on sea weed, two firsts for me. Very tasty. They even had a fancy basketball cake shipped in from Swanson's (one of the grocery stores in Bethel). What a fun time and treat!
Tea for Three or Hot Chocolate Rather
This was our little tea party. We had to sing happy birthday and blow out the candles several times. Once for my friend back home, Annika, who called part way through our teatime;) These kids make me smile.

Note the tree growing in the corner of my house with the leaves blowing across the room. That was a gift from my mom, gram and aunt helping ease the pain of my treeless fall in Quin. Put it together one day. So proud was I of the forest that had sprouted in my kitchen. Then somewhere between deciding to call my neighbor Sherry to ponder this creation with me and take some pictures to share with you all... it dawned on me, Egad! I AM my mother. I flashed back to my childhood on the farm with my dear ole mum who's idea of interior decorating was to take my unsuspecting friends out on a 'nature hike/bog walk' to the swampy muck just past our horse pasture where they would select, collect and categorize (kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species..okay it wasn't that extreme but I had to memorize that in 7th grade and I've finally found a time to use it, just now) any number of plants, trees, shrubs whatever was available. My mum would then proceed to hang these nature treasures around in our house, she brought the outdoors in. I was always embarrassed more often than not would silently boycott the excursions, meeting up with my hostage taken friends upon their return. Surprisingly those friends now recall their travels with my mum with affection and chuckles. There is what seems to be an elite "Bog Walkers of the Skime Farm" club alive and well out there in the world. A moment of slight panic followed. Then laughing and smiling I admired the momish creation sticky tacked to my wall and decided it could be much worse, but for the grace of God. She's my hero. Mostly... even if she did just ask me tonight if she could shorten all my jeans so she can wear them. That means she has claimed them. Evidently she's gone through my closet. O-well. Here's to all the Moms out there!


Miss Domestication- n. a poser, appearing to be what one is not in the area of domestics, an unintentional misrepresentation of knowing what one is doing in the kitchen.
ex. There was a grave miss domestication when the speech pathologist asked her for her recipe. She truly had no idea why the cookies turned out so well.

That would be me. I need you to seriously understand my lack of kitchen sense, maybe God brought me up here to teach me to cook or just to get a few laughs. What came over me, only the Lord knows, but this weekend I think I made salmonberry/blueberry jelly from the berries we picked earlier this fall!! (It's still too early to tell but I'll keep yas posted, cross your fingers;). Thanks to Amy Lou my wonderful friend who sent jelly jars and pectin (I didn't even know that word until two months ago:) to make the sugar filled treat. So here's the proof, my current knitting project and salmon-blueberry jelly. Come visit and I'll let ya try some....real tempting right???? Whipped up some caribou stew today too, lol. Fannie, Emma and family gave it the okay so apparently it turned out. Anyway I consider this stuff nothing short of miraculous so just had to share;) Lots of Miss Domestication going on here;)

Shout Out To: Larry, my neighbor in the village back in Hayward, "Follow your doctor's orders!" And to everyone in Quin (Justin, Milt and company) who made the Wrestling Tournament a smashing success!

"Then he said, "Go into the world. Go everywhere and announce the Message of God's good news to one and all." Mark 16:15