December 2018

I haven’t added blog posts for a few weeks due to a number of reasons…But I am now ready to return to my computer keyboard and photo collection. There is much to share on this adventure of life!

This blog post is about the beauty of the first big snow fall to hit Burns Lake area.

Around the winter solstice (December 21st) the days grew so short that morning duty occurred in the dark! My duty starts at 8:05 a.m. so I had the opportunity to watch as the sun rose and shared its spectrum of beautiful color and soft hues and enhanced the sparkle on the snow flakes and snow banks around me.  Students are not permitted to go inside the school buildings here unless the temperature (at the bus shop) reaches -20 Celsius or lower. We reached -19.5 degrees one morning….but apparently it was not low enough in sd91!

One school has about 6 snow shovels which are really popular with some of the energetic students as they help clear sidewalks and areas around the school grounds. I am learning about different types of materials to melt snow. Lava rock type material is really popular at one school.

Snowballs are not permitted, but snow people and snow forts are popular structures in our fields.

I have plugged in my vehicle at the house a few times when temperatures drop below -15, but I haven’t used the vehicle heater plug ins in the parking lots at school yet. I find that many staff depart earlier up here. I think it is partly due to the early darkness. When it gets dark about 4:00 p.m. it’s not much fun walking home on slippery streets that are narrow and not well lit! However, others dash off to go skating on the frozen lakes or enjoy outdoor activities before we lose the light. It’s great to see so much enthusiasm and involvement in outdoor activity up here. I have added several outdoor activities on my bucket list during my time teaching up in the Burns Lake area.