Last week in Shishmaref

Posted on March 13, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

The good, the bad, and the tasty this week.

The bad. We heard that every year about this time, there is a lice breakout. I don’t know enough about lice to know if the eggs hibernate until a certain temperature, or what happens. I have learned more about lice this year than I ever wanted to know! The only bugs that I have seen up here are flies and tiny red spiders that live outside. We missed the short window of mosquitoes in the summer. This has been an unusual year in the sense that there have been several outbreaks of lice. It has become such a big issue that they are shutting the school down next week, during our spring break, to thoroughly clean. It’s a bit of a drag for us because we shower and do laundry at the school. Fortunately, we have a friend who lives in a house with running water, so we’ll have a backup plan. Makes me itchy every time I think about it.

The good. We saw the most amazing display of northern lights last week. The lights, when visible, can be seen anywhere from 11 p.m. to 3 or 4 a.m. Those are sleeping hours for us. The first time we saw the lights, it was because someone pounded on the door to wake us. Last week, I was shocked awake by Jack jumping up out of bed exclaiming “the lights” as he looked out our bedroom window. Apparently, people were banging on our door and throwing snowballs at our bedroom…I didn’t hear any of it.

I didn’t bother taking my camera out because I didn’t think I could capture them. You’d think because we are so far north, the aurora borealis would be seen all the time. Because of the path of the lights, this has only been the third night this winter that we’ve seen a decent display of the aurora. Imagine looking up at the sky and seeing greenish swirls above and all around. By the horizon, we saw just a hint of purple in the lights. They traveled and moved swiftly. They are said to dance. They curved and morphed from streaks to bands before my eyes. Beautiful and amazing.

The tasty. The week ended with pecan turtle bars. A soft butter cookie base with a buttery, sugary, carmel-y layer covering chopped pecans. The whole cookie was then blanketed with swirled melted semi-sweet chocolate chips. They were cut in small pieces in order to enjoy one or two with less guilt. Oh, my!

McKay’s Buntings

Posted on March 6, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

My hat’s off to great bird photographers. Birds are difficult subjects. Watching us intently with expressive little faces, these fat McKay’s Buntings tolerated us getting within about 25 feet before flying away. Their feathers were fluffed up for warmth, making them look roly poly. Today was a gorgeous day to try and capture them: icy clear skies and 6 degrees above zero.

Moonscape

Posted on March 6, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

As I look from the sea wall out onto the frozen sea, I think this is what the moon must look like…

Kiwi Oatmeal Bars

Posted on March 6, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

A few months ago, our school received kiwi as the fruit of the week. A surprising number of students enjoyed the kiwi. The ones who did not like their kiwi gave the fruit to their teachers. So, Jack and I took about a dozen fruit home. The kiwi were aging faster than Jack and I could eat them. I decided to try out the jam feature on our bread machine with the remaining kiwi. The jam has been sitting in our freezer waiting to be eaten. Honestly, kiwi jam didn’t really sound that appealing. It looks kind of interesting — bright green with tiny black seeds. Jack thought a blueberry tart with a kiwi jam layer would be good.

After doing a bit of research about what could be done with jams, I settled on a raspberry oatmeal bar recipe. I followed the recipe except for the type of jam…homemade kiwi! It came out terrific. The tasty bars are mostly sweetened by the jam and have the healthy properties of oats. Mostly, they taste delicious. After eating two, Jack suggested my next endeavor should be my own little bake shop. He says my baking is now that good. Thanks, Jack!

Frozen Wave Breaking

Posted on March 6, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

The cold bright sun causes changes in the snow and ice. As the light and temperature changes, there are more photographic opportunities to capture Mother Nature’s art.

I love the interplay of the shadows and the sparkle of the snow as this wave is seemingly frozen in time.

Home Baked Bread

Posted on February 27, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

A picture perfect loaf of wheat bread.

Back in September, my first attempts at bread failed. I couldn’t get the dough to rise right. I figured the temperature in the house up here must be too cool. I read in my rice cooker manual that there was a bread function. Lo and behold, it worked. Since Jack and I have a little rice cooker, our loaves were cute little round babies. They lasted for two good sized sandwiches with an oddball end sandwich left over. That worked for awhile. Then we decided it was time for a real bread machine. After quite a bit of research, we ordered a Zojirushi BBCC-X20. What a terrific machine. It bakes beautiful loaves of bread. I’ve tried herb bread, cheese bread, wheat bread, pizza dough, and kiwi jam! All terrific! There is nothing more satisfying than eating a hot slice of bread straight from the oven. I used to always say “I will never use a bread machine.” Ugh, I’ve been bitten by every single “never” I’ve ever uttered! Life is too short to knead and tend home made loaves of bread.

Read the whole review at: http://www.amazinggrazefarm.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_reviews_info&products_id=84&reviews_id=6

Clearing the Pantry

Posted on February 27, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

The last day of school will be May 20. The food goal is to eat everything in our pantry by the end of school. Who knows what culinary creations may occur during this process. The pumpkin craisin bread came out delicious. Just out of the oven and barely cooled, half of one loaf is already gone!

Most of what we have left seems reasonable to eat and create with. I’m not sure about the 50 pounds of dried beans and bags of pecans and almonds. Stay tuned…

Chores ala Shishmaref

Posted on February 27, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

Today is Sunday. The beginning of the week. Chore day.

Some of the chores we have to do are usual. Today is our scheduled day for laundry. The staff all have a schedule to follow in order to equitably share the washers and dryers. When I used to rent my home, I used to basket up my laundry and drive over to the laundromat. Here, the basketing-up is the same. It’s the short hike over to the classroom which houses my assigned washers and dryers which is different. In the fall, the walk was over sand. Some Sundays, my walk is fighting against wind and icy temperatures. Today, my path was elevated by a few feet of packed down snow. Besides the venue, the laundry is the same laundry chore.

Most Sundays, I bake. This weekend, I baked more than usual. I always bake one loaf of bread. This loaf is for sandwiches to take for lunch during school. With only a few months of school left, I looked over what is in our pantry. It’s time to start using things up. I found bags of craisins and a can of pureed pumpkin. The aroma of pumpkin-craisin bread is now filling the house. There is bread available at the store, but the prices keep me baking at home. I’ve also come to really enjoy this chore and can see always baking my own bread. This weekend, I also made pizza dough. Again, at over $10 per frozen pizza, it’s cheaper, and fun and easy to make our own.

Every six weeks or so, we have to fill our water tank. We have a 300 gallon water tank inside our front door. A really basic electric pump sits next to it and pumps water into the kitchen and the bathroom sinks. We are really conservative with our water use so that we don’t have to fill it so often. As soon as it gets down to about 60 gallons, it’s time to refill. We are lucky, in the sense that we live right across from the school. There is an industrial-style spigot on the school porch that we run a hose from. The hose is long enough to cross the road and then is threaded through a hole in the wall and into the tank. We’ve got the whole process down to about a half an hour. Other staff members have to take a portable 150 gallon tank and fill it at the school and then take it home and transfer the water into their home tanks using a pump. A few of the lucky staffers have homes with “city water” which means they don’t have to deal with hauling water at all.

Today, the spigot on the school porch was frozen. It’s been hovering from 0 to 9 degrees. What to do? Simple solution…a blow torch quickly thawed the situation and we were seemingly ready to go. All right, one end hooked to the school and the other threaded into the tank, water turned on…and no water. Seems the last person who used the hose didn’t take all the water out, so the hose was frozen. Bring the hose inside to let it thaw and move on to the next chore…

Trash. We’ve waited a long time to dump trash. The last time we did it, we used the school truck and drove out to the dump. Now, the school truck is buried under a few feet of snow and will remain in hibernation until the spring thaw. Our dumpster is full. Jack had to locate the school’s snowmobile and sled. Once it was located, Jack and our friend Brian loaded up the sled with our two dumpsters’ contents and snowmachined out to the dump where they will burn it all. So far, no hitches on this chore. I’ll see what happened when they get home. The dump is an interesting place…there might be scavengers there…birds, foxes, or even a polar bear!

It feels good to have everything clean and filled. It was a beautiful sunny day. The house smells like a bakery. Life is good.

Dreams of Fireweed and Chamomile

Posted on February 24, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

Yesterday, it stormed so hard that school was closed. To put this into perspective, our school is never closed. One of the teachers told me throughout her past eight years she has been at Shishmaref School, there has only been one day closed for weather.

The wind is coming from the south, which means it’s warm. It’s bringing wet snow. The gusts strain to knock me over on my short commute to school.

No planes bring people in to town or take people away. No mail leaves or comes in. Everything stays still until the storm passes.

I remember snow days when I was in first and second grade. (This was in the state of New York) I remember excitedly listening to the radio and cheering when we didn’t have to go to school. It was bonus time. I don’t remember having to make up days to make sure we had the required number of school days. I was too young to notice. Maybe we did.

In Shishmaref, we make up the days. If we close school, then we make it up on the following Saturday. That sort of takes away the enchantment of snow days.

This kind of storm is dreary. It’s no fun to go out and walk. It’s no fun to look at the world through the veil of soggy falling snow.

So, I look at my photos of the beautiful fireweed from last summer. And I dream of the fireweed and chamomile I will harvest in the Kenai this coming summer. Maybe a cup of hot cocoa and a movie will help distract me from the soggy storm.

Parking Lot

Posted on February 19, 2011 by Jack & Barbra Donachy

One of the big events out here is basketball. There are two outdoor basketball courts that are used in the summer. During the school year, the gym fills the need. Each school, no matter how small, has a basketball team. When the schools play, the community shows up to cheer them on. In what seems to be tradition out here, the natives cheer on the teams…our side or the other school’s. It’s a terrific social event. I like to visit with people I don’t normally get to talk to.

Today’s game is the first one of the season during the day. It was a great opportunity to photograph what the turnout looks like outside the school. Notice how the outside of the school is all parked up!