Pumpkin Carving

With living in Carievale, we have had the opportunity to do some things that we have not been able to do in a few years. One of those things was carving a pumpkin.  I was super excited about getting a pumpkin and carving it and watching Sawyer experience the whole pumpkin carving experience. Greg  was an excellent picture taker as we enjoyed feeling the pumpkin "guts".  Sawyer was not 100% sure about the pumpkin insides and seemed to be more interested at putting the guts back in the pumpkin that I had already taken out. 

All in all we enjoyed our pumpkin carving experience. Sawyer was not happy in the end when I put the pumpkin back outside. She liked it so much she wanted to keep playing with it. I think I will put a light in it on Halloween and  show her how it glows. 

We are not taking Sawyer out trick or treating this year. We will probably go out next year. We felt she was to young to go out and does not eat candy so it was pointless. I know that we could eat the candy but our waist lines hardly need that. 

We hope you have all enjoyed your weekend and are gearing up for this next week. 

 Sawyer kept wanting to touch the pumpkin here but we were trying to cut off the top.
She seemed very into the pumpkin carving experience.

The final product!

At the Movies

It has been a relaxing weekend.  We had a chance to go to the Carnduff Theatre on Friday night with another couple and saw The Butler.  It was so refreshing being able to "go out" as we haven't been able to do that the last three years.  We did find a lack of babysitters (we have a surplus back home with all the family members all queued up) here though.  With it being rural there aren't many people nearby and many of those who are able can't afford the pay cut (the allowances out here are ridiculous).  The theatre was pretty amazing.  It is a converted church from way back that recently purchased a digital projector.  Tickets are $6 with popcorn only $2.  Not bad for a date night.

Saturday we travelled into Estevan for our weekly grocery and city experiences.  At night I went to Carievale's Hoedown.  It is a fundraising event to support the local arena, riding area, ball park, and hall.  It consisted of around 100 silent auction items that have been donated by local businesses and families.  Some were small (pies, baked goods, etc.) while others were a lot larger (Apple TV, brand new chainsaws, $500 Spa gift certificate, etc.).  Needless to say they were all out of my price range, as the pies were at $50 when I had left. 

Claire has been getting opportunities at Carnduff School recently which has worked out.  It is a much larger school, which includes a high school.  She has enjoyed working there and subbing all around.  She doesn't have to mark or plan, so who wouldn't.  I like her only subbing too, because I can still rely on her to help out marking sometimes too. 

Where SMART is spelled with an R

Another installment that seems much too late.  Unfortunately there will be no new pictures today.  I would love to show some from my school, but I am more cognizant of putting my students' faces on the internet. 

We are absolutely loving it out here!  The community, house, and work all feel like home.  We are obviously missing loved ones back home, but for right now, this is where we are supposed to be.  I have 25 students (11 Grade 6, 11 Grade 7, and 3 Grade 8 students).  The automatic respect for staff, each other, and most importantly self is much more evident.  Most of the students want to learn and achieve high marks.  I am also learning Saskatchewan's educational practices as some things are drastically different.  For example, no marks are given for assignments or assessments.  Instead a MABEI scale is given out.  Meeting, Approaching, Beginning, Experiencing difficulties, and Insufficient Evidence.  Instead of handing out 9/10s or C+, students receive one of the 5 letters.  As well, each outcome is assessed.  As an example, Math has 14 outcomes for the year.  By the end of the grade, each outcome will have been assessed.  In Ontario, Math has five strands and students are given broad assessment results each term.  All in all, it is very quick and provides a more accurate picture of all aspects of learning.  The one area that has been heavily criticized is that nothing denotes work or learning above expectation.  Meeting is the highest achievement the student can achieve.

Our home life is becoming more settled.  Almost all of rooms have been painted and we have attempted to personalize each area.  Claire, after three long years of waiting, finally has her scrapbooking area set up (*sorry Dad about not bringing the desk out yet).  Edgar has been loving our fenced in backyard.  We have also finally purchased and picked up our new vehicle.  We now own a 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe.  It is a very nice vehicle and we are pleased at our purchase. 

As mentioned, I do not have any photos, but I can share a few stories from the first month.  One of my students is bright, and I don't mean just, "she writes neat and knows her multiplication table."  My first day I had the students think of questions they wanted to ask.  Most thought, "What is your favourite subject?/How old are you?"  But this girl asked, "Do you consider yourself to be an organized person?"  Word for word.  Who talks like that?  A few weeks later, during our Questioning Unit, I had the students think of three random questions.  After collecting them and typing them up I randomly handed them back out for the students to find its answers and complete a short presentation on their findings.  Again, most asked, "Why is the sky blue?/When was the first hockey game?/Why is grass green?"  Instead this girl inquired, "Why are there wars when nations can just peacefully talk?/Why in a world of technological advancements, are people still dying from ordinary things?" 

I would love to post this picture, but it is what it is.  There is a young student named Gunner who wears a western outfit on a routine basis.  He isn't the only one as many students regularly wear cowboy boots with spurs, cowboy hats and jeans to school on a daily basis.  This particular student has several shirts that remind me of old pictures/movies from the 70s.  He wears them as they were designed too, with the first two/three buttons undone. 

One of the new opportunities this position has for me is to coach a school team.  With our small school size there are not a lot of team opportunities, but I have volunteered to be the Girls Volleyball coach.  Just like everything else, I am loving it.  Working with the girls has been an excellent way to connect with them, as well as with their parents.  On a bit of a selfish note too, I am feeling more at home being connected with competitive sports again.  It has definitely been too long. 

Until another day, Goodnight and Goodluck.

Carievale, Saskatchewan

Not to much new to report here. We went for a walk tonight and took some pictures of the town so everyone could visualize where we are living. 

This is a picture of the two churches in town. The one on the right is a United church and the one on the left is an Anglican church. 

This is the school. It is small, but Greg loves it. We can see the school from our house as it is at the very end of the street. 

This is one of the two grain elevators in town.

This is a picture of the main street in town. There two grain elevators on it and a few businesses. Unfortunately, a lot of businesses have closed. 

This is the sign the train sees as they enter Carievale. The train comes through a few times a day. Love hearing stuff go on in town.

And this is our humble abode, on the corner of Pacific and Bishop. We really like it although it is very old and needs A LOT of work.

School

Well it is about time that I posted something about my new experiences at school.  I am absolutely loving everything about it.  The students are great and the staff are very welcoming, even though there is only 10 of us (including secretary and EAs).  It has been really refreshing to get into this school and work in a different setting. 

As for the community, we are really loving it too.  Everyone is friendly and has made sure we feel welcome here.  We have enjoyed going to church and meeting all 30 attendees.  Claire, along with another woman, will be running the Bible Story time for the children's program this year. 

A bit of exciting news...we are officially Saskatchewan residents.  We went and surrendered our Ontario licences and purchased Saskatchewan plates and insurance.  For those that don't know Saskatchewan has public insurance, SGI.  In all, our insurance and yearly sticker cost just below $90/month for our Pontiac Pursuit.  Not bad considering I was at 100% fault when we got into our accident in Winnipeg. 

Well there are no pictures today, but we are going to take some photos this weekend and post them at some point.

Ending Summer with a BANG!!!

Well summer has come to an end! We had a great summer. We went on many vacations camping, cottaging and just hanging out with family and friends. We also celebrated Sawyer's first birthday. However now we are off on a new adventure. We are becoming Westerners and are moving to a small town (about 240 people) in Saskatchewan called Carievale. 

We already really like Carievale and are looking forward to seeing what this place holds for us. Unfortunately, it has been quite the adventure getting here. We shipped our belongings her on August 10th and were told they should be here by August 22. The box did not end up arriving in Winnipeg until two days later. We are now being told that our box will not arrive until September 5 or 6th. So the only belongings we have with us is what we could fit in our vehicles (which is not much considering we are moving here). The U-Haul company has decided they are going to charge us a new fee every time we turn around or talk to them. So this process has cost us a lot more money. They also told Greg that when they bring the box to us they are only letting us have an hour or two with it and that I will have to unload it. Now this is all fine and dandy but I have a one year old running around and Greg is working so unloading this box is not going to be the easiest thing and many of its contents are too heavy for me to lift on my own. We are in the process of talking to them so hopefully something will work out. All I know is I would not recommend U-Haul to help you with moving ANYTHING!

On top of our stuff not being here. We are now dealing with insurance companies and trying to figure out what to do with our RAV. We unfortunately got t-boned in Winnipeg on the way here. No one was hurt, thankfully. So this week has been spent figuring out what they are going to do with our vehicle. It is being said that they are probably going to be writing it off. We are hoping we hear this week so we can take the next step with our vehicle. 

So far we are loving Carievale. It is very small town and for those of you who have ever watched Corner Gas, it is exactly like that. People have helped us so much since our stuff is not here. Lending us pots and pans. Buying us groceries. Giving us a bag of meat and lending us a table. Their generosity has been so encouraging. We are living in the oldest house in Carievale. 111years old. I absolutely love it. However it does need some work, but it has so much character. I will post pictures of the house and the work we have done on the house at a later date. 

I hope everyone is enjoying the end of summer and for those of you that are returning to school I hope you have an awesome school year. 

 This is a picture of our last night in Niagara. We had an amazing evening with my siblings. So much fun going to the Butterfly Conservatory, out for dinner and playing tourist around Niagara Falls! Love these guys so much. Shout out to ROB. We MISSED you!!!

 This is our RAV after it was hit. So sad. It looks awful on the outside but I kid you not when I say it does not look like anything happened on the inside. Only the air bag out makes is look different.

 Sawyer playing outside on out deck. She loves playing in the big backyard, but I think it is Edgar who likes it more. he loves to bask in the sun on the deck during the day.

 Welcome to SASKATCHEWAN!

Sawyer hanging out on the couch one morning! I honestly just thought it was a really cute picture of her.

Heartbroken

We are heartbroken today. We got the devastating news this morning that one of our students in Deer Lake, one that Greg taught this year in Grade 8, died yesterday. He was thirteen years old and he hung himself.
This student is one you would never expect to do anything like this. He ALWAYS had a smile on his face. He always stopped to talk to you. He loved Sawyer and always wanted to give her lots of kisses and talk with her. This student went to church every week, he was a christian, sang in front of the church. He went to visit and talk with the Elders of the community. He loved to hunt and fish and play his guitar. This is what we saw on the outside, obviously no one in Deer Lake realized that there was a lot of hurt going on on the inside.
I am shocked, sad, heartbroken, numb. I feel awful for Greg who spent 5 days a week 7 hours a day with this boy. Please pray for Greg and I, Deer Lake and this boys family as we grieve the loss of this special boy.