work hard be kind

Aloha Friday.

I woke up nice and early, which is quite rare these days. At a dark 6 am, I got out of bed and laid in front of the heater. I’m so grateful for our heater so that I don’t have to freeze! Someday we’ll have a wood stove and that will be ever so lovely.

I’m grateful for beautiful mornings. And for a puppy who gets us going in the morning.

I’m grateful that I said YES to a phone call for substitute teaching at the school in the Russian village, Nikolaevsk! When I was little we lived right by the Russian village in a little cabin and we had so many great forts in the woods. Today was my first day of substitute teaching. It was great. Really great.

The school is so unique, with maybe like 70 kids K-12. There is focus on preserving the Russian culture and remembering the Old Believers. Not all the kids are Russian of course, but it was great because I felt like I was in a different place. It was all new and exciting and the kids were really great.

The half hour drive in the North Fork wilderness was beautiful and brought back lots of memories. So I’m really grateful for how all of that worked out. 

I am especially grateful for the inspiration of the spirit, and that I followed the spirit and made a salad for the ward Thanksgiving dinner. :) I didn’t feel like using the salad spinner (because I don’t like it very much) and I didn’t feel like cutting up veggies (I was being a sloth), but I felt like I should so I did. And pretty much it was like the only green salad there, so I’m glad I could make a nice contribution. :) 

I’m grateful for our wonderful Homer ward and the lovely Thanksgiving party. I’m grateful for the crayons and paper leaves so that we could write down things we were thankful for. I’m especially grateful for the moment when little Katy came over and said, “Can you help my write ‘my sister’?” Goodness those two nieces of mine are so precious and such good sisters.

I’m thankful for texting and picture messages so that my siblings and I can stay in touch. :) I’m grateful for my in-laws and that I love them and they love me. I feel wonderful being in Chris’s family.

I’m grateful for movie time with Christopher — we watched Gattaca (the first ever dvd my family owned when I was a kid) and folded all the laundry, which is great! Grateful for Chris, who got me some chocolate gelato, which made movie/laundry time even better.

AND I’m grateful that our friend told us “the lights are out” and we got to watch the Northern Lights for a couple hours on a dark chilly hill under a beautiful sky. (This picture is obviously not an iPhone picture, like the rest of my pictures these days. Also, with the slower shutter speed, the camera captured a lot more light than we could see with our lovely eyeballs and supervision. We couldn’t see any pink, only green. Nevertheless, twas really beautiful and lovely.) The sky was magical with the northern lights and starry starry night.