Baby Seal!

Hi family and friends,

First of all we must welcome two of our cooperating teachers, Erik and Shoe! I am sure you have heard these names before- they are two high school teachers from the Gustavus area and have worked with the college on numerous accounts. They observed us today and will be with us until Wednesday. Our MN Barrow family is growing :) Michele we also be added on Saturday.

Today was an exciting day for us middle school teachers. We left school at 2:30 (just finished teaching for the day) and went to find a polar bear someone had spotted by our dorms! Though we did not get there in time, we did see a baby seal! A nice man on a snow machine drove by and pointed it out to us from a distance. Now here is where the story gets good :) Standing about 20 yards from the seal we assumed there was a small hole into the ocean that it had popped out of for a minute. Wanting to get closer for better pictures, Steve suggested someone crawl over to it, mimicking an adult seal and go in for a closer look at the scene. Rach volunteered, got on her stomach (in the snow), and began to slither her way to the seal. She truly looked like a seal- nice work Rach :) She would stop every few seconds when the seal would look up (it was lying on its side), and then continue on her journey. Once she was close enough (Eric joined her), they realized that the baby seal had no where to go and we could all simply walk over to it! I felt like we were filming a 'man verses wild' video, it was classic. We then all walked over the seal and took pictures. After talking with other towns people, our guess is that the seal was dragged in by a fox, but not killed. Later we were informed that some men picked it up and went to bring it toward the end of the ice/ocean for its own safety. Good luck baby seal.. Steve said it looked about a week old.

After dinner, we watched and participated in the NYO (native youth olympics) at the high school. All i can say is to google NYO and see what amazing events these students do! We tried to participate- key word is "tried," and it was pretty amusing to say the least. Everyone picked which events we would have the best chance at :) Us ladies, Eric, and Steve went to the band concert after NYO practice and watched the two middle school band groups perform (beginner and advanced). It was nice to see so many other teachers at the concert :)

We are all excited its Friday tomorrow- it has been a much busier week now that we are teaching more (if not full time) in the classrooms. I am looking forward to sleeping in on saturday! We have all wanted to crawl back into bed these last few mornings.. Anyways, soak up the heat and sun for us, I get jealous when i hear about the nice days you have been having!

molly