Get Comfy.

What a crazy couple of weeks it has been since I last poured my heart and soul out onto this page! 

First of all:  allow me to update you on the hamsters (since I know that is the main reason why anyone reads this anyways, correct??).

I still have 6 in my possession. 
- Carmonika, the original (who looks permanently shell shocked whenever I open her cage),
- 2 blind hamsters (I will elaborate),
- and 3 "normal "(putting that incredibly loosely) babies.

Carmonika I will keep forever.  I have found a home for a blind one and one of the other male hamsters with eyes.  I will keep the second blind hamster and two "regular" ones for my classroom pets. 

OKAY so let me explain the situation with the blind ones.  I THOUGHT I had 2 albino hamster babies because they were pure white and never opened their eyes!  So cute!  Well upon further investigation I realized that they in fact HAD NO EYES.  I did some quick internet research which revealed a genetic abnormality that occurs in these kinds of hamsters due to bad breeding.  Well, "bad breeding" should be the middle names of all of these babies due to how often they like to practice jumping to their deaths from human heights but I will leave that one alone for now.  So basically I couldn't give the blind ones to a pet store knowing they would likely become snake food so they had to stay.  I tried unloading the two regular hamsters I had left in pet stores in Oakville and on friends but no luck!  So I decided to bite the bullet and keep 3 babies (one blind one at home and 2 in the classroom) and give 2 others away to a gentleman in a nearby community.  So now I have DEFINITELY paid for a lifetime membership in the Singles Club and have accepted my fate as the crazy hamster lady.  Thanks guys.

Okay, second thing.  I was going to separate the kids before I left but found out 2 weeks old was too early.  I was able to clean the cage and let the babies out in their playground for a stretch of the legs which was super cute!  It was too early to tell who were boys and girls so I had to leave that until before I left last week (more on that in a second).  Now I THINK I have identified their genders but I definitely had a boy and a girl in the same cage for a period of time and chances are they have mated and I will have 3 billion blind hamsters running around my house.  Honestly, when will my life become easy like the movies? 

Okay SO moving on from hamsters.  Last week Monika and I were offered the last-minute opportunity to go on some Nelson math and literacy training in Val D'Or.  This training took place at the end of last week.  Since last Monday was a holiday and Tuesday was a travel day for the training, we were taking, we decided to make a little "vacation" out of it.  SO Monika and I left on Friday right after work and drive to Oakville and squeeze in a quicky visit with family before heading to Val D'Or which is equal distance from Wemindj (so no extra driving other than down to Oakville).  We made it pretty much intact as the roads have now been affected by the northern winter and were able to spend some quality time with family.  It was a short but sweet visit, I managed to get some wonderful shopping in for Christmas in the classroom and some quality time with BOBO! Then on Tuesday morning we booted it to Val D'Or to check in at our gorgeous hotel The Forestel and explore all that Val D'Or had to offer!

The training was very useful and I learned A TON about guided reading, guided writing and took home some great ideas about using a particular math program in the classroom.  It was a small group comprised mostly of department heads and consultants with a few teachers thrown into the mix.  We shared some great ideas and overall it was a very useful training.  Hearing stories from other schools made me realize (again) how lucky I am to be working at MES in Wemindji.  We have such a dynamic and creative staff and the students are working at full capacity to be successful.  I am so proud of the hard work we as teachers do every day and even more proud of our students for rising to the occasion and trying their hardest to meet the high expectations of the GVC and those which we set for them.  We met a bunch of AMAZING people and friends for life and heard some incredibly hilarious stories about other communities.

Anyways, thanks to my amazing supply teachers, I am looking forward to going back to an intact classroom and good reports.  There are only 6 weeks until Christmas break and it is going to be INCREDIBLY busy with introducing a new guided reading program into my classroom, digging deep into new, fun writing tasks, organizing and participating in the Christmas concert and taking over the school's Breakfast Program officially with Monika.  Oh and raising my grandbabies and possibly my great-grand babies.  Stay tuned.

5:30 on the James Bay Highway - PITCH BLACK.

Babies! The two bottom ones are the blind ones...

Road trip with the hamily!

First civilized meal.  Obligatory McD's stop

Dollarama weeps when I am done with it.

Letting Mama drive the beast.  She found it empowering.  As do I.

OMMMMM

Weather whiplash.

Last supper with my family.  Delish!

My SWANKY hotel room at The Forestel last week!!

I honestly cannot hype Mike's up enough.  I LOVE MIKES.

LOVE MIKES

The Haul - not all mine proud to say!

I hit a bird.

Oh and Flat Stanley came along for the ride.

My lovely note from my wonderful hammy-sitter Carmen!

The new (temporary) set up.  Ladies in the penthouse and gents in the bachelor pad.

My clear driveway. Ahh.

The Unveiling

2 WEEKS!!  2 weeks have come and gone (tomorrow technically but I can't wait any longer!) since my grandhammies have been born.  So much has happened in the past week.  They grew hair! They grew teeth!  They grew eyes!! They wander around the cage, stumbling and bumping into things, exploring what the new world has to offer!  So cute.  I figured it was time to separate when I: a) realized I could no longer control my impulses to cuddle these babies and would need to take care of it stat, b) I saw them eating food pellets (they can survive without feeding off Carmonika) and c) I have to cuddle them.

Carmonika seems to be doing a good job as mother, I feel bad taking her babies away from her but I have to think of the children.  It is getting tight in their house and soon I need to separate the babies further by gender so they don't reproduce!  However that wouldn't be the most upsetting thing to ever happen...

That being said, the MOST upsetting thing DID happen.  This Friday night was the staff Halloween party.  It was awesome, lots of fun with a theme of Superheroes and Villains.  I, of course had the best costume going as The Hamburglar but people really went all out!  It was a lot of fun, good games, good music and great company. ANYWAYS. It was blizzarding that cold and stormy night and I should have known something awful was about to happen (as when it snows something terrible usually is happening in my experience anyways).  As I came home I put down my things, got changed out of my costume into more comfortable attire, grabbed some water and went over to the cage to check on the kids.  I was greeted by a terrible sight.  One of the babies had DROWNED in the water bowl.  DROWNED!!!!! I was DEVASTATED.  I still am.  So so sad.  I remember this baby being a rambunctious chap, running around the cage chased by Carmonika trying to pull him back into the house.  He obviously got a little too explor-y and tried to take a dip in the water dish.  The hamsters are quite small right now so even the small amount of water in a small dish was too deep to climb out of and this poor little feller died :(  So I immediately got him out, cleaned up and refilled the dish with just a small amount of water, hopefully shallow enough that there would be no more casualties. So far so good but the damage has been done. 

I can say with confidence now that I have 5 babies left, 3 albinos and 2 grey/brown ones.  They are adorable and I can't wait to let them run around their fenced in yard and play with their new toys!! And cuddle them of course.  I've got a home for one of them, 2 will go as classroom pets (I have to secure permission first but I think it'll be fine) and that leaves 2 more.  I might keep one for myself but I need to get another cage if that's the case and I am still waiting on an express order from an online pet store with a cage included so that needs to happen! I have to assume that 2 died of natural causes although we will see if I find any teeny bones when I clean the cage tonight.  Ehhh... :S

Otherwise another busy week has passed.  Halloween with the kids was hectic but very fun.  Carmen, Monika and I didn't get very many trick or treaters this year (it was a wet kind of night and we weren't in the best location) but it was fun nonetheless.  Report cards are due this week and I haven't started so that's going to be a lot of fun but that's the life!! Christmas vacation starts in 7 weeks and I am very excited to drive home and visit with all my friends and family and enjoy some time off! 

Last night Carmen, Brandi and Shauna's students held the first of many fundraisers for a summer trip to Nicaragua.  These ambitious and awesome teachers are organizing a trip through Me to We to South America with some high school students to participate in community improvement projects that will benefit that particular southern region and enhance the lives of the locals as well as provide Wemindji students with a life-changing, character building experience.  The monetary cost is high so fundraising has begun on a grassroots level and all help is appreciated!  Contact me if you want more details! 

Anyways I am going to spend the day cleaning, cooking, maybe starting report cards and celebrating the extra hour of sleep I got (although I spent it with a splitting headache so really it counts for nothing).  Oh yah, it hasn't stopped snowing since last week so my hermitism has officially begun!

Dirt pudding for the kid's Halloween party! Yum!

Class-designed pumpkin

My November door! See a theme....

Burgling ALL the burgers.

Monika was Super M! (Or, Marsha's sidekick... HA)

OAKVILLE represent!

Two of the babies!

More babies!!

BABIES!!

EEE!!

Delicious fundraiser takeout made by Carmen, Brandi and Shauna's students.

Hard at work cooking up orders raising tons of money!

My life.

S(NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO)W

Well, it's finally happened.  Snow has officially arrived in Wemindji.  After a few "preparatory" days of flurries here and there - a little tease for the senses - I awoke this morning to a healthy blanket of white stuff covering as far as the groggy eye could see.  I woke naturally to the bright light (wait, BRIGHT?) shining through my blinds.  I knew immediately something was wrong.  This kind of light was something I remembered foggily from my past.  It wasn't a bright-sunlight kind of light.  It was a reflective, ominous kind of bright light. It was... SNOW LIGHT. If you have ever woken up to a fresh snowfall, you know what I mean.  This brightness shining through was not that of the glorious sun.  It was the glow of a trillion tiny snowflakes resting upon what used to be grass, driveway and road. 

Some see the arrival of snow and chilly temperatures as a invitation from Mother Earth to "come outside and enjoy the new and exciting things I have to offer you!", dressed up in a blanket of white, fluffy stuff!  I see it as a rescinded offer to participate in the world.  Well, there used to be a sidewalk here, lets GUESS where it is now and until June.  There USED to be a road here, shrug! Oh you like hopping in your car and driving away? NOT GONNA HAPPEN EVER AGAIN.  And let the season of complaining begin!!!

Luckily I have a family of hamsters to raise which I anticipate will keep me quite busy over the next couple of months.  Yes, I am still proud Goo Goo to a number of baby hamsters plus Carmonika.  I have done quite well if I do say so myself at not interfering with the nest and just peeking through the bars every now and then to try and catch a glimpse of my new hamily!  Carmonika is friendly but cautious, coming out every now and then to eat and prance around the cage for a minute or two.  From what I can see through the bars there are at least 5 babies in there, maybe more.  If any have died I think they would have been the runts and not been murdered.  My theory is if she was going to murder some, she would have murdered all.  Carmonika strikes me as an all-or-nothing kinda gal. 

There is a plus side to all this snow!  I will again become super teacher (locking myself in my classroom where the snow can't touch me), my house will SPARKLE, my freezer will overflow with baked goods and prepared meals, my eyebrows will be plucked DAILY, blog updated with no real news HOURLY, and I can catch up on all my long-neglected TV shows!  Here I come Sons of Anarchy, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, The Borgias, Dexter, Downton Abbey, The Walking Dead!  Who knows, maybe I'll even have time to finished re-watching ER!  Who am I kidding, OF COURSE I'll have time!  Winter lasts 13.5 months here!!

This year's Halloween door!

This was Friday

Epic muffin failure. Don't want to talk about it.

Carmonika watching me watch her.

Neat frost on my windshield! (Neat frost? Listen to me I've lost my mind)

My view for the next 78 months.

Hmm..

GREAT IDEA picking a white car!! How am I going to find this thing in a snow drift?!?

Goodbye stylish summer/fall footwear!!

I am a Goo Goo*!!

*Goo Goo or Gookum: Cree for grandmother.

Never thought I'd be a granny at my young age but stranger things have happened!

Turns out the wonderful gift of a pet hamster I received from from very thoughtful friends has MULTIPLIED. 

See, I knew Carmonika was in her teenage/adulthood years when I got her. I have owned baby hamsters before and they are pretty darn small. Nevertheless she was adorable and I fell in insta-love. It was not until last night while cleaning her cage that I realized Carmonika had gotten FAT. And not just all-over-girlfriend-needs-a-diet-fat. I'm talking her badonkadonk was out of this world. I mentioned to Carmen and Monika that she might be pregnant, and oh how funny would that be!

Jokes on me, tonight after dinner I heard some strange squeaking coming from Carmonika's cage! I lifted her house and low and behold there were 8 BABIES and Carmonika looking fashionably svelte. So I freaked out, called over reinforcements and quickly looked up what to expect when you weren't expecting! Turns out I shouldn't have lifted her home but how else was I supposed to see if there were babies in there/get a quick photo?!

So I haven't touched a thing since other than to give Carmonika some more nesting material. I will wait (ever impatiently) the 3 week period until I can separate and ween babies from mummy and in the meanwhile hope for the best! Mummy hammies can be mighty aggressive when it comes to protecting their young (even to the sacrificial death) so I am hoping she is merciful and lets them live! Cross your fingers!