Hays Celebrates Christmas

Like most American stores, Hays couldn't wait for the start of Christmas. (That's partially why we have skipped talking about Thanksgiving and gone onto Christmas!) Starting the day after Thanksgiving, Hays began showing their Christmas spirit by listening to all of their favorite holiday tunes. Among the favorites: Noisy Boise Christmas, Hanson's Snowed In, Mariah Carey's All I Want for Christmas is You, O Come O Come Emanuel, among some others...

In the weeks leading up to the 25th, effort was made to decorate every nook and craney of our house, complete with multitudes of nativity sets, reindeer, lights, stockings, etc.

      

Yule Log

Reindeer

 

Nativity set #2

Nativity Set # 1

Nativity Set #3

A couple of evenings were devoted to baking and frosting cookies. The traditional cookie cutter shapes were perhaps a bit over shadowed by some of the hand sculpted shapes like baby Jesus, the Christmas turd, and a face replica of our support person.
Pictures to follow...

An evening was spent, watching Christmas Vacation while drinking personal quarts of eggnog (a holiday spin on our gallon challenge!)
Picture to follow as well....

1st Grade

The last week of school, the children put on a Christmas program (with a little help from their teachers!) Highlights from the program included a skit made up entirely by the Kindergarten class entitled "Christmas Dinosaurs" and an acrostic poem by the 1st grade (M stands for Mrs. Toe!).

 
Our holiday celebration in Hays wrapped up with a holiday staff party (because let's be honest, no holiday celebration is complete without a holiday staff party!) We tidied our place, and invited the entire Mission Grade School staff over for an evening of festivities which included a white elephant gift exchange. The hot items of the exchange: a mug full of candy, a hat and scarf set in Mission blue and gold, and pair of hand knitted hand warmers.

Halloween!

We know it is now December but when you have halloween costumes as epic as ours were you can't help but feel the need to share it with the world.

Every Thursday is big breakfast day at Mission. This means that Wilma and Chrissy (our lovely school chefs)  prepare a glorious feast that includes pancakes and waffles or french toast.  Along with those yummy carbs we have a sausage patty or link, hard boiled egg and a fruit.  We are also treated with the opportunity to use a fork instead of a spoon and to wash it all down we of course drink a half pint of milk. 

When we were discerning (yes, it was a formal process of discernment) our halloween costumes we wanted to have a group costume idea that the students at the school would really enjoy and some how we decided that big breakfast was our best and most delicious option. We spent many Thursdays secretly conducting research during breakfast and coming up with ideas on how to make our costumes. We also collected some cardboard. 

After many heated discussions we were able to decided how we would split the items up and create the costumes themselves.  David was the french toast complete with beret, Jenny was the 1% or green milk, Harry was the nibbled on sausage patty, Martha was the waffle and Megan rounded us out by being the fork.  We decided the egg and fruit were less essential food items and just ignored them, its not that we don't love them there just aren't enough JVs in Hays to fill the needs of the big breakfast costumes ensemble. 

The costumes were also a huge hit at the Billings halloween party even though we were sans fork. Everyone wanted pictures with us and to watch us dance the night away granted we were not able to sit down or do anything other than dance. We were worried that the other volunteers who have not experienced the Mission tradition but as it turns out everyone loves breakfast.

Needless to say our costumes were a big hit and we still hear mention of then on big breakfast or days when there is green milk at breakfast or lunch. Big breakfast will also never be the same for us. The costumes still reside in our hallway waiting for a chance to be worn again....

What is a sugar beet?

The Biggest Sugar Beet in Chinook!

Way back in September after we won our fiesta station and right before our first area visit there was a glorious celebration of the sugar beet in Chinook. Now you might be wondering what a sugar beet is much like some of us were but that is not important. What is important is the celebration itself.

Every year the town of Chinook comes together in all its glory to celebrate this vegetable but really its just a big block party. The shut down main street and people set up little booths selling crafts and baked goods, there is also a car show and a fun run/walk.

Now we were told this was one of the less exciting festivals in the area but we decided to see for ourselves. We showed up(thats right JVC we showed up!) right in time to register for the fun run and talk with Jackie(a woman who works with us) about the puppies she was selling. We also took the time to stretch out before our race. The race/ walk was great and David and Megan even won some prize gift certificates.

The display of decorated beets

After the race we explored the town stopping at all the little craft booths and talking with people. At one booth there was a husband and wife team selling deep fried oreos.  We stopped for a bit as Megan discussed the art of deep frying with the man who resembled santa claus. He gave us free samples and told us a little about his recipe but would not share all of the ingredients because he uses a top secret recipe.

Dead Beets

Right next to the fried oreo booth was a nice trailer displaying the star of the day, the sugar beet. Apparently people young and old in Chinook, MT take great pride in their sugar beets. There was a contest for the smallest, the biggest, the best carved and the best dressed beet. After marveling at the glory of the sugar beet as an art form we headed to the museums to learn more about the local history and the wildlife of the area.

The Fiesta Station

A couple of weeks ago, the 5^th & 6^th grade class held a Chinese Auction as a fundraiser for their end of the year class trip. The Hays JVs were of course there in attendance for support.

Among the items being raffled off was something called a Fiesta Station. The station is a mini buffet that holds all the makings one would every need when making a burrito or taco. What gives the station it’s fiesta, is that it is in the shape of a vender’s cart and topped with a chili pepper on top!

Destiny intervened that day, in that raffle item # 22 (the fiesta station of course!) went to the raffler #22 – Megan! Since Megan was not present at the time of the drawing, Martha and Jenny were nice enough to not only collect her prize, but also have it all assembled for her when she arrived home later that day.

 

Megan and the other volunteers have wasted no time breaking in the Fiesta Station. The very next day, the station was commissioned for use at the priests’ house for a meal with the new Jesuit novice and the Dominican sisters. Needless to say, the meal had an added zest thanks in part to the station!

The Fiesta Station also made an appearance the week our Area Director was in town to visit. On this occasion, it seemed only fitting that fiesta music be played and everyone be required to dance when the Macerena came on.

In the future, the station may be used for other non-taco/burrito type meals. Since the Fiesta Station has the capacity to either cook or keep items warm, there are a lot of potential meals it could be used for. One idea that is currently in the works is using the Fiesta Station as an ice cream sundae buffet. More will follow on this matter as things develop…

Do it like they do on the Discovery Channel...

The first weekend of October we ventured to the breaks of the Missouri River with Greg and Margaret to see the elk in the nature preserve. This time of year the elk are looking for mates for the winter. The bull elk are “collecting” females for their herds. During this time the males and females can be heard bugling and the males with their ever impressive racks can been seen fighting. Its pretty much like watching the discovery channel in real life.

            When we go there the elk were about 50 feet from the road as they were emerging from the trees and grazing in the grass. As the females stuff their faces the males try and impress them by fighting, bugling and sniffing their hindquarters. We were fortunate enough to witness a miracle in the making as one male had his way with a female after winning her in a brief scuffle. We also watched as two elk locked antlers and a third came in a stole the female they were fighting over.  

Look at the rack on that one!

            Watching the elk is a big thing around these parts. We are asked almost daily if we have gone down to the river to see them yet. Many people go every weekend and it is pretty cool, just a little ways away and all our dreams came true on the first visit. 

Harry's Haircut!

Two weeks ago Harry asked Martha and Jenny to cut his hair. He was thinking it would be great since his parents just sent out his clippers and he would have a nice haircut for the coming week of school. Little did he know that they had another exciting plan... While Harry sat patiently waiting for them to finish making him look oh so handsome they plotted and cut. They cut all but one section on the back of his head near his neck. A few times they worried that their plan would be foiled as Harry reached back to feel the progress. Finally they task was completed. Harry's hair was cut and looked awesome. 

Martha and Jenny managed to give Harry a very stunning tail.  Harry is still sporting his tail two weeks later and the kids at school think its pretty cool and Father Joseph said it looked like a ski slope. Over all the haircut was a success but we will see if he ever asks Martha and Jenny to cut his hair again...

The Gallon Challenge

The JVC year is known for being a challenging experience and our community has been working hard at making sure that we challenge ourselves enough. One of the ways we recently challenged ourselves was by partaking in the gallon challenge.
For those of you not familiar with the challenge, don't assume things too quickly. (We are a dry community afterall!) The challenge involves an individual drinking an entire gallon of milk within a single hour. In our setup, we also added the stipulation that the milk must stay down in the challengers’ stomachs for an hour.
Now not all of us were felt we were up for the gallon challenge. In fact, just the boys and our visiting novice priest felt up to the challenge. The girls, as well as our support person, decided to try what seemed like a more achievable task – the saltine challenge. In this type of challenge an individual trys to consume 6 saltines in one minute.
Despite our strongest efforts, the milk and the saltines seemed to be the champions this time around. Perhaps though there will be a round 2 some time soon!

The Bathroom Challenge

Back at the time of orientation, there was talk of how the kitchen usually ends up being a place of common ground among communities. However, in the Hays community this year this is not quite so. This year, the room that seems to be getting the most attention is the bathroom!

It all started when we arrived in August and we found the essential elements of our bathroom on the front lawn. Granted it worked out nicely for our photo shoot that there were three toilets (one for each girl) and two bathtubs (one for each boy) but now a month or so into the volunteer year, we are all getting a little tired of the potty dances while we wait for our new bathrooms to be done.

To keep our minds off of the wait, we have placed bets on when the bathroom will be done. We are now onto our second set of bets after our first set of dates all past in August. This time around, our bets are going into October. Still some of us are keeping optimistic, with the soonest date for completion being this Friday.

With all seriousness though, we haven't felt the inconvenience of having one bathroom that much. Truly, we are fortunate to have an extra bathroom. The only issue - it's in our basement. And let's just say, that like most basements, it's creepy!

It's especially creepy when you have go in the middle of the night. Oddly enough, we all realized very recently that we all have the tendency of going during the night. Still probability has not played its part yet with any of us running into each other, scaring the living daylights out of one another. Hope is though soon enough the bet will be over and we can stop holding our bladders, and our breathe that we meet a creeper in our basement!

There's a lot going on here...

Be warned this is going to be a very long post to make up for the time since the last one.

Hays Pow wow

            Fortunately the pow wow was later this year, which allowed us to participate in the whole weekend.  The festivities began on Thursday with a youth pow wow.  The youth pow wow was a lot of fun because many of the kids that were dancing were Mission students. We also got a chance to try out our pow wow dancing and got in on a few specials. Four of us participated in the potato dance and we all lost miserably but had a lot of fun.

            The potato dance is done in pairs. The pair must hold a potato between their foreheads while dancing around the arena to a round dance song. Towards the end when all of us were out the announcers called some special moves that the dancers had to follow such as turning around and changing directions.

            Harry and David entered the street dance special and David won for the male dancers. The street dance is regular pow wow style dancing in street clothes. David won twenty five dollars which came in handy since we had not received our JVC stipends yet…

            On Friday night we headed down to the canyon for the first Grand Entry even though it was a little rainy and cold. We bundled up and packed in Margaret’s car and headed down for some fun. The pow wow is the biggest event in Hays and it was great to be there for the whole thing.  As the volunteers we are quite noticeable and we still don’t realize how many people now “know” us.  Everyone comes out to the pow wow so it was nice to be able to meet and see a lot of the students from Mission and their families as well as meet other local people that we have talked about and heard of so far.

            Saturday was the fun walk/run and the Hays Parade.  We got up early and drove down to the canyon for the fun walk/run even though it was still raining and very muddy. We only participated in the one-mile walk/run because we had to get back “downtown” to judge the parade.  Once we completed our run/walk we collected our shirts and headed to pick up our official ballots to judge the parade. After getting our ballots we headed home to make tea, coffee and hot chocolate before claiming our spot across from the post office. We also grabbed a bunch of grocery bags because we had been told of the large amount of candy that would be tossed our way.

            When the parade started we were a little distracted by the excitement of the candy that was being thrown at us and missed some of the horse back riders and had to write descriptions instead of numbers… but we got a lot of candy.

            Saturday and Sunday were also spent at the pow wow. On Sunday Father Bob held mass at the pow wow grounds and two children were baptized which was pretty neat however we were late since church was not right in the front yard.

Beginning of School

            The first week of work was spent preparing for school. We spent long hours at school setting up classrooms and laminating.

            School finally started on the Wednesday after the pow wow August 18^th. The first three days were half days, which is a nice way to settle back into the routine after the summer. Most of the students ride the bus to school and are there by 7:45am.  Almost all of the students eat breakfast at school before the bell rings. The first few days were a little crazy as the students settled back into the routine.  It was a wonderful feeling to be in the new school at the beginning of the new school year.

            The first full week of full-length days was exhausting for everyone but now we have all settled into the routine and each day seems to be better than the one before.

Memorial Rodeo

            The first weekend after school started there was a memorial rodeo for a former volunteers father-in-law who passed away last year.  The family held a youth and over 55 rodeo in memory of their father and grandfather.  The event lasted all weekend and we spent a lot of time there playing with the children and watching the events.  There is a large group of children from that family who attend school at Mission. On Saturday night there was fiddling and jigging in the evening.  We went expecting to be able to maybe jig and listen to the music but it was clear once we got there that we were going to be the source of entertainment for the children for the evening. At one point we helped two of the 5^th grade girls scare the younger children who were setting up their sleeping bags in a tee pee by walking up to the outside and hitting the canvas and as much as the boys want to deny it they screamed louder than all of the girls.

            On Sunday there was a giant feed and give away after church. We stuffed our faces with food before the giveaway and then we were given more food to take home when we helped clean up after the event.

Lewistown Metis Pow wow/ Labor Day weekend

            After school on Friday we set out for our first community camping trip. We drove to Lewistown, which is about an hour and a half from Hays for the Metis pow wow celebration.  We got to Lewistown around 6:30 and were greeted by a group of Mission students as we set up our tent.

            On Friday night were the jigging, fiddle and waltzing competitions along with a giant live auction.  We sat through fiddling, jigging and the live auction thinking that there would be a waltzing competition at the end because Father Bob and Margaret were going to compete. We were excited for this competition because last year Father Bob and Margaret were one of the best pairs and we were hoping that they would take first place this year (they didn’t win last year because the judges thought it would be a conflict of interest) but unfortunately there wasn’t a family that wanted to sponsor the competition this year so there wasn’t a competition.

            After our disappointment in not getting to watch Father Bob and Margaret dance we walked back to the tent to get ready for bed. We layered on many layers before climbing into the small tent for the night.  We were guessing that we would be cold since it has been pretty cold at night lately but the next morning we all admitted that we were warm if not hot during the night.

            On Saturday morning we headed into town to find food and watch the parade.  We stopped at Albertsons where we indulged in free samples and bought some bagels before finding a tree to eat under.  Then it was time to find the perfect parade watching spot.

            As we waited for the parade we searched an awesome antique store for wonderful things that we might be able to afford for the house but walked out empty handed to sit on the curb and wait for candy.  The parade started a little late but it was associated with a pow wow so we were not surprised.  Lets just say the parade was quaint. There were about four or five“floats” in the whole thing.  A float could be consisted a horse, a truck with people in the back, or a trailer with people on it anyway we got to tootsie pops to share between the five of us.

            After the parade we went back to the pow wow for the afternoon and grand entry. The grand entry was also very small but there were a lot of kids and some of our favorite dancers from the Hays pow wow were there.  One of the fifth graders taught us how to dance women’s traditional during an intertribal and David judged the men’s categories.

            On the way home we stopped at a fantastic restaurant called LBM or Little Big Man’s.  They everything you could dream of from pizza to a burger bar.  We quickly mad friends with the wait staff and became obsessed with the idea of a burger bar fight which we were told ahs never happened but we insisted that they should always be prepared and even considered starting the first one just to make sure they were ready. Once we had stuffed our faces at the burger bar we headed home to Hays. 

Week 1

The week started with a long train ride with Debbie, 20 hours to be exact. Debbie was the conductor for our car and she was GREAT. As Harry said she has "sass." This was the nicest train car we have ever ridden in. There were even flowers in the bathroom.
In the sightseeing car there was a man we like to call Big Jim. Big Jim was very impressed with our service work. So much, in fact that he felt the need to buy us coffee and doughnut holes. Also because he was not able to attend church that morning and felt an obligation to contribute to the good Catholic cause. He also taught us about squirrels and mountain goats since the sightseeing was M.I.A.
Upon our arrival in Havre we were greeted by our lovely elderly (but young at heart) support person, Margaret, who welcomed us with a warm hug, groceries and ice cream before dropping us off at our convent. What was once a bathroom is now a very modern and industrial extension of our living room with wires sticking out, two showers for furniture, holes to the basement, no walls and toilets moved to the lawn which made for some awkward first moments after our long trip.
During our first week we toured the town checking out all the local hot spots including Martins, the Boys and Girls Club, Downtown, Mission Grade School and the Canyon. We had a lot of spare time since school has yet to start which allowed us to brush up on the months of Cosmo that was have missed. We were welcomed into the Mission Family through a joyous celebration of Father Joseph's 83rd birthday. At the end of our first night we sat down to an exhilerating game of Banana Grams, compiling words out of letters similar to the way our year will be complied of many memories...