Snow has arrived in Alaska. And, with this volume of snow, you now have an opportunity to conduct some fun experiments with snow, make frozen bubbles and make a delicious treat.
SOME WAYS TO EXPERIMENT AND PLAY WITH SNOW
IDEA # 1 – Determine How Much Water Is in Snow.
Ask a family member to help you find a measuring cup around the house. Go outside and fill the measuring cup with snow. Then, cover the top of the measuring cup with plastic wrap so no evaporation will happen. Let the snow melt. Then look at how much water remains in your measuring cup. Ask a family member to help you calculate the ratio of water to snow.
IDEA #2 – Make a Snow Volcano Erupt (outside)
Ask a family member to help you find the following ingredients in the house. Be sure to tell them what you are planning before asking them about the ingredients. You will need a plastic bottle or cup, baking soda, vinegar, dish soap, and food coloring. Be sure to dress warmly before you go outside. Start by putting the cup into the snow and then build up snow all around the cup to make it look like a volcano. The opening for the cup should be at the top.
Put 3 tablespoons of baking soda into the cup. Then add a few drops of food coloring. Add 1 tablespoon of dish soap. When ready, you will add 1 cup of vinegar. Step back and enjoy the volcano show.
IDEA #3 – Make a Snow Treat
When fresh snow comes, all I can think about is making snow cones. Making a yummy snow treat is easy. Start by preparing your ingredients before going outside. Some great ingredients include berries or juice. Before going outside to collect the snow, have a bowl and your ingredients ready. When ready, grab a coffee cup and set out to gather some snow. Look around for an area where the snow is fresh and clean. When you return, act quickly.
Before you start, ask your Elders or family members if there are teachings about the different types of snow and ice you can eat.
IDEA #4 – Make a Frozen Bubble
One of the most fun activities to do in the cold is making frozen bubbles. Ask your family for a mixing bowl. To make bubble solution, you will start by collecting the ingredients and gently mixing these into the mixing bowl. You will need liquid dish soap (1/4 cup), granulated sugar (1/4 cup), and warm/hot water (1.5 cups). After mixing, let your solution cool.
While the bubble solution is cooling, you can make your bubble blower. With a family member, cut off the bottom of a plastic water bottle.
When ready, take out your bubble solution and bubble blower. Be sure to dress warmly. Dip the bottom of the blower into the solution. Then blow slowly from the drinking end of the bottle. If it is freezing outside, you will create amazing frozen bubbles.
CAMP FIRE SPARK
Camp Fire Alaska will be writing a weekly article featuring ideas and activities for youth, teens, and families to do together. Share your photos of making your outdoor snow volcano, snow treats and frozen bubbles. Send us details at [email protected] and use the hashtags #CampFireAlaskaSnow and #CampFireAlaskaSpark in your social posts.
Joe Slowinski, Camp Fire Alaska
Anchorage, AK
Voters sent a message this month, but Alaska already gets it
Earlier this month, voters across the country delivered a strong message that they are tired of government overreach and want a change in direction. In Virginia, New Jersey, Seattle, Minneapolis, and Buffalo, people showed support for parental involvement in schools and opposition to pandemic-related mandates. They also supported increased law enforcement and spoke clearly against government intrusion.
It’s good that the rest of the nation is finally catching on. In Alaska, we’ve been fed up with encroachment of government for a long time.
President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate is blatantly unconstitutional. Already halted by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, which called it “fatally flawed” and “staggeringly overbroad,” it threatens the jobs of workers if they decline to be vaccinated. Biden bulldozed over millions of Americans’ rights and medical autonomy by compelling individual behavior under the guise of a workplace regulation. What’s more, his mandate made no allowance for people who already recovered from COVID-19 and have natural immunity, People should make their own decisions about medical treatment, and independent Alaskans don’t take kindly to having politicians push their way into the provider-patient relationship.
Alaska had by far the highest violent crime rate of any state in 2020, and still there are leftists who want to defund and dismantle police departments. Incredibly, Biden installed Vanita Gupta in a top job at the Department of Justice, despite her Senate testimony a year earlier urging lawmakers to adhere to the Defund the Police movement. In Alaska, we know that people in our most vulnerable communities need public safety protection.
Another great risk to the livelihoods of Alaskans are Biden’s radical environmental policies, which attack our resource industries. On his first day in office, Biden halted the oil and gas leasing approved under President Donald Trump. Biden then worsened the blow by suspending leases that had already been sold, with the Secretary of the Interior, Deb Haaland, leading the charge. And even though he had promised he would defend the massive Willow energy project and its billions of dollars in investment and thousands of jobs, Biden allowed U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason to block it without filing an appeal.
Biden reversed another Trump policy when he returned to the “roadless rule” for the Tongass National Forest. This blocks our ability to attract tourists and produce timber, both of which mean jobs for Alaskans. It was Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack delivering the blow that time.
And finally, the same federal judge as in the Willow case, Judge Gleason, stopped the King Cove Road, which would link Alaskans living in the Aleutians with life-saving emergency medical facilities.
The people listed above have taken direct aim at Alaska’s sovereignty, safety, and prosperity. And all of them have something in common: They all bear the seal of approval from Sen. Lisa Murkowski.
Murkowski paved the way for Biden’s presidency through her outspoken and unrelenting opposition to President Trump, even though Trump won Alaska twice by double digits and enacted policies that were great for us.
Murkowski cast the deciding vote on the Senate floor to confirm Gupta to the Justice Department.
Murkowski cast the deciding vote in committee to move Haaland’s nomination for Interior Secretary to the floor of the Senate, despite expressing “very real misgivings” knowing it would hurt Alaskans.
Murkowski voted to confirm Judge Gleason, calling her a “superb judge” despite knowing her record of supporting environmentally radical positions from the bench, putting her in position to block the Willow project and the King Cove Road.
Murkowski voted to confirm Vilsack as Agriculture Secretary, allowing him to block access to our own forest.
And when she had a chance to cast votes that would actually help Alaska with liberty-minded judges, she voted against confirming Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and voted to filibuster Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
We heard what voters said across the nation earlier this month–it’s what Alaskans have been saying for a while. Government is supposed to work for us, not against us.
The government’s role in our life is supposed to be like the two referees in a hockey game. They regulate the game, call the fouls, and make sure the plays are fair. But right now, we have 200 referees on the ice with sticks in their hands, messing with our puck!
Next November, I will be asking Alaskans to send me to the U.S. Senate because we deserve a leader who will listen to the people, and who will help clear the rink so we can get back to playing the game!
Kelly Tshibaka, Candidate for U.S. Senate
Anchorage, Alaska
