So it's been an exciting past week. Tuesday we had food bank, Jewell and I worked outside giving away the clothes and other donations we had gotten in, that was pretty interesting. We had yet another group staying with us, a youth group from Elizabeth, CO, they were all pretty young. They were working with the Salvation Army during the day and went to the park with our Clubhouse kids on Tuesday and Wednesday night. Jewell and I decided to take the teens to the park on Tuesday, while we were playing basketball we watched this probably 8-9 year old little boy start to attack his little cousin who was maybe 6-7, it was very heart breaking to watch the amount of violence they already know and understand at such a young age. I got to pick up my car from the shop Wednesday late afternoon!! When we got back to ROP we found out we were running Clubhouse because Angelina needed to leave early, and it was a madhouse. We decided we aren't going to be going to the park anytime in the near future, even if we do have extra hands. Thursday morning I dropped Jewell off at Food Bank of the Rockies and I went and picked up kids, Angelina and I were taking a couple of the kids to a ranch in Boulder where they could go horseback riding and be away from the city for part of the day. On our way up there I was attempting to merge onto the highway when I was plowed into from behind. I was going between 10-20 mph, she was going probably between 40-50 mph. Thankfully no one was hurt yet again, Bulldog on the other hand is looking pretty bad. The back fender was pushed into my tires, so I couldn't drive, a tow truck came and towed both of us, and the police officers were wonderful. It was so nerve wrecking being in yet another wreck with kids in my car, I'm so thankful that Angelina was in the area this time. After getting the wreck taken care of we went to Nancy's ranch. The kids got to feed and play with the chickens, and then they learned some of the basics about horses and maintenance of having/riding them. Nancy had me hop on Danny to ride him down to the arena where the kids could ride, it was so great to be on a horse again, it's been such a long time since I've been on one. Danny and I got acquainted pretty fast, he used to race barrels, I was showing some of the girls how you do barrels when Danny I guess decided he was warmed up enough that he took into a full run doing them, it was so much fun. The kids rode around for about an hour and then we headed back up to the house for lunch. I got to deal with the insurance companies, and thankfully her insurance took full liability for the accident, we got me in a rental and headed back to Aurora. I'm pretty sure I've never been more aware of everything going on around me then I was on the drive back. Coffee house went pretty well that night, Ashley came, and I think it was really good for her to get some time for herself without all of her younger siblings. Friday we took the day off and spent it with Angelina at her and JJ's house. We had Margarita Pizza and it was sooo good. We spent the day just hanging out and talking, went for a walk at the park near her house and got some incredibly delicious ice cream from a local place right down the street from her. Friday night, Jewell, Amber, Kaitlyn, and I went out for a girls night. We walked to the 16th Street Mall, which is an outdoor shopping center in the midst of downtown Denver, it's really cool. We ate at Chili's and spent the night just walking around and talking. Saturday was our annual Bikes and BBQ event, which was so much fun. The Christian Motorcycle Association met us at a local park and cooked for everyone and took the kids and adult on rides around the city. The kids absolutely LOVED it!! It was so cool to watch the kids go from scared to getting on the back of one of the bikes to not wanting to get off the back when they came back. It also didn't hurt that I got to go for a ride too, I miss riding and find it so funny that I used to get so mad at Dad when he would talk about getting a Harley. Saturday night Jewell and I ordered pizza and watched Gran Torino and Diary of a Mad Black Woman with Denita. Both incredible movies, I had seen Diary before, it's one of my all time favorites, and Gran Torino was a new watch for me and has become one of my favorites, I highly recommend everyone watch it. Yesterday was a lazy day, after church I picked up Kaitlyn and we went walking through a shopping center, window shopping has become a new favorite past time. Scum last night was incredible!! They did the service completely different from normal, and it was so good. I continually get fed so much spiritually when I go there, I am so happy that I found them. After Scum Jewell, Kaitlyn, and I drove downtown to grab some late night food at Hard Rock Cafe. The food was great and we walked through the 16th St. Mall again. We had a blast talking, laughing, and taking pictures. Jewell leaves on Saturday so we're doing "lasts" right now, and it was a great "last Sunday night". Today has been a slow day, we have a group helping us during the day from Iowa so there wasn't too much set-up work for ROP's food bank. Jewell made me go running with her, which was pretty interesting, after 8 blocks I was pretty sure I was going to die, so I headed back while she ran 3 miles. And now it's just been random office work for the majority of the day. And now I'm off to make dinner for us, I'm going to attempt a random chicken dish, fingers crossed it tastes good!
Muchos love!
Monday, July 27, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Living on Tulsa Time!!
Sorry it's taken me longer to post than I expected, things have been busy. I last left off with the wonderful story of Bulldog's injury. I'm sitting here trying to think of what all has happened between then and now, and I'm drawing a blank and feeling kind of sad, the wreck happened two weeks ago today and I feel like it happened forever ago. On top of which, I've been really struggling lately to remember things, all sorts of things, this is something that really depresses me because I've always had a really good memory and relied a great deal on it for all sorts of different and random things. The rest of the week after the wreck was spent wandering aimlessly between projects from what I remember, nothing too exciting. Jewell, Kaitlyn, and I made two different trips on the weekend. We spent Saturday at Garden of the Gods, got stuck in traffic due to an amazingly beautiful and breathtaking storm, and then had a few of the girls who went to the teen adventure camp come over to go through pictures and pick out which ones they wanted. Sunday we drove to Castle Rock which is about 30-45 minutes away, it has an outlet mall, the main reason we went. We primarily spent our time window shopping and just hanging out, it was a pretty good time. We got back in town just in time to go to Scum and had a great night at the service, as usual. We spent the evening talking and hanging out, playing a couple rounds of Polish Pool, this crazy random game Jewell taught us, it's sooo much fun and very addicting. Monday and Tuesday were spent working at ROP's food bank, which is always interesting. Wednesday we had a staff meeting, which for the majority of I sat and played, rocked, fed, Angelina's baby boy, Daniel, he is so incredibly precious! I love him, he's almost 3 months old. Wednesday was a slow day filled with random projects after staff meeting, I got to take off early though and headed towards the airport. I was nervous about flying out because Denver is so huge, but it wasn't too bad. The flight went pretty well, I sat next to a girl named Evelyn, she's around my age and moved to Colorado from Montana recently, we talked the entire flight about all kinds of things and ended up trading numbers at the end of the flight, I'm hoping she'll start coming to church with us on Sundays, she was talking about not finding one she liked since she moved. During our flight we flew through a lightning storm!! I love lightning storms, and to be flying through one, to get to watch all of the beauty and craziness that is lightning storms in such close proximity and from a completely new angle, was INCREDIBLE!! Dad picked me up at the airport and took me to Whataburger for dinner, it was 11 at night, so I got myself some breakfast taquitos, something I have been craving for a very long while. Tyson flipped when he saw me, yet again and spent the whole night laying as close to me as possible in the bed. Thursday I went to lunch with Grandma and had a great time eating Mr. Mambo's. I feel like since I left the old relationship I had with my Grandma, the one I let slip through my fingers, has been rekindled. We've always been close, she's one of my best friends, but I've gotten busy over the past few years and not made her as much of a priority as I should have and I've taken advantage of having her around. So our quick lunch turned into a really long one and although it limited my time to do other things, I'm glad it happened, and when I do come back in town if you are the person scheduled to hang out with me after Grandma time, I'm apologizing in advance for the fact that I will be late. After lunch I went and picked up Liz Ray and ran a bunch of random errands while jamming out to some awesome 90's tunes! I love being able to be goofy and ridiculous and completely myself when I'm with her, it's amazing. I picked up Sarah, dropped Liz off, and picked up Mom and we headed out for a girls night. Dinner was at Brownies, one of my favorite childhood restaurants, and then we headed to the PAC for Wicked!!! Can I just say that hands down this is one of my top 5 musicals/shows/productions that I have EVER seen. I loved everything about it!!! Friday I had a much needed appointment with my hairstylist, my hair was basically turning blond, and several parts of it were already there, I am now back to my dark brown with a few random purple chunks, that are more vibrant then the last ones, and they have a hint of pink undertones, I like them a lot! I went up to Airco after my hair appointment and spent way longer than expected there jumping from office to office and catching up with everyone. From there I packed up with Heidi and we headed towards the lake. I found out Friday night that Mr. Chicken and Fish was closed for good, a very sad time in my life happened at this moment. Mr. Chick as my family calls it, has been a restaurant in Wagoner for I don't even know how many years, what I do know is that my family basically went there every weekend we were at the lake when I was growing up, and we went to the lake almost every weekend during the summer. We got to the lake house that night only to discover the air conditioner was broken, and it was the one time my dad didn't drive his truck up there, so he had no tools with him to look at it. He called one of our techs who lives in Wagoner and while he came out to fix it Heidi and I took a trek down to the lake to meet an old friend from high school who was out on his fishing boat. He picked us up at the docks and we went out towards the dam and just chilled on the water, it was so amazing, I was so happy to finally be out on the lake, I had been craving it since May. Saturday Heidi and I got up early and fixed breakfast for Mom and Dad and then we packed up to hit the lake. Roberts and John and Sarah came up for the day, we spent the day on the boat, knee boarding, tubing, and skiing. Heidi made knee boarding and skiing look painlessly easy. Heidi and I were the first tubers, and of course we went together. We started out on laying on our stomachs, a few minutes into the ride my lower body had slid under Heidi and into the tube, to try and keep from completely disappearing into the tube, something that has happened before I grabbed the strap on the other side of Heidi by going over her, there are pictures where it looks like I have her in a headlock, but all you can see is her lower body, it was pretty funny. We saved ourselves from flipping several times, and when we finally did it was killer. I think we collided in the air at least 4 times, I felt like I was shoved in a dryer with someone else. We also broke the rope as we got thrown from the tube, it was pretty killer. I somehow managed to get talked back into the tube, solo this time, after about a 3-5 minute run where I fought with everything in me to stay 100% behind the boat I called it quits, normally I'm the crazy daring girl who is swinging out beside the boat trying to catch as many big waves as possible, screaming, taunting, and loving every minute of it, but I was hurting pretty bad. I spent the rest of the time enjoying the boat rides and watching everyone else tube and ski. Dad also taught me how to drive and then let me drive!!!! It was so much fun, very exciting, and also a little nerve wrecking because so many people were out. I'll stick to riding, it's more enjoyable for me that way. We had a huge feast of food that night, mom made all my favorite cook-out foods, from scratch, I love her home cooked meals. Liz came up for the night, we went swimming in the dark without lights, creepy but fun at the same time, we watched Bride Wars and had girl talk all night, it was much needed! Sunday was spent lounging by the pool, eating Bueno, hanging out with people at the church, spending time with my favorite little sister, and dinner with the rentals and some friends at Hideaway before my flight. The return flight to Denver felt miserable, we had a lot of turbulence, and being sore and sun burnt made for me being in not the greatest mood. It took forever to get out of the airport and back home to ROP. Jewell got home from Yellowstone probably an hour later and we exchanged a few stories as we fell asleep. Today was spent helping set up for tomorrow's food bank and getting the newsletter ready to be mailed out. Jewell and I went window shopping at a local outdoor mall and had some random hangout car time with Kaitlyn and Amber right outside of their house. While we were there, a shooting happened right down the street, that was an interesting experience. On that note, I'm heading to bed, it pretty much catches you up to date. I'll try and be better at posting more often so that the posts aren't so long when I finally get around to it.
Muchos love!!
Muchos love!!
Monday, July 13, 2009
Poor Bulldog...
So it's been over a week since I last posted, sorry things have been crazy, absolutely CRAZY!! And every time I think that I do have my life somewhat back in order, something new happens and throws it even more out of whack then it already was. But enough about that and on to the a recap of the past week.
So we left for boy scout camp with the elementary kids on Sunday, instead of 10 we only had 8. I got this talk about how I was representing ROP and was the lead person since it was just me and Luke going/staying for the entirety of the camp and I'm on staff, Luke isn't, talk about pressure and nerve wrecking. We got there early, the first ones to arrive, I'm sure this is shocking for some of you since I was in charge, but I've actually been very good about being on time and early since I've been up here. We got our kids settled in the different tents, yes I said tents, and yes I did sleep in one. The other two groups got there and we got acquainted, Luke already knew the head of Open Doors group so that made things very easy, also Kaitlyn was there which made me super happy!! We had dinner and combined our kids, splitting them into color groups for the week based off of age. Kaitlyn and I got paired up and put with the youngest kids, we had 7 1st and 2nd graders, we were both excited and thought we were going to have a fairly easy time, we couldn't have been more wrong. Everyone went to campfire together and it was great, the kids were loving things. We went back to our campsite and had the kids start getting ready for bed. I got Illiana set up and in bed, she was our only girl, 7 years old and sleeping in a tent with me. As the adults were hanging around making sure everyone was good, Gary, the head of Open Door, called me as being the one that all the kids would go to in the middle of the night because they were scared or what not, I laughed it off not even realizing how right he would be. I told Illiana two different bed time stories to keep her from being scared, made sure 2 of my other boys got to bed okay since it was their first camping experience and then me, Luke, Jewell, and Kaitlyn walked down to the lake to talk and look at stars. We went back up to camp around 11 and right as I was getting settled into bed, Jewell came to my cabin and informed me that Sebastian was throwing up. Sebastian is the cutest and sweetest little 6 year old boy who has been waiting to go to camp for the past several years and was super excited to be there. We got him cleaned up and had the medic give him some stuff, and then we were told he would have to go home the next morning which made him cry and caused my heart to break. After getting all of that taken care of I went back to bed hoping to get some rest when Illiana woke up again and it took me a while to get her back to sleep. Finally thinking I would get some rest I heard a little boy crying outside of my tent, I got up and Elijah was wondering around camp crying because there was a spider in his tent, I killed it and then proceeded to try and prove to him for 30 minutes that it was dead. When I finally got him to sleep I went and laid back down, pretty sure it was nearing 2 at this point. I finally started to fall asleep when Alex, one of my favorites, came and woke me up because he was scared and also was worried about his little brother who was in a different tent, the kids were under very strict instructions to not enter anyone's tents, and Alex is a great kid who doesn't even think about pushing the rules let alone breaking them. These are the kinds of interruptions I got for the entire night and I'm pretty sure I never got more than 30 minutes of sleep at a time. I then got woken up for the day by two of my boys staring at me and poking my face at 6 in the morning. Our first day seemed like 2-3 days. I have never met more stubborn 6-7 year olds. Everything was a negotiation, especially with Elijah, which we later found out he didn't have his normal daily medication. We took the kids through an obstacle course that was built for much bigger kids. Shot BB guns, which is where Angelina called some boy scout out for shamelessly flirting with me and Kaitlyn, which was incredibly hilarious. I got to shoot the staff gun because they didn't have any more of the ones the kids were shooting, and I totally impressed everyone with my amazing shooting skills, no joke, I actually shot a fly that landed on my target, on purpose, the guys were betting that I couldn't do it. Not going to lie, pretty sure I have never been more proud of my country girl skills and totally attribute it to my father and brother, and being from Oklahoma!! We took the kids to the lake, which was a lot of fun, I was so excited to finally be in water, even if it was wading in the shallow end of a pond/"lake", and I got to try and teach some of the kids about swimming and such which I always enjoy. After lunch we had tent time which is basically a time for kids to chill and maybe even take a nap, Kaitlyn and I laid out and tried to work on our tans while Luke and Gary made fun of and played disc golf. It was really good to be able to just sit and chill and talk about life and such, I'm pretty sure Kaitlyn and I are going to be really good friends, we get along so well, I'm so thankful she came into my life and will be here through September. The afternoon was pretty long, we had crafts which went well, then we went to sling shots which didn't go as well, Kaitlyn and I had to step up and enforce some major discipline, after that the rest of the afternoon went pretty well. After dinner was free time, we took our kids up to do tie dye shirts and then took them boating on the lake right at sun down, worst decision we had made. They were great when they were on the water and completely occupied, when we got off the water, things went down hill really fast. I unfortunately had to pull out some major bad cop, mom voice lecture skills and I totally hated it. When we got back to camp they all went straight to bed and when I was hoping to get some down time Alex came to me very worked up and wanting to sleep with me because he was so scared, it was so heart breaking. After what seemed like forever I finally got our set of kids settled in there tents and went to have some downtime with Kaitlyn which turned into us and Luke, then Gary and Gene joined us. We had some great conversation and overall it really helped to settle me. I got woken up a few times during the night, but not as many as the night before and Tuesday went very well with the kids. They were on great behavior for the most part. We packed up to head back home Tuesday after lunch, we stopped at McDonald's to let the kids play on the playground and to try and break up the drive a bit. When we were leaving I had Luke get in front of me because I didn't want to lead anymore and try and figure out a way home when he already knew it since he lives in Denver and is familiar with the area. We were maybe 2 miles from the McDonald's when we were coming down a hill, Luke was stopping for a red light and I tried to stop, my brakes weren't responding, I luckily had enough time to put my car in neutral and pull up my emergency brake in hopes of minimizing the impact. The crash didn't do any physical damage to Luke's car, but completely smashed up the front of Bulldog, we had to pull over because my car wasn't letting me drive. Luke transported Jewell and the kids back to the McDonald's to play while they waited on someone else to come pick them up. I stayed with my car and spent over an hour on the phone filing a claim, figuring out what body shop to have my car towed to, and trying to work out other details of the wreck. I felt so bad for Luke because every time he came back to me I was experiencing another emotion and was trying as hard as I could to hold it all together. We argued about if he was staying with me while I waited on the wrecker and the rental car people to pick me up, he soon realized that there was no way he was going to win, I was way more stubborn he left and helped get the kids back to the center for our Tuesday evening programming. Enterprise finally picked me up and got me set in a car, luckily rentals are a part of my coverage and I don't have to pay for them. I got back to ROP where Luke and Jewell had made me dinner and were waiting to cheer me up, which basically turned into rag on Dena time. It was good though, it made me feel like I was back at home and hanging out around the guys. Angelina took each of the kids home and talked to the parents about what had happened and the support the parents offered up to me was so touching, I was terrified about what their responses were going to be, but there wasn't a bad one. A few of the parents were more worried about how I was doing and feeling more than anything. I'll post more later about how the rest of the week went, but I need to get some sleep, so I'm leaving you with some pictures of poor Bulldog.
Muchos love!!
So we left for boy scout camp with the elementary kids on Sunday, instead of 10 we only had 8. I got this talk about how I was representing ROP and was the lead person since it was just me and Luke going/staying for the entirety of the camp and I'm on staff, Luke isn't, talk about pressure and nerve wrecking. We got there early, the first ones to arrive, I'm sure this is shocking for some of you since I was in charge, but I've actually been very good about being on time and early since I've been up here. We got our kids settled in the different tents, yes I said tents, and yes I did sleep in one. The other two groups got there and we got acquainted, Luke already knew the head of Open Doors group so that made things very easy, also Kaitlyn was there which made me super happy!! We had dinner and combined our kids, splitting them into color groups for the week based off of age. Kaitlyn and I got paired up and put with the youngest kids, we had 7 1st and 2nd graders, we were both excited and thought we were going to have a fairly easy time, we couldn't have been more wrong. Everyone went to campfire together and it was great, the kids were loving things. We went back to our campsite and had the kids start getting ready for bed. I got Illiana set up and in bed, she was our only girl, 7 years old and sleeping in a tent with me. As the adults were hanging around making sure everyone was good, Gary, the head of Open Door, called me as being the one that all the kids would go to in the middle of the night because they were scared or what not, I laughed it off not even realizing how right he would be. I told Illiana two different bed time stories to keep her from being scared, made sure 2 of my other boys got to bed okay since it was their first camping experience and then me, Luke, Jewell, and Kaitlyn walked down to the lake to talk and look at stars. We went back up to camp around 11 and right as I was getting settled into bed, Jewell came to my cabin and informed me that Sebastian was throwing up. Sebastian is the cutest and sweetest little 6 year old boy who has been waiting to go to camp for the past several years and was super excited to be there. We got him cleaned up and had the medic give him some stuff, and then we were told he would have to go home the next morning which made him cry and caused my heart to break. After getting all of that taken care of I went back to bed hoping to get some rest when Illiana woke up again and it took me a while to get her back to sleep. Finally thinking I would get some rest I heard a little boy crying outside of my tent, I got up and Elijah was wondering around camp crying because there was a spider in his tent, I killed it and then proceeded to try and prove to him for 30 minutes that it was dead. When I finally got him to sleep I went and laid back down, pretty sure it was nearing 2 at this point. I finally started to fall asleep when Alex, one of my favorites, came and woke me up because he was scared and also was worried about his little brother who was in a different tent, the kids were under very strict instructions to not enter anyone's tents, and Alex is a great kid who doesn't even think about pushing the rules let alone breaking them. These are the kinds of interruptions I got for the entire night and I'm pretty sure I never got more than 30 minutes of sleep at a time. I then got woken up for the day by two of my boys staring at me and poking my face at 6 in the morning. Our first day seemed like 2-3 days. I have never met more stubborn 6-7 year olds. Everything was a negotiation, especially with Elijah, which we later found out he didn't have his normal daily medication. We took the kids through an obstacle course that was built for much bigger kids. Shot BB guns, which is where Angelina called some boy scout out for shamelessly flirting with me and Kaitlyn, which was incredibly hilarious. I got to shoot the staff gun because they didn't have any more of the ones the kids were shooting, and I totally impressed everyone with my amazing shooting skills, no joke, I actually shot a fly that landed on my target, on purpose, the guys were betting that I couldn't do it. Not going to lie, pretty sure I have never been more proud of my country girl skills and totally attribute it to my father and brother, and being from Oklahoma!! We took the kids to the lake, which was a lot of fun, I was so excited to finally be in water, even if it was wading in the shallow end of a pond/"lake", and I got to try and teach some of the kids about swimming and such which I always enjoy. After lunch we had tent time which is basically a time for kids to chill and maybe even take a nap, Kaitlyn and I laid out and tried to work on our tans while Luke and Gary made fun of and played disc golf. It was really good to be able to just sit and chill and talk about life and such, I'm pretty sure Kaitlyn and I are going to be really good friends, we get along so well, I'm so thankful she came into my life and will be here through September. The afternoon was pretty long, we had crafts which went well, then we went to sling shots which didn't go as well, Kaitlyn and I had to step up and enforce some major discipline, after that the rest of the afternoon went pretty well. After dinner was free time, we took our kids up to do tie dye shirts and then took them boating on the lake right at sun down, worst decision we had made. They were great when they were on the water and completely occupied, when we got off the water, things went down hill really fast. I unfortunately had to pull out some major bad cop, mom voice lecture skills and I totally hated it. When we got back to camp they all went straight to bed and when I was hoping to get some down time Alex came to me very worked up and wanting to sleep with me because he was so scared, it was so heart breaking. After what seemed like forever I finally got our set of kids settled in there tents and went to have some downtime with Kaitlyn which turned into us and Luke, then Gary and Gene joined us. We had some great conversation and overall it really helped to settle me. I got woken up a few times during the night, but not as many as the night before and Tuesday went very well with the kids. They were on great behavior for the most part. We packed up to head back home Tuesday after lunch, we stopped at McDonald's to let the kids play on the playground and to try and break up the drive a bit. When we were leaving I had Luke get in front of me because I didn't want to lead anymore and try and figure out a way home when he already knew it since he lives in Denver and is familiar with the area. We were maybe 2 miles from the McDonald's when we were coming down a hill, Luke was stopping for a red light and I tried to stop, my brakes weren't responding, I luckily had enough time to put my car in neutral and pull up my emergency brake in hopes of minimizing the impact. The crash didn't do any physical damage to Luke's car, but completely smashed up the front of Bulldog, we had to pull over because my car wasn't letting me drive. Luke transported Jewell and the kids back to the McDonald's to play while they waited on someone else to come pick them up. I stayed with my car and spent over an hour on the phone filing a claim, figuring out what body shop to have my car towed to, and trying to work out other details of the wreck. I felt so bad for Luke because every time he came back to me I was experiencing another emotion and was trying as hard as I could to hold it all together. We argued about if he was staying with me while I waited on the wrecker and the rental car people to pick me up, he soon realized that there was no way he was going to win, I was way more stubborn he left and helped get the kids back to the center for our Tuesday evening programming. Enterprise finally picked me up and got me set in a car, luckily rentals are a part of my coverage and I don't have to pay for them. I got back to ROP where Luke and Jewell had made me dinner and were waiting to cheer me up, which basically turned into rag on Dena time. It was good though, it made me feel like I was back at home and hanging out around the guys. Angelina took each of the kids home and talked to the parents about what had happened and the support the parents offered up to me was so touching, I was terrified about what their responses were going to be, but there wasn't a bad one. A few of the parents were more worried about how I was doing and feeling more than anything. I'll post more later about how the rest of the week went, but I need to get some sleep, so I'm leaving you with some pictures of poor Bulldog.
Muchos love!!
Sunday, July 5, 2009
I Need My Country!!
So I'm going to try and get completely caught up in this update because I leave tomorrow for yet another camp and won't be back until Tuesday night sometime, and I'm coming back to a crazy busy week!!
I left off at going to dinner with people from Scum, and like I said it was INCREDIBLE!! I love that church and all the people associated with it, it has been such a blessing from God finding Scum. We got back home pretty late Sunday night so we didn't get a chance to meet our roommates for the week. However we got the chance at 6 am Monday morning when they started playing Chopsticks on the piano in the room next to mine and Jewell's, and we have ridiculously thin walls. We picked up some of the kids for VBS and then spent the morning inside talking with Angelina about this and that. The group had lots of teens and were super organized so we really didn't have to do anything, it was nice. Angelina gave us the day off, so we went to Friday's and had lunch and hung out. I took Jewell back home to work on stuff for her class and I went shopping for some clothes to wear to Matti and Luke's banquet. Funny story, earlier in the day I shipped all my nicer clothes, make-up, and jewelry back home because I wasn't wearing or using it and my space is super small, then I got a text saying the dinner was semi-formal, talk about a scrambling panic. I got back to the building with like 30 minutes to get ready, normally totally do able, not with 15 high school girls in the same bathroom though. The banquet was in an old spaghetti house, it reminded me alot of Spaghetti Warehouse, but not as delish! After the banquet and saying goodbye to Matti, Jewell and I made a much needed Target run, I left some of my toiletries at camp since I left in a rush. When we got back home, the bathroom was a mess. Like a complete and total mess, pretty sure there was at least 1/2 inch of water on the floor, all of the floor. The girls had tried to use our towels, and my bathrobe to clean it up, and the topper of it all was they used our shampoos and stuff. Needless to say we were livid but all we could really do was laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. After we slip slided around and got it all cleaned up we talked to their leaders and got it somewhat worked out. The next morning we didn't have to much disturbances, Angelina let us have the early morning off and we got to VBS around 11 and started making lunch for the kids, nothing like feeding tons of kids spaghetti that you threw together at the last minute. Angelina had a meeting with all of the teens after lunch so Jewell and I got to keep our eyes on 30 plus kids playing on the playground. This is when we learned that Jewell is totally not an authoritative person. I had to address an issue with two of the girls and sat them in time out, when tons of the kids went to the two separate areas I asked Jewell to clear one out while I did the other, when I looked at her area like 5 minutes later I'm sure there were double the kids she was originally clearing out. I think I was there for like 10-15 seconds and they were all away from the tree, it was a little funny in retrospect. After camp finally got over and we got all the kids home, Jewell and I headed back to the center for some downtime before Coffeehouse. When we got back I found the shower area of our bathroom a mess again and mine and Jewell's cabinet was open. This is the place that we keep the majority of our toiletries and our towels, it's behind a curtain in the back of the bathroom. When I went to close the cabinet and clean up the area I noticed that my toiletry bag had been dumped out, that's when my day went from long to crappy! I realized my make-up bag and make-up brush bag, my brand new face moisturizer, and the stuff I use when wearing my hair curly were all gone. I'm pretty sure I hit total freak out mode and started asking everybody if they had seen it, I've pretty much turned the entire building and my car upside down twice trying to find them. Needless to say that I have come to terms with the fact that it was all stolen and I won't being seeing it again, which kind of sucks because I keep realizing some of the things that were in the bag, like my favorite pair of earrings I got in Hawaii, or my favorite pair of tweezers, or the fact that my bag was super cute! After dealing with the wonderful trauma of having something so huge stolen from me, we decided to hit the streets to advertise Coffeehouse since no one was attending that night. Wednesday Angelina had the day off so Jewell and I were the leads for the VBS, we made like 80 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and once again I got to play the disciplinarian. It seemed like the never ending day. Luckily Vicki decided we could have the night off so we attempted to run errands, which took forever and we got nothing accomplished except for getting very frustrated. After getting back and grabbing a late dinner I decided I needed to go for a drive. I decided to head towards a Macy's and prayed to make it before closing in hopes of accomplishing one thing on my list, acquiring the basic make-up necessities. I made it and met an incredible woman who helped me after hours and was absolutely wonderful. From there I stopped for some late night comfort food and had a wonderful conversation with my favorite Sarah, love how talking to her can mellow me out. I resolved by the end of the night to have a great Thursday. Jewell and I spent Thursday at Food Bank of the Rockies as per our normal routine. It was a little weird not having Luke and Matti with us, but we managed. The morning was pretty slow and we got the agencies done pretty fast so Amanda put us in one of the freezers to clean it out and get it organized for her. And of course the day she does this is the only day I have ever worn shorts instead of jeans. All morning long we had been joking with Jarvis, one of the warehouse guys on fork lift duty and totally mine and Jewell's favorite, about him stealing out lunches. So Jewell and I go to get our lunches out of the fridge, and mine is gone. I'm pretty sure after I looked everywhere I had to have the most defeated look on my face and Jewell didn't know if she should laugh or be mad for me. I grabbed a bag of Cheetos, a water, and sat down half laughing half crying at the irony of everything. Some of the staffers at Food Bank had bought pizza and they graciously gave me some when they found out my lunch was stolen. When we got off we hit the grocery store, it was here where Jewell discovered the entire lining on the back passenger of my door had started to fall off. I sat in the rain, laughing, as I slowly pushed it all back into place. We got back to the center and were about to start eating dinner when Vicki asked me if I could go pick up one of the girls across town for Coffeehouse. I had to leave immediately not getting any real down time or dinner. Coffeehouse was incredible despite how hungry I was! After we got done with Coffeehouse and got everything cleaned up and people out of the building I crashed pretty much immediately, didn't even change. Friday we got to sleep in and were supposed to have training at noon, which got pushed back to 6. After we got done with our training Jewell and I decided to go grab a movie to watch while I got stuff ready in the kitchen for our 4th celebration. Instead we realized the fireworks hadn't gone off at the Rockies game yet so we headed downtown, got parked and started walking towards the stadium. The fireworks were INCREDIBLE!! It was hands down the most amazing show I have ever seen. We got back and I made a "firecracker cake" and a few other things for our cook-out for the 4th. Which brings me to today. Got to sleep in which made me pretty happy, Luke got here around noon and we loaded up and headed to the City Park of Denver, found a spot close to the water and attempted to grill, our grill however ran out of gas halfway through the burgers. I got elected to go ask the group across from us to cook our food which they graciously did as they proceeded to try and set me up with two different guys in their family, one getting ready to be the first to graduate from college in the family, the other a divorcee with a kid. But in other news, the random seasoning they put on our burgers was the most delicious seasoning I've ever had. We attempted to throw a Frisbee and not get attacked by the geese, I fell in the mud several times and quickly came to the terms that I was just going to be covered in mud. We packed up from the park around 3:30 and headed towards Commerce City, making a pit stop for more hamburger meat and gas for our grill at Target. We staked out a pretty good spot next to the soccer field and were getting settled as it started to pour down rain. Luckily Luke backed my car in to the spot right next to our area so we had a quick get away to the car. We hung out in the car for a while as the storm passed asking got to get to know ya type questions. When the storm finally cleared we played Frisbee for a while on the field trying to stay warm...it was freezing!!! We made so much food and spent some time giving it away to all the different workers and security detail at the festival, which was fun to get to do. The mechanical bull wasn't working, which made me severely sad. The firework show was decent, but stopped randomly half way through due to "technical difficulties" and is supposed to be rescheduled for a couple of weekends from now. Then the fun started, I realized in the moving of our blanket at the beginning of our show, I had lost my car keys. Did I mention we were on top of a hill with no real surrounding lights, Jewell luckily found them after looking for about 5 minutes. Overall the day was pretty successful, had good times with some new good friends, despite our arguing over listening to country. It seems very few people here like country, and the people who can stand to listen to it for even a song or two are few and far between, so needless to say I'm going a little crazy and missing it. However I made Jewell and Luke listen to Brooks & Dunn's "Only in America" on our way home tonight and Luke said it was a good song, to me it's just not the 4th without that song. And now that I'm caught up I'm going to check on my clothes so I can pack for camp and hit the hay, and try and get some rest before going to Adventure Camp with 10 of the younger kids.
Much love.
I left off at going to dinner with people from Scum, and like I said it was INCREDIBLE!! I love that church and all the people associated with it, it has been such a blessing from God finding Scum. We got back home pretty late Sunday night so we didn't get a chance to meet our roommates for the week. However we got the chance at 6 am Monday morning when they started playing Chopsticks on the piano in the room next to mine and Jewell's, and we have ridiculously thin walls. We picked up some of the kids for VBS and then spent the morning inside talking with Angelina about this and that. The group had lots of teens and were super organized so we really didn't have to do anything, it was nice. Angelina gave us the day off, so we went to Friday's and had lunch and hung out. I took Jewell back home to work on stuff for her class and I went shopping for some clothes to wear to Matti and Luke's banquet. Funny story, earlier in the day I shipped all my nicer clothes, make-up, and jewelry back home because I wasn't wearing or using it and my space is super small, then I got a text saying the dinner was semi-formal, talk about a scrambling panic. I got back to the building with like 30 minutes to get ready, normally totally do able, not with 15 high school girls in the same bathroom though. The banquet was in an old spaghetti house, it reminded me alot of Spaghetti Warehouse, but not as delish! After the banquet and saying goodbye to Matti, Jewell and I made a much needed Target run, I left some of my toiletries at camp since I left in a rush. When we got back home, the bathroom was a mess. Like a complete and total mess, pretty sure there was at least 1/2 inch of water on the floor, all of the floor. The girls had tried to use our towels, and my bathrobe to clean it up, and the topper of it all was they used our shampoos and stuff. Needless to say we were livid but all we could really do was laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. After we slip slided around and got it all cleaned up we talked to their leaders and got it somewhat worked out. The next morning we didn't have to much disturbances, Angelina let us have the early morning off and we got to VBS around 11 and started making lunch for the kids, nothing like feeding tons of kids spaghetti that you threw together at the last minute. Angelina had a meeting with all of the teens after lunch so Jewell and I got to keep our eyes on 30 plus kids playing on the playground. This is when we learned that Jewell is totally not an authoritative person. I had to address an issue with two of the girls and sat them in time out, when tons of the kids went to the two separate areas I asked Jewell to clear one out while I did the other, when I looked at her area like 5 minutes later I'm sure there were double the kids she was originally clearing out. I think I was there for like 10-15 seconds and they were all away from the tree, it was a little funny in retrospect. After camp finally got over and we got all the kids home, Jewell and I headed back to the center for some downtime before Coffeehouse. When we got back I found the shower area of our bathroom a mess again and mine and Jewell's cabinet was open. This is the place that we keep the majority of our toiletries and our towels, it's behind a curtain in the back of the bathroom. When I went to close the cabinet and clean up the area I noticed that my toiletry bag had been dumped out, that's when my day went from long to crappy! I realized my make-up bag and make-up brush bag, my brand new face moisturizer, and the stuff I use when wearing my hair curly were all gone. I'm pretty sure I hit total freak out mode and started asking everybody if they had seen it, I've pretty much turned the entire building and my car upside down twice trying to find them. Needless to say that I have come to terms with the fact that it was all stolen and I won't being seeing it again, which kind of sucks because I keep realizing some of the things that were in the bag, like my favorite pair of earrings I got in Hawaii, or my favorite pair of tweezers, or the fact that my bag was super cute! After dealing with the wonderful trauma of having something so huge stolen from me, we decided to hit the streets to advertise Coffeehouse since no one was attending that night. Wednesday Angelina had the day off so Jewell and I were the leads for the VBS, we made like 80 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and once again I got to play the disciplinarian. It seemed like the never ending day. Luckily Vicki decided we could have the night off so we attempted to run errands, which took forever and we got nothing accomplished except for getting very frustrated. After getting back and grabbing a late dinner I decided I needed to go for a drive. I decided to head towards a Macy's and prayed to make it before closing in hopes of accomplishing one thing on my list, acquiring the basic make-up necessities. I made it and met an incredible woman who helped me after hours and was absolutely wonderful. From there I stopped for some late night comfort food and had a wonderful conversation with my favorite Sarah, love how talking to her can mellow me out. I resolved by the end of the night to have a great Thursday. Jewell and I spent Thursday at Food Bank of the Rockies as per our normal routine. It was a little weird not having Luke and Matti with us, but we managed. The morning was pretty slow and we got the agencies done pretty fast so Amanda put us in one of the freezers to clean it out and get it organized for her. And of course the day she does this is the only day I have ever worn shorts instead of jeans. All morning long we had been joking with Jarvis, one of the warehouse guys on fork lift duty and totally mine and Jewell's favorite, about him stealing out lunches. So Jewell and I go to get our lunches out of the fridge, and mine is gone. I'm pretty sure after I looked everywhere I had to have the most defeated look on my face and Jewell didn't know if she should laugh or be mad for me. I grabbed a bag of Cheetos, a water, and sat down half laughing half crying at the irony of everything. Some of the staffers at Food Bank had bought pizza and they graciously gave me some when they found out my lunch was stolen. When we got off we hit the grocery store, it was here where Jewell discovered the entire lining on the back passenger of my door had started to fall off. I sat in the rain, laughing, as I slowly pushed it all back into place. We got back to the center and were about to start eating dinner when Vicki asked me if I could go pick up one of the girls across town for Coffeehouse. I had to leave immediately not getting any real down time or dinner. Coffeehouse was incredible despite how hungry I was! After we got done with Coffeehouse and got everything cleaned up and people out of the building I crashed pretty much immediately, didn't even change. Friday we got to sleep in and were supposed to have training at noon, which got pushed back to 6. After we got done with our training Jewell and I decided to go grab a movie to watch while I got stuff ready in the kitchen for our 4th celebration. Instead we realized the fireworks hadn't gone off at the Rockies game yet so we headed downtown, got parked and started walking towards the stadium. The fireworks were INCREDIBLE!! It was hands down the most amazing show I have ever seen. We got back and I made a "firecracker cake" and a few other things for our cook-out for the 4th. Which brings me to today. Got to sleep in which made me pretty happy, Luke got here around noon and we loaded up and headed to the City Park of Denver, found a spot close to the water and attempted to grill, our grill however ran out of gas halfway through the burgers. I got elected to go ask the group across from us to cook our food which they graciously did as they proceeded to try and set me up with two different guys in their family, one getting ready to be the first to graduate from college in the family, the other a divorcee with a kid. But in other news, the random seasoning they put on our burgers was the most delicious seasoning I've ever had. We attempted to throw a Frisbee and not get attacked by the geese, I fell in the mud several times and quickly came to the terms that I was just going to be covered in mud. We packed up from the park around 3:30 and headed towards Commerce City, making a pit stop for more hamburger meat and gas for our grill at Target. We staked out a pretty good spot next to the soccer field and were getting settled as it started to pour down rain. Luckily Luke backed my car in to the spot right next to our area so we had a quick get away to the car. We hung out in the car for a while as the storm passed asking got to get to know ya type questions. When the storm finally cleared we played Frisbee for a while on the field trying to stay warm...it was freezing!!! We made so much food and spent some time giving it away to all the different workers and security detail at the festival, which was fun to get to do. The mechanical bull wasn't working, which made me severely sad. The firework show was decent, but stopped randomly half way through due to "technical difficulties" and is supposed to be rescheduled for a couple of weekends from now. Then the fun started, I realized in the moving of our blanket at the beginning of our show, I had lost my car keys. Did I mention we were on top of a hill with no real surrounding lights, Jewell luckily found them after looking for about 5 minutes. Overall the day was pretty successful, had good times with some new good friends, despite our arguing over listening to country. It seems very few people here like country, and the people who can stand to listen to it for even a song or two are few and far between, so needless to say I'm going a little crazy and missing it. However I made Jewell and Luke listen to Brooks & Dunn's "Only in America" on our way home tonight and Luke said it was a good song, to me it's just not the 4th without that song. And now that I'm caught up I'm going to check on my clothes so I can pack for camp and hit the hay, and try and get some rest before going to Adventure Camp with 10 of the younger kids.
Much love.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)