drained! (not me. our pool)

yep yep. it looks really weird. we had to have some work done on it so we had to drain it. this is the first time in 6 years that it has been completely drained. cool cool.
well, its off to yearbook camp tomorrow for me and some friends that are going to be on yearbook staff next year. it should be fun, but i better go finish packing! :)

adios for now mi amigos! :)

schedules already!

i got my schedule in the mail today. kinda exciting, kinda not.
well here are my classes! people still going to valley tell me if we have any together. people who have already graduated feel free to tell me your opinions of the teacher or class.

semester 1:
1.) yearbook flietstra
2.) AP english brewer (2 full years in a row!)
3.) algebra 2 romberg
4.) chemistry tamminga (i'm relieved!)
5.) AP US bras
6.) study hall streelman (mrs.) (although, i didn't even sign up for a study hall...hummm? could be useful though)
7. honors spanish 3 morales

semester 2:
1.) honors spanish 3 morales
2.) AP english brewer
3.) yerbook flietstra
4.) AP US bras
5.) chem baas (i'm scared...i haven't heard anything too good about him)
6.) bible admiraal
7.) algebra 2 hoekman

i am also taking wilderness challenge, which i'm super excited about! should be fun! :)

so, not much going on here...just plugging away at my summer homework. blah! i hate it!

hope all is well with you all!

later alligator! :)

my arm is dead

okay first let me start out by saying that this is my 200th POST!!! thanks to a friend who got me started on blogging! now i don't know what i would do with out a blog!

anyway, back to the whole my-arm-is-dead-thing. i today was forced into a place that little children fear, that claims to help the sick and keep the healthy feeling well, the place that has a distinct and utterly repulsive smell. anyone guessed it yet? well, the place i speak of is none other than...the doctors office! dum dum dum(going for dramatic effect)! after realizing that i would be gone for both the sports physical days at valley and still needing a sports physical in order to play tennis in the fall, i found myself up at 6:30 getting ready to go to the doctors. little did i know what i was in for. i made my way to the third floor and went in the door labeled "well children". that waiting room makes you feel like you walk right into munchkin land from the wizard of oz, complete with a yellow brick road and little people on the walls. anyway the nurse takes me back, measured me, weighed me and had me read the eye chart (that's another thing: i found out that i have terrible vision, but i still manage to function with out a problem. so, no need for glasses yet! :). then she turns to me and asks me "how long has it been since you have had a full physical?"
"ummm...couple years, i guess."
"oh, then we'll give you a full one instead of just a sports physical today."
"oh, er...thanks" NOT!
so, i got the whole sha-bang today and let me tell you, i hate physicals! i understand why they have to do them, but i don't have to like them. it is soooooo awkward having a doctor look at places i do not display to others. especially when the doctor keeps asking you questions like "are you happy with the way you look" and "have you had any temptations in the following areas? drugs" NO! "alchol" NO! "sex" DEFINITELY NOT!!! what do i look like? then to just put the toppings on the golden spoon (like the expression "icing on the cake", just my version) she tells me i have to get vaccinated for meningitis (no idea how to spell that or even exactly what the stupid disease is)! stupid shot! right in the deltoid so, that is why my left arm is dead. poo! stinky shots! :(

the entire day wasn't horrible, though. i did get to go on a lovely little bike ride up to golden spoon, where i was delighted to see that they had pumpkin pie (my favorite flavor)!

well, i'm going to return to reading now. hope the rest of your days were better than mine! :)

just another day in paradise...

here are the last of my pictures. i like these ones the best! :)

all the under water ones are from snuba diving. snuba is like snorkeling and scuba combined and you don't have to be certified. you just have a mouth piece and an air hose attached to an air tank that is on a raft floating on the surface...pretty cool! it's like you can breathe under water! whats not to love? :) and yes, that is me, just in case you couldn't tell.

the quality didn't turn out great, but hey at least i got some pics.

sitting on the bottom of the ocean is always fun! but no, i don't sink...they put a weight belt on you to keep you from floating up to the surface. so fun!

well, since katie can't snuba (snuba is a funny word) she hung out and drank down some pina colodas! ha ha! no, just kidding! they were all non-alcoholic and she only got a couple of sips, but she wanted more!

jamie and i hung out at the beach together and the salt water was really burning...solution: some cheap sweet looking goggles! we're cool! :)

isn't beach hair lovely?

we had a complementary golf cart at the condo we stayed. notice though how when i'm in the drivers seat it stayed stationary...i'm not to ever be trusted with a golf cart again after my episode 4 years ago. sweet shades though, huh? :)

while i was there i got the best souvenir ever! the world's best t-shirt on the face of this earth! it's my new favorite shirt! it has a happy face with dread locks and it says "smile, mon"! how cool is that? love it! click on the pic so you can see it better.

well, that pretty much concludes my trip to the grand cayman islands! what a fantastic trip it was!

bye for now! or as they say in the caymans: no worries, mon. see ya later!

...and remember, SMILE, MON! :)

days 3 and 4

DAY 3:

this day was completely awesome from start to finish. it started off with this little guy...mr. stingray! actually there were tons of stingrays, not just the one in the picture. we went to a place called stingray city, where there are hundreds of these amazing creatures. this definitely had to be one of my all time best experiences of my life. you see we took a boat out to this giant sandbar in the middle of the caribbean ocean. we not only got to see the stingrays, but we actually got off the boat and swam with them! it was pretty shallow on top of the sandbar so standing wasn't a problem. these guys are not afraid of people either. i've always thought (probably as many people do) that stingrays are kinda out to get you and if they see you they will attack and sting you...not true at all! they are amazingly gentle creatures. from the minute we got in the water they surrounded us. swimming up next to us, through our legs, flapping their fins on you as they swim by you...it was almost as if they were playing or acting like a cat just rubbing up against you. feeding them was also an experience. they have a mouth that is on the underside that is almost like a little vacuum cleaner sucking up the food we offered them. you just put your hand out, they swim over it and you just feel this little suction on your palm...so cool! some of these things aren't exactly small either. most were probably as big or bigger than katie! i got to hold one too. it kinda just swam directly into my stomach and our guide person told me to hold it on both sides. really awesome! i was really bummed that we don't have any pictures of any of us in the water. we were all in the water with them, so no one thought to go get a camera and take pictures...awesome experience though! it really let me appreciate God's creation in a whole new way!

we went out to dinner one night at a really nice restaurant, so we had to get all dressed up.
my cousin, jamie, and i
my cousin, justin, and is girlfriend, seppi.

me and jenna

DAY 4:

i didn't take too many pictures on thursday. mainly because we did wave runners on this day, where it impossible to take a camera (unless it's water proof). i do have an awesome story though. my cousin, jenna, and i buddied up and shared a jet ski. both of us like to go fast and do crazy things. my sister, betsy, accidentally fell off the jet ski and went flying. jenna and i decided that looked like fun! so, what did we do? i got the thing going up to full speed and then turned the handle bars as sharply and fast as i could (i was driving). the entire jet ski almost flipped and we went flying in the air and landed at least a good 10 ft. away...brilliant idea! :) we hit the water hard though, but still totally worth it!

alright, you still have some more fun pictures coming your way so keep checking! :) i have been saving my favorite ones for last! :)

well, i'm off to go play some tennis! bye!

days 1 and 2 of my trip to the grand cayman islands, mon

DAY 1:
on the first day (monday) we all just kinda hung out at the beach and swam in the beautiful water! it was so pretty. it was crystal clear and the wildlife was awesome! right off the beach there were these giant yellow ring things floating in the water that you could sit on and just relax. but who wants to relax when you could attempt to get 5 people to balance and stand on it and then try to knock each other off. it was a lot of fun!


here are some pics of our first day in the caribbean!


katie was just so excited she had her shades on in the plane! what a cutie! :)

this was the water right off the beach where we stayed...beautiful!


this is my little frog friend, who visited our pool.


this was the view from my bedroom. it was right after it rained. that was something else that was really cool...it rained everyday that we were there. not for long, just short storms of rain, thunder and lighting (so cool!). it did pour pretty hard though. very cool experience to swim in the ocean while the sky is pouring rain and lighting is flashing above!

DAY 2:

another fun and very hot and humid day. did i mention how hot it was? it was hot let me tell you. high 90's during the day and low 90's - high 80's at night. playing tennis in that weather is not so good. it looked like i had just climbed out of a swimming pool...gross! tennis was fun though, as always. i did play quite a lot with my aunt, uncle and cousin. one cool thing: they only had clay courts and one grass court; no concrete. grass was very difficult because the ball pretty much just dies so we pretty much just played on clay. my shoes are still red, but it was totally worth it...it's time for some new shoes anyways. totally a blast though to try something new. it's amazing how different the ball bounces! okay enough about my passion for tennis. on tuesday we did alot of snorkeling, which was really cool. we snorkeled a ship wreck that was right off the coast. very neat! some shopping in town as well...but, it was a pretty laid back first couple of days. katie mostly enjoyed peek-a-boo with justin. pics below.

here was her method:

run over to him shouting "again"
put his hands on his face and walk away until he shouted "peek-a-boo"

then of course laugh hysterically and do it all over again! :)

i have a pretty cute video that i might post later.

well, that's all for now! i'll post some pictures with me in then tomorrow. i just didn't happen to have many from the first few days. :)

i'm back

as of 2:00am this morning i am back in nice cool california (ca has cool temperatures compared to the caribbean). let me tell you what a day it was yesterday! we were supposed to get back around 9:00pm, but no. our flight left grand cayman at 1:00 in the afternoon cayman time (11:00 CA). we had a connecting flight from miami to LA and it is only about an hour from grand cayman to miami. however, a huge storm blew in and they weren't allowing any planes to take off or land from the miami airport. the captain comes on the intercom and says it just a minor storm that should only last about 10 min, so we are just going to circle the florida keys for 20 min. 45 min later...circling in a plane is not a good thing for me. especially when circling for 45 minutes! i will spare you the details, but lets just say i had a job keeping my complementary airline snack in my stomach. anyway the captain again comes on and informs the passengers that we will be landing in ft. myers, florida to refuel and wait out the rest of the storm. we land, refuel, and wait, and wait, and wait some more, then we did a bit more waiting. after about an hour of waiting we took off again and flew the 20 min (shortest flight i've ever been on) to miami. by the way we only had a 2hr. layover and by that time had pretty much missed our plane. finally we get off the stupid plane and then had to go through customs where there were hundreds of people (seriously hundreds. i'm not exaggerating. you couldn't move). customs took about another good hour to get through and then we had to get our luggage from the baggage claim. then we had to run through the airport (let me tell you the miami airport is NOT small) to go recheck our luggage and try to get a flight out of there. by this time it was 8:00 (east cost time) and the last flight for LAX left at 8:15. the lady was not very nice about it, but she put us on standby. to make this story shorter i'll just cut to the chase. thanks be to God we all were able to get on the flight and go home. we landed at 11:00 and then did some more waiting, because apparently all the gates were full. we waited on the plane for over an hour. then another hour to get the bags and another to get the car and get home, so that is how i didn't get to bed until 2:30. wow fun times...not! oh, and i had to sit next to this lady, who was nice, but talked way too much. not that i normally mind talking, but you think she would know to shut up when i'm asleep. several times i was asleep and she just started talking to me, waking me up and making me very irritated. but, it's all good.

stories of my actual trip and lots of pictures to come! :)
bye for now!

me very sleepy

lets just say it's going to be a loooooooong day! :)

good bye for now.

i'm off tomorrow!

yep yep! caribbean here i come! we leave tomorrow and i'm all packed and ready to go. i kida had to be since we are leaving super early. we fly to miami, florida from LAX tomorrow morning at 7:30, ick! 7:30 not that bad right? well, the plane leaves at 7:30, meaning we have to get to the airport around 5:30, meaning we have to leave the house at 5:00, meaning i have to get up at like 4:30! not looking forward to that. i don't know about you guys, but 4:30 is like still night time to me. lets just say it will take a little more than just an alarm clock to get me up tomorrow! well, maybe i can sleep on the plane a bit.

not sure if i will have internet access, so if not this will be my last post until next sunday...hopefully i will, and can keep you all updated.

hope you all are doing fantastic! :)

too many things going on...

here is my mini break down of everything that has been happening:

-remember how my cat died (if you don't read two posts below). well, the place sent me a sympathy card. honestly, it was a little over the top...it sounded like more than a cat had died. anyways the thing that really disturbed me was on a piece of paper they put her paw prints. the first thought that went through my mind was "i wonder if they did that before or after they put her to sleep?" *shudder* i'm sorry, but that just creeps me out!

-i played tennis for 3hrs today! that was fun!

-katie has found two new obsessions: the pool and otter pops. preferably otter pops in the pool. today she kept asking for an otter pop. we told her she had to wait and eat it in the pool (so she wouldn't get it everywhere). so, the next thing i know she runs out of the room and comes back holding one of her swimmer diaper things, points to the fridge and says "bu" (her word for blue) informing me she wanted a blue Popsicle, then runs to the door, looks at me and says "da. pool" ("da" is what she calls me). well, the terrible two's are right around the corner...lucky she is so cute! :)

-i, again, cleaned out my closet. i do that often don't i?

-went and saw pirates of the caribbean, for the third time, with my mom and betsy last night.

-went out to lunch with jenny, grace and kelly yesterday.

that is pretty much all i've been doing. i leave on sunday for the caribbean! i'm so excited! not too excited for tomorrow though. i know this guy who runs a painting class and he called me to go and portrait sit for the people in the class. i've done it before and it is super boring! i just have to sit there from 8:45-12:00 not moving while people practice painting. well, it is kinda cool to see how different people paint you and i do get 15min breaks every 45min or so. oh, and some money always helps too! :) so, it really isn't all that bad, i guess. :)

well, adios for now! :)

i won't ever forget to take the trash out again

well, i got to high jump yesterday. that was fun, especially going to the grocery store for my mom 1hr. before i had to be there. yeah, i had to work in order to get the car. well, of course i wanted the car, so i found myself driving to vons 45 min to 4:00 (the time i had to be at HJ camp). there was like 20 things on the list too. oh, but the best part is when i walked in i forgot to get a cart. there was some creepy guy asking for money outside so i didn't want to go back outside for one. i decided to just use a handled one...bad idea. so picture this (i assure you it will be more fun for you if you do get a mental image): i'm running through the isles grabbing my various assigned items for purchase and as my basket gets filled with more and more, it gets heavier and heavier. by the end i'm more attempting to run, instead of running, because of the weight of the basket. people were just staring at me like i was insane. i did make record time and make it by 4:05! :)

okay, so about my title. this is another somewhat amusing story. last night, it was my night to take out the trash cans to the street to be picked up in the morning. ummm....it slipped my mind? :) so, when i realized this, this morning, it was too late and our street had already been picked up. my step dad saw that another street in our neighbor hood hadn't been done yet. so, what did he do? he called someone we know on the street and asked if we could put ours in front of their house. yeah, i got some strange looks here as well. but, i can't blame people. i would stare too if i saw someone walking through my neighbor hood pushing trashcans. yes, a fun experience indeed. i won't forget that again. :)

sad news :(

so, the other day (sunday in fact) the vet called back with the blood test results for my cat. they didn't come out too good and she told us that we needed to take her to an animal hospital. the doctor said that she was in a lot of pain and that the mass in her stomach was a tumor. the only thing they could have done for her was to preform surgery that cost $3,500 and the chances they said of her living after it were slim. the only option was to put her down. very sad, especially because she was so young.
well, i was sad, but i'm doing fine now and sort of at peace about it.

yay! i figured it out!

so, i got myself a youtube account and figured out how to post videos! i'm proud of myself!

rebekah these are for you! :)

personally i enjoyed the second one better (mostly because i'm not in it). the first video is pretty pointless...i was just experimenting how to work this.

enjoy! :)









ya, that was her "running" me over.

fun times! :)

picture time! :)

yesterday julie, rebekah and i hung out at chipotle, goldenspoon and the park! fun fun!



julie didn't want to be in any of the pictures. so, that is why she isn't; i'm sure you all can still enjoy laughing at me and rebekah though! :)





wow! that's attractive...NOT!





strange, strange. but, we had fun and that's what counts! :)

love the face, rebekah! i look like i'm trying to give her a hug. i don't know if any of you noticed this, but we are matching. that is the reason we took this pic (we were going for a surprised look). we didn't even plan it. i walked into chipotle and was like "hey wait a min" same exact shirt in different colors and plaid shorts...crazy!

yes, very strange indeed. i have some pretty sweet videos, but i have to go set up a youtube account...maybe i'll go try and figure it out. :)

peace out! :)

i have some fun pics, but i'm way too tired! well, you will have something to look forward to tomorrow.

sorry for that very pointless piece of info.

hope everyone is well! :)

happy (belated) 4th of july

i'm not slow on the uptake i just wanted to space out the happiness. i can still say "happy fourth" on the fifth cant i? :)

anyway, my kitty cat is sick. we don't know what's wrong with her. we had the vet come today for our dog (we have a mobile vet, who comes to your house in an RV type thing...it's pretty cool they have like a whole set-up in there and they don't have to pay for office space), but my cat has been not looking so good this past week. she has been throwing up a lot (which is gross, but bear with me and just keep in mind: at least you guys don't have to clean it up :p). i have, also, noticed she has begun to lose weight. we had the vet check her out today and they found a mass in her abdomen...not good. we aren't sure what it is, but they took some blood samples and she will have to be x-rayed and possibly have surgery. fun stuff. poor kitty! sad, sad.


on another note: i am really tired for some reason. i took a 2 hour nap today. then when i woke up i was watching my sister watch elmo and just crashed on the floor. i didn't wake up until katie, so pleasantly, sat on my head, started hitting me with her juice cup and screaming "again" to inform me that i was to get up and push play for her....oh, gotta love her. :)

so, i'm going to bed! good night! : )

i'm hot, but i have a cold

it stinks! i feel fine, but i keep coughing and i can't really breathe through my nose...bummer (i sound funny). not too much has been going on today. i went to the car wash for my mom. i went to julie's house and we played nintendo 64 (yes, we are cool) for a while...now i really want to bust out my old nintendo and play it! anyone who wants to join me, feel free because i pretty much do absolutely nothing during the day! sad, sad. what else did i do today? humm... played tennis, which isn't the smartest thing to do when you can barely breath, but i lived. i'm just kinda dead now.

well, i won't bore you any longer...

good bye! :)

my trip to the oh so evergreen state

well, i made it back from seattle today. it was a short trip, but still oodles of fun! i do have to say i didn't like downtown seattle that much; there just wasn't a whole lot going on. i guess you could say it wasn't exactly what i expected it to be. downtown kinda reminded me of a cross between a wannabe new york with some random san francisco type hills here and there. minus the crowds of people. my mom and i went to visit some friends of ours up there, who are actually visiting from london, england. it was good to see them all again and also meet the kids. they have a little girl, who is 3 almost 4, and a boy, who will be 2 in august. oh, side story: since they have been living in england, i think, for about 4 years now (both are originally american) the kids were born there. i love the way they talk! they both have british accents...it's really cute! :) anyway, here are some pics...

nice sign huh?

now tell me. is it normal to have mannequins standing on balconies? ummm...well , apparently in seattle it is.

and if no mannequins are available card board cut out figures of the president will do....strange i tell ya.

AHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WE INTERRUPT THIS EXTRAORDINARY PICTURE SEQUENCE TO BRING YOU SOME VERY CRUCIAL INFORMATION! THIS IS NOT A DRILL! I REPEAT THIS IS NOT A DRILL: A MAD KILLER BEE HAS JUST ENTERED THE BEDROOM OF DANIELLE AND IS ATTEMPTING TO ATTACK HER WHILE SHE TYPES THIS....yes, this would be a good time to leave the room!

alright, i realize you have no idea of how much time has elapsed since, but it has been about 10 unsuccessful minutes of frantic bee chasing. so, i'm pretty much sitting in a room with a bee flying around somewhere. oh well, on with the pictures! :)

we walked around the farmers market, which was pretty neat...the fish was definitely the best part. the smell was disgusting! i also don't like fish though; not that i would like the smell even if i did like the taste, but whatever.

the big highlight of the farmers market for my mom was going to the original starbucks. this wasn't just any old starbucks let me tell you...it was THE starbucks; the first. it originated in 1971 in seattle. now i know the history of starbucks.....yay for me! :) i don't even like coffee.

oh, i also discovered that they have a thing with pigs in washington...very strange indeed.

see, no joke about the pig obsession thing. this is only three of many more that we saw. told you seattle was a strange city.

seattle needle. an observation here: washington is called the evergreen state right? well, little did i know that in fact it has a double meaning. washington=rain everyone knows that so everything is green. it is also called the evergreen state because of its abundance in pine trees.

okay, horrible picture, but i just wanted to give you guys an idea of how light it was at night. i took this picture at 9:45pm! is that crazy or what? it has something to do with being in the pacific northwest or something.

here is craig, elizabeth, jessica, nathen, my mom and me. jessica really liked her fairy costume. :) i had a good time playing with those two.

yep yep! well that was my weekend adventure! fun times! :) hope all is well with everyone!

i suppose i shall now go and attempt at finding the bee that may not be in my room anymore. *sigh* don't worry, i'll remember to bee careful! ha ha ha yeah, so not funny. :) it's been a long day.