A Day in the Life...: much soccer was played, much tackling was done

my first week back was absolutely amazing! after not looking forward to coming back to school and even wondering if Westmont was the right place, I've been extremely blessed to discover that i am absolutely loving this semester so far. i think it really hit me Tuesday night; i was in the lounge with Shannon, Leif and Shea. Leif and Shannon got out their guitars and we just started singing and worshiping. it was so refreshing and it was like at that moment, i knew that God did want me here. so, my first week back was such a blessing and a bit eye opening.
the weekend was full of nothing but activity! Friday night was Clark broomball! we all made our way down to the ice rink and divided up the teams by section. our section's color was purple and Barrett just happened to have purple lipstick handy, which we all used to give our self war paint. great! anyway, it was the Clark burbs vs. the Clark beach (different sections of our dorm buildings). it was so much fun! i did earn a great bruise from landing flat on my back. totally embarrassing. i'm running full out towards the ball, loose my footing and my legs just fly out from under me and the next thing i know i'm lying flat on my back on the ice. i wasn't the only one that fell, though my fall was one of the worst. Barrett totally crashed into a wall, which was pretty great. after broomball we all had a sliding contest to see who could slide the farthest.
when we got back in the cars to drive back up to Santa Barbara, Barrett and i were both expressing our frustrations at the fact that we couldn't run. i said it made me really want to play soccer. so, when we got back to campus, we ran to ask our friends if they wanted to play soccer the next day. they all said they were in. Saturday we had a dorm BBQ to celebrate the new lawn we got. while we were at the BBQ, word spread about our soccer game and before we knew it most of the neighboring buildings had joined our game. it was great! however, many other people joining meant that some of them knew how to play pretty well. Barrett opted for tackling. after the game had finished, Barrett and i got into a full on wrestling match. great way to relieve aggression. our friends were gathered around us, staring at us like we were crazy. Amy and Allison did join in though. by the way, the Allison I'm referring to is Barrett's roommate, not my roommate Allison. after soccer, we just hadn't had enough activity and so we started a game of volleyball. great fun! we rewarded ourselves with chipotle and yogurt land for dinner :)
since soccer was so fun in the sun, we just had to get a game going in the rain! what else do you do with a Monday off when it's raining? the group made our way down to the field to play for a while, which actually turned into more tackling...this time it was even better cause it was in the mud! we also did some puddle sliding. after getting totally soaked, Allison, Reggie and Shannon went back to the dorms, leaving Amy, Barrett, Clara, Leif and i to start a game of soccer. we divided the teams up as Leif and Barrett against me, Amy and Clara. we decided this was good because Leif was the best player and Barrett didn't have very good footing on the slippery rain-soaked field although we all played barefoot, so who knows why. anyway, the game kind of went along like Leif having the ball, us three trying to get it from him and Barrett trying to take anyone out who came near him. we tied at 2-2 and then decided we were way to cold and wet to continue. we got back up to Clark and had to take a few pictures before throwing all of our wet, muddy cloths in the wash together. we figured it would be best to do it all at once instead of putting them in with our other cloths...good thinking.

our great looking-tough picture. l to r: Leif, Clara, Barrett, Amy and me

there. now we are happy :) except Leif....who is exasperated? hiding?

haha...if you look at each of us individually we all look we are staring each other down...except Leif, who looks shocked and Barrett, who just looks scary