something to think about

alright, remember how i said (maybe you don't, so i'll say it again) that i would post later about mr. westrup's metaphor for our night hike since i wanted to do it justice? well, that is what i'm going to share with you all in this post. take note i still won't do it justice, but better than it would have been.
so, on our little hike through the darkness (with no flashlights) you can pretty much only see what is a few feet in front of you. you know, you can make out shapes and stuff, but sometimes things may look scary in the dark that wouldn't if you looked at them in daylight. all you can really do is follow the path and trust the person leading you. but why do objects like trees or rocks look frighting at night? well, just simply because we can't see them clearly...the dark holds the unknown, which can be intimidating. this is exactly like life here on earth. we don't understand everything there is out there, but when we get to heaven we will know everything and see everything clearly as if the sun had risen and showed us what those "scary" unknown objects were. we also must put trust in our leader of life (God) to lead us along the path He has in store for us. so, if you have an issue in life that you are anxious about, just remember that God has your back and you will understand everything in time. patience is a virtue (side note: my mom used to say that to me when i was little and i always though she was telling me "patience won't hurt you" haha! well, it works...both are true :). anyway i just wanted to share that since i thought it was pretty neat.

hang in there! half way through the week everyone! :)

joshua tree in pictures

storm clouds on friday morning! nice and dark












this is friday afternoon at shortwall, so as you can see the storm cleared out pretty quickly.



















this is from the top of shortwall












here is morbid mound from looking out from the top of shortwall. click on it to make it bigger and you can see a small group of people standing near the base of it...near them is the face i climbed.




































that's me climbing morbid mound! almost to the top! notice the amount of layers i'm wearing...it was cold, but look how blue the sky is! so beautiful!













leaving j-tree








hope you enjoyed the pictures!
scroll down for the written version of my trip! :)

joshua tree!

hello everyone! hope your weekends were all as amazing as mine was! so, are you all ready...better get nice and settled in you seat because this post is going be be a long one ( there, i warned you).
so, we all met at school at 6:45 thursday night to get loaded onto the bus and head out to j-tree. nothing too exciting on the ride up...i slept. :) when we arrived it was absolutely freezing, dark (hopefully you figured that one out) and windy! the tents were already set up, so we all piled our stuff in. by the way, the girls all had one tent for six of us. big tent, but still a little cramped...no worries though. we sat around the campfire for a while, worshiped and then it was off to bed. so nice to climb into a nice warm sleeping bag. we all said our "good nights" and just as i was drifting off a huge, let me emphasize HUGE gust of wind just comes up and completely collapses our tent on top of us! haha! it was absolutely hilarious! mr. westrup comes over with a flashlight and tied it back up for us. good thing too or else we would have been soaked. around 1:00am the predicted rain started. it lasted utill around 9:00. we woke up to the sound of rain and everyone tried to huddle together and stay dry under a tarp while the infamous cheese pancakes. mr. westup made me try some and actually they weren't that bad...you kinda get used to them. anyway, the rain finally stopped, we packed lunches and half of us headed out to short wall while the other half went to morbid mound, which really isn't very morbid. at shortwall i was taught the proper way to set up a system! yay! lots of knots. fun stuff. half way through the day the two groups switched locations. so, morbid mound was where i did my first climb on real rocks! pretty exciting! and i absolutely loved it!
friday evening was a bit colder than thursday, so i stayed close to the fire. when we got back i had a little bit of free time while others were preparing dinner, so a few of us went into the tent and i decided i would just lie down for a second under my sleeping bag just to get warm. the next thing i knew i was out and didn't wake up till it was dark outside. ha! i must have been tired. after dinner, we went on a night hike, and that was probably one of the most amazing experiences ever! i also saw three shooting stars that night! incredible! standing out there looking at the sky really makes you realize how small you are, yet God still cares so much about you. during our hike we decided to turn off all our flashlights, so it was pitch black. mr. westrup had a really good metaphor for this in regards to life, but i want to do this metaphor justice, so i will have to wait on it since i have limited time right now. when we returned from our hike we saw that mrs. fieldhouse had arrived, so getting to see her and talk with her was a treat!
the next day was the migz competition, which was a blast! full of running all over the place, getting wrapped up in webbing, setting up systems, climbing blindfolded and much more! oh, and can i brag for just a sec? my group consisted of two guys and another girl, who didn't want to do the blind climb. three group members had to do it, so that left me and the two guys. neither guy wanted to go first (let alone at all)...psh wimpy boys! i guess it takes a woman to step up and do it. i was proud of myself. :) it was fun...i think that was probably my favorite station.
well, that's pretty much all for now...i'll post some pictures up in a little bit and then some more stories later...i've gotta get going on my hw! yikes!

awesome weekend though!

so long, farewell

i'm off to j-tree for the weekend! i'll post lots when i get back! i'll be back on saturday night, so no too long.

gonna be fun!

hope you all have an awesome friday! :)

have you ever experianced...

coming home to your house after school and having all the doors wide open and it full of people you don't know (family is not around) all whom are wearing little blue booties on their shoes. sounds like a bad dream huh? but, no it was reality. my mom volunteered our house for the Valley Christian home tour yesterday. so, my family all had cleared out, but i had homework, so not much i could do there. it was pretty funny though to walk in carrying a bunch of stuff and just mosey on through like i owned the place (oh, wait i kinda do in a way...well my parents do, but i do live here). after people had realized that i did live here they started asking me questions like "where do you guys keep your tv?" or things about my family like how many siblings i have and their ages. the funniest thing was an elderly lady looking at one of our family pictures, then she looks at me and says "you know, you look a lot like this girl in this picture." uh, well, that's because that is me, but i didn't say anything. haha! the only slightly awkward part was to have people walking through your room while trying to write an english essay, but whatever. it was fun i guess to talk to them about some of my pictures and stuff.

well, i'm off to do homework, but that's okay since i don't have school on friday! wilderness challenge trip! going to be so fun! :)

weird, i just looked outside my window and some crazy creepy looking fog just rolled in. one minute it's all sunny and bright and then next its duh duh dun! (going for dramatic effect). i've seen this type of stuff in movies. its dark and foggy and then something bad always happens...

now i know why santa has elves

so he doesn't have to do all the work that the holidays bring! :) there are so many things happening...december is a busy month! mostly all good things though. i have a lot to look forward to in the next few weeks. of course christmas is always fun and with friends and family coming to visit, it's even better! next weekend is also my first wilderness challenge trip! going to be so much fun!
but, yikes...where has time gone? i really have to start christmas shopping...ugh! decisions, decisions. anyone want to make it easy on me and tell me specifically what they would like? and don't say nothing (as long as it's in my price range) haha! :)

oh, i don't know why i just thought of this, but did i tell you guys about me totally eating it? haha! no joke. saturday night at the christmas parade thing we were trying to make our way down 2nd street through a mass amount of people and i tripped over a step in the sidewalk. the next thing i know i'm lying flat on the pavement with a bunch of people staring at me. how embarrassing is that? i seriously got up and ran. haha oh, man. so sad. my knees have bruises on them, but other than that it didn't hurt.

adios for now mi amigos! :)

i can see clearly now the rain is gone

random title, i know. but, i can see now! i picked up my new glasses last week. yeah i know i'm hot...what can i say? actually, no just go ahead and say it...i look pretty dorky haha! :)
good thing i only have to wear them in class to see the board!

:)

happy december everybody!

december is finally here! i love this month! anyway, we kicked off december with a christmas parade. actually we had to be in it, since my step dad is on city council. we got to ride on a fire truck down 2nd street and wave at all the people...how funny! of course this had to be on the coldest night of the year so far! it was freezing! fun though and we got dinner after at open sesame...always delicious.

picture time!

katie all bundled up and playing on a golf cart before the parade started

my cousin, justin, and sister, betsy, drinking hot chocolate...yum

wow...uh i've got some nice wind-blown hair going on in this picture :)

well, that was my saturday night :)