A long trip...And too much to do!
Hello My Friends,
I am sitting at home listening to BT and 30 Seconds To Mars (music picked up from Tarons…If you haven’t heard “Echelon” by 30 Seconds To Mars, then d/l it…Very cool. Reminds me of A Perfect Circle). I got home Wednesday night, after an exhausting plane trip. The two weeks I spent at their house was strangely short and over long before I wished. But it also seemed long. It’s been forever since I’ve heard from you; I hope you’re doing well and are having a nice time, where ever you are and whatever you’re doing. I’m doing pretty good, but very busy and overwhelmed. Eheh. I suppose I’ll tell you about the trip, though there will be a lot of Tarons in it…
I got on the plane to head up to WA on the 26th of July at 8-something in the morning Eastern time and remained on planes until 1:45 pm Pacific time, swapping planes once in between. I sat next to a couple nice guys on the LONG ride (4 ½ hours, no movies or anything b/c the plane wasn’t equipped for them…which was really lame. >: ). One was from Seattle and heading home and the other was from FL and taking a vacation like me. The Seattle guy told us a lot about WA, so that was cool and we all talked a lot. I’m glad I had someone to talk to or otherwise I would’ve died of boredom. I finished my book on the shorter plane ride (2 hours from Atlanta to Dallas, TX; the second one was from Dallas to Seattle) and a walkman is only so entertaining for so long.At the Seattle airport my baggage was late and I missed the first airporter bus I was supposed to take to Bellingham and had to take the 3 pm one (which actually worked out better for Philip and Laura, who picked me up, b/c Philip got to work a little later and pick up Laura before he picked myself up). I had to borrow a cell phone to call the Tarons and notify them that I would be late, and the girl I borrowed it from was Asian and didn’t speak English well. We had fun trying to talk to one another and use sign language and she had this cool little computer that we could type words into and it would translate them. She was very friendly and cool. When I got to Bellingham Philip and Laura were there to pick me up and we drove to the Taron’s house, to be my home for two weeks. I got my first real sight of the Cascades and Mount Baker out of the car windows as wind turned my travel-grunged hair into a flying mop and the sun glared at me even through my sunglasses. They’re so beautiful! Our “mountains” are like hills compared to them. I was impressed with the mountains, the awesome way that all the evergreens grow in a cone shape (in GA they grow all over the place. So weird, but farmers have to shape the X-mas trees. LOL), and how wonderfully cool it was. Coming from GA where dressing in ANYTHING is painful, the weather in WA is so great – I was comfortable that first day even dressed in black pants and a black ¾ shirt. It was very neat. Anyway…
When we got to the house, I was greeted with a screamed “Ashley’s here!!!” and a hurried gathering as the car drove up. After getting out, everyone kinda stood there for a second before I broke the growing silence and silliness by giving T, and then everyone else, a big hug (BTW, giving a guy who is 15+ inches taller than you a hug is extremely hard without looking stupid. In case anyone ever wants to know. :P). After that I got a tour of the house and we unloaded all my stuff and talked and ate supper and went to bed late after playing a cool game of Apples to Apples.
I got told I was different than expected (even T says I was different from a year and a half ago when she and Cadet came to my house) and was impressed at how well I’d predicted most of the Tarons that I hadn’t met to be. But I think everyone likes me, so that’s cool. The only people who were a bit different to me were Philip and Mitch but I wasn’t too surprised by anyone, thankfully. :D Being around the Tarons made me feel small and rather dumpy…Even Lyd is taller than I am now, by like ½ an inch or something, and Seth is working his way up. :O It’s rather depressing. But I got used t it fast…Just about EVERYONE is taller than I am anyway, so what does 6 inches or so matter? :P
Anyway, the next morning I was up before any of the other girls, but after everyone was up we decided to go on a walk out to the cliff and down to the creek. It was quite an adventure…Sarah, Laura, Michael, Kayla, me, Cadet, and Lydie all went. Mitch and I took plenty of pictures (which I’ll have up on a Yahoo! Photo Album ASAP for everyone to look at). We went out up through Pipeline and into a huge awesome pasture after inspecting a neat structure that Luke Haas (friend/neighbor of the Tarons) was building. We found blackberries along the way and ate some (they were REALLY good – huge and sweet and juicy) and then went to the cliff. The path was so grown up we all HAD to go down it…I was just sure I was going to either fall or else throw up from the effects of vertigo, but no, I reached the bottom safely and without incident other than being freaked out. LOL. Laura was dreadfully afraid but we all accomplished the task. We then went down to the creek and had fun playing around and getting wet. The bottom of the creek is a perfect mix of mud and sand so that it isn’t gross and squishy or nasty and grainy either. :)Laura and Sarah went ahead and we lost them; we assumed they’d continued along the creek since Laura had left her shoes, and so after putting our own shoes on and grabbing hers, we walked along the bank and kept calling them, to no avail. After awhile Kayla goes “Whoa, what is that?!?” and I bend over the grey bedraggled lump to find that it is a half-grown baby bird, obviously quite hungry. Mitch, T, Cadet, and Lyd quickly found some grasshoppers(Lyd was best at catching them) while I held the poor fellow. After we got a couple down him he started to perk up and look around. Eventually (after pooping everywhere, naughty fellow) he was crawling around and flapping on his own power and we decided that, regardless of where Laura and Sarah were, it was late and we needed to go home. So we went home, only to find Susie and Laura already there…We fixed up a cage for the birdie, and, after searching vainly to find out what kind of bird he was, Lyd demonstrated the zip line for me (looked very scary and I never did end up getting to try it) and we caught lots of little white moths for the bird (he loved them) and after a cooling swim in the pool and dinner proceeded to start packing for the Edmonton trip (and guess who was dumb enough to leave the Canadian money she’d brought with her behind? LOL. Yes, I am an idiot sometimes). We stomped mole hills, cleaned the house and Cadet mowed the lawn and Mitch weed-eated (or is it weed-ate? LOL) and we all took showers and all that good stuff.
We got up at 4 am to pack the van and we left at about 6 am. I sat between Mitch and Dube on the front seat. We talked and took pictures and enjoyed the wonderful mountains after getting safely over the border. We had lots of resting spots and the trip was very enjoyable. We stopped at a really nice little park for lunch. There was a railroad alongside the road for nearly the entire way through the mountains. Lyd really enjoyed that b/c she likes trains a lot and we saw TONS of trains! We drove through the Cascades and the Rockies. It was really awesome. Mitch shared an earphone of his iPod with me and introduced me to some really good music (Counting Crows actually are a very cool band – I had always thought they did rock-pop and cheesy lyrics, but no…The lead singer does a really good job. The lyrics are awesome and he makes them so vulnerable, emotional….Ah. I really like them now. :D). We spotted this one formation in the Rockies that looked exactly like a huge man sleeping on his back on the top of one of the mountains – it was incredible how real it looked! We even saw fingers on his hands. :) We drove through a couple rainstorms while we were in the mountains and another once we got into AB and down onto the flat land…We stopped to eat at a restaurant before we got there…I split a sandwich with one of the girls (they were BIG and we’d sorta been snacking all day). We got to the Elossaises in time to see the sunset and take lots of pictures (Mitch has a really cool one up on his blog – michael.taron.net; check it out!) and get ourselves acquainted with the older gals. The Elossaises are very cool people and we all really really really liked them. :) All the Taron girls and I slept on the floor in the big room and stayed up talking for awhile. The next morning we got up and showered and ate breakfast (very good and prepared specially by the Elossais girls) before heading out to the local zoo to check everything out and meet the Grounds family. We had a good time there and I got some pictures that I’ll try to get up with everything else. The animals were nice and entertaining and we left about an hour ahead of schedule to make sure we’d get to the church gathering on time and maybe be able to help with set up. However, since we got lost and it took us an hour to get there, we were just on time. LOL. I met lots of new people and got to hang out with some long-time-but-no-see friends for a bit. We had lasagna and salad for dinner. I met Char Barrow for the first time and that was really cool even though we didn’t get to hang out much. She was a lot like I expected her to be – she’s beautiful and just darn awesome and I’m going to have to make another trip up to Edmonton sometime to get some real time with her. :) (Hey, Chot, if you take the time to read this – I love you girl and I mean everything I’ve said. I AM going to figure out how to get up there next summer/spring.) Michael got some cool pictures (my camera battery was dead :( ) that I’m hoping I’ll get soon; we’ve agreed to swap pictures so we both get everything. I have to make up a CD for him first though. Hehe. I went home with the Wagner family and Vicki Flewelling to sleepover with Melinda and Vicki. The younger Wagner children all thought I had wings, due to a conversation that took place some months ago in which they were told I was flying up from GA. “All by herself?!?” “Yes.” “I can’t wait to see her wings!” Or something to that effect. At any rate, I had thought it would be a cool idea to create a set of wings and wear them, b/c I was sure they’d be really disappointed if I came without wings. So Kayla had been a wonderful dear and made me some really cool fairy wings – black, of course – and we’d pinned them to a favorite shirt for me to wear on Saturday, at least so that they could see my “wings”. They thought I was the coolest thing this side of the Rockies and held me in a state of awe and stared at me all Saturday morning. LOL. On Saturday morning the Weirchowski (I hope I’m spelling that right – please forgive and correct me if it’s wrong) family came over for a late breakfast. They are an awesome family and I really like Beka and Micah – we had tons of fun and hope I will get the chance to spend more time with them sometime soon. They’re both funny and cool (I LOVE YOU GUYS!) and we had fun talking and telling life stories. Hehe.
We then got into the vans – I rode with the Weirchowskis so no one in the Wagner van would have to double buckle, and got introduced to some cool opera-style music – and rode to the Saturday get-together site. I met even more people that hadn’t been able to make the Friday evening get-together and got tons of weird looks and questions about the wings (LOL…It is so fun shocking people :P) and got to hang out with the Tarons some more, before the cook out (I was still stuffed from breakfast and didn’t eat anything but a few strawberries though). Afterwards I walked around with Char, Ann, Trin, Ang, Ben, Trahern, Hannah, and Evangeline and we hung out in a nice air-conditioned building for a while…Then I decided to change out of my wings and put on something cooler…Those wings were acting like the sails on one of those dinosaurs and attracting sunlight or something.After that I went and found everyone playing volleyball. I suck at volleyball, but Mitch convinced me that I should at least try to play, so I did, playing very badly and dropping out when I cracked my knuckles in a failed attempt to thwack the ball over the net. LOL. Sports are always the same for me…I never practice them enough to get any good at them, though. :( I sat with Irene and we watched the game and chit-chatted for a little while before deciding to take a walk. We took a LONG walk and talked of many things, both small and great. We came back in time for the Psalm-sing and that was really fun. I went back with the Wagners again, and apparently missed out on a really fun time with the rest of the older people, who stayed out til 2 am at a coffee chop, talking and stuff. Argh. Oh well. It was said that I was missed, so I am comforted in that. :P Not that it wasn’t fun staying at the Wagners – We watched a movie and then Melinda showed me some really funny LOTR things that people had messed up (Like pathetic attempts at putting subtitles on pirated versions of the movies…Oh man, that was hilarious) and some drawings of LOTR people done by fans, some of which were good, others bad, and some so bad they were silly and funny. :P So it was cool. We went to bed late and got up relatively early (8 am) to get showers and everything in preparing for worship. The Tarons, minus Kayla and Cadet, who had stayed over with the Weirchowskis, came over for lunch before dinner and to talk with the Wagners. Mr. Wagner is a very cool guy and very knowledgable. We left to get to the building in which we were to have worship around 1:30 pm I think. I sat with the Tarons for the service. It was a cool sermon and there were 4 children baptized and communion served. A very nice and also very LONG service. I helped with set-up of the meal and tables/chairs afterwards and got to talk to Irene some and also afterwards during clean-up, which was very nice. I talked to lots of people after the service and had lots of fun. Shawn Anderson gave me the most incredible compliment ever received by my humble self and I am very grateful to him for it (Thankyou!). It made my day twice as awesome as ever. I went back with Tarons to the Elossais’ house and we all stayed up really late talking with the girls and signing their signature books (Seth ended up falling asleep on the loveseat) and then we girls stayed up even later talking amongst ourselves. All of the Elossais girls are so cool I really don’t know how to describe them, other than cool and sweet and funny and wonderful hostesses! They’re very awesome. We had to get up early Monday morning to take our showers and pack the van and say goodbye to everyone. Irene came over to spend a little while with us and say good bye to me; it was hard for me to let her go though... I don’t hold up well saying goodbyes, alas. Saying goodbye to the wonderful Elossais family was difficult, too. Saloum was being his adorable self and I was holding him a good portion of the time. He liked to crunch his face against mine and squash my nose flat. LOL. He is a “Ticklemonster” and is a very sweet kid. Manuel was very quiet and cute the whole time and quite shy; he never did really warm up to any of us girls. I think he liked Michael though. We finally got ourselves situated in the van. The trip home seemed much longer than the trip towards Edmonton. We took more pictures of the mountains and even got some of this elk that was grazing right on the side of the road! Mitch and I were bored enough that poor Philip probably got a hundred pictures of him taken – he was sitting in front of us and convenient. LOL. The little girls also got lots of pictures taken of them. Hehe. Some of them are very cute and will have to be put online soon. We traded seats around quite a few times on the trip home; the backseat people were very cramped and suffocated and wanted more room and air. We got back to the house safely and were greeted by Darren Harr and his dog Heidi (Heidi is currently living at the Tarons since the apartment Darren is living in doesn’t allow pets). We quickly decided that it would be best to just go to bed and to unload everything in the morning, so we promptly headed to bed.
On Tuesday we cleaned up the house, did laundry, cleaned up the van, and went to see Charlie and the Chocolate factory. I liked the movie. The music and effects were awesome and the acting great and it is much closer to the real story book than the old musical version. I love Johnny Depp, and he does a wonderful job playing Willy Wonka. The movie is just disturbing enough to get you a little and funny enough to make up for the disturbing parts. Very cool, very clean, and highly recommended by myself if you’re in a light mood. :)
From Tuesday to the weekend the days are all a kind of blended euphoria for me…I was very happy and having fun and it all mixed together and now I don’t remember what we did on which days. Eheh. I know we swam a lot, picked blackberries and some of the girls made pie, I remember shelling peas and watching movies and staying up late, and I think it was on Friday that Mrs. Taron took T and I to this really cool little store called Treasure Cove where I bought all my siblings gifts and some jewelry for myself and a silver ring for Teesy.
On Saturday Philip, Sarah, Michael, Kayla, me, Cadet, Lyd, and Seth took a hike up to Lake Ann near Mount Baker. We started out well on what was supposed to be a 9 mile there-and-back trail. On the way down into a valley Mitch expressed what I was thinking better than ever I could when he said “Some things are just so beautiful they make your heart hurt.” It was the most lovely place I’d ever been in my life. We took tons of pictures and Mitch and I were frequently left behind because we had the cameras and kept stopping to take the pictures. We crossed over several streams that, of all things, had leeches in them. There were flies everywhere down in the valley and Sarah, Lyd, and Seth decided to go back about halfway through. They took the water with them and poor Philip ran all the way back from giving them the keys to the van and then we didn’t have any water to give him. We toiled up a huge rock field without any water and finally decided that we’d get some from the next fast-moving stream we came across. I believe we’d have had heat strokes if we hadn’t gotten some water from one. There was no shade and we had to go up and up and up without a respite from the valley floor over the mountain to get to the lake itself. We did make sure that it didn’t have leeches in it first though. LOL. It tasted of rocks and moss, but wasn’t bad at all. A couple of us almost gave out before we got to the top. We played in the lake and splashed ourselves and took a good rest before heading back. The last stretch was awful on the way back – our water ran out again and my lungs died. I acquired a dry hacking cough as a reminder of just how unfit I was to be climbing around in the mountains and it still hasn’t completely left me, over a week later. Pretty sad. The other people were really glad to see us – Seth was very cute, dancing around for joy. They had gotten back several hours before and were quite thoroughly bored, I’m sure. We were all thankful to get in the van and rest our tired legs and lungs and drive home. :)
We realized suddenly that I was leaving on Wednesday and that we still had a bunch of trips that we needed to squish in together to get them done. Sunday was smooth and restful and I tried sauerkraut with some really yummy sausages for the first time and actually liked it, much to my surprise. Cadet and Lyd and I climbed up into the Sparrow Spire and sat and talked awhile before making a shaky climb down a rickety old ladder. Then on Monday we got up early and Philip took us to get Cadet and Lyd their dresses for the wedding and then down to Seattle. t was me, Philip, Sarah, Mitch, Kayla, Cadet, and Lyd, and we all had tons of fun. We spent the morning at this really cool outdoor mall and ate lunch in the van before driving to Seattle. We had a ton of fun there. We saw the Space Needle and went into the Experiment Music Project buildingand looked around. We got hot and sweaty after walking around outside a bit and went down to this really cool, really huge, fountain. T and Cadet and Susie and Lyd all went down and got soaking wet, while Philip, Michael and I all decided it wasn’t worth it and stayed on the outer rim. I have some very cute pictures of the other girls though. :P We then walked to downtown Seattle and checked out the awesome shops and went into the convention center. It was so cool…There were plants everywhere, in the building and hanging down the walls and everything. It reminded me of the legends of the hanging gardens of Babylon. It was just beautiful. We rode a train back to the EMP building and being quite tired, drove home.
On Tuesday Philip was kind enough to drive T and I to Vancouver to visit Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design, where we’d like to go to university together. It is a very nice facility and in a wonderful neighborhood. Granville Island is possibly one of the coolest cities I’ve ever experienced. Kayla and I were both very impressed and would like to start in fall 2007, if possible. It seems such a long ways away, but I have to finish high school and we gotta get good jobs and figure out all the ins and outs of financial support and help. I will probably be moving to WA in the summer of 2007 to get settled in, Lord willing that everything goes well. Please pray that this will be possible and that God will help us make this happen! After getting home we ate dinner, I packed and we watched a final movie together. We were going to have to leave at 3 am to take me to Bellingham to get on the airporter bus and it was already almost midnight so we just decided to stay up. Mitch and I went downstairs and made a bunch of cool music CDs to listen to on the plane while Philip put their entire music collection on DVDs for me to take home. I now have a bunch of new favorite bands since going to their house. Hehe. Counting Crows, Liquid Tension Experiment, Nightwish, Renaissance, among others. :P Though I’m also still faithful to my old loves, Stratovarius, Sonata Artica, and lessers. The truly great will never fade. I took a shower and then we Cadet, T, Lyd and I all sleepily fought to stay awake. Cadet and I did the best job, talking about everything and nothing important. Before long though Mrs. Taron was whispering that it was time to get going and we shook Lyd and T and climbed into the car. After getting to the Bellingham airport we stood around the bus shivering in a strong cold wind and hugging each other goodbye. The bus driver yelled he was ready to go and we slowly let each other go in the torture of a sad goodbye and I climbed aboard. I managed to get a few winks of sleep on the bus before we got the Seattle. I bought coffee and breakfast at the airport Starbucks and sat read The Great Hunt (from Robert Jordan’s Wheel Of Time series) while waiting for the boarding call. My first flight was 4 ½ hours long and I finished the 600+ page book during the flight and broke out my CDs and walkman for some entertainment. I tried to sleep but as I was on an aisle seat people kept whacking me in the head and waking me up as soon as I dozed off. :( We got to the airport late and then another plane was in our gate so we had to wait for nearly 30 minutes for it to remove itself before we could get in. I rushed across the airport and into a skytrain to take me to the concourse I needed to be in (the Dallas airport was set up by morons, BTW. It takes a train to get anywhere there b/c all of the concourses are not only separated by huge distances but they are also split in half with huge distances between the halves and no way to walk to your destination at all, much less get there on time, so that you HAVE to take a train, and regardless of train or not, it takes forever. Absolutely insanely stupid.) and got to the gate just at the time the plane was SUPPOSED to leave (3:37 pm). However, due to all sorts of delays, including inclement weather in Atlanta, the plane was still sitting at the gate and not due to take off for another hour. So I got to eat lunch and wait on the plane and talk to this nice old lady and this one really cool guy (he was really good-looking, too…) for a while before we boarded. And then once we got on board, the pilot radioed to us that we weren’t going to be allowed out of the airport for another hour. So I called my dad and told him my plane was going to be really late (using the cell phone of afore mentioned nice old lady) and gave him the flight number so he could check on the flight status. We got let out of the airport only 45 minutes after we’d left the gate, but ran into turbulence and had to fly around Atlanta a couple times before we could land b/c of bad weather before finally getting in. And then our baggage took a good 45 minutes to get down to the baggage claim area. One of my bags had had the lock broken off of it and the zipper torn open (lovely kind airport people, yes). It was after 9 pm when my dad finally picked me up outside. I was greeted by a chorus of small children screaming my full name at me and all trying to talk to me at once. Hehe. It was very cute. I didn’t get to bed until around midnight due to everyone wanting their presents and to look at pictures and talk to me, etc. I hadn’t slept in over 24 hours and fell asleep about 10 minutes after my head hit the pillow (really good for me).
So…That is my recount of the adventures I had on my 2 week vacation. On Thursday we canned 73 quarts of peaches and we up until midnight again. On Friday I worked from 10 30 am until closing and clean up (I got home about 10 pm). I am still tired, ack. I need another vacation! Hehe. I was up very late talking to Amanda Price last night, which was very good for me I think. Today we started organizing for school and I’m already overwhelmed. It’s very sad. I’m not sure how much time I’ll have to keep you guys updated over the next couple weeks, but I shall indeed try to write.
To those of you who take the time to read this – my hat is off to you and congratulations! It amounts to 7 pages as a Word document and you are truly a dedicated person. I shall attempt not to ramble on and on so much in the future and have more edifying and interesting topics.
Look to the skies and follow the wind – whispering wild things to your heart and swaying trees underneath a clear pale sky – Look to the skies and touch the clouds – sailing like great ships in oceans of light – Look to the skies and live.
Much Love and eHugs to you all!
Listening to: Nightwish, “The Kinslayer”
I am sitting at home listening to BT and 30 Seconds To Mars (music picked up from Tarons…If you haven’t heard “Echelon” by 30 Seconds To Mars, then d/l it…Very cool. Reminds me of A Perfect Circle). I got home Wednesday night, after an exhausting plane trip. The two weeks I spent at their house was strangely short and over long before I wished. But it also seemed long. It’s been forever since I’ve heard from you; I hope you’re doing well and are having a nice time, where ever you are and whatever you’re doing. I’m doing pretty good, but very busy and overwhelmed. Eheh. I suppose I’ll tell you about the trip, though there will be a lot of Tarons in it…
I got on the plane to head up to WA on the 26th of July at 8-something in the morning Eastern time and remained on planes until 1:45 pm Pacific time, swapping planes once in between. I sat next to a couple nice guys on the LONG ride (4 ½ hours, no movies or anything b/c the plane wasn’t equipped for them…which was really lame. >: ). One was from Seattle and heading home and the other was from FL and taking a vacation like me. The Seattle guy told us a lot about WA, so that was cool and we all talked a lot. I’m glad I had someone to talk to or otherwise I would’ve died of boredom. I finished my book on the shorter plane ride (2 hours from Atlanta to Dallas, TX; the second one was from Dallas to Seattle) and a walkman is only so entertaining for so long.
When we got to the house, I was greeted with a screamed “Ashley’s here!!!” and a hurried gathering as the car drove up. After getting out, everyone kinda stood there for a second before I broke the growing silence and silliness by giving T, and then everyone else, a big hug (BTW, giving a guy who is 15+ inches taller than you a hug is extremely hard without looking stupid. In case anyone ever wants to know. :P). After that I got a tour of the house and we unloaded all my stuff and talked and ate supper and went to bed late after playing a cool game of Apples to Apples.
I got told I was different than expected (even T says I was different from a year and a half ago when she and Cadet came to my house) and was impressed at how well I’d predicted most of the Tarons that I hadn’t met to be. But I think everyone likes me, so that’s cool. The only people who were a bit different to me were Philip and Mitch but I wasn’t too surprised by anyone, thankfully. :D Being around the Tarons made me feel small and rather dumpy…Even Lyd is taller than I am now, by like ½ an inch or something, and Seth is working his way up. :O It’s rather depressing. But I got used t it fast…Just about EVERYONE is taller than I am anyway, so what does 6 inches or so matter? :P
Anyway, the next morning I was up before any of the other girls, but after everyone was up we decided to go on a walk out to the cliff and down to the creek. It was quite an adventure…Sarah, Laura, Michael, Kayla, me, Cadet, and Lydie all went. Mitch and I took plenty of pictures (which I’ll have up on a Yahoo! Photo Album ASAP for everyone to look at). We went out up through Pipeline and into a huge awesome pasture after inspecting a neat structure that Luke Haas (friend/neighbor of the Tarons) was building. We found blackberries along the way and ate some (they were REALLY good – huge and sweet and juicy) and then went to the cliff. The path was so grown up we all HAD to go down it…I was just sure I was going to either fall or else throw up from the effects of vertigo, but no, I reached the bottom safely and without incident other than being freaked out. LOL. Laura was dreadfully afraid but we all accomplished the task. We then went down to the creek and had fun playing around and getting wet. The bottom of the creek is a perfect mix of mud and sand so that it isn’t gross and squishy or nasty and grainy either. :)Laura and Sarah went ahead and we lost them; we assumed they’d continued along the creek since Laura had left her shoes, and so after putting our own shoes on and grabbing hers, we walked along the bank and kept calling them, to no avail. After awhile Kayla goes “Whoa, what is that?!?” and I bend over the grey bedraggled lump to find that it is a half-grown baby bird, obviously quite hungry. Mitch, T, Cadet, and Lyd quickly found some grasshoppers(Lyd was best at catching them) while I held the poor fellow. After we got a couple down him he started to perk up and look around. Eventually (after pooping everywhere, naughty fellow) he was crawling around and flapping on his own power and we decided that, regardless of where Laura and Sarah were, it was late and we needed to go home. So we went home, only to find Susie and Laura already there…We fixed up a cage for the birdie, and, after searching vainly to find out what kind of bird he was, Lyd demonstrated the zip line for me (looked very scary and I never did end up getting to try it) and we caught lots of little white moths for the bird (he loved them) and after a cooling swim in the pool and dinner proceeded to start packing for the Edmonton trip (and guess who was dumb enough to leave the Canadian money she’d brought with her behind? LOL. Yes, I am an idiot sometimes). We stomped mole hills, cleaned the house and Cadet mowed the lawn and Mitch weed-eated (or is it weed-ate? LOL) and we all took showers and all that good stuff.
We got up at 4 am to pack the van and we left at about 6 am. I sat between Mitch and Dube on the front seat. We talked and took pictures and enjoyed the wonderful mountains after getting safely over the border. We had lots of resting spots and the trip was very enjoyable. We stopped at a really nice little park for lunch. There was a railroad alongside the road for nearly the entire way through the mountains. Lyd really enjoyed that b/c she likes trains a lot and we saw TONS of trains! We drove through the Cascades and the Rockies. It was really awesome. Mitch shared an earphone of his iPod with me and introduced me to some really good music (Counting Crows actually are a very cool band – I had always thought they did rock-pop and cheesy lyrics, but no…The lead singer does a really good job. The lyrics are awesome and he makes them so vulnerable, emotional….Ah. I really like them now. :D). We spotted this one formation in the Rockies that looked exactly like a huge man sleeping on his back on the top of one of the mountains – it was incredible how real it looked! We even saw fingers on his hands. :) We drove through a couple rainstorms while we were in the mountains and another once we got into AB and down onto the flat land…We stopped to eat at a restaurant before we got there…I split a sandwich with one of the girls (they were BIG and we’d sorta been snacking all day). We got to the Elossaises in time to see the sunset and take lots of pictures (Mitch has a really cool one up on his blog – michael.taron.net; check it out!) and get ourselves acquainted with the older gals. The Elossaises are very cool people and we all really really really liked them. :) All the Taron girls and I slept on the floor in the big room and stayed up talking for awhile. The next morning we got up and showered and ate breakfast (very good and prepared specially by the Elossais girls) before heading out to the local zoo to check everything out and meet the Grounds family. We had a good time there and I got some pictures that I’ll try to get up with everything else. The animals were nice and entertaining and we left about an hour ahead of schedule to make sure we’d get to the church gathering on time and maybe be able to help with set up. However, since we got lost and it took us an hour to get there, we were just on time. LOL. I met lots of new people and got to hang out with some long-time-but-no-see friends for a bit. We had lasagna and salad for dinner. I met Char Barrow for the first time and that was really cool even though we didn’t get to hang out much. She was a lot like I expected her to be – she’s beautiful and just darn awesome and I’m going to have to make another trip up to Edmonton sometime to get some real time with her. :) (Hey, Chot, if you take the time to read this – I love you girl and I mean everything I’ve said. I AM going to figure out how to get up there next summer/spring.) Michael got some cool pictures (my camera battery was dead :( ) that I’m hoping I’ll get soon; we’ve agreed to swap pictures so we both get everything. I have to make up a CD for him first though. Hehe. I went home with the Wagner family and Vicki Flewelling to sleepover with Melinda and Vicki. The younger Wagner children all thought I had wings, due to a conversation that took place some months ago in which they were told I was flying up from GA. “All by herself?!?” “Yes.” “I can’t wait to see her wings!” Or something to that effect. At any rate, I had thought it would be a cool idea to create a set of wings and wear them, b/c I was sure they’d be really disappointed if I came without wings. So Kayla had been a wonderful dear and made me some really cool fairy wings – black, of course – and we’d pinned them to a favorite shirt for me to wear on Saturday, at least so that they could see my “wings”. They thought I was the coolest thing this side of the Rockies and held me in a state of awe and stared at me all Saturday morning. LOL. On Saturday morning the Weirchowski (I hope I’m spelling that right – please forgive and correct me if it’s wrong) family came over for a late breakfast. They are an awesome family and I really like Beka and Micah – we had tons of fun and hope I will get the chance to spend more time with them sometime soon. They’re both funny and cool (I LOVE YOU GUYS!) and we had fun talking and telling life stories. Hehe.
We then got into the vans – I rode with the Weirchowskis so no one in the Wagner van would have to double buckle, and got introduced to some cool opera-style music – and rode to the Saturday get-together site. I met even more people that hadn’t been able to make the Friday evening get-together and got tons of weird looks and questions about the wings (LOL…It is so fun shocking people :P) and got to hang out with the Tarons some more, before the cook out (I was still stuffed from breakfast and didn’t eat anything but a few strawberries though). Afterwards I walked around with Char, Ann, Trin, Ang, Ben, Trahern, Hannah, and Evangeline and we hung out in a nice air-conditioned building for a while…Then I decided to change out of my wings and put on something cooler…Those wings were acting like the sails on one of those dinosaurs and attracting sunlight or something.
On Tuesday we cleaned up the house, did laundry, cleaned up the van, and went to see Charlie and the Chocolate factory. I liked the movie. The music and effects were awesome and the acting great and it is much closer to the real story book than the old musical version. I love Johnny Depp, and he does a wonderful job playing Willy Wonka. The movie is just disturbing enough to get you a little and funny enough to make up for the disturbing parts. Very cool, very clean, and highly recommended by myself if you’re in a light mood. :)
From Tuesday to the weekend the days are all a kind of blended euphoria for me…I was very happy and having fun and it all mixed together and now I don’t remember what we did on which days. Eheh. I know we swam a lot, picked blackberries and some of the girls made pie, I remember shelling peas and watching movies and staying up late, and I think it was on Friday that Mrs. Taron took T and I to this really cool little store called Treasure Cove where I bought all my siblings gifts and some jewelry for myself and a silver ring for Teesy.
On Saturday Philip, Sarah, Michael, Kayla, me, Cadet, Lyd, and Seth took a hike up to Lake Ann near Mount Baker. We started out well on what was supposed to be a 9 mile there-and-back trail. On the way down into a valley Mitch expressed what I was thinking better than ever I could when he said “Some things are just so beautiful they make your heart hurt.” It was the most lovely place I’d ever been in my life. We took tons of pictures and Mitch and I were frequently left behind because we had the cameras and kept stopping to take the pictures. We crossed over several streams that, of all things, had leeches in them
We realized suddenly that I was leaving on Wednesday and that we still had a bunch of trips that we needed to squish in together to get them done. Sunday was smooth and restful and I tried sauerkraut with some really yummy sausages for the first time and actually liked it, much to my surprise. Cadet and Lyd and I climbed up into the Sparrow Spire and sat and talked awhile before making a shaky climb down a rickety old ladder. Then on Monday we got up early and Philip took us to get Cadet and Lyd their dresses for the wedding and then down to Seattle. t was me, Philip, Sarah, Mitch, Kayla, Cadet, and Lyd, and we all had tons of fun. We spent the morning at this really cool outdoor mall and ate lunch in the van before driving to Seattle. We had a ton of fun there. We saw the Space Needle and went into the Experiment Music Project building
On Tuesday Philip was kind enough to drive T and I to Vancouver to visit Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design, where we’d like to go to university together. It is a very nice facility and in a wonderful neighborhood. Granville Island is possibly one of the coolest cities I’ve ever experienced. Kayla and I were both very impressed and would like to start in fall 2007, if possible. It seems such a long ways away, but I have to finish high school and we gotta get good jobs and figure out all the ins and outs of financial support and help. I will probably be moving to WA in the summer of 2007 to get settled in, Lord willing that everything goes well. Please pray that this will be possible and that God will help us make this happen! After getting home we ate dinner, I packed and we watched a final movie together. We were going to have to leave at 3 am to take me to Bellingham to get on the airporter bus and it was already almost midnight so we just decided to stay up. Mitch and I went downstairs and made a bunch of cool music CDs to listen to on the plane while Philip put their entire music collection on DVDs for me to take home. I now have a bunch of new favorite bands since going to their house. Hehe. Counting Crows, Liquid Tension Experiment, Nightwish, Renaissance, among others. :P Though I’m also still faithful to my old loves, Stratovarius, Sonata Artica, and lessers. The truly great will never fade. I took a shower and then we Cadet, T, Lyd and I all sleepily fought to stay awake. Cadet and I did the best job, talking about everything and nothing important. Before long though Mrs. Taron was whispering that it was time to get going and we shook Lyd and T and climbed into the car. After getting to the Bellingham airport we stood around the bus shivering in a strong cold wind and hugging each other goodbye. The bus driver yelled he was ready to go and we slowly let each other go in the torture of a sad goodbye and I climbed aboard. I managed to get a few winks of sleep on the bus before we got the Seattle. I bought coffee and breakfast at the airport Starbucks and sat read The Great Hunt (from Robert Jordan’s Wheel Of Time series) while waiting for the boarding call. My first flight was 4 ½ hours long and I finished the 600+ page book during the flight and broke out my CDs and walkman for some entertainment. I tried to sleep but as I was on an aisle seat people kept whacking me in the head and waking me up as soon as I dozed off. :( We got to the airport late and then another plane was in our gate so we had to wait for nearly 30 minutes for it to remove itself before we could get in. I rushed across the airport and into a skytrain to take me to the concourse I needed to be in (the Dallas airport was set up by morons, BTW. It takes a train to get anywhere there b/c all of the concourses are not only separated by huge distances but they are also split in half with huge distances between the halves and no way to walk to your destination at all, much less get there on time, so that you HAVE to take a train, and regardless of train or not, it takes forever. Absolutely insanely stupid.) and got to the gate just at the time the plane was SUPPOSED to leave (3:37 pm). However, due to all sorts of delays, including inclement weather in Atlanta, the plane was still sitting at the gate and not due to take off for another hour. So I got to eat lunch and wait on the plane and talk to this nice old lady and this one really cool guy (he was really good-looking, too…
So…That is my recount of the adventures I had on my 2 week vacation. On Thursday we canned 73 quarts of peaches and we up until midnight again. On Friday I worked from 10 30 am until closing and clean up (I got home about 10 pm). I am still tired, ack. I need another vacation! Hehe. I was up very late talking to Amanda Price last night, which was very good for me I think. Today we started organizing for school and I’m already overwhelmed. It’s very sad. I’m not sure how much time I’ll have to keep you guys updated over the next couple weeks, but I shall indeed try to write.
To those of you who take the time to read this – my hat is off to you and congratulations! It amounts to 7 pages as a Word document and you are truly a dedicated person. I shall attempt not to ramble on and on so much in the future and have more edifying and interesting topics.
Look to the skies and follow the wind – whispering wild things to your heart and swaying trees underneath a clear pale sky – Look to the skies and touch the clouds – sailing like great ships in oceans of light – Look to the skies and live.
Much Love and eHugs to you all!
Listening to: Nightwish, “The Kinslayer”
Hey Ashley, it was wonderbar to read about your trip and nice to see you blogging. :D Hope you're able to keep it up and I'll be praying for you in regards to university. God bless. :)
Posted by
Jody |
9:55 PM
Dude, that was a long entry! Glad you liked the music. Have you listend to Cat Stevens yet. :p
Posted by
Anonymous |
11:39 PM
Hey, miss you and love you! :) And yeah, I did read the whole...was like living it over again, LOL.
~Cadet
Posted by
Anonymous |
10:00 AM
WHOOOOOOOOOOOAAAA! And you said I write long posts?!? Wow. That was, like, day by day accounts... you have quite the memory. Anyways, love you muchly, and congratulations on your first--well, second--blog post. What did the kiddos think of the presents we chose?? Did Rachel like the earrings, and your Mom the necklace? (Guess what?--I'm finally reading Deerskin.. too sad, too real--hurts my heart. I'm so glad now that she and Ash have run away from that horrid, awful, frightening --! yeah, that guy [shudders])
Talk to you! (phone calls sometime this weekend?)
--T
Posted by
Anonymous |
4:44 PM
Mitch...Haha, yes, I have listened to Cat Stevens. It was like a whole different era of music! My brothers started yelling for me to turn it off but my grandmother thought it was cool. LOL. I think it's *okay* - not gonna be my favorite thing ever, but I don't hate it either. :) I have 4 pages of that email typed go through my opinions of the other music as well. :p And it HAD to be long - It was a recount of two exciting, fun filled weeks with my favorite people! :p :p :p
Posted by
Ashley |
3:06 PM
Cadet - right back atcha! (grabs her in a big hug)
Posted by
Ashley |
3:09 PM
Teesy - It had to be long, as I told Mitch. (G) I tried to do my very best to remember every single wonderful day I was up there. :D The kids and my mom love the presents...My mom thought the necklace quite cool, though she hasn't worn it yet. Rachel and Chris and Hannah all wear theirs all the time. Ahhh...Isn't the writing sooo awesome in Deerskin? I felt everything was so real. I love Robin McKinley. She is such a good writer. *sigh* Wish I could write like that! :/ Anyway...YES, phone call is a MUST - Saturday is out until evening b/c I'm working all day, but would that work?
Posted by
Ashley |
3:15 PM
Hey Ashley! :) Congrats on getting your new blog up--very fun and exctiing to read and very looonnggg. ;) I miss you and love you very much, hope to talk to you soon!
--Lyd
Posted by
Anonymous |
12:13 AM