Catching Up

Wow! So it has been forever since I last blogged and I've got nothing else going on right now so I figured I'd throw up a blog. In the past 2 months or so, a whole lot has happened. Prom, school finished, my super good friend got back from Ecuador after being gone for 10 months, I went to Indiana, got my braces off, I went to Venezuela (just got back yesterday morning at like 1 a.m.) and have had a major lack of babysitting jobs :-(. I had like 3 summer babysitting jobs lined up, but they all fell through, that's okay, though, it should be a relaxing summer. So I'll go in order of events...

     Prom was super fun! No date :(, but I went with my awesome friends and had a lot of fun. We went to Lauren Davis house first and got ready/took pictures/atesnacks/etc. From there we headed to America the Beautiful park to take more pictures and then went to a yummy restaurant called Nosh. It's like an appetizer restaurant and I had chicken pate without knowing what it was. If you don't know, it's chicken puree, YUCK! But it was all good. Haha from there we headed to prom itself. It was a fun night of dancing and awkward slow dances :). All in all, I had a blast.

Kristin and I on our way to Nosh!

The lovely ladies!

     School's out obviously! I missed the last two days of school because of my Indiana vacation which kind of stunk because it meant I had to do four finals before I left. I did two during study hall and one after school. The other was making a documentry with my friends and I just did it with them on our own time. I was a little sad to leave knowing I wouldn't see some people over summer, but I was also really glad to be out of school and only have one year of highschool left. Both our foriegn exchange students have headed back to their countries (Brazil and Spain) which is a little sad :( but I'll get over it. So I still haven't started summer reading, but I need to start soon!

     Julianna is back! I'm so happy! I went with Annie and Kristin to get her from the Denver airport the night before leaving for Indiana. We stopped at this burrito place and it was so yummy. We had a lot of catching up and laughs. Since I hung out with her once and we tried playing black ops (an unsuccessful attempt) and we went shopping down by the movie theatre. I also hung out with her and some others at a sleepover. We went downtown and took a bunch of cute pictures. I loved it!

Driving home from the airport with Juls.

Downtown with some besties!

     Indiana was great. It was really fun to see my cousins and grandparents after going over a year without seeing them. My grandmother's 80th birthday went well. I spent most of the time at my cousins, the Olsons, house and a few nights at my grandparents house. I went and aw Pirates of the Carribean (the newest one. Is that 3 or 4?) with my older bro and cousin Leah. It was good, but would have been better if I had seen the previous ones :) My little cousin Hunter came home with us. He's still here until this Friday. Super cute!

Me with my second cousins Cora and Rainy.

Girl cousins minus Angelica.

My family and cousin here at Garden of the Gods.

     Braces are off! Now I just have to worry about the stupid retainer :( I hate it so much. Oh well, soon I'll only have to wear it at night.

No braces!

     Now this will probably be the longest paragraph. Venezuela was absolutely amazing and perfect in every way. I'll be writing this portion of the blog mostly for my own memory so you can skip over if you want :)

•  Saturday-We had to be to Radiant no later than 5:45 a.m. to leave for the Denver airport. Jonathan got sick on the way up so we had to stop. We still made it in plenty of time. Going through security, Sydni got stopped for extra checking and was told it may take a couple hours. It turned out the just checked her shoes and it only took like 15 seconds. I slept most of the day. We had Chic-fil-a in the airport in Atlanta. We finally got to Ecuador late in the night (probably around 10 Venezuela time (1 1/2 hours later than Mountain time becauise Chavez (president) is crazy)) and I thought I had checked my bag and a red bag. Of course I checked my bag and a dark blue one with supplies in it, but we went on a wild rampage looking for a red one. We even put in an order form for them to return it to us from the airport, but it turns out we had the suitcase all along. I felt so bad. It was a two hour drive from the Caracus airport to Samuel's house so when we got there I put sheets on my bed, took a shower, and crashed. Everyone was exhausted. The A.C. woke me up sometime in the middle of the night and I was freezing! I got my blanket out of my backpack and went back to bed. Unfortunately, that was the only night I was cold.
• Sunday- We woke up for and ate breakfast at 8:00 a.m. We had cereal, fruit, and yummy toast along with super yummy juice. We went to church right after and practiced our human video for a bit. Pastor Scott did the message on character and Pastor Gary translated.  We did the human video at church and got to meet some of the kids. Katherine and Wilken were the two that introduced themselves. The rest were still a little shy still. We went back to the cafeteria area and had sandwiches for lunch (like every day for lunch) and then went and played with the kids some more. We played beisbol using our hands as bats and just had fun. We talked to one of the non-orphans,  Manuel, who one of the girls had a huge crush on. She said he was 17 but we later found out he was 20. Haha. We went swimming tgo cool off and then had I think hamburgers for dinner. Maybe not though, I'm not super sure. After dinner we were all tired so we went to bed. It was so hot, but we survived.
• Monday- This was the first work day. We were divided into two groups. My group went down to the families houses and painted them yellow. The other team went and de-rusted a fence and started to prime it. Half the kids went to school in the morning while the other half went in the afternoon so we had some of the kids helping us. Wilke was writing his and everyone else's names on the wall in paint. By lunch we had all the lower half of the house finished and a lot of the upper half too. We wouldn't have been able to do it without the help of some of the older kids. The other team only had six sections of fence primed out of 70-something. We didn't think we would get done with the priming in our time their let alone the painting of the flag colors (yellow, blue, and red) in our short week there. We went back to the house after lunch to finish it up. We kind of slacked during the second half of the day, but got like all except the top of the wash room painted. Thony, a 13-year old there, helped so much during the afternoon! We got to go hose-back riding that day which was so fun. Fredy was in charge of the horse, but we got to take control of the reigns. It was so fun. We went swimming again that night and then ate dinner. I don't even remember what we had. Maybe that night was lasagna. It was the best lasagna I'd ever had if it was! We went straight to bed after dinner again which felt nice.
• Tuesday- After breakfast, Pastor Scott asked if any of us girls wanted to weed-whack. I didn't want to, but no one else volunteered, so I did it. They were huge weed-whackers that needed a thing attached to our backs to carry. I worked with someone I wasn't very fond of, but I didn't really have to talk to him so it was okay. The field we did was so huge and by lunch I was absolutely exhausted. My team had gotten like 17 parts of the fence done and primed and the other team was having trouble  getting their house painted because a) some of the people were not paainting at all and just playing with the kids and b) the kids were making messes with the paint and getting in the way. They asked if I wanted to go and keep the kids occupied while everyone else painted and I jumped at that opportunity. I hung out with the kids at the playground and had a blast overall, but I really got to know one of the little ones, Leomar. He was my favorite ever since. After they finished painting the house, evryone left to go swimming except me. I stayed and hung out with the kids for an hour more. I stayed with Jenna, Amber, and Alexis (the American girls there) and got to just play and get to know some of the older kids (Jesus). I ended up sitting on Alexis lap in the car on the way to dinner because their wasn't a whole lot of room. We went to a place called Mister Bread after dinner that night and all got dessert and shared. Super yummy. On the way home, the police stopped us and we were supposed to have our passports, but didn't. Eventually they let us go, but they really wanted money. We went home and again, crashed. 
• Wednesday- Since the houses were painted and the fence still needed to be worked on, we all went up to the fence and worked on it. We de-rusted and primed almost the whole thing by lunch. Even with a long break for a heavy rainstorm. Orlando and Kuka came in at lunch which was a nice suprise. At lunch Pastor Scott said we could either continue painting or go play with the kids. Most of us jumped at the chance to go hang out with the kids, including me, but some stayed and painted the fence. I'm really glad I hung out with the kids. We all sat on the benchs and chatted and took pictures and then it started to pour again. Most of the kids ran for cover in the multi-purpose building and spent some time on facebook, but me, Jenny, Mikayla, and Jeanette hung out with Thony, Jesus, Fredy, and a few others. First Jesus caught a huge from and was trying to get us to touch it. I was too scared he'd throw it at me so I didn't. One of the kiddos put a lizard on my shoulder because they knew I would freak out. It worked! Then we went on the porch of one of the houses and pushed each other into the rain. It was such a blas and we were soaked! At dinnertime that night, we played cards with Orlando which was fun. Then after dinner we went to the multi-purpose room to chat with the youth group in Colorado. It didn't work so well, and I didn't actuallly talk to them, but it was still a good night. We played spoons in a huge group, played the stomping game (Orlando gave me a bruise on my foot that's still there) and Junior taught us salsa. We also set off these lantern things like in Tangled which was super cool. We went back to the rooms and zonked out once again. Kuka spent the night so she didn't have to drive back to Caracus in the evening.
• Thursday- not my favorite day, but it was okay. We woke up early and got started painting the fence. we started with the worst part, the yellow. top, but got it done before lunch. After lunch we painted the rest of it with Orlando this time and then decided that we were going to get s'mores that night with Orlando. That fell through, but it was still a fun plan. We did baptisms and re-baptisms that evening before dinner which was really neat to watch. That night pastor Gary talked about going to Caracus on Friday and then stated we wouldn't be able to see the kids at all. We hadn't seen them that day either and didn't get to say bye to them. I was so so so so so so sad. I actually started crying. Someone asked if we could stay back instead of going if we wanted and Pastor Gary said it was up to Pastor Scott. Pastor Scott said yes, but it turned out I was the only one who wanted to stay, so Pastor Gary asked Orlando to hang out with me all day.
• Friday- Our last day. I was really sad it was our last day, but super excited to spend it with the kids. We all went early to the orphanage and everyone said their goodbyes to the kids who stayed home in the mornings, but didn't get to see the afternoon kids. I waved goodbye to the team and just hung out with the kids for about 30 minutes until Orlando came. We did piggy-back rides, coloring with chalk, talking, tickling, playing "la monstra" with Leomar and a few others and just having a good time. Around lunch time Orlando and I headed to the cafeteria room and met with Patty and Jeanette who were cooking tacos. We had like an hour until lunch so Orlando and I played cards while we waited. Soon, one of the older couples joined us and we played cards with everyone. The chicken tacos were amazing! I loved them so much. After lunch I told Orlando we could go up to the lodge to sand the plaster on the wall if he wanted so it didn't feel like a wasted day for him. We did that for two hours then headed back down to the orphanage. On the way down he asked if I wanted to see the pigs so we went and did that. We were walking toward the pigs and I saw a dead snake. So gross! The pigs smelt horrible so when Orlando asked if I wanted to go into the pen I said no. Haha. We kept walking down, talking, and listening to some of the Rio soundtrack on Orlando's phone (one of his favorite movies) and then finally got to the orphanage. Anakarina gave me a watch right when we got there as a "sorpresa". I was touched. Then we had cake for one of the house dad's birthdays. It was pretty good, but I'm not a cake fan so I gave mine to Orlando. Orlando asked if I wanted to go to pick up some of the kids from school so I said yes. We went there and they were so happy to see me. The introduced all thier friends to the Americana and then I rode with them in the back of the pick-up for the 15 minute ride home. When we got back I played futbol with Wilke, Thony, Jose, and some of the others, but I was doing really bad and quit. They were super nice though going really easy on me :). While I was playing soccer Orlando had fun with the landscape setting on my camera and took a bunch of pictures.  Orlando, Anakarina, Orlandito, Victoria, me, and some others took pictures for a while. It was fun. Soon Patty and the gang drove up to take Orlando and I out to dinner and I had to say bye to the kids. It was pretty sad, and I didn't even get to say bye to all of them because we had to leave so quick. Orlando decided last minute to go home and shower because he stunk so bad so I didn't even get to say bye to him :(. We had yummy food tjhough. These huge platters with lamb, chicken, beef, yuka, poatato, tomato, and a bunch of other yummy stuff. Best of all was the Mora juice! SO yummy. We went to Mister Bread again after dinner and the older couples all got a bunch of sweets and such to eat. We headed back for Samuel's house and stopped by the cafeteria to get water and ice for the coolers by our room. As we were filling them up, Pastor Scott came back from Caracus with Gary Heiny. I told him a little about my day and then went in my room to start packing since we were leaving the next day. I had about ten minutes to myself before Junior and David brought everyone else back. I started crying again because I missed everyone so much already. We did devotions (although we had done these in the mornings every other day) and a break-down of the day like we did every night then we all went to bed.
• Saturday- Another travel day. This time 23 hours of travel! We woke up at 4:00 a.m. and left by 4:30. I slept a little and cried a little on the way to Caracus. Actually I slept a little and cried a little the whole day. We got through everything in the Caracus airpport and said our last good=byes to Junior and Pastor Gary then sat and waited for forever in the terminal. Not only do you go through security like in America, but they also check everyone's carry-on (as in going through it) before they got on the plane. Just Go With It played on the way to Atlanta just like it had on the way to Caracus. I slept like the whole ride anyways. We went through customs in Atlanta and then we all went to the airport's TGI Friday's for a lunch/dinner. I went with the leaders to Starbucks afterward and Pastor Scott paid which was so appreciated. Storms started brewing as we were supposed to be boarding so our flight waas delayed. It kept getting delayed until it was like 3 hours late so we had like 6 hours in the airport. I bought a book (The Lucky One) and read some of it, played endless rounds of Egyptian Ratslap, slept, and just sat around. Finally we got on the plane and I slept like the whole time. Every other plane ride I had slept, but it had been difficult because I had been in the middle seat (always between Ascheleigh and Pastor Scott), but this time I had a window seat and slept the whole plane ride. It was so nice. We got back home around 1 a.m. Colorado time and I slept until 1p.m. even with all the sleeping the day before.

     Here are some photos from the trip:

Richad. I know I'm not suppposed to pick favorites, but he was definitely one of my favoites. I miss this little man to pieces!

So I know this is a little hard to see, but this is Thony and Jesus. They were older but had such sweet hearts. I miss them :(

Me with Ana Karina, Orlando, Roxanna, Victoria, and others whose names escape me.

One of my favorite pictures. Eating Mango, and Orlandito's face cracks me up!

So we called him Aaron the whole time because that's what we thought he said his name was. Turns out it's like Adams or something. Whoops. Still, another one of my favorite kiddos.

Love it!

Huggies! They're too cute. Aaron and Nikaeli.

Roxanna. Que Bella!

And he was my all time favorite. My little Leomar bear. How I miss him!

     So basically that's my trip. I spent all of yesterday crying along with crying this morning. I really really miss those precious kids. I'm hoping to go back next year and see everyone again.

     I'm taking two little ones (Jackson and Erika) along with my little cousin to the zoo tomorrow. I might post pictures if I remember. I'll try to be more consistant, but there's no garuntees. The days fill up so fast.