Week 9 Recap

Week 9! We had a lot of people leave this week, so I'm probably going to be sniffling and reminiscing my way through this post. Sigh. Here goes!

Awesome picture of the sun--I was just about to go to fireside in the upper meadow when I saw the cloud cover. Cue one very quick dash back to staff housing to snatch my camera and run back down...it was well worth the near asphyxiation.

This reminds me of the Ozarks...

I entrusted Moriah with my camera, and came back to find this. XD

EB, looking like the boss she is. XD

Let's just say that I like to hang out at the barn a lot. For some reason I find it relaxing to see/chat with the wranglers and watch them work with their horses.

It was this week that I decided to try to get my lungs into shape, so I started doing a morning property loop walk. On this particular morning, I was harassed by a murder of crows. O.o

This is the view from the upper meadow after huffing and puffing my way to the top--I'm very glad to report that now I can walk to the upper meadow without stopping or feeling like I want to die. :P

Jordyn was cutting fruit and decided to get creative with the platter one morning. In her words, she doesn't get to be very creative and it was driving her crazy...

EB may or may not have purchased a sign to edit the existing caution signs in the kitchen. 

And someone went crazy with the labeler, hence there's a lot of labels saying random things all over the kitchen.

Doughnuts! It was Cambell's last day, and she actually made some doughnuts from scratch after we ran out of the other kind. I miss that girl...

Oh yes--for wrangler breakfast that morning I wandered in the back way and witnessed an impromptu wrestling match between Lij and Luke. Guess who won?

All I gotta say is that Lij is like a bulldog in his wrestling technique where if he gets a hold, he does NOT let go. O.o

NOT THE HAT!!!

Yeah....Lij won. Basically he laid across Luke's ribcage and pinned him down so he couldn't move. It was pretty freakin' hysterical. 

EB and Brooke! We're helping the latter's family move this weekend, and I cannot WAIT.

Kara and I--she was one of the Texas Babies (i.e. the girls from Texas, aged 18, who spent a lot of time together) and I realized at wrangler breakfast that I hadn't gotten a single picture with her the entire month she had been here. O.o

All the Texas Babies! They left us the next day... :C

ANNA! She left me too. *sniff*

And Jordyn....man, now I'm missing everyone.

One stayed, two left...

Kay had this little thing where she would talk for the horses, so we had to get one more picture (and maybe even a video :P) of her talking for Rip. It was awesome.

Claire...

Yeah...not sure what's going on here. XD

Emily P took a frolicking picture for me...it's not hard to be in high spirits at random times out here. XD

Oh, my burn! Storytime: a few days before this picture was taken Moriah and I had been vacuuming the library. At one point I could smell the belt on the vacuum starting to burn, so we turned it off and I took the bottom off to see the damage. At one point I was manhandling it around and touched my arm on the round thing that held the belt in place--needless to say it was like touching molten magma. (only a *slight* exaggeration) At the time it didn't look like anything had happened, but over the course of a few days it got darker and darker, until by the end of a couple of weeks it had turned a dark brown, the dead skin was sloughing off, and I had TONS of people ask me 'what did you do to your arm?'. It made for some interesting explanation times.

 

I hate the picture formatting on this website. -.- So top picture: some of us went into town on Saturday to shop and whatnot--I went to a little coffee shop with Melanie and we read/sketched the whole time; I'm working on a picture of my old roommate Claire. It was a marvelous time--the coffee shop is also a Christian used book store, and Melanie insisted on buying me Passion and Purity by Elisabeth Elliot. Let me just say that that book has helped me IMMENSELY with some problems I was having with one of the guys here. I read the book in one 3-hour sitting because I couldn't put it down, and have loaned it out to a couple of girls already. :P

Second picture was the other girls coming to join us and zonking out on the couch. Basically...any opportunity to sleep is jumped upon out here. It's kind of hilarious, actually, especially when it happens in a public place (or in my case, whenever we go to Bible study *cough*).

And the third picture...I had been wearing my favorite ratty jeans that day. They're full of holes, threadbare, you name it, but they're SO comfortable and I love them to death. But, as I was entering the backseat of the suburban to ride back to the ranch, they ripped right below the pocket. At that point it was just a little hole, and I thought it wouldn't be a big deal to get back and run into staff housing without people noticing. After we got back, though, I stood up to crawl over the seat and as soon as I lifted my leg I heard and felt the fabric give until there was an 8-inch slit below my right cheek. I may or may not have been clutching my backside until I got into the safety of staff housing to change...but I was laughing the entire time, so it really wasn't too scarring. XD

Next up: either a week 10 recap or the Twin Sisters sunrise hike from Saturday!