January 26 Stop what you're doing and think again..

Lately, i've been more busy than you can possibly imagine.

Even the thought of the next days of the week tires me out. I've been trying so hard to get all my crap together and it's finally done.. only in time to do cast makeup for the big school production, "pack of lies". It's a 2 hour long play and i admire the people in it for their skill, time management, and perserverance. i had signed up to do makeup in October, but now that the time's finally come, i don't think I have the time. well, I know that i can make it, and let's just say that for the next week, I won't be bored at all.

Right now, I have my regular, 6 hour-a-day, classes, homework on top of that, a job at mcdonalds, mexico missions trip, and the play. It doesn't seem like alot. But I'm committed to them all and it's hard to keep track. It's been a long month, and it seems like people can't stop yelling at me. They don't really know what's going on right now with me, and it seems they don't want to hear any sort of explanation, even if it IS valid. Yesterday, I worked and I told my friend Kevin why I was having such a great day. It was because no one had yelled at me. I mean, it's hard to keep everything up to speed especially when you have no time in the evening to yourself. tonight's the first night that that's happened. Even my birthday was busy. So much for sweet 16. It's really no different except for the fact that your life becomes a spiralling pit of unceasing business. My Oma and aunts and uncles forgot my birthday, as did my sister. Today, they sent me a message on facebook explaining how they were sorry they didn't remember and then subliminally expecting me to accept some sort of peace offerring they call a birthday gift.

I spent a weekend in the "slums" two weeks ago. we were allowed to keep the clothes on our backs, a blanket, and two personal items. we lived in teams and ours decided that one of our items was to be useful for the whole team and the other item was for our own personal use. It was really hard, but you grow closer to eachother without even noticing. By the way, this was a weekend "retreat" for the mexico missions team. Friday, we arrived at the church. We didn't know what to expect, so we were all luxuriously packed and ready for a relaxing weekend with friends and preparing for our trip. Suddenly, we were shocked with the truth. We were to build a slum out of cardboard, duct tape, string and a table cloth. We were not to use any electricity at all and if we wanted water, we had to go outside and use the hose. Every meal, we ate mashed lentils and curry over rice, except for on saturday when we had beans and a thick porridge. Saturday came and all night, no one had slept. It was hard ground and we were all scared of the next day. Not to mention, it was also only 3 degrees inside. It was terribly cold. 6:30am came and we all raced downstairs and ate our warm lentils and rice infront of a heater. Quickly, everyone helped to clean up the food and we were out the door and on our way to Vancouver. Not to go people watching, but instead to run a childrens program. We came back to the church around 2pm and were allowed free time. Us, girls, decided to rebuild our slum fort and take a nap while it was still light. The guys, being guys of coarse, wouldn't let us sleep, but instead decided it would be fun to run around in their underwear and yell and bang on our door. Sooner or Later, it got really annoying and someone told the overall leader what they were doing. She took the shirts off their back and couldn't have them back until about 10. At ten, everyone went to bed. we were all so tired and not thinking straight at all. But, one of the guys noticed "hey, we have 10 hours to sleep. That's way too much" and, he was right. At 2am, someone came upstairs only to wake us up to a blazing siren and a megaphone. He was yelling, "this is the police. i wanna know who's in charge right now. The rest of you head downstairs now. go. go. go!" I thought it was real and had no clothes on because they were really itchy because of all the sweating we had done earlier that day. I just grabbed the blanket and ran. I got downstairs and I'm saying to myself, "this is real. I've got to get out of here." Eventually, everyone came downstairs and I asked, "am I going to need clothes for this?" everyone laughed because I always say stupid things when I'm tired. On Sunday, we got together with a group of people funding us to go and we weren't allowed to eat anything. At the end, we went home and 3 of the guys: steve, jordan, michael and I decided to go for pizza. I felt guilty eating this middle class food.

Now, it's affected my daily life. I hang with different people, I'm careful of the heat and lights in my house, what i eat is different and I have a totally new appreciation for food.

Before I had left for the weekend retreat, I was complaining about how my socks were old. While I was gone, my mom bought me new socks. When I came home, I looked through my "old socks" and had a new appreciation for them. I didn't throw any of them away, but rather put the new socks in my closet where I don't have to see them. I haven't looked at them since.

So, I'm telling you. That was a weekend, imagine a lifetime. Chill out. We don't really know what we have. We have toothpaste. we have doctors, we have dentists, we have education, we have a fair government, we have a wealthy country. People in 3rd world countries don't consider school a job, or mcdonald's a real job, or enjoying themselves in a play, or spending time bonding with people. Those aren't jobs, they either happen without any effort, or they are a privillage.

So, think again.

January 2?

I've lost track of the days, but i can tell you that i remember newyears eve. What a night. The parents went out with their friends to the bar, Leah stayed home with Jake, Maaike hung out with good friends. So, Jenessa, the friend from alberta, came to visit us for the new year. It was the red-haired trio, which consists of Maaike, Jenessa, Brianne. Later on, Brianne's boyfriend shows up. He's a nice guy so we don't mind that he's there. Then, later on, Peter and Bethany come and join us after their new years church service. We chilled as if it were normal even though we had a special guest in our presence. It was good. Just like old times but with a bit of a twist because our little Brianne is growing up. At about 10, we decided "hey, let's go get a bite to eat". So, we walked over to the mcdonald's in walmart but it was closed. "ahh, whatever, there's a Timmy's across the street" we said. So, we're walking and come across a shopping cart. However, we're all hyped up and not thinking straight, as always. We jump in the cart and ride down the hill. The faces of the people in walmart were absolutely stunned. It was good times though. So, we get to timmy's. and no one has money so we're digging around and manage to find enough for a coffee. So, the six of us split a large coffee and were, once again, on the journey home. So, we get home and Jenessa and i eat a box of alphabits without telling brianne (it's her house afterall). She didn't really care. But she didn't even know 'til we threw them at her. That was pretty messy. We had been teasing the couple to kiss all night. We didn't think they would. But as soon as the ball dropped in the Big Apple, well, you know what happened. : ] It made my heart happy. As well as a longing for what I'd never really had. "SOMEONE TELL ME WHERE MY SHOES ARE!!@!@#" *a pause* "AHHH, WHATEVER, WE'RE GOING WITHOUT SHOES." My foot was bleeding fountains and i hadn't even noticed. oh well. we made sure to wish all the neighbors another hell filled party year and went back inside. People left after an hour or so and the tri, once again, remained. I had to work at noon and i made a point that we had to be out by four. We were and I even had time to come home, shower, get ready for work and get there with 20 minutes still remaining. Everything worked out pretty good.

Christmas time was also excellent. The computer died for almost all of the break so we HAD to talk to eachother. Not a problem with me, but you know how my mom gets. ahahaha. i enjoyed the company of family on christmas eve. But, christmas day.. that's another story. As a tradition, we always celebrate on christmas eve, which leave christmas with all of the cleaning. Well, we finished cleaning after church and we were on our way to the house of some long time family friends. After playing an old-school card runescape-like game for quite a while, we figured we'd better get going. Everyone loved their gifts and I enjoyed getting the gifts. My friend, corrie, and I did all of our shopping at value village.

on the 28th, my sister, my dad, other family friends of ours, and I went up to the mountain and put in a long day of snowboarding. that was a good day. it passed so fast, i don't really have much to say about it.

well, yesternight, the family went for dinner at "charlie don't surf" in whiterock. An excellent restaurant. The waiter looked like mr.tumnus from Narnia but he was pretty cool. after that, i was totally shot and just wanted to go to bed. HOpefully, one day soon I'll have a few more pictures up.

well HAPPY NEWYEAR EVERYONE. 2010 IS FINALLY HERE.

Oh, and by the way, I think that's a pretty good looking family of 5. : }