My life is pretty uneventful right now

We had a singing at 709 last Thursday and then I went to Merry Ann's until 2 with some of my roomies.

I babysat for a non- family member for the first time in my life Friday. Trevor slept for an hour and then he bawled for his mom for an hour and a half. And Gab and Karen laughed at me.

Bright and early Saturday morning I went to package soap in Indiana with the Washington yg. I wasn't looking forward to it, but it ended up being tons of fun. It helped that Laura was as wound up as I was. :) We came up with some fun stuff to do at Luke and Heidi's wedding...too bad I'm too chicken to try any of them.

My car needs an oil change so I left it at home. It was kind of tight in Matt's truck since Fred came too. We're leaving for Mexico on Friday!! I'm so excited! I'm looking forward to the sun and the food the most I think. :)

I have a midterm tomorrow that I should be studying for. Hooray for Solid State Structural Analysis.

Spring Ice Out

Or in. :)

So I had a lazy weekend. Nothing too exciting happened. Joanna got announced to some guy from Ohio and she'll move away and I'll never see her again, but I'm really, really happy for her. :D

O, I did go canoeing with my dad and my sister. On the same ditch/field that we go ice skating on. It was really fun, even with the wind and the snow. I stole Jakey's work boots just in case I had to bail out into the not very deep water. Hooray for crazy fun times on the farm. :)

Dad and Shelly.

The canoe is still broke, but it wasn't taking on water.

Dad and I in the snow.

Shelly and I fighting the wind.

If you're not part of the solution

You must be the precipitate.


*GRIN*

Is your refrigerator running?

It was a good weekend. Lots of stuff happened, so here are some of the highlights.

-I made chocolate chip cookies... yum. But they all got eaten already.
-Amy and Audrey came to stay with me Friday night. :)
-The IBNO conference on Saturday was really good, and Scott came so that was exciting.
-Ate at Za's twice in one day.
-Played Rook, It was a really close game but Scott and Matt pulled ahead the last hand and pretty much trounced Ryan and I.
-Got to listen to "The Unicorn Song" and some other great folk songs
-Spent some quality time with U of I people and Alumni playing our version of 20 questions.
-Got our beautiful snow sister stolen only to find out that she just wanted to go to church. Crazy boys.
-Meg hosted potluck at our house, the food was excellent, the kids were hilarious.
- Had a paper wad fight with Nelson, Grant, and Leah at the table. :)
-Played Candy Land with Kedron and Addy.
-Used Lyssa's exercise/stretch band thingy as a slingshot for tennis shoes.
- Laughed hysterically while the kids prank called the Shaker. Kedron: "Hewo, I love you, will you mawwy me?, bwing me candy, I want fwowers." Addy: "I want to Cook you." Nelson: "Hi do you want to buy candy canes? They're 5cents for red stripes, 5 cents for the white stripes, that's 10cents all together."
Sarah described it perfectly, it totally felt like the beautiful chaos of playing with all of your cousins in your grandma's basement- including the 'Oh no, we're caught' feeling when their parents were ready to leave and came upstairs to get them.


The conference audio should be available eventually at
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/hknobloc/www/index.htm

Snow ball fights and Sister Ada Lou

So Gab and I just got back from getting polar pops. Yeah, I know it's kind of late for caffeine, but I figure since college is almost over I might as well live a little. Or something. Plus Dr. Pepper is just sooo good. :)

Wednesday night after church the yg went to the Shaker for some wonderful pie provided by Darl and Janelle. We were all sitting around after partaking of the goodness and I guess B.J. thought we needed to liven things up a bit... because he went outside for a while and then started handing out snow balls. (You know, "one for you, one you, one for me," kind of thing.) Obviously you can't just hold a snowball, they must be thrown; so in pretty short order we had a full blown snow/ice fight in the house. In our church clothes. It was beautiful. There were some minor skirmishes involving water and a leftover piece of pie before it was all over. They had to break out the mops to clean up the floor. I did witness a first- Matt with a mop. Which he used on the coffee table. And the piano.

When us girls got back home we decided that since the snow was so nice that we needed to make a snowman. Well... he ended up as Sister Ada Lou. She's so cute. She's wearing a laundry detergent blue jean skirt (there's no food coloring in our house!), and a green tissue paper sweater. Her hair is up in a very nice bun and she was wearing a designer grass head covering. Did I mention she's on her knees praying? Hehe. There were some broken candy canes in our yard that Kristen and Sarah tried very hard to use for her mouth; it kind of worked. Amber took some pretty funny pictures but they are still on her camera, sorry. :)

Four of us U of I girls went to ISU bible study tonight and had supper at Kaleigh and Joanna's. It was really good...they're pretty much the coolest. So we got back relatively early...but I'm tired and I do have class in the morning...
Blessings.

Polar Pops and Ping Pong

Yesterday we had our annual parent appreciation dinner... it was a success even though my parents couldn't come. Matt's couldn't either, ironically. :) The food was good, the desert tasted um, grilled, and the slide show was a hit.

I was craving a polar pop by the end of the night and said something to Gab... come to find out so was everybody else. So after we cleaned up at church a bunch of us got polar pops and went over to the Castle to hang out. We played a few rounds of 'gentile style' ping pong which was made even more difficult because of the spiral staircase in the middle of the room. There are more marks on the wall now. Then we sat around and threw tennis balls and a frisbee around the room. The later it got the more wound up we got and the stranger the conversation got. :) Good times. And then Gab and I had 'confession time' in the car on the way home.... o dear.... I definitely did not get enough sleep.

This morning the young group served lunch in Champaign so I had to get up way too early and go help at church. It all went really smoothly and once again it was just really great to work together with the yg. My hands are very dry now from all the dishes I washed this weekend. O well, it was worth it. :)

After church I tried to take a nap... and woke up feeling nauseated. I never learn! But then Meg's parents took us girls out to eat at Kennedy's for supper- the food was really really good.

I don't want to go to school tomorrow.
Blessings.

I wish I had room for a grand piano

Hm.. so the week is over. It was a good week. The two snow days in the middle were pretty glorious. :) Props to Dan for bringing the skid steer over and clearing our drive!

Us girls went out to eat Wednesday night at olive garden for valentine's day. It was soooo good. It's probably a good thing that it is so expensive (for a college kid) or I would eat there way too much.

Thursday in lab we were playing with liquid nitrogen- using it to condense evaporated solvent from our reaction. We get a lecture every time about how our vacuum lines need to be clear and not open to the atmosphere while you have liquid nitrogen cooling the trap. If you do have your lines open to the air you run the risk of condensing oxygen. Not a good thing. Pretty much you have rocket fuel in a small glass tube. :D Anyway, one of my classmates accidentally did that. He had to get a blast shield in his hood. It was pretty funny.

The young group recorded Easter program songs at Neil and June's Thursday evening. It's always fun to sing holiday songs out of season. Afterward us girls- Sarah, Gab, Amber, Kristen, and I- had a great discussion with Neil and June about a lot of things. :)

Meg is putting together a slide show of pictures for parent appreciation this weekend and she asked Amber, Kristen, and I to record some piano music to go with it. Since they have the talent and I have the key to the university school of music practice rooms it worked out really well! It was so great. We found a Steinway grand piano and spent about an hour recording. And messing around. :) They are both so good already and the "real" piano made it sound phenomenal.

Tonight we had bible study and then we helped make food for tomorrow night. So now I'm really tired. Maybe because I haven't had Dr. Pepper all day! Yikes. :)
Blessings.

Snow Day!

Yesterday the U of I cancelled classes for the third time in its history (so I'm told). Woot! It was beautiful. I had decided that I wasn't going to my first class because it looked really cold and snowy so I was asleep again when my roommates awoke me with their celebrating. :) So I got to sleep in and was pretty much lazy and unproductive all day long.

Gab, Amber and I tried to run some errands but we only got about 20 ft. down our driveway. So instead we had roommate bonding time with some Sweet Home Alabama. :) We were invited to Brown House for chili by Martin-shoveling our driveway out of nowhere-all star. We walked to Brown House down the middle of the streets; the sidewalks are nonexistent. They had such a good turnout! Pretty much everyone was there, plus a few extra. We celebrated BAM's unbirthday, played some games, had a rubber band war, and just had an all around good time.

I got shoved in a snowbank when we got back to the house because Gab said I kept hitting her with rubber bands. I maintain that it wasn't me! Ben just has really bad aim. :) Sarah decided to make cookies and we called the Shaker to see if any of them were bored so some of the guys ended up coming over.

We played some group games...they all seemed to involve stretching and bending so I'm kind of sore today. :) It was lots of fun though, a great way to start singles awareness day, I mean, Valentine's Day. Classes are cancelled again today!! But today I really need to actually do my homework.

Happy Valentine's Day!
Blessings.

What a weekend

Friday night I spent an enjoyable evening at Famous Dave's with the wonderful fun ladies of the Champaign church. It was such a good time and I can't wait until next months get together.

Afterwards I gave Fred a ride home. It wasn't as quiet of a ride as it normally is. Maybe I'm getting better at the making conversation thing... or maybe not. :)

I got a phone call at 11 from Heidi, she said she "had a gift for me" and asked if I was home so she could drop it off. She parked all the way at the end of the driveway so I couldn't see her car.... and then she handed me a dozen chocolate chip cookies. I didn't get it right away, but we had this bet that if she was married before Christmas that she had to bake me cookies. I think I said something like, O no, before she said that he was out in the car. I was soooo glad when Luke walked in. :) So they stayed and talked for a while... it's still really weird and I'm not sure I like losing two dear friends at once, but I guess it's worth it for the cookies and the purple bridesmaid dress. :) It's too bad that they forgot the Mrs. Knapp duck, that would have been perfect!

The funniest part was that my mom had no idea that they were over and Shelly was eavesdropping the whole time.

Saturday I did my taxes and didn't get (very) stressed or emotional. (Last year was bad... near tears bad) Shelly had her friends over for a valentine's day dinner. They all dressed up and I did Shelly's hair really foofy. It was pretty great.

Church was good today. Luke and Heidi got announced. And my roommate Alyssa. And a bunch of other people from random places. So now I'm back at school and tired. Gab and I walked at CIRCE and rehashed the weekend and stuff and then I went grocery shopping with Amber for 711 supper tomorrow night. And now I'm going to bed.
Blessings.

I did say I wanted to go winter camping...

Just not in our house. :)

So the gas regulator froze yesterday evening... we realized we didn't have any gas coming into the house when the stoves didn't work and we couldn't get the pilot lights lit. And then the house started to get cold(er than it already is). Our landlord finally came and we had heat by 11 so we didn't all have to have a big slumber party with space heaters in the attic.

Some of us went to CV to sing where it was warm- that was lots of fun. Ben made invisible koolaid and red water. It was thoroughly confusing. We almost had brownies. :)

I'm actually going home this weekend... eventually anyway. :)
Blessings.

We got iced

Last night the Shaker made taffy... and a few of the girls from 709 decided that they wanted some. So they went over and grabbed a few handfuls off of the porch where it was cooling and left because they were all busy and didn't have time to be social.

Around midnight Amber and Sarah called up the stairs, "girls, we have visitors." The entire Saltshaker was in our front yard with shovels and garbage cans. They proceeded to move all of the snow from the yard and piled it in front of the front door, the back door, Ash's door, and the basement door. We managed to get one bucket of water thrown before resistance became futile. All we could do was watch out the windows as more and more snow got dumped at our doors. Then they brought out buckets of water and poured it on the piles.

So after they had finished and our yard was a mess and we were completely snowed in; they gave three cheers (hip, hip- hooray) and drove off into the sunset singing "Goodnight Ladies." Ok, maybe not the sunset part- it was after midnight. Then we had to find our shovels and dig ourselves out. It was a late night and really cold to be shoveling snow at 1am.

Our poor neighbors.

It gets funnier the more I think about it. All that for a few handfuls of taffy.

Minnesota

I like that state a lot. Even though it is sooo cold. It was a really great trip and I had such a good time. There were six of us that braved the cold of the twin cities; Meg and I, Jeremy, B.J., Dale, and Loren. The trip out was uneventful, we played 20 (or so) questions, and made it there without freezing to death even thought the heat wasn't really working.

Saturday we checked out the St. Paul Winter Carnival. They had some really cool ice and snow sculptures and dog sled races. We watched the Jamaican dogsled team race (no, it was not cool runnings) on snow for the first time. It was a rather chilly day (high of -5 F, low -13 F) to be out doors, but after we warmed up a little and ate some lunch we went ice skating behind Meg's house. We didn't have any hockey sticks so we devised our own game. It was a cross between soccer, broomball, and basketball. The goalies had brooms but everybody else just had to kick the basketball with their skates. It was quite interesting, but very fun.

Saturday evening B.J., J-Hod, and Dalestyle fixed the temp gauge in the van- go guys- so we would have heat on the way home. Then we sang around the piano, played some games, and had a "jam session." Meg's little brother Joe was disappointed that he missed it until he discovered that jam didn't mean to slam into each other and knock people over. *grin*

We spent Sunday with the Minneapolis church- it was so good to be there. They don't get many visitors in the winter (imagine that) so they were glad to see us. We left right after church, and had a good ride home. Somebody decided that it would be fun to play 20-let's grill Jenny-questions on the way back. They know way too much about me now. Questions ranged from "what five things would you take if you were stranded on a desert island," to "what's your favorite farm memory," to "if you could change your last name to any AC last name what would you change it too?" The last one was from Jer and I took the fifth. *grin* So then we grilled him for a while.

So now I'm back at school and I'm tired and not very excited for Monday.

Does anybody want to go winter camping in the Boundary Waters?? I'm up for it.

Blessings.

Cold

My parents came down Wednesday night and took Matt and I out to eat, and then after church Mom and Dad and I went out for bubble tea. It was good times. Plus they brought my ice skates down which are a necessity in this weather.

Last night I went to ISU... kind of last minute. There were six of us in Sarah's car and somehow most of the conversation was directed at seeing how embarrassed they (*cough* Mike) could make me. :) And we went to Steak and Shake for milkshakes afterwards...

I got a text message from my brother in the middle of bible study asking to borrow my cordless drill. What's wrong with this picture? (yes, I know Denver was gone... but still!)

I'm going to Minnesota with Meg for the weekend. :)

Bubble Tea

I got out of lab early tonight. Hooray! As much as I enjoyed playing with liquid nitrogen and low energy x-ray diffraction, I still was excited because some Gridley people came down for the evening.

We went out for bubble tea. I was not feeling adventurous and got strawberry. I wonder how many people actually order green bean slush in a given week.

If anyone was wondering I think like a serial killer. (According to BJ)

Having a girlfriend is equivalent to buying 3 beers a day.

It's really really really cold out there. Pretty sure my down comforter is one of the best purchases I have ever made.

Meet me in St. Louis

So I had a great time in St. Louis this weekend. Meg and I, BAM, Nic, Josh, and EZ all went out together. The road trip was pretty uneventful and we made it in time for Matthew's testimony so it was all good.

Meg and I stayed with the Rinkenbergers and Kent and Jan H. were there too. It was a fun night. Meg got beat at Foosball. :) We tried hard to feel sorry for the guys... they stayed with Nathan and got to sleep on couches and the floor. We each got our own very comfortable double bed.

I'm not feeling very motivated to do anything at all right now.
Blessings.

A good day

Yesterday was fantabulous. I woke up on time and didn't hit the snooze. (amazingly enough) My first class of the day was floral design and I made two corsages that don't look too bad! :D Then I went and signed up to take piano for two credits... it should be fun, but I'm really really bad so I do feel sorry for whoever has to teach me.

We did our first experiment in Inorganic lab. I don't have to wear goggles and I get my very own hood! The experiment actually worked and the mixture turned all sorts of pretty colors: blue and purple and finally red. The only bad part was that my TA, who reminds me very much of BDY, dropped my sample in the rotovap. He saved most of it so it's all good. :) I was so excited to be in a real lab again I didn't even mind... I think it was the fastest four hours ever.

After supper I went to a singing at Saltshaker. It was Rogan's birthday so Meg baked him a cake and I donated one of my corsages to the cause (Since I have no reason to wear them and they will probably just get moldy in the refrigerator). Blake whipped up some really good taffy and we pulled it. Mike and I had a lot of trouble figuring it out so Gab had to rescue us. :) It turned out pretty good considering. Us girls reclaimed three of our pans that they were hoarding. I finally figured out the chemistry problem they had on their white board this morning... it was really bugging me. :)

My Friday lab doesn't start until next week so I got to sleep in this morning. When I finally woke up Gab made me come to the gym with her. I was not very awake and I didn't notice that I grabbed the 20lbs ball for our ab workout.... yeah.... I'm going to hurt a lot tomorrow. And I just finished cleaning so that's a workout in and of itself.

I'm going to St. Louis tomorrow for Matthew Schrenk's testimony and baptism.
Blessings.

Sledding

I have p-chem lab from 6-10 on Tuesday nights. Which isn't that bad, but... I don't like night classes and I have to miss singing at the home. It's required and it's pretty easy and my schedule was hard enough to figure out this year so I just decided to deal with it. However, I refuse to be excited about it.

So I was kind of bummed about not going to the home last night until I got home from lab and Amber and Sarah asked if I wanted to go sledding. YAY! I love sledding. We don't have a lot of snow right now, maybe an inch or two, but it was perfect sledding weather. None of us girls had sleds, but Amber and Sarah came up with some rubbermaids. 711 brought their awesome couch-on-skis-sled. There were a few real sleds but the couch was by far the best. :)

I thought C-U was pretty flat and boring, but there is a really good hill, marriage hill, out by orchard downs. We had a lot of fun and I got very wet and cold. So of course we had hot chocolate when we got back.



The couch sled arrives... it was hard to push it up the hill, but such a great trip down!

BAM, Me, Amber, and Fred ready to go. Blake Z., Blake K., and Jer gave us a nice running start. Matt totally panzed and didn't show.

Action shot of some of the guys heading down the hill.

The rubbermaids were kind of disappointing. Sarah and I tried really hard but only got about halfway down the hill. O well. It was a nice thought. :)

Ice Skating

Sometimes when it rains and fills up the drainage ditches and then freezes we get a great ice skating rink at our house. If you don't think about what exactly was being drained, or the lovely view from behind the hog houses. :) Saturday it was frozen, so Shelly and I went skating. Unfortunately, Matt drove the honey wagon right over the best part of the ice so it was an obstacle course trying to dodge the harrow, the woodpile, the holes from the wagon and the clumps of grass sticking through. Good times.

School

So I was in KS last weekend for Ned's baptism. It was kind of crazy, we drove out in a snowstorm, but overall it was very good. I don't know what it is about our family- for some reason we always seem to have a lot of people in not very big places. There were 20 some extra people at aunt Karen's for the weekend; every bed and most of the floor space was taken.

We came home Monday morning and then Matt and I left for school. Woot. Not sure if I'm happy or sad that this is my last semester. My last first day of school went ok. I don't really have a lot of classes this semester which is going to be very very nice.

It was good to be back in Champaign church again tonight. And good to be with my roomies again.

Screw your courage to the sticking place and we'll not fail

Or fall. Much.

I went skiing today with Heidi and Katelyn at Chestnut in Galena. We made it without getting lost! Even with our random route through Iowa. (Hooray for mapquest) It was lots of fun but I'm going to be soooo sore tomorrow. :) They were making snow all day today and the wind was blowing up from the river so it felt like icy needles on my face. I broke down and bought some ski goggles. I'm sure I looked hilarious but Kate and Heidi were nice enough not to mention it.

So skiing kind of terrifies me when I am at the top of the hill. And anything steeper than "green" slopes is petrifying. Hence my title and your Shakespeare for the day. :) Yes, that phrase actually went through my head, and yes, I know I'm weird.

We sang three part harmony on the ski lift. And in the car. I hurt already.