Snow Day with Dad!

After 2 whole hours of waiting...

 

and waiting....

and waiting,

we finally got our rentals!! Yay! Seriously though, we arrived at about 9:30 and didn't start skiing until 1. That's what we get for going up on a Saturday! They actually ran out of rentals and were beginning to send people home. As you can see here, the line went out into the parking lot. And there were so many cars, that people parked down the hill! We actually parked about a mile (give or take) away from the place! (It was a long walk)

pre-skiing picture!

Looking good Sydney! She had some truly amazing hat hair. Also, Cam squeezed into the background of this one-even though he was being super camera shy. (ay-yi-yi.! That kid does not like his picture taken!)

Once we actually got on the slopes though, we had a great time. Well, sorta. Cam had a bad run the first go-round but he liked it much better after a good lesson. After the lesson, he was skiing down that hill like a pro!

Sydney also had a great day! She had a bunch of good runs and she picked it up so quickly. She even rode the lift by herself a couple of times! (as did Cam. We were all very good at riding the lift.) Syd fell a lot but it didn't hurt her morale one bit! She just kept getting up and trying again! And hey, everyone falls. Heck, even Dad fell this trip!☺

 

While the kids were in lessons, Dad and I took the blessed hour and a half to ourselves and rode the lift all the way up to the top of the mountain. It was a fifteen minute lift ride (15 minutes!) and it was really cold up there but boy, was the view beautiful! Absolutely made the day! This is our city from the very top! We found the general area that our house was!

On the way back down, Dad taught me how to turn with my skis straight. (I call them french fry turns as opposed to pizza turns.) I biffed it a couple times but it was all good. It was so cold up there that my eyes were watering and I started crying! But, that's to be expected when you're 9,157 feet up in the air--with sunglasses! It was really cold but the view was worth it. It's really hard to capture with a camera but we did our best.

 

All and all, it was a pretty awesome day! Even with all the waiting. Next time, we'll rent skis in town and go up. Then we can skip all the lines. And, we'll go during the week instead of on the weekend.

ATC's

Every few months or so, I discover something new that I attack with wild enthusiasm. This time, it's ATC's or artist trading cards. Essentially, they are small works of art, of any media, that fit on a 3½"X2½" sheet of paper-the same size as a typical sports trading card. The only rule of ATC's is the sizing and because it can be made using any media, it is very open to creativity-which is what I like! The possibilities are endless!

There are three things you can do with them. 1) keep them 2) trade them or 3) swap them. At this point, I'm doing a combination of all three. Keeping some, trading others, swapping more. These two are for a swap. I'll be sending them out tomorrow. I can't wait to see what comes back to me. I'm so excited. In a swap, you make several ATC's-all the same and send them along with a SASE (Self-Adressed-Stamped-Envelope) to your hostess. She divides up the cards equally and sends new ones back to you! It's been quite fun so far. I'm still learning the ropes of it but that's all part of the process.

Fun Times with Chris!!

Chris is an engineer in our C3 group that we host here. Sometimes, he comes a little early and then we get to do fun things before everybody else gets here! We've done stuff like new math problems!

Last time, we made an awesome donkey piñata for my dad! (shown left) We filled it with candy and made him bust it open with a plastic wiffle ball bat. It made for a great video!!

Today, Chris brought a really old (really old) box camera that was his grandfathers! It was super cool! It didn't have any film in it so we couldn't take any "real" pictures, but it was really neat to look through the view-finder. This camera is like 100 years old! Yee haw! I love old stuff.

Chris took the camera apart for me and showed me how it worked. He even drew a very nice diagram for me on the whiteboard! But when he found out I'd never made a home-made box camera, we had to make one! I dug up a shoebox and we made our own. It was really cool. We made a simple one and then we upgraded it, slowly adding to it to make it better as we went along. Chris said that to make it take an actual picture, we'd only have to add light-sensitive paper to the back of the box. The light would shine through the pinprick to the light-sensitive paper and the paper would record the image. I'm not sure how to explain it better but it's really neat stuff! So the above right is a camera that's 100 years old. And this (at left) is a homemade box camera, and THIS 

 

is a modern camera. Actually it's a camera+phone=ipod. Yes it is the Iphone!

HAPPINESS!!!! (aka. Milea's coming)

I have a wonderful penpal, whom I've been writing for about five and a half years. And in those five and a half years, we only saw each other in real life, twice. The day we met and another day, last June, when we stopped by her hometown for a couple hours. We are so alike, it's not even funny! We could be twins!! We have such similar tastes and we even look alike!

So, ever since I hung out with her last June, we've been trying to get her to fly out for Easter Break. And we finally booked her flight today! YAY!!! I am so happy! She will be here, the week just prior to Easter. I'm so excited! It even makes today feel a little better since we couldn't go the snow.

(The roads were closed so we couldn't go to the snow with Jacob. sadness. Maybe next weekend.) But Milea is coming and I am so so SO excited! yay!

Snow!

Twas the night before last,
When, all through the town,
Mighty torrents of raindrops,
Came all slashing down.

Just me and my family,
So warm in our beds,
As the house shook and shuddered,
Right over our heads! (Seriously)

But when we awoke,
What surprises! Oh Oh!
The great northern mountains,
Were dusted with Snow!!

More snow than ever,
Before had we seen!
Snow on our mountains,
White and pristine.

It's absolutely beautiful! Unfortunately, the roads are closed up there but hopefully, they will open up again soon. Our youth group leader wants to take us up there for some fun after church tomorrow. Yay snow! Snowmen, and snow angels and snowball fights! Oh my! It feels like Christmas all over again! I'm so excited. I hope the roads will open up.

Apple Peels for Wilbur!

A while back, apples were on sale and Mom bought eighty (80) pounds!! (typical, knowing her.) We ate some of them in the beginning but a good majority of them went into our friend's (very large) freezer-never to be seen again.

haha, no. Yesterday, we went over to her house and we peeled apples for 3 hours! We also made the delicious gooey yumminess pictured above. That, is apple pie filling and it is warm, heavenly goodness. And it's all mine!! Mwa hahahahaha! We ladled the pie filling into freezer bags and we had enough bags of filling for 15 apple pies!! AND, when we left her, there were still a lot of apples left. She probably got another 4 batches of filling (cooked by the vat of course!) out of it. (which is enough for about 20 pies. We supersized!)

Now, we can have apple pie all year round! Just take a bag out of the freezer, defrost and bake! I say, I am going to be sick of apple pies!




This is Wilbur but I like to call him "Little Piggie."He is our friend's pot belly pig and actually, pigs are cleaner than dogs! (Supposedly) He's really cute! And mostly house-trained. Always a plus! I took a video of him but it didn't turn out very well. I've been trying to convince Mom to let us get a pig but she said 'no.'



These are some of the apple peels that went in Wilbur's "trough." (Really though, it's more of a plastic tub that they put his food in. I guess you could call it a trough.) This is only some of the apple peels because....

Cam likes to eat them!!

He says it's like fruit roll-ups that are healthy for you. I say it's a long shot but hey, he likes them! It took me forever to get a good shot since I'm not very steady with the camera. (And even this shot isn't very good.) He was stationary too! Cam was watching a movie and eating great big strands of apple peels. I think he came back to the counter three or four times!

Studying for Bio

This morning, I took my biology test, (which I'll admit, I put off on Friday because I didn't want to do it. Let's be honest: biology is a monster of a subject!) I spent a good portion of the morning studying and memorizing my definitions plus the chemical process for cellular respiration...then, when I took the test, it turned out that I didn't even need to know the exact steps! (which is good because I accidentally forgot about 6 Hydrogen atoms) I could answer every question and I'm fairly confident that I got them right. It was awesome!

I've noticed that my note and test taking skills and habits have greatly improved since I've started homeschooling. At school, I hardly ever studied for tests but now that I am taking the time and effort to actually sit down and genuinely study, I am seeing great results!

All I can say, is that our AWANA team is going to crush everybody at Bible Quizzing!! Oh yeah!

Although, I really shouldn't be at the computer right now. I have more biology I have to do....

Farmer's Market!

Yesterday, Mom and I went gallivanting to the farmer's market! It was so different from what I'm used to. We saw a few of the coolest dogs--including a Great Dane, a couple Rottweilers, and a ginormous Russian shepherd hound thing (It was the size of a Great Dane but it had a long snout and it was fluffy!!)

We bought produce to make salsa (and man, was it good!) and there was one guy selling hydroponic tomatoes! These tomatoes were pesticides free and they were grown without any soil. He cut one up and let people sample it so that you could taste the difference between his hydroponic tomatoes and other, normal, tomatoes. And let me tell you, they tasted amazing! We bought four. Hee Hee. (shown above: tomatoes but not hydroponic ones)

We also saw a lady wearing this really interesting jacket. It was quilted and on the back it said, "A messy house is the sign of a happy quilter." (Hah! We sewed a lot of pajamas over the holidays and boy do we know how true that is!) It made us laugh. The first pic is zoomed in and the above pic is the full jacket.
And, I saw an authentic old fashioned typewriter! (I'm pretty sure it was real...) It was neat! I'd never seen a typewriter before so it was cool.

There were so many sellers and stalls. It was so new and different (As it is every time we go. No farmer's market is the same twice.) All the sights and sounds and smells... It was a lot of fun. Mom made me ask permission from the sellers before I took pictures of their merchandise. (Although, I didn't ask permission from the lady with the quilted jacket. I just pretended I was taking a picture of the mountains and zoomed in.) None of the sellers declined me but I'm sure they thought it was a strange request....oh well!

Good Job Sydney!!

Wooooh Sydney!!

Today, we went to Sydney's school assembly and showered her with our support and love for doing a good job. This semester, she maintained an average of at least 3.7 and made the Principal's honor roll. And we are SO proud of her. Yay Syd!!

As she walked across the platform, we screamed so loud for her! After Syd came back, the woman next to us asked if we would scream for her girls too! They said to her, "can you ask them to scream for us too?" Isn't that just the cutest thing you ever heard? So we screamed nice and loud for them too and Sydney got a little carried away and started screaming for a bunch of completely random strangers. It was a lot of fun.

We love you Sydney! Keep up the great work!

Cookies Cookies Cookies!!

One of my friends invited me over today and we made so many cookies!! It was ridiculicious (thanks to uncle Brian for the awesome new word)! We had so much fun!

We made:

• 
  
  pumpkin cookies
• 
  
  yellow happy face cookies

and

• 
  
  a brand new invention that I made up! Yahoo!

Here's a pic of what I invented:

I'm not sure what to call it yet but it is fantabulous!!!

We can't reveal the recipe due to the possibility of Recipe Snatchers who might steal our idea and take credit for it. But we can tell you that it involved pecans, mint milky way bars, and pure awesome-ness!! Mmm, mmm. If only you could've tasted them!

They were so gooey and chocolate-y and warm!! It makes me feel all snuggly just thinking about it! ;)

Rusty Gets a Trip to the Vet!

Yep, So Rusty got to go visit the vet!! It was quite an...interesting experience.

Yesterday, Mom was petting him and she felt this really weird bump on his back. She thought it was a tumor but when Dad checked it, it was a puncture wound.

Rusty is back to cat scrapping!!! Except this time, he didn't do so well. We think the cat bit him and it resulted in an abscess. So one hundred eighty bucks and a bottle of antibiotics later, we brought him home. He's also got a lovely shaved patch coming on. Good job Rusty!!

Rusty cowering in the vet's office.

Noodle Cakes!!!

Ah, noodle cakes. Truly, the tastiest most delicious food that is the absolute worst for your health.

My mom has been making "noodle cakes" for quite a while. Essentially, it's only a few steps on its way to being a complete meal. Cooked out of sheer laziness, it is dee-licious! Crunchy on the outside, yet soft and tender on the inside... mmm mmm. Plus, (big bonus) it's shaped like a pancake!! Oh yeah.

The real dish is ultimately supposed to be the best home-made chow mein you ever tasted. however, it can be rather involved work and though worth it in the end, we hardly ever get past the noodle part. (Generally, after youc ook the noodles, you tear up the noodle pancakes and stir fry in vegetables and meat. Usually, we just stop here and eat it. Lazy, I know, but it's amazing stuff.

Since we moved here though, we haven't been able to find very good chow mein noodles so we're experimenting with different types of noodles in anticipation of making a HUGE batch of chow mein (the real stuff) in a couple weeks. (Because, if you are going to make it, you better do it big) Yesterday, we visited the Chinese food store (which, if you've ever been in one, smells really strange) and bought five different packages of chow mein noodles to try.

For the actual noodle cakes, you first boil the noodles, drain them, and rinse with cold water. Then you toss them with soy sauce and fry them in a cast-iron skillet on both sides until it's nice and crispy. Yum-o!

This batch didn't turn out so good. Better luck next time!!

The Great Fish with Cancer Question

I've been presenting this scenario to my friends to see what they think.

So you now have a fish. Sure he's ugly but he's also your fish. You're rich now and this fish did not come off easy. In fact, it was very expensive!! (very expensive)

You're sitting in the waiting room at the vet's office. The doctor comes out with your (very expensive) fish in its bowl. The doctor has a very solemn expression upon his face and you notice your (very expensive) fish is not looking so good. He actually looks worse.

"I'm sorry," the doctor says sadly, "but your fish has a fare form of cancer. There's nothing we can do." he hands you the fish bowl and leaves you alone with your beloved (and expensive) pet. Sadly, you take in your ugly fish, your ugly fish. You bring the fish home.

Later that day, you hear of a fish practitioner who is willing to operate on your (very expensive) fish. He can surgically remove the tumor invading your poor (and expensive) fish's body. You have plenty of money but you will have to put your precious fish into the hands of a complete stranger for a little while...

So my question is this: Would you pay the money to remove the cancer in this fish?



It is such a silly question, I've found that it sparks rather interesting conversation. Of course, I don't always describe the whole scene. It might make a good story. Maybe the fish practitioner hasn't studied oncology for ichthyology like he claims....

First Post and Fry Bread!

First post!! Yippee!! Well, I am a very fun bubbly person and I love lots of things as my profile will gladly tell you.

what else do you put in a first post? =)

oh, that's another thing about me. (that I forgot to add to my profile) I have an addiction to smiley face emoticons. Not even kidding. I use them all the time! Even in my snail mail letter writing awesomeness, which I am sure is very bad form but I don't care and neither do my friends, who actually read my letters.
I also have a tendency to use very long complicated run-on sentences when I'm writing or typing very fast.

Moving on to the fry bread:
Mom experimented with Fry Bread today since we had leftover oil from deep fried mac and cheese and chinese chicken wings from New Years. It was very yummy. She made this dough and squished it flat with a rolling pin and dropped it into the fry pan. man oh man! That was good stuff. Tastes almost like piroshkis!!