Vice Verses

This awesome video doesn't say enough about how awesome THE SWITCHFOOT CONCERT(!!!!!) was!!

But because I never (or rarely ever) include only one picture.... Here are a few more: 

For Christian's birthday, his family and a couple friends went up to see Switchfoot in concert in Phoenix on Friday night. It was so much fun!

 There was much iPod/iPad game playing on the ride up between Joe and Logan's iPods, and my device. Christian's favorite game is this game called "Cut the Rope." You have to slice the little ropes to get the candy to the frog. It is a ridiculous game, but he likes it. *shrug* Joe and Logan were playing "Cuberunner" in the back.

 The lines were crazy long! This is the front of the line, and we'd arrived about two hours before the concert even started. We ran into Ben and Maddie there and they were five hours early. (They were like the 8th people in line.)

The back of the line. If I was taller, you'd be able appreciate the full extent of how huge this line was..

We were among the first three hundred people in line, so we got wristbands to go on the floor!! It was so exciting!! We were really close to the front!

This is an awful picture of all the cellphones in the crowd during one of the opening bands. (If you can imagine, the other picture I took was even worse, so be happy I spared you.) All the cellphones was probably the coolest part of the opening bands. Nothing really exciting happened until Switchfoot came out.

 THERE THEY ARE!!!!! Oh the lights, the music, the fist-pumping!!! The epicness!!!

 Jon Foreman (the lead singer) came into the crowd!!!!! Look how close I was to him!! There are only three or four rows of people in front of me!

Then he jumped into the stands!! Right next to Christian's parents!!! Who were quite pleased and surprised by this.

The lighting was amazing. It is so hard to capture in photographs. The whole thing. It was just amazing. I can't even describe. Switchfoot puts on a good show. It also helped that I knew nearly all of the songs they played from my concentrated album listening over the last two weeks and also songs I'd just heard on the radio or friends' ipods.

This was as they were leaving the stage. By the end of the concert, I was near-deaf, hoarse, and sure that I needed to see a chiropractor. (which will probably happen on Tuesday.) It was a wonderful experience. I was torn between not wanting it to end and feeling completely exhausted. Since it was in Phoenix, I didn't get home until about 1:30am.

I know I keep using the same adjectives to describe it, but they're just not enough. If you could see me explaining to you, there would be much arm-waving and gesturing and jumping and pitches my voice doesn't normally go to*. All that jazz. All in all, it was a fantastic concert and a wonderful evening.


*I was literally squawking in happiness when my video finally loaded. You have know idea how happy I was...

Youth Camping Trip!!!

It's the post you've been waiting for: the youth camping trip!!! Sorry I haven't been on top of things. THIS IS PHOTO HEAVY. PREPARE YOUR EYES FOR AWESOMENESS.

First night: Nicole, Melissa, and I playing hearts.

It soon became evident that it was a looong hike to the bathrooms so the girls decided to go together on Saturday morning to wake ourselves up. Later, we found out that there was a bathroom much closer. (Though you had to walk uphill.) And I was so thankful I brought hand sanitizer.

After breakfast (apple bread and cereal) we took a hike (longer than the hike to the bathrooms) in the mountains. We probably hiked for about two hours and were all very hungry when we got back to the campsite. But the views were amazing!!

Rest break! This is: Nicole's head, Alex, Christian, Cam, Kerri, Kevin, someone else, and Logan.

And that's Daniel, who didn't want his picture taken.

About halfway through the hike, We found these massive rocks, which we climbed and you could look out and see all the mountains. It was so beautiful! I think you could even see a bit of Tucson (or maybe Oro Valley, not sure which) in the distance.

Me and Christian! ^-^ All along the way, I picked the pretty flowers I saw and poked them into my braid. Sadly, they wilted by the end of the hike, but while they lasted, they made me happy! I love flowers!

Nicole!

We took a (mostly) group picture on the top of the mountain. Not everyone was in it, but it's still a great picture! And we have few group pictures of us as it is.

After we got back to the campsite, we made sandwiches and had free time. We played a few card games and then the boys started playing poker. When they started to take their shirts off, the girls decided to hike in the nearby woods. We ended up sitting by a little crick and singing worship songs with the guitar. (The guitar wasn't singing though. We were singing and I was playing the guitar!)

For dinner, we roasted hotdogs on sticks. I pioneered the stick part as I was very hungry and the stick I found... well, it had character. It was a bit skinny and wobbly at the end, but I made it work. (All the while, burning the end of the stick. When I took the hotdog off, my stick was all charred except where the hotdog had been.) However, the stick ended up roasting several more hotdogs!

Jacob, Daniel, Cam, and Alex. I'm really not sure what they're doing.

We got a huge game of hell (or "nertz" if you prefer) going, and Jacob was trying to distract us. Nertz is a fast game similar to Solitaire with multiple decks of cards (approx. one per person.) It gets harder the more people are playing. We played with six.

I'm a cowgirl at heart! Yeehaw! I tried on Jacob's hat for size.

More Nertz-playing.

 Jacob, myself, and Christian! The flash on Jacob's camera was so bright! I was squinting in almost all of his pictures.

The boys did crazy things at night after the girls went to bed. One of these things included the decimation of our ladle and can opener. o_O Jacob replaced them for us though so it was all good. When it comes to this sort of stuff though, you're better off not knowing what happened.

In the morning (Sunday), we packed up the tents and had a little worship/devotion time with Jacob. It was really nice. And Cam helped douse the fire before we left.

 

And that concludes our (awesome) youth camping trip!

All in all, it was a great experience. I loved spending the weekend on the mountain with my friends. We talked about doing hard things and how God has been working in our lives. And we also did a lot of goofing around. 

Jacob also announced to us that he would be stepping down from youth ministry and another couple from our church would be taking it over. The transition has already happened and while it's been difficult for some of us, it has also been a good thing. Sometimes, God uses change in big ways and we just need to accept it. (Which is always the hardest part.) Youth ministry isn't the same without Jacob, but I've come to terms with it. And it's okay.

More Pictures from Mattea's Visit

 Me offering a feather duster to Mattea in the middle of the Chinese grocery store. Doesn't she look pleased?

 More pictures from the sleepover!

 Me being goofy with a pair of shorts on my head and she had to take a picture.

 Sarah and Mattea being silly!

 Matt and I at Isaiah's house.

 Isaiah, Mattea, and Stephen. They were throwing knives at a wooden board propped up against a tree. o_O

 Then Isaiah lit a huge fire using a tiki torch.

 The whole group. (left to right: Luke, Joe, Stephen, Isaiah, myself, and Kevin)

 The amaaazing sushi we got at Sushi 10. It was sooo good. In case you were wondering, this is the same place we went on my birthday.

 On Tuesday, we went bowling with Mattea's aunt and uncle and baby cousin. Isn't he cute???? ^-^ The baby beat me in the second game...

All in all, it was a FABULOUS visit! (As you can probably tell from all these amazing pictures.) Last night, me and Mattea were actually talking on Skype and it was so much fun!! Video chat is really fun. Haha. We were dancing and showing each other random stuff. It was great. =D