pepper and s'mores

on saturday my aunt left for california. emie, tori, and norwood are already down there. so my aunt asked me to housesit/dogsit for them while they were gone in cali. i said yes before i knew that my family had already made plans to go the beach the same week. ugh.

anyway, i've been watching their dog, pepper, which is a black poodle. saturday and sunday night were tough cause pepper kind of got lonely and yeah....stuff happened that wasn't exactly super fun. let's just say i had a lot to clean up. but anyway, since then, i've been sleeping at their house and pepper has been sleeping with me. i don't know if i like this arrangement or not because i kind of like my space when i'm sleeping, but whatever, it keeps pepper happy.

i'm kinda bummed that my family is going to the beach without me. i mean, i could bring pepper down there with me, but that seems like a hassle cause then i've got a dog in my car for 2 hrs trying to make it's way to the front seat so it can sit in my lap while i'm driving. and then pepper would get all gross with sand and i don't want to have to clean that up. so i don't really know what i'm gonna do.

goodness...

so far this week has been pretty decent. on monday night, rachel and i went to the waterfront and sat out on the log on the beach and watched the sunset and the moon was out too, so we got to see the reflection of the moon on the water and the sunset at the same time. to say the least, it was incredible. then we went to winco and got supplies to make those cup of dirt with worm things that you have when your little..(you know, chocolate pudding with crumbled oreos, and gummy worms...) it was really delicious, but i kinda felt sick afterward, although it was a good sick. =)

then last night i played tennis with brant and his siblings as i do most every week. i played horribly (and i blame my racket). but after that, i went over and we had s'mores and just sat around the fire until it was late. and i felt sick again cause i think i ate too many marshmallows, but again, it was a good sickness.

nathan is going to the beach tomorrow, so i'll be home by myself. plus anne is at bball camp, jamie's on a fishing trip, and emie and tori are in cali. i miss them all very much and can't wait for them to come home.

gurg, and nathan and i haven't been at the beach together for a long time. and i still haven't seen him surf and i really want to. maybe i will have to go down to the beach for a day at least. ok.

oh. and my macbook and ipod should be coming either today or tomorrow. so hopefully i'll have something to occupy my time for at least a few hours. oh my word im so excited.

my indonesia meeting is on monday. yay! so i'll get to meet everyone on my team and i'm really excited about that!

the 4th of july is next week and i love that holiday. and emie and tori come back the 3rd. ahhh they've been gone for almost 3 weeks...

ski camp is coming up in 2 weeks. i hope all of you remember the july 11 is free slurpee day at 7-11. so make sure you go and get your fill of free slurpeeness. cause i'll be gone at camp. but then, it's not so bad cause i'll be with my friends, and wakeboarding, tubing, and waterskiing, and sitting out in the sun for 5 days. yesssss. and then i leave for indonesia in about 4 weeks. (july 23rd!)

ok.....hope you all have a wonderful amazing day!

dolce gelato e piu

i love summer. i took joe and thomas to the waterfront today and they rode bikes while i ran (yay for summer workouts for fall sports...). then we went to dolce gelato (yay for italian ice cream, soo good!). then we ate lunch and i went shopping. hehe yay! plus it was 82 degrees out today. ahhh i love summer.
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so i've realized that there are 4 main goals in my life.
love and trust God.
make, build, and maintain friendships/relationships with people.
be genuine.
try.
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i don't know why i have never listened to maroon 5 before, but i realized that i kinda like them way much. good stuff. anyway...
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random thought that i have yet to answer:

why do i make life more difficult than it is?

living life should be simple, right? but if you really think about life, it's kinda complicated. but then it's really not. why am i thinking when i could be living? why am i worrying when i could be trusting?
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yay for random thoughts
and yay for boredom.

otterpops and cough syrup

this conversation actually took place today:

joe: "this otterpop tastes like cough medicine."
thomas: "well, it tastes fine to me."
joe: "thomas, you like cough medicine."

then i laughed.

congradulations my friend

today nathan graduates from highschool.

sometimes it's weird to think that we are both college students now.

all i can remember is us when he used to chase me around the house and finally catch me and tickle me because i was laughing so hard i couldn't run anymore.

or when we used to play legos together. for 8 years it was just nathan and i. and since then, our relationship has stayed just as close.

i wouldn't want any other person to be my brother. he's pretty much one of the coolest guys i know.

so nathan, congradulations my
surfing.
drummer.
long boarding.
guitar playing.
flipflop wearing.
song writer.
summer loving.
blue truck driver.
lot boy. (err man)
skateboarding.
snowboarding.
sun soaker.
quick witted.
chill.
brother and best friend (and kook).
i wish you the best and hope and pray to see you succeed in the many talents that God has given you. i love you more than you know!!

home life

family is a strange thing sometimes. the best thing, but always the strangest.

sometimes family members do weird things.

last night joe kept poking his stomach. i don't know what possessed him to do this. everytime i told him to stop, he just started laughing hysterically. and i don't know why.

thomas sings all the time. in fact he is making up a song right now.
"na na bah dah dah dah hmmm. elllen...dadddy...nahtan. rahhhhh. la la la. i want to win the piston cup! i'm movig dawn wahhh! nana nina te bebo." *slaps legs for a beat* then...*mumbles some random sentence loudly but incomprehensible* "ellen come play with me" "yay i love my sister" is what i finally decipher. what a cute kid. =)

i would tell you something strange about nathan, but there's not really much to say. he just kinda reminds me of flipping a coin. there's only 2 sides and you never know which one you're gonna get.

living at home is comfortable. it's where you can be completely yourself and no one can judge you. but not many other people every get to see that unless you're really transparent and even then...

today i played memory with thomas. yup, memory. it was great besides the fact i got beat. uhhg. i need to practice more if renee and i ever want to beat brant and justin. haha. (which we will this summer)

emily came over last night and we made dinner together. it was delicious besides the fact that it got cold. and the reason it got cold? we were laughing instead of eating our food. and i wish i could tell you what we were laughing at, but unfortunately all i remember is the laughing part.

i probably burned at least 924.347 calories. excellent...

only one more day of school. then finals next week. oh joy.

a quick life story

first things first:

i write this as a testimony to what Christ can do in a persons life if they let him...

so i grew up in the church, asked Christ to come into my life at a young age, and pretty much knew all the Bible stories and everything like that.

all through high school i pretty much did everything in my own strength. i had it all together, or at least that's the front i put on, but i always knew something was missing.

my first wake up call was my junior year. i got mono, strep throat, a fever, and puking all at the same time. i was completely helpless. as an involved student and athlete, that sickness pretty much screwed everything up. but i got through it.

the summer in between my junior and senior year i went on a missions trip to south korea. it was really awesome, but i was still missing something.

senior year started out tough. my great grandfather died right before school started. two weeks later, my friend's brother died. at the beginning on december, one of my classmates died in a motorcrosse accident. january, my grandpa died from cancer. i struggled with depression, grief, and questioned my faith.

finally at the end of summer, i attended a summer camp that totally flipped my life back on the right track with the Lord. i finally realized that what i was missing was having my own faith, not my parents, my churchs, but that i needed to make my faith in Christ my own.

i began my freshman year at college with a strong desire to pursue and develop my relationship with Jesus.

so here comes the best part!

so ever since south korea, i've really wanted to go another missions trip, but nothing has really come up. back in decemeber, after praying about missions for some time, some opportunities came up, but they didn't end up working out. i guess it wasn't God's timing. so i've still been praying about it and about a month ago, i was volunteering at a youth conference on a saturday when i ran into an old soccer teammate of mine. i asked her what she was doing this summer and she said that she was going to Indonesia on a missions trip. i thought that was really cool and told her that i was really interested in missions and we kinda left it at that.

so monday night i was talking to my mom about the whole missions thing and my prayers. basically i was kinda having doubts about whether God was listening to me or not.

well, i woke up tuesday morning, checked my email, and had an email from my friend, kylee, who i had run into that weekend at the youth conference. and her email went something like this,

"hey ellen, i was thinking about how you said you were interested in missions and we still need more people on our trip. would you be interested in going to Indonesia with us?"

ahhh it was so cool how God totally answered my prayers! and i felt really bad for even doubting Him.

so i told her that i was and that i would pray about it. so i spent a week praying and seeking counsel from people about the trip.

on friday i got a phone call from her saying that they needed to know by the following thursday if i was gonna go or not (because they had to purchase airline tickets).

i really wanted confirmation from God just so that i knew that this trip was His will and not my own, so i continued to pray and wait for confirmation.

so wednesday night rolls around, and i still haven't heard any confirmation. finally, i get a call from my pastor saying that he felt like the Lord told him that i should go.

so on thursday i called the team leader and made sure everything was good to go.

saturday, i sent out 50 support letters to friends and family. i needed to raise $1800 for my trip.

as of yesterday, i am fully funded. God provided all my financial need within 3 weeks. talk about answering prayer...

i am super excited because God worked out the timing for everything and it blew me away how awesome He is!

so i'm going to Indonesia this summer with fellowship of christian athletes and we're gonna go build a sports court for a muslim school and run a basketball camp. we may also be visiting a couple orphanages and doing basically anything else that needs to be done. i'm stoked because i've always wanted to do a missions trip that was a sports ministry type of thing.

God worked everything out to the last detail. i'm so excited. it's just so cool to see that God really does answer pray, and not only that, but God knows our desires and cares about us even down to the little things.

beware of choxie

so last night emily and i were hanging out...

i went and picked her up at about 7. then we went to safeway and bought rice cakes and water.

after safeway, we went to target. and i bought choxie dark chocolate expresso truffles because they were on sale and i wanted chocolate.

so we then made a quick detour to our favorite bulk food store, winco, and picked up an arizona raspberry iced tea for me and a cream soda for emily.

we then tore into our box of expresso truffles and started to devour them. this was at about 10:30. at midnight, i ate one more of those delicious chocolates.

this is where it all went wrong.

i could not fall asleep at all. i was wide awake.

1am....still awake, online, looking at snowboards...

2am...in bed, reading my bible...

3am...get up, grab some old journals and flip through them...

*as a side note on old journals, i just have to interject that reading old diaries/journals is one of the most interesting/hysterical/pathetic things to do at 3am or anytime for that matter...

so finally 4am rolls around and i'm finally drifting off to sleep.

the moral of this blog:

do not eat dark chocolate expresso truffles late at night.

the surgical strike

so basically there is an unwritten law among my group of girls which states we always go to winco on our weekend festivities.

during this brief period of time, we usually speed walk to the cracker isle, pick out a finely crafted box of rosemary and olive oil triskets before we dash madly toward the bulk candy section, where we select sour gummy worms, m&m's, swedish fish, and for ellen's personal indulgence, a toffee and almond symphony bar.

then we saunter over to the bakery for emily to pick up a freshly baked toasted to perfection loaf of french bread, which has to be soft enough to manage when you have $3,000 of metal glued to your teeth.

after that experience, we head over to the drink section, where we pick out our personal favorites from the arizona iced tea family. as soon as we have made our selections (which is quite a lengthy process), we come to the realization that these drinks are better cold at which point we put them back and go to where the are stored chilled at the foot of the check out stand (and yes this happens every time).
after quickly grabbing our cold beverages, we push through the check out and immediately tear through the thin packaging separating us from our beloved junk food.

our ritual is only concluded by an abundance of bread crumbs being flung through the air and landing in precarious positions all over ellen's car, much to her dismay. we also always end up being so lost in animated conversation (and dance moves) that racing anne home to make sure she doesn't blow her curfew is inevitable.