Trip to CA

So last week my dad, Benji, Laura and I took a 21 hour trip to CA! It was so much fun!! I got to meet my family over there, and make some great memories :)
I got a long really great with my family.
First we went through Texas.
Man, i do NOT miss that place! It's flat and ugly haha!!
Then New Mexico - now that place is beautiful! It looks like God took a paint brush, and mixed a bunch of colors, and went all out! It's wonderful!
Then Arizona, that's where we started getting into the mountains and that's what i love! It's wonderful! It was like the crack of dawn when we got there. It wasn't like foresty mountains, it was more like deserty mountains, until we got closer to California.
But before we arrived we got to see the Grand Canyon! It is beautiful!! God is awesome!! That's all i can say.
Here are some pictures that i took.






Then we arrived at last! (sorry i didn't get a picture of us next to the CA sign). It was so nice. My dad took us around the little town of Hanford, California (where he grew up). He told us his memories, showed us where he went to school, and where he used to live. It is such a cute town, i would love to grow up there. But i loved just getting to know my family. It was so much fun to get to know them! We got to go get ice cream at Supreme Dairy!! Best ice cream ever. That picture is their SINGLE scoop!!
Then we got my dad's favorite pizza, the wonderful Me -n- Ed's!! So great :)

And we got to hang out with my uncle's family, and they spent the night. My dad told me that my aunt and i were separated at birth haha!!
So it was so much fun!! Here are some pictures of us playing with our cousins.

My cousin Sarah

My cousin Luc

My aunt got this new beautiful camera for her birthday while we were there :)

My uncle Gary

They played catch all the time! Everyone did, baseball was how we got close to each other
Here is Benji and our cousin Justin playing.

Justin

Laura and Sarah playing a hand game we taught them.

My grandpa, we call him Poppy :)

My grandma, we like to call her Kay-Kay.
Here she is showing Laura and Sarah some pictures.

Asian District

A couple of Saturdays ago, we had a Boot Camp "challenge" to go to the China Supermarket. We all expected that we would have to find the weirdest food in the store, then eat it. But we were wrong!

As we pulled into the parking lot, we saw John and his dad standing in the grass. They motioned for us to come over so we did. All of us went over, and John said that one group would go to one side of the Asian District, and the other team to the other side. The challenged us to learn how to say 'Hello' and 'Thank you' in Vietnamese, which is Gam an (Thank you) and Dow (Hello) Then learn the background of the people. I thought the first side we went to wasn't very exciting, except above one of the doors was a mirror that we learned was a anti-demon mirror. When the 'demons' looked into the mirror they would get scared off.

Then the teams traded sides, that's when the fun happened. First we went in to a bakery (which wasn't really a bakery) Their specialty was duck, and...pork i think. They didn't have ANY sweets.

Then we walked past a jewelry store and we tried to open the door but it was locked. We looked through the windows and saw people inside, as if it was open, so we tried to open the door again but it was still locked. My dad walked away with Benji thinking that might work. So The Eskimo and I waved to the people inside, and in just a few seconds we heard a beep and the door opened! We walked inside to another door. The store people waited till the door was closed until they opened the other door. We walked inside to a quiet little jewelry store. Behind one of the counters stood an older Vietnamese couple. 'Hello!' they greeted 'Dow!' we greeted back. We looked around for a second and then asked about their life. We asked if they had a store in Vietnam and the man showed us a picture of their store. It was a cute little store, nothing like you'd see in America. We asked him if his customers in Vietnam were any different then the ones in America. A smile appeared on his face, and he chuckled under his breath. "America wants (some type of gold..i forgot) and in Vietnam they want (a different kind)." The Eskimo and I both laughed, although we didn't really know what was so funny. We asked them a couple more question before we said "Gam an!" and left.

We met my dad outside, and told him about what we learned, before we went into the next store. The next store wasn't a Vietnamese store, is was African (the lady who owned it was from Ghana). The lady there told my mom that she was a Christian (which is AWESOME!). We looked around the store for awhile. It was a cute little store, with food and clothes from Africa. I loved it :) If i had money i'd totally shop there. When we left she told us she would love if we came back and visited with her some more, and we told her we'd love to!

Next we went to a Vietnamese alteration shop. We didn't go in, just looked in windows, not wanting to bother anyone if they were working. We started to walk away when the door opened, a little Vietnamese women came out. "Hello!" she beamed "How are you?" Her English wasn't very good, but she was trying. "Oh we were just looking around." we said. We asked her how long she's been in America. She thought for a minute then answered "About 15 years." She looked sad. "Have you been back to Vietnam since?" we asked. She shook her head, "No." She sighed "My son come, he married! Many of my children married!" We asked her a couple more questions, before we headed back to the Supermarket.

All of our stomachs turned as we turned the corner and fasted..IT (haha a bit dramatic :P). Mr. John and his dad stood out front with a list. They put us into teams and told us to find everything on the list. My team was me, Pony Girl, and Benji. I was prepared for them to say "Then eat it" but it never came. When they said go, we all raced inside (i'm sorry i don't have pictures...the store had a sign that said NO CAMERAS, so no pictures.) i don't have the list anymore, but it had some weird stuff on it:
Dragon Eyes,
Duck heads
Ant eggs
Headless ducklings
Full ducks with heads (do they have something against ducks??)
And so on..

After about an hour, our team finished first (It was a big store)!! We learned more about their culture (gifts they make to the dead, incense, anti-demon mirrors, etc) then went out to lunch with Mr. John and his dad :) The food was amazing! i got to know Mr. John, and his dad better (fun stuff).

Then Mr. John told us to follow him so we all got in our cars, and followed Mr. John to a Buddhist Temple. Now that was interesting. We learned about their different gods and we got a tour inside. They had a room just for praying for your ancestors (with music playing in the background). Then we went into a room where the worshiped. They had a big Buddhist, surrounded by flowers. There were also the guards of the doors. Our guide said they would be scary, but i didn't think they were. We asked questions and stayed for about 1 hour, then left.

So that's pretty much it..talk about a fun Saturday :P.

My family..this should be exciting

This is me having fun with Picnik
my siblings (and me) and our ages.

Oklahoma City National Memorial

So we went to the Oklahoma City National Memorial last night..If you ever just want to cry, go there. It takes a lot to make me cry, but as i stood in front of a fence that had stuff that parents hung in memory of their little girl who died, because of these two men's anger... Or stuff that a daughter hung in memory of her father... I sat there and cried. I couldn't control it. I was angry. For those of you who don't know what happened, on April 19, 1995 Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh drove up in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. The back of their U-Haul truck was full of fertilizer. A bomb. The reason these two men were about to do this terrible attack was because they were angry. So as they prepared the bomb, they raced off, dropping the key to their truck in their carelessness. Because of their anger, the bomb took 168 lives, including 19 children under the age of 6. It injured 680+ people. Now imagine THIS

9:01 am-You're complaining about having to get up early, as you get a cup of coffee with your co-worker, after dropping off your 2 year old little girl in the daycare downstairs.

9:02 am-You're walking back to your office when suddenly the building you and your daughter are in explodes...taking your little girl's life, but sparing yours.

9:03-You're laying in the ashes, in complete pain, the only thing on your mind is your little girl. Is she ok? Is she injured? Is she alive?

Now in those 3 minutes your life would totally change, and 680+ lives did. When i thought about it that way last night, i began to cry.
Because of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols carelessness, they got found...ONLY because of the key found outside of the building. And so those two wicked men were sentenced to prison for life. And so that's what happened on that awful day.



At the memorial center, you walk in, and there is a reflecting pool to represent where the truck parked. On one side of the water is an arch that says 9:01, and then on the OTHER side, is an arch that says 9:03. So it's like 9:01, just a normal day, 9:02, this awful thing happened, 9:03, the world is completely changed. Then they have 9 rows of chairs, for each person that died. 168 chairs. The have bigger ones for the older people that died, and smaller ones for the children. At night the place lights up. Another thing that was really sad (well all of it is sad) was they have this statue of Jesus crying and at the bottom of the statue it says, 'And Jesus Wept' then in front of the statue it has this walk, that is missing some bricks. And all of the bricks represented the people who had died. 168 bricks missing. Then surrounding Jesus are pillars. Each pillar represents a child that died. 22 pillars (three of the women who died were pregnant).

The wall missing bricks, representing people who have died.

I got a new camera :) and more!

So as some of you know my birthday was on the 14th :) It was so much fun, i got to spend it with the boot campers, and my fam! I had so much fun! Thai Guy's wife had a Death by Espresso from Joe's...she was bouncing of the walls! It was really really funny! Then Wednsesday my grandparents came :) It was so good to see them! I missed them so much. Last time i saw them was when we left for Boot Camp. They got to their hotel while we were working at Spero. So they unpacked their stuff, and headed to where we were. We gave them the oh-so-grand tour of The Spero Project. Then we headed back to our apartment for a couple of hours to cool down since we'd been at Spero for 4 hours. After that we headed over to Language Lab. They loved seeing the kids run after us as we got out of the car. They loved seeing the happy refugee kids faces. They also loved the A.C. in the class room because of the fact that it was 100°! That's pretty normal for Oklahoma. Once we were there for about 1½ hours, we headed back to the apartment. Now mind you i was just looking at a camera the night before, that was going to cost me $500. And so my grandparents told me "This is your birthday gift, and going away gift." And they handed me a box. I slowly removed the wrapping paper, to reveal...A beautiful new camera!! I almost started crying, as i stared at the box in total awe.."Thank you..so much!" i finally whispered. And got up and gave them each a HUGE hug. I was..in love. haha! The next day i got an ice cream cake! Now this is pretty cool, the flames were the same color as the candle!! That totally made my day :D! That day we gave them a tour of HGM :) Now HGM+My oh so beautiful camera=Amazing pictures, and i'm going to show them to you.

Saturday we opened Joe's Addiction. I woke up at 6:30 am to go with my mom and Katelyn. Now let me tell you, the sky here is beautiful, i don't know what happened, but it is the prettiest sky i've ever seen! Every day! I think God likes the sky here for some reason, 'cause He does something special with the sky.

At Joe's we met a family who was interested in HGM. So we took them up to the campus and gave them a tour and told them how we felt called to the mission field. After they left, my dad took Nate, Annie and Garrett home; and Benji, Laura and I stayed behind, while my mom did laundry. Thirty minutes later we got a call from my dad. "Kelly, i'm not kidding when i say this. Our apartment got robbed." "What did they take?" I heard my mom say, "The wii, all of the wii games, and Laura's DS." Apparently the robber came in through my parents' window, and stayed in that room, and ONLY got that stuff. We were a bit shaken, but weren't scared, we had total faith in God. He did this for a reason, and we just had to accept it and carry on. And so that's what we did. Lately i've been going through a really hard time with what happened to the missionaries in Afganistan. As you know i've had a heart for over in that area, and it made me think, would i give up my life for the kingdom of God? Of course i say i would now, but when the time comes will i? So i want to thank everyone for encouraging me. Some of you encouraged me by sending me a letter or letting me just talk to you. Thank you so much everyone.

Boot Camp week 5....a lot

yes i am alive, i just don't have time to do a blog post EVERY day :P Here is what has happened these past weeks. First off we got a tour of Brick Town! I loved it. I love doing that kind of stuff :D The Mountie's Love got hold of my camera, so we are lucky to have pictures of it. Here they are

Gangster.

Once i get a facebook, this shall be my profile picture :)

Benji had fun torturing the ducks..

We FINALLY finished this heart that the Mountie's Love made!! We have been learning about love, and she had us make each piece something about love. It took us forever and 10 days :P But we finally finished it and we are proud! Here is before and after:

Here are the pieces i did :D

We also went to the wonderful Mustache Bash, celebrating the grand opening of Shop Good! What an exciting night! I got to hold Thai Guy's baby all night!! All proceeds go to the Spero Project. Here are some pictures taken at the Mustache Bash, not taken by me sadly, i found out that i can't take picture, while holding a baby...

Me (i don't quite like this one of me) Benji, Laura (what's with the face?) Kate, Jael, and Josiah

Same...Minus Laura

This dude won BEST mustache, and he totally deserved it.

Minus the hot weather it was great :) They had different bands playing all night. Cool air conditioned store. It was amazing! Then we had a retreat up at HGM (Heart of God ministries). I didn't want to go around lugging my HUGE bag, just so i can have my camera with me, so i bought this beautiful bag for $10! It is just the right size for my camera :D Part of the retreat for the kiddos was going to the museum! I think i was most excited!! So all 14 of us packed into the 15 passenger van, to head to the museum...45 minutes away, and 8 of us were 9 and under...quite fun...not really. So after the oh-so-long drive, we arrived. All of the kids began screaming with utter joy (I was one of them....) The whole way there we could hear Annie in the background saying "I have to go to the bathroom" so that was the first exhibit we stopped at. The bathroom. But what caught mine and Jael's eye was the Chocolate exhibit!!!!! What museum has a CHOCOLATE exhibit?! But of course we didn't go to that one first, we went to the....URG i just blanked on the name!! Well here are pictures of the exhibit :) The room was dark so i couldn't get a lot of good pictures...i only got..2.


Well i didn't get a lot of pictures of the exhibits cause they all weren't the brightest....sorry. Now at last i heard these wonderful words "Time for the chocolate exhibit" and all of the kids screamed. Well let's just be honest, all of us did :)

They had these seats, that looked like Reeses cups...I thought that was pretty nifty :D
And now the fossil room...i have a lot of pictures of this one!

Little bitty dinosaur

OK now this was the best part of it all =) They had this HUGE life size model thingy of a mammoth! And its foot was up for NO reason, until today =D Well....you'll see!

Yup so that's pretty much it..so there..I'll try to update more, but it has been crazy here, so yuppers =)