Me Being Lazy and Never Updating My Blog

That pretty much sums it up. However, I have been busy: let me give you a snapshot of my last semester!



Spring means track, which means heading to California for Spring Fling! This year we competed at Northridge, UC Irvine, and PLNU. It was probably our best trip ever weather-wise, and an all-around awesome time. Santa Barbara was made better when Tori showed up for a few days.

The only drawback to the trip was that Lisa tore her ACL during our first weekend. Even though her Nationals goals were lost, she remained such an inspiration to the rest of the team with her work ethic and attitude. She came back and scored in two events at Conference a month later! Here's Lisa and the group at Magic Mountain the day after it happened.





We had such a great group of freshmen this year! Here are two of them (Rachel and Beth) hanging out with Emily, Cindy and I in the pool in San Diego.





Mom and Ryan during the meet at Point Loma

Conference at the end of April was one of our best showings in recent years, although the guys side was plauged with setbacks. The girls had a great run, with three first place finishes (including Emily's!); here is our 4x1 team going up to get their medals.




The Coaching Staff at Conference: Me, John, Doug, Jeff, and Greg

In April Mom took on a new project: flowers. She joined a floral design school in Portland and brought home gorgeous arrangements nearly every night! If anyone knows someone in the area in need of flowers for a wedding or other occasion, please give Mom a call - she's excellent. This is the nosegay she made for Emily for Spring Formal.





Ryan and Emily before going to Spring Formal

In March I also put together a sleepover at the middle school I work at for our 8th grade girls. It was part of their Drug, Tobacco, and Alcohol Free unit - they did the planning and fundraising - with the dual goals of learning how to put together a wholesome party and giving them the experience of something fun without any alcohol or drugs. It went really well - I chaperoned along with a fellow Christian teacher, and the girls had a great time sleeping in the hallway, dancing and playing Mafia in the gym, and watching movies and playing RockBand in the classrooms.



Two girls defeating Lauren, my fellow teacher and chaperone, in a pillow fight.



May was full of fun times with the track team:

Girls Night Out (during which the guys, per tradition, pranked one of the girls' apartments by filling over a thousand connected Dixie cups with water.)





A pre-meet dinner at our home (that's Casey, a freshmen, standing on the tree)





Our crazy intra-squad heptathlon (where the girls payed back the guys' prank by freezing their underwear into a massive ice cube)









Me throwing the shot

Wine Tasting with friends in Carlton






Nationals!


This is the only shot I have of Ryan competing - I was running around constantly because all of our athlete's start times coincided. He did awesome - he had a bunch of season's bests, plus PRs in the shot and pole vault - all while dealing with being sick and having to have an IV in the middle of the second day!



Ryan with John and Joel - who has been at Nationals with him all four years




The team posing with John's new "West Region Coach of the Year" Award

And that's basically it! I recently finished teaching and have been searching for and applying for jobs, as Gaston cut my position due to economic woes. It was hard to say goodbye to everyone, staff and students, but I'm hopeful that God has something better for me coming along the way!

I will try to be better about keeping this up to date in the future. :)

New Years

This New Years, as per tradition, I headed over the pass to visit the Jacobys. It was a smaller gathering than normal, as we were missing the Gentry sisters and their brood - who are spending the holidays in Michigan - as well as Colleen and Erik who stayed at home with his parents, Travis and Kat in California, and Amy and Forrest in Washington. But we had a blast with Bailey, Alfred, Lee, Kelly, and the rest of the Jacobys minus Jaymie - who's back in Colorado with some girl. :)
As always, we ate too many sweets, stayed up way late (my dad would have been proud of the parents for staying up till 2:30 - normally he was the only one who made it that long), played card game after card game, braved the wind and snow to spend New Years Day morning in the hot tub, and overall just enjoyed each other. It was a blessing for me to spend time with dear friends I don't see nearly enough - especially Josh and Heather's kiddos who seem to grow up way to fast! I got to hold sweet Salim and play Uno with Asher, Arden, and Daisha.

Dancing Asher - all three of them enjoyed bouncing around in front of my new camera

getting ready for Uno

Granite Hot Springs

Having been a Wyoming girl since I was six, and having a desperate need for cold winters and piles of snow, I made my way to Jackson after spending Christmas with Mom, Ryan, Amy, Forrest, Ephraim, and Wallis at our home in Oregon. It has been a wonderful trip so far. All of the Wachob clan were here, so we have been having glorious adventures in the snow. Sunday afternoon we went for a sleigh ride on the Elk Refuge, courtesy of Doug and Becky - it was fun to see the elk up close and shiver together in the wind. Monday we took off for Granite Hot Springs and spent the day skiing, snowmobiling, and swimming. We got a late start so we had to ferry people in on the one snowmobile we had to make sure we made it the ten miles and back before dark. Although it cleared up later on, when we started out it was blowing and snowing quite a lot. We all made it by about 2:00 though, and then realized we had no pots or pans to heat the soup for lunch. But lo and behold, we found that we had a can of cougar gold cheese - it worked like a charm! The cheese came out and the chili went in, and Dad would be proud that his favorite gift was put to such creative use.



Elisa loved the hot pool, as did the rest of us - even Sadie had a big smile on her face the whole time. Since we arrived so late, by the time we got in the pool we had it all to ourselves! Elisa spent much of her time climbing out of the pool, grabbing a snowball, and walking back into the pool to throw it at one of us. Often it would melt before she could get close enough, and then she'd start back up again - quite undeterred. Adam challenged us to jump in the snow on both sides of our bodies before we could get back in - and then proceeded to lock his wife, sister-in-law, and myself out of the pool area which led to many screeches of protest and pain. :)




We didn't get around to leaving until about 4:30, which meant we had about an hour of daylight to ski back 10 miles. To make things more interesting, Doug thought the snowmobile had run out of gas (luckily it hadn't). We set out in the beautiful half-light of the evening and tried to soak in all the stillness and serenity before the night covered this enchanted world.



Night came, and with it a few sparkling stars poking their heads through the cloudy sky. Doug came too, roaring in on the snowmobile to pick us up. Nine people on a snowmobile, you say?? Yes, it can be done! Colleen and the girls rode with Doug, and Adam, Kristin, Becky, Erik and I each grabbed onto a rope and towed behind them for about five miles. It was heaven!! More and more stars came out to join the parade as we admired the splendor and the adventure of it all. Of course, we were traveling slowly and of course, I was the only one who fell down (twice); and yes, Doug did accidentally try to run over Adam on a downhill slope; and yes, the girls didn't get to bed that night until 10:00 - but heaven it was none the less!!

Hawaii in August

The whole crew at the Banyan tree
Sweet Elisa and I
Mommies and Daddies and babies, Oh my!
Ephraim and Sadie hanging out the first morning in Maui
The first sunset we saw
Grandpa Jack and a wide-eyed great-grandson
Don't hit him Sadie!! :)


Heading out to dive
After a trip with the kayak and an encounter with a turtle

Sleeping in the shade
Grandpa and Trish
Dancing

A very tired and cold little girl
Wearing the lei I made

Jaci and Elisa being goofy

Part IV: An Incredible Journey

I'm way past due to be done writing about Europe, so here are just a few pictures to cap off the trip.

So grateful to have made it to Normandy
Carentan was full of beautiful old buildings and bright flowers

Riding across Utah Beach



One of the 4 causeway exits from the beach that the Airborne units were charged with securing
The "Chapel de Notre Dame" in Carentan - sorry I couldn't turn it right side up!
The castle in Caen, taken 15 minutes before I realized I was lost and wouldn't make it to the ferry
Sunrise over the English Channel (from inside the ferry)
Milford Haven, Wales

And that's the end!! I am so thankful I was able to take this trip - it was an amazing experience I will cherish always. Thanks to everyone for praying - I know it kept me safe and well. Thanks to Mom for her skymiles and the pedicure; to Amy, Colleen, Cathy, Laura, Emily, and everyone who wrote me notes; to Trish for flying all the way out to Norway on a whim and making that week such a wonderful time together - I'd go with you anywhere! - and thanks too for the birthday cake and trip around Stockholm; thanks to all the Juniors Abroad crew for letting me join in the fun, and to Cindy, Kelly, and Emily for making room for me to crash with you; thanks to Lucy and Leisel, my trusty blue traveling companions; thanks to Mary & the Feeneys, Jim, Hank, Maresh and family, Hans, the Switzerland crew, Jackson & Lou, everyone at REMM, the Canadians, Arden, Michele, Marisa & Eva, Ben, and every new friend I met along the way for your kindness, hospitality, and warmth; and thanks to our Father, for making the mountains and the seas and then opening our eyes so we can see the beauty of His majesty. I love you all!!