Merry Christmas and all that jazz

Hey hey! Soooo...Christmas has already come and gone! Can you believe that? Ugh. but ti was a good year, for me at least. I got a bunch of CDs and DVDs for my new portable DVD player (which I use EVERY DAY), and Mariokart for Wii. I also got some money to put towards my guitar fund. Woot! And um...yeah! So now I'm onto making plans for New Years. Sounds like it's gonna be a Darb/Preston/me thing at their house, which will be fun. Woot...2009! Hopefully I can graduate in the new year...that would be nice.
Anyways, I'm gonna go now...make some music, watch some movies...all that awesome stuff.
So...MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY NEW YEAR (or HAPPY HOLIDAYS if you want to be all politically correct). :D
-Kristen

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas... :D

Sooooooo...It is Sinterklass day! We pigged out on tasty Dutch treats this afternoon with Grandma and the fam, which was pretty awesome. Nothing beats chocolate letters, pepernoten and those little chocolate things with sprinkles on them! :D
So my trip to Ontario went well. I ate more fast food than humanly possible to ingest but it was good :P I had to get my fill! :) And oooooh the Pizza Hut! Still my favourite pizza.
Anyways, so I went to work with my dad on the set of The Listener, which was pretty cool at first and then once we hit twelve hours I was rather far beyond bordom...
Gram was having some health problems, so that kind of sucked...a lot. But she's doing a lot better now, so that's good.
My dad and I recorded two new songs, which are definitely some of my best recordings yet, so that's awesome! When they're totally done I'll post them somewhere for you to hear.
I had my first of many Christmases to come, which went well. I got a portable DVD player and lots o' cash to buy DVDs with. And Gram was able to make it to that so that was awesome. Uncle Al and Dan also surprised me by coming too, so that was great! :D
I also met my dad's girlfriend, Vanessa, who is very very cool. :)
Aaaaaaaaaaand...yeah! So I'm home now, and still a bit tired. But I've watched many movies in the past few days, and I have lots of new tunes for my iPod.
OH! So, I finished my psych 12 project, which means I'm done the course, and I got 100% on it, so my final mark is 96%! :D YAY!
Anyways...that's about it for now, so I'll write more soooooonly!
-Kristen

November

Sooo...'tis November. Blind Bay is getting gray and cold. Ick. I hate winter.
But I will be headed to Ontario soon (even though the winters there are much worse)! We shall have an early Christmas and feast upon Pizza Hut and Swiss Chalet! Woot!
Also! We are going to record two acoustic songs to put with my new single when it's finished! Whoohoo! :) Shall be good!
Um...yeah...so there's not a whole lot else to report. I've been busy. School is dull...but what else would you expect?
So yeah!
-Kristen

MEXICO!

SOOOO! I'm back! We made it safely between all the borders and such, but it was basically two days of travelling both ways, which was tiring and fairly dull. But Mexico was amazing. It was such an incredible experience! It was dirty and dusty and crazy! There are no seat belt laws (which is fun!) and tons of speed bumps (TOPES!). Every morning, we'd go to Sala (which means living room) for "morning devotions", and we'd go to the cafeteria for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Coka-Cola was sold everywhere, and everything was cheap. I learned a lot of Spanish (although I still can't speak much of it). There were palm trees EVERYWHERE! There wasn't really a way for us to communicate with anyone from home, but the week went by pretty quickly. We were only allowed three minute showers, so you had to keep turning the water on and off...and we ate lots of pb & j in the visitors' lounge! :P There was also the "Tiendita" or the snack shack, where you could buy tasty things and pop during break. Overall...it was an incredible experience, and I'd like to go back at some point in the future.

Anyways...so here's what we did! :



So, last Saturday, we flew from Kelowna to Seattle, and then from Seattle to San Diego. We had to wait on the plane in Seattle because they're main ignition for one of the engines wasn't starting. But they fixed it, and after almost two hours, we finally got on our way. In San Diego, we checked into our hotel for the night and went out for dinner, which was really good, and had soft ice cream that looked like dog poop...which was a good source of entertainment for quite a while, because yes, we are immature. We stayed up late watching a John Wayne movie (:P) and then got up early to start our drive down to Vicente Guerrero. We drove through Tijuana, and stopped for lunch in Ensenada (we ate at a McDonald's...how exotic). We also kind explored a bit of the city. There was a little sort of plaza beside the ocean, so we sat there for a few minutes and got a whole bunch of pictures beside this massive Mexican flag (seriously, it was huge). Then we drove for a few more hours to Vicente Guerrero, where we got our rooms, unpacked and then went out for dinner to eat tacos. We went to a taco stand called "El Pollo Loco" (The Crazy Chicken), which was pretty tasty. Lorna also got us to try what she thought was brain. So we tried a brain taco. We late found out, though, that it was actually a face taco (bits of cheeks and chins and such). So we ate face. Heh... It was actually pretty good. It tasted like hamburger, but I was grossed out because we thought it was brain...



Monday, we went on a tour of the mission. Darby and I had breakfast duty, which means that we had to set up the tables for the visitors (us and the other groups) and then mop the cafeteria afterwards. After the tour, which was rather informative, we had work assignments for the afternoon. Preston and I were helping to clean up the cement from a little wall they were replacing. I was sooooooooooo dirty by the end of that! My legs looked tanned from all the dirt. And everyone knows my legs don't tan. So that's a big deal. :P It was good though, we worked hard, with a guy named Elias, who had knocked down the wall that morning. That night, we babysat for one of the houses in the orphanage. We were in Casa 6, which had 12 kids, but some of them were older than 16, so we had a fairly easy house.



Tuesday, Preston and I worked in construction again. We started by sifting sand for Elias and the wall, and then were sweeping the dust and stuff out of the rooms in the new addition they're building onto the Bible College, so that they could be textured and painted, which was another incredibly dirty job. Isaac, one of the head builder guys, had us drive his truck back and forth between the wall and the construction site to bring Elias tools and cement bricks, which was pretty crazy. Preston got to drive an old pickup truck in the middle of nowhere in the Baja...haha! :P Anyways, I worked in The Nuthouse that afternoon. They grow macadamia nuts at the mission, so I was working with a few other people cracking nuts. That evening, we went out to a migrant work camps about half an hour away from the mission, for "Adult Evangelism". When we were driving into the camp, all the kids chase the white vans because they know that people are coming from really far away to play with them. It was really cool and very fun! I blew bubbles with the kids for a while and then we had piggyback races, which the kids loved. Then, they set up a movie for the kids to watch and then one for the adults. They give out Bibles to the adults that want them and pray for anyone who wants to be prayed for. It was dark by the time we left, and then we went out to "Smokie's" (sp?) for tacos. I just bought a Coke, though. Everything is really cheap down there, which is pretty awesome! :P



Wednesday, I worked in the print shop in the morning, where we stuck all the inserts together to be mailed out to the US and Canada. That afternoon, Darb and I went on our first "Child Evangelism" together, which was incredible. It was basically helping a lady teach a VBS class to a bunch of kids in a neighbourhood. We would drive through while the teacher (we had Antonia the first day) would call the kids using a little portable amp thing. All the kids gathered at a church building, and when we got out of the vans, a little girl and her tiny little brother came up to Darby and I and gave us flowers. It was so cute, and a really cool experience (Darby told this story in Sala on Friday). Then, we went in and sat with all the kids (we had about 60 come that day), while Antonia sang songs with them and prayed and such. Three little girls globbed onto me...they were really cute! One sat on my lap and studied my skin because I'm so white, and one played with my hair. She picked a hair elastic off her wrist and did my hair with it. I wore my hair that way all week until the elastic broke :'(. Anyways, so they kept touching my face and playing with my hair and looking at my glasses and stuff. They kept saying "bonita" but I didn't know what that meant until later, when I found out it means "beautiful". That was probably the highlight of my trip. After the VBS class, the kids line up with their own cup and spoon at the back of the van, where we pour them a glass of milk (powdered...ew) and give them each a spoonful of peanut butter, plus whatever snack the teacher brought, which in this case was individual packs of pistachios (sp?). I handed out the nuts, while Darby scooped the milk, and a lady named Catherine from another group (she was really cool) did the peanut butter. We ran out of milk near the end and one little girl hardly got anything at all, which makes you feel horrible, because really, it's the only source of nutrition they get, and the vans only come by once a week. One little girl that we gave milk to knew how to say thank you in English ("dankooo"), so she kept saying it and the other kids thought it was funny, so when we were driving away, they all chased the vans yelling "dankoooooo!". A few of them spilled their milk because they were running so hard...



Thursday, I worked cleaning in the kitchen. Jose (he's so cool!) who does a lot of work in there, had me and and a lady named Wendy washing windows and counter tops and such. We went on child evangelism again that afternoon, but I ended up getting sick to my stomach from the lunch at the mission and Lorna got Carmen (the teacher) to cut the class short because I had to go back. I felt pretty bad about that, but there wasn't much of a choice, and all the kids got their milk and peanut butter, so it was okay. Later that evening, we went to another adult evangelism, which was really cool. We played with the kids a lot and when the movie started, two little girls sat on my lap the whole time. They were smelling my hair and asking what colour my shampoo was! :P They were surprised when I told them it was blue! :D After the movies, we prayed with some of the adults and then they were given Bibles. It really felt like something was accomplished that evening.



Friday, I worked in the Nut House in the morning, and then we packed some stuff up. I bought a hoodie and some souvenirs at the gift shop in the mission. We stopped at the market in Vicente Guerrero to buy some stuff. I got a cool hat and bracelet and some gifts for people. Then we headed out to the beach. It was so much fun! The water was the perfect temperature and we waded in a bit and looked for shells and stuff. It was amazing! After that, we went back to the mission and rinsed off, and then went out for dinner. Brendan joined us for that. We went to a little store by the mission after that and Darby and Preston bought massive glass bottles of Coke for a dollar! :P



Saturday, we packed up, cleaned the visitors' centre and left early in the morning. We stopped at the "Bufadora" or the "blow hole" in Ensenada on our way back, which is like this little crevice in the rock where water shoots out every 30 seconds or so. It was pretty cool! There were lots of vendors who would try and get you to buy stuff from their stores...they were rather annoying. There were tons of Bob Marley posters and t-shirts and stuff...one guy even "had Bob Marley's canned appendix"! HAHA! :P Anyways...so we kept driving through Ensenada and Tijuana and then we waited in line at the border for about 2 hours, while vendors on the street tried to sell you crappy ceramic pumpkins and crucifixes. We bought some "churros" (sp?) that are like super-fatty doughnut sticks...they were soooo good! :P Once we got passed the border, we drove to our hotel and stayed there for the night. We also enjoyed our unlimited showers! :D

In the morning, we slept in a bit and then packed up the last of our stuff to leave. And then we flew back home!

Overall, it was an incredible experience. I did so many new things (eating face, driving around without seat belts, eating rice pudding, flying on a propeller plane from Kelowna to Seattle...), and had a lot of new experiences that changed my life. It's weird to think that people live like that, and they're not very far away. I also met some very cool people: at the mission, at the camps, and from the other volunteer groups that came down.

One thing I found interesting was that a lot of the kids in the camps didn't know how to be held. Most of them were fine to piggyback but if you picked them up, they would keep their legs straight instead of wrapping them around you (which makes it hard to hold on!). It really made me realize that a lot of those kids don't get time with their parents, who work usually 6 days a week to make just enough to get food for their families.

This trip seriously was an eye-opener. You think you know what goes on because you see all those World Vision commercials and stuff, but you never really know until you get there. There are pictures from my camera up on Facebook so you can see the mission and stuff, and the title of this blog is a link to the mission's website. I'm hoping to get more pictures from other people's cameras up on facebook soon, so I'll keep you posted.

Now, all we need are some palm trees in BC!
-Kristen

Shuswap Idol

Whooooohoooooo! Sooooo...I won second place in Shuswap Idol! Woot! That's $250! Yay! It was great! I had a lot of fun and I competed against some great singers. I think everyone was deserving of what they won and I'm glad I got to be a part of it this year!
So, on Friday night I sang "Here Without You" by 3 Doors Down. On Saturday I sang "Every Little Thing" by Delirious?. And today I sang "Hear You Me" by Jimmy Eat World, which I also sang at the Blue Water Music recital at the beginning of the year. I have videos of all of my performances, so I'll try to get those onto youtube soon.
Anyways, so that was pretty great! Darby won a whole bunch of ribbons with her goats and her photos and stuff, and Preston won some too, I believe.
The whole youth group came out on Friday night to see me play, which was really cool! They were all super supportive.
Sooo now I can breathe easy and play songs other than the ones I performed and...yeah! Yay! That was great!
Talk to you soonly!
-Kristen

SEP tember

Sooooooooooooooooooo...September is here! Gah! That sucks. September means school officially starts...icky. And that summer's over...icky x2.
Sooo...Kyle started school today, and he had a pretty good time, which was cool.
Anyways...my summer consisted of teaching swimming lessons, reading books, facebooking, performing...um...eating... and now it's over. Which means that I have to start a ton of courses so I can graduate this year. Hooooorrah.
And the news of the day is that I made Shuswap Idol! Gah! Auditions were yesterday, and there were some very good singers...and then I kinda sucked because I hadn't completely memorized the chords to the song, so I missed a few...so I wasn't very confident that I would make it...but I did! GAH! Soooo...I play one song on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, at the Salmon Arm Fall Fair, and then I could win 1st, 2nd, or 3rd (or nothing!) or possibly the "People's Choice" award, which is the person that the audience voted for the most. Sooo...that should be cool!
Aaaand...now I have to go get some psychology work done. Hip hip horray.
I'll post the results of Idol some time next week...have a good weekend!
-Kristen

Al Berta

Sooooooo-ooooooo-oooo-ooo-o-o....ooo...o....... We went to Calgary this weekend! It was pretty fun, other than being cramped in the car with a screaming baby for half the way there and back...which is a six hour drive, by the way. Anyways, my mom's cousin, Dave, got married, and Bri had a baseball tournament (the nationals!), so we all went down on Thursday and we got home late last night. Bri injured his ankle really badly, but he stayed with the team. He's still in Calgary right now, with them. They've still got some games. He'll probably be back tomorrow or something...
Anyways, so on Friday, we went to the Calgary Zoo, which, I have to admit, is about a hundred times better than the Toronto Zoo. :P They had a baby elephant and a baby giraffe and there were baby peacocks running around and all the mountain goats and deer and stuff had babies, which was really cool.
Saturday was the wedding, which was fun, we went shopping for a few hours and went out for dinner in between the ceremony and the reception. And then on Sunday we went over to Uncle Chuck and Auntie Lynn's place for lunch, which was fun. Then we went on our way home...long and boring...woot woot.
So yeah! That was my weekend!
-Kristen

Summer!

Alright, so VBS is over. It was pretty crazy! I had about ten kids in my group most days, which gets crazy.... It was a good week though. We went swimming afterwards, pretty much every day and stuff and I have a billion cuts and scrapes on my feet and I'm so tired but it was fun!
I taught two swimming lessons with Caleb this week, which went well and I'm starting with Ethan next week, and I won two free guitar lessons at Blue Water (again) and I've been playing on the Worship Team at Carol's church on Saturdays, which has been going really well, and I've been taking a new course that Grandma's teaching about hearing the voice of God, which is really cool. I'm also working on reading the Bible cover-to-cover. Plus there's the school work that I've barely had time to get started on. So I'm keeping rather busy. I actually went two days without using my computer at all, too, so that's a rather amazing accomplishment! :P
Anyways, I'm going to go write some songs and clean the cat litter (fun fun)...
-Kristen

Happy Canada Day & Such...

Alright so it's incredibly hot in Blind Bay. We don't have air conditioning, and it's about a million degrees out.
We've been working on the Canada day float for the last two weeks, and it looked amazing! And then as soon as the parade was over, they pulled the entire thing apart. I helped with some of the games at the celebration thing today and then Preston and I walked around for a while.
Travis left for school yesterday. He's now officially moved in. It's weird that he's gone, but I think he's ready :)
Darby's in Manitoba this week so it's just been Preston and I.
I start teaching swimming lessons tomorrow. I'm teaching two of the kids from church...for pay! Woot!
Bri's been teaching me how to drive, too. We've only gone out twice so far, but I'm getting the hang of it.
What else, what else...Um...that's about it. I'm so hot right now. I've been dripping sweat for a few days now... Ick.
So I'll post more soon...
-Kristen

June

Sooo...school's basically out but I still have socials to finish, which I'm gonna work on this summer.
I also officially got my learner's liscence. I now have actual photo ID. Sweet.
I passed science with a final mark of 87% or something...
Um...everyone's birthday is this month...so it's been busy.
I'm going to a movie with Brendan and Preston tonight, so that should be fun :)
What else...? Um...I guess that's about it. I can't do any school work until I sign my socials kit back out, which can't be done until the end of June. I'm also going to try and graduate with Preston next year, which is an enormous task, but if I work my butt off, I think I can do it!
Anyways, I've gotta go, but I'll post more soon!
-Kristen

POST #100!!!!!!

Wow! This is post number one hundred...that's a lot of posting! :P

SOOOO!!! Tuesday, I got my L, which means that I can officially drive while clearly displaying my L sign on the back of the vehicle, with someone over the age of 25 that has a valid Class 5 licence, and I can't drive between midnight and 5am and if I'm with a blood alcohol count of over zero, while driving, I will likely not be able to drive for quite some time. I also have to wear my glasses. Darn those restrictions. I wish I could drive by myself at 3 in the morning with a few bottles of booze and no corrective lenses. They've ruined my plans...

ANYWAYS! So that was good. It was just a written test, which I passed and now I can learn how to drive. Which is good because right now, I can't drive at all. In any way.

I got my report card last week, which I didn't even know was coming, but it was good. All A's, and I'm done most of my courses. I'll be continuing Socials 10 next year, or maybe through the summer because I started late and didn't get it done. I'm also almost done PE and Science and my independent studies in music. So, I'm doing pretty good right now!

And...yeah! That's about it! I'm going to see Travis's school play at the theatre tomorrow night with the youth group and Saturday morning I'm playing guitar with Carol at her other church, and then there's some youth rally in town as well on Saturday, so I'm keeping busy! :P

All for now!
-Kristen

History Maker 2008!

Alright so History Maker was one of the most amazing weekends ever. It was so much fun hanging out with everyone, and on top of that, there were great bands and some incredibly powerful experiences.
So we drove our fleet of vans to Chilliwack on Saturday morning. Darby and I drove with Shanan and listened to awesome tunes all the way there. After about 4 hours, we finally made it to Karen's mom's church, where we were going to stay. We unloaded all our stuff and then went to the kick-off thing. Revolution Band played. They were okay live but I doubt their recorded stuff is any good. :P Then we went to our Hubs, which are like, little sort of seminars. Darb and I went to the "Girls Only" one, which was pretty much only because we didn't want to do any of the other ones. That wasn't too bad. Then we went to one that was supposed to be "spiritual journaling" but the guy didn't show and instead there was a missionary that spoke and some girls who fell in the hole at the Starfield concert (if you don't know what happened, Google it). They're story was really awesome!
Soooooo....there was also this awesome speaker, Mike Pilavachi (sp?). He was this AWESOME British guy. He was sooooooooooo funny! :P He also had some really great stories and at one point, he had anyone who wasn't yet a Christian come up to the front and everyone prayed for them and they all got saved (why do they call it that?). That was very cool.
Then we went out to eat...mmm...endless fast food. (EW.) Anyways...so we went to see Stellar Kart (!!) at the late concert that night, which was awesome! We were in this huge mosh pit! It was awesome! Darby and I each bought a Stellar Kart button and I got a t-shirt, too.
Sunday, we went and had showers at the rec centre and then we went to the morning service, which was amazing. We all did communion, which was really cool because there were like, 2000 of us all doing it at the same time! Then Revolution band played some more and then we had our Hubs for that day. Darby and I went to what was supposed to be "making the band" with Parachute Band, but turned out to just kind of be a "how to give God the glory of your creativity" sort of thing, which was still very cool. Simon, the guitar player, and Sam, the drummer, were good speakers so it was cool. Plus they're from New Zealand and have amazing accents. Then we went with Preston to the "leadership" hub called "leaving a legacy", which was kinda cool. Some of it didn't really apply to me, though.
Anyways, so after that, Parachute Band played a bit and Omega, their singer, told the story of how he was born without a nose and had to have operations as a baby and he's always looked funny, and he hated it. He was going to kill himself but then he heard God speaking to him. It was really cool.
Then! Mike-the-awesome-Brit came out and was talking again, which was not as funny as the day before, but still very, very good. He had anyone who wanted to feel the Holy Spirit come up to the front and he had everyone pray and all the youth leaders come and pray over everyone. Darby and I went up and we just stood with our eyes closed for a long time. There were so many people trying to get to the front, so we were glad we went up right away. Sandi prayed for us and another youth pastor prayed for us. There were girls crying behind us, and we weren't entirely sure why and then suddenly, Darb and I both started sobbing, and I wasn't even really sure why but it was amazing. The most incredible experience ever. And then the band started playing a song and we were all just swaying to the music. It was incredible.
And then this annoying speaker came out and started taking. He wasn't very good. He was trying to be too cool. I only agreed with half the things he said. But hey, he was the only downside to the weekend.
Monday morning, the host-of-the-weekend guy came out and talked to us. We all got glowsticks, which represented all the miracles that were going to happen in us and through us and for us and it was so cool to look around and see thousands of "miracles" (which was the theme of the weekend).
Then Dilirious played! They were amazing. I'd say the best of the weekend, even though I love Stellar Kart. It was so powerful! They same some great songs (although not may favourite one) and at one point, the singer jumped down into the moshpit and got a security guard to give him a boost and then he was literally kneeling on the crowd. They were holding him up, and then he started singing and it was so awesome. The video is at the top of this post.
Anyways! So then we ate lunch and headed home. Our van LITERALLY rocked out until we got home. It was so cool. :P
SO THAT WAS HISTORY MAKER! There are pictures on Facebook for those of you who are my friends. If not, too bad for you. :D Anyways, have a nice day!
-Kristen

SIXTEEN

So I'm officially sixteen now! Woot! I can't believe it.
Bri's parents are here and we had a massive pig roast with a bunch of friends and fam'ly. It's was pretty awesome!
I've been playing Guitar Hero a lot lately...it's so awesome! I almost beat the game on medium and then I'm gonna start working on hard.
i've also been working my butt off in school because it's almost the end of the year and I'm really behind in socials. Ugh. But I'll get it done. :S
Anyways, I have to go buy some tunes on iTunes so I'll write more sooooon!
-Kristen

New Tunage Up Soonage!

Weeeeelllll....okay! So I went to Ontario for two weeks and had a great time hanging out with the fam and such. We had an early birthday party for me since my birthday's in May (I'm gonna be sixteen!!!! GAH!). I got Guitar Hero! Horrah! And two other Wii games which are awesome!
I also got to do two recording sessions with Amanda, which went soooooooo well! She helped me out a lot with my vocals and she changed the arrangement of the song a bit to make it better. It sounds sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo great so far! And we don't even have the drums, bass or lead guitar yet. As soon as it's done, I'll have it up on all my music pages. You can google my name if you don't know where they are.
Anyways, the song sounds great! It's really catchy and Amanda got me doing things with my voice that I didn't know I could do (like the supper high parts) and she got my pronouncing my words super clearly, because I have a habit of slurring, so you'll know what I'm saying.
So that's that! My birthday is approaching fast and we're having a pig roast (like...a full pig) when Bri's parents come and we're having some friends over and we're celbrating all four May birthdays! Woot!
So yeah! I guess that's about it right now...
-Kristen

April!

Hi there! How's it going?
So it's april, now! Woot! March was far too long. Lasted forever.
So I'll be in Ontario next week. Should be fun! I get to record a new song and Amanda Bentley's gonna help me, so that's awesome! And Matt Brann (Avril Lavigne's drummer) is gonna drum for me on it! Whoo hoo! :D
Anyways...so I'll be 16 soon...that's pretty awesome. Gonna have a party! And roast a pig on a spit! :D
Anyways...that's about all for now. I'm gonna go eat some pizza now.
-Kristen

Happy Bunny Day!

Hey, folks! So...how's it goin'? I hope everyone had a great Easter! I did! I think we ended up colouring about 2 dozen eggs...it was great! We had a red bingo dabber thing and if you used it on a wet egg, it looked like blood. So we made some bloody bunny eggs and stuff... it was pretty sweet!
Anyways...so there are a lot of big birthdays this year! To name a few: Preston and I and turning 16; Darb, Sam, and Dan are turning 13; Ky's turning 5; Arden's turning 4; Dad's turning 40; grandpa's turning 70...and I think there are more, but I can't remember them all right now! So there will be lots of birthday bashes this year!
The Ontario trip is approaching and the Mexico trip is becoming more real. The trip is booked but we've got cancelation insurrance on it, just in case. I'm so hoping I can go though. It would be incredible.
Anyways...so I working on school a lot, watching lots of reality shows, making extra cash where I can (which is found in not very many places), reading library books like mad...I dunno. Keeping busy. Trying to get my 120 hours of phys ed done and 100 hours of practicing guitar and such for my 2 Independant studies in music. Finding lots of new bands on the internet and through friends and the library. Music is amazing.
Alright...so that's about it. I'm gonna go write a few songs before American Idol comes on...Have a great day!
-Kristen :)

Music is cool.

You have to watch that. Jess showed it to me and it's pretty much the greatest thing ever... :D

Hi. So...I'm trying to get about $1000 to go to Mexico in October.
So we're at church on Sunday and we realized that there were only 5 spots left to go on the missions trip to the orphange in Mexico and then it was totally random but it ended up that we're trying to get me, Darby, Preston and grandma and grandpa to go. So Uncle Des figures that about 1000 bucks should cover the cost of the flight, hotel rooms and food.
So...I need money. For my birthday would be great. Or if you're just feeling generous :D
but yeah...if you can give me money for my birthday, that would be good. :)
Anyways...so yeah...I'm almost 16. Which is really weird because I need to start learning how to drive soon...and that's odd because I don't feel like I'm old enough to do that yet :S
But anyways...I'm excited about my Ontario trip! Gotta plan lots of stuff for that.
So.............Yeah. I guess that's about it for now...
have a nice day...
-Kristen

Dude

He's my sad little friend.

Okay, so hey folks! I've got my Term 2 report card and I'll have the marks up here soon because I don't remember them right now.
I'm starting an independant study or two in music because I can. And I can get some great credits from it!
It's March! A major month of birthdays for friends and family!
I'm due to be in Ontario in April and for the first time I don't have to fly alone!!! YAY! Grandma and grandpa are flying with me both ways, which makes things easier, safer, more fun...etc.
I've been really sick with the flu or something since around Saturday evening. I'm feeling a lot better now but my muscles hurt. Seems to have really taken a toll on 'em.
It is the season for reality shows! I've been watching the Apprentice, Survivor and American Idol, plus a new season of Beauty and the Geek starts on Tuesday (YAY!!!).
Anyways...so that's about all for now! More to come soon!
-Kristen

Aloha.

Hey folks. Soooo...this week, I'm babysitting lots of kids, having a bass lesson, it's Valentines day, Survivor's on (must watch), there's youth group, I have to do lots of school work and there's church on Sunday, followed by a birthday dinner for my mom at the grandparents' house.
So it's a pretty busy week and it hasn't even started yet! Also, I'm finished Planning 10 (which is a mandatory course out here). It's basically planning your future and all that jazz. Not all that interesting, but yeah. Anyways, I finished it with 100% so that's cool.
So, I'm writing a new story. I just started it on Friday. It'll either be really good, or production will stop when I'm sixty pages into it and realize that I have no idea where it's going. I'm not one for planning stories beforehand, so that's usually what happens. I only finished 2 of my stories...ever. And now that I look back on them, I realize that they weren't that great. But they were pretty good for my age.
ANYWAYS! So the story is about a girl who thinks everything is ugly and she can never see the beauty in anything. And it got me thinking that there are so many people like that! I know so many people who can't find the good things in life. Pessimists, yes. But also really shallow and misguided. I hate it! You'll be watching a movie and they'll say the stars are ugly because of a blemish or a little flab. Or walking down the street and they'll randomly point out someone who is not exactly glowing with good looks and they'll just laugh or say something incredibly mean. And ya know, I know that's kind of how the world is now, but it's horrible! And don't get me wrong I do it too sometimes without even noticing. And then I feel so horrible for thinking or saying something so shallow. People can't help how they look. And just because a tree is dead, that doesn't mean it's ugly.
I dunno...I could took about it a lot but I would probably end up repeating everything I already said, just saying it with different examples and such. All I'm saying is that everything has something beautiful about it and that it's important not to overlook that or you're gonna find yourself is a rather ugly place.

Okay... so I'm gonna go now because I feel like it. Have a nice day.
-Kristen

February So Far

Well...it's February. Don't know what happened on Groundhog Day because I really don't care. It was Superbowl weekend and we had the Arenses over. Apparently the other team should have won, but I don't understand football in any way, so I just watched Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers on the half-time show and that was enough for me. But Tom Petty could've shaved. At least the stage was freakin' awesome.
So...Apparently there's a new Jack Johnson album out today. Across The Universe comes out on DVD next week or something. Report cards should be ready next week or so.
So...currently, things are fairly uneventful. Went to a hockey game last Friday. Was fun. They left it at a tie game though, which was odd. :S
Anyways, that's about all for now...
-Kristen

News

Weeeeellllllll...There's not a whole lot of new stuff here. Heather from EOP says I've finished Art and Music 10 already, so that's good. Now I just have to focus on Socials, Science and Phys Ed. Yay. At least the only exam I have is for science.
So...I play Wii a lot. And I can't wait until we get Guitar Hero. THAT would be cool. We rented some games at Blockbuster and bought a Spyro game with my giftcard, so it's been fun :)
I finished reading all the books I got with my Chapters gift cards already so I'm going to have to start library-ing again.
Anyways, that's about all the news I can give you right now! Not much has been happening :P
-Kristen

Happy New Year!

WELL! It's 2008! It's weird to say that :P
So, I stayed up until almost 8 in the morning on New year's eve and finally crashed until 9:30. We watched a bazillion movies and ate tons of gummy worms and chocolate kisses and Cheesies and such. It was awesome :P
Anyways...so, school starts up again on Monday. Uck. I hate Socials.
I have lots of cool stuff from Christmas and we got a Wii!!!!! So that's awesome. Been playing that daily and I was playing Mario Olympics too much the other day and now my shoulders are sore. The rowing and swimming relay really take it out of you!
I'm writing a whole bunch of new stories...sorta, reviving the ones I started a while ago.
If you're looking for a good read, I'd recommend Sarra Manning. She's awesome. And she's british so you can just picture all the characters talking in this sarcastic british accent and it makes everything that much better :P
So yeah...I'm gonna go now but I'll be writing more soon!
-Kristen