one wierd week

Hello all, S here. I know I haven’t posted in a while, but I, and the rest of MASK have had a very hectic past few weeks. This week in particular has been very unique for me. A lot happened to me last week, and felt a wide range of emotions and had the deal with some interesting things. And now, I’m going to tell you all about it.

So, I’ll start with Monday. Parachutes (youth Group) was at our youth pastors house for a special thing, and that was really cool. But Monday night was pretty intense. First of all, last Tuesday and Thursday were my last days of school, so naturally I had finals and projects and presentations and book reports and everything due that week and the week before. So I stayed up well past 1 in the morning finishing and re-studying school stuff. Secondly, Tuesday was my 15th birthday. I don’t know if you ever feel like this, but I felt as if I had been looking forward to this day, but the moment came… then left, and I wanted it to feel different but it didn’t, it was “just another ordinary day”, even though I got a lot of wonderful letters and good wishes, it felt as if they were being received by another person. Tuesday night was very emotional for me, to be honest, I cried. I haven’t done that in a while. I cried because I was over tired (because of staying up sooo late the night before, because of what I just explained , plus I was thinking about how hectic this summer will be (I excited for it, but Mask will hardly ever see each other) and just other stuff). Saying all that, I really truly had a magnificent birthday and it was very good even though I cried!

Now were to Wednesday. Woah. Well, the cool thing was, we got to pick up K from the airport, That was TONS of fun!!! Thanks for the encouragement you gave me K!! On another very serious note, later on Wednesday I didn’t have choir like I normally do, so I was kinda bummed out, but I had enough homework that I was glad for the extra time. Around 4:30ish (I think) my dad got home from work and said that some big commotion was going on at a house across the coldisak(sp!) from us. Two fire trucks, an ambulance and two police cars were outside and some good neighbor of ours were outside. The garage door was open. It took until 6 to know what had happened. Apparently the man who lived there had hung himself; the wife had come home to find him in the garage. She began screaming and that’s when our neighbors got involved. We don’t know why he did, we didn’t know him that well, but it has shocked our family all the same.

Thursday was uneventful, just went to school and had worship team, it was very nice. We talked about what had happened and prayed over it. I also invited a lot of people to come to the party I had just decided to do that Friday. Star Trek themed!! I have always wanted to do a Star Trek party. Even though it didn’t turn out exactly how I had planned (given I had decided to do it only two days earlier, I’m not surprised) but I had lots of fun anyways. There were a few hook ups, but they couldn’t be helped. We got to watch new move on our projector which was totally awesome, and many of them spent the night of the 10 people I had time to invited 6 could come, so that was cool. I’m deeply sorry if you (as readers couldn’t come, didn’t know about it or didn’t have a good time, but as I am explaining, it was a hectic week! Saturday the ones that were left went for a walk, K has pics, and that was totally amazing! (For some reason, whenever I get a chance to go for walks with my guests the “party” always livens up). Saturday night my family slept, and then we watched my favorite Star Trek Original movie, The Voyage Home. It was great! Sunday was cool. I woke up and went to a nearby church with my dad, It was really powerful and really amazing. Romans 1:21-30 I think. Sunday night was nice. We had home church as usual and I got to hand out with a little three year old girl. She is so cute! My name is “Big friend” lol. I also got a card from her grandma with and itunes gift card inside. Two Sundays before my parents bought her old ipod Touch, so now it’s mine and its awesome!

Well, that was the week. I cried, I laughed, and felt a lot of the emotions in-between, it was one weird week.

Love you all!
~Silly Sarah

P.S Mom and Dad, Thanks soooooo much for all you did to make my party special. I know it ward balancing little kid and teen, but I know I had a good time just being with good friends! Thanks for putting up with my suddenness! I love and appreciate you both soooooooo much!!!!! and thanks Mask for leting me cry and have a Star Trek party (being happy about it! lol jk) and for puttingup with me for seven (? right ?) years. You all are amazing!!

P.S.S. Its mostly spelled right! Lol!!

Overwhemling

Man, I know a lot of people who are feeling overwhelmed right now, including myself. So if that's you, just hang on! School's almost out, just take it one day at a time and soon it will be better. I promise!
School is hard this time of year but it ends. Some people have busy summers too, but that's just not the same. There's always free time on Summer days.
So just make sure you're getting enough sleep and drinking water and letting some stuff out- talk to your friends! Or family or whoever, it will help you stay focused if you can release your thoughts some way (like writing them in a blog).
MASK is trying to plan our summer and trust me, this is no easy feat! But we're managing alright, and so can you! Haha, this is so random it doesn't even make sense. Well, that's ok. No one reads it anyway :P
-K

Levenworth

Hey! So... I went to Levenworth this weekend. It was pretty awesome. Kind of a last minute trip, but my two sisters and their husbands were going so I flew downt to Seattle on Friday night and we all drove to Levenworth on Sunday. I stayed with Kendra, my oldest sister who had two kids, for most of Saturday and then spent that night at Katy and Justin's. We had to get up really early because Justin leads worship at his church (he's awesome) and it's a long drive. It was SO PRETTY down there, everything was so rich and green and beautiful and it smelled amazing...I love the Spring down there. In the summer it gets hot and dry and stuff but in the SPring it's like an oasis of life.
Anyway, I had an GREAT time, good stuff in Levenworth. I bought a ring and a hat and a wallet. Yup. I flew back down on Wednesday morning and made it to school for the last two classes...school is awful. TONS of makeup work.
Today we began our mock trial for the impeachment of President Nixon and I am H.R. Haldeman, Nixon's chief of staff. It's really important, and I was awful. Just awful. But it's Friday tomorrow so I'm stoked!
It was S's birthday on Tuesday- HAPPY BIRTHDAY S!! She's having a Star Trek themed party tomorrow so we'll report on that later. Anyway, just an update. I love my family and I am so lucky and so blessed to have them it shocks me into silent awe every time I'm around them. I just sit there silently and am happy.
Roman is adorable, he's moved into the "why" stage. Haha. Fun stuff!!
-K

I Have A Wrench

Ok, so, one thing you might not know about me is: I am very protective. Secretly. But I am sharing this secret with you today, because I have a story. :)

So, my mom took me to work last night. And it was late. And it was dark. And there were shifty people around.
So, we are loading stuff into a truck out back. And, what do I do?
Well, I start looking for some kind of weapon. My preferable choice would have been a box cutter, but, finding none handy, I stuck a wrench in my back pocket.

Imagine my surprise when I actually got to use it.

Ok, so, I wasn't scared, that was not the reason for sticking a wrench in my pocket. I stuck it in my pocket to protect my mom in case of an emergency. Yeah. And...I have always wanted to hit someone over the head with one.

Now, before you assume I DID hit someone over the head with it...don't. Because I didn't get to. But, as we were loading, the back store door swung shut behind us.
And it doesn't have a handle on the outside.
And my mom's keys were INside.
We were stuck.
That heavy, metal door is impossible to get open.
That is, unless you have a wrench in your back pocket.

I felt like a superhero. I pulled it out with a "whoosh!" and my mom said "oooh!!" And we pried open the door.

Nice, huh?
Yeah. Be safe, peeps. It's always handy to have a wrench in your back pocket.
Or maybe a set of spare keys.

But, whatever. That's it. :)
And don't think I'm violent or anything and that my dream is to hit people over the head. I just want my loved ones to be safe. :) AAAAWWWWW!!! *sniffle sniffle*

yeah.

You can count on me!!! *whoosh!*

-A

My Point

Well, not much to report from my end. K and M pretty much summed it up.
After H2oasis I had to leave. I took a shower and clonked into bed. I got up on Saturday at 8:00am and prepared myself to go snowboarding. yay!
It was really fun and sunny. There was only fifteen people on the slopes, so me and my two other friends had practically the whole area to ourselves!! It was super fun.
I ate a quick lunch and headed off to the Trailer park thing with M and K. It was really fun and I enjoyed it a lot. I can definitely see us having some really good times with those kids.
I'm eating apples.
After I got back home, me and my family played a massive game of Seafarers of Catan. I don't know WHAT it is, but every time we play that game before bed, we go absolutely crazy!! Me and my siblings were SO HYPER it was insane. We were singing, laughing, talking crazy talk, firing missiles on each other, and ...yeah. That game does some weird stuff. I mean, dude. I just wish someone was there to see what went on.
If I had to say, it was weirder than some of the stuff MASK does, and trust me, we do some weird stuff.
Anyway, that's all from my side.

Spot on,

-A

Long-term relationship building.

Ok, so Josh (our youth pastor) has teamed up with the Kievinvelts (a family who runs Parachutes Youth Ministries) and they have come up with a plan! Josh has selected some of our youth group (MASK included) to start some long term relationships with kids who live in Dimond Estates (a trailer park). They are really nice kids but they don't have really stable adults in their life and Josh and Joel think that we could really help them. So we'll start out by just hanging with the kids and later on set up some kind of mentorship program, maybe do some tutoring. I am very excited about it, but pretty nervous too. You'll probably be hearing more about this later :)
-K

Oh man! Busybusybusy like a beaver!

Ok sooo...this weekend has been hectic!! So crazy. Really. First, there was quite some confusion but I somehow got to H2Oasis (an indoor waterpark here in Anchorage) and met SAM. It was actualy a ton of fun, Jessica (a friend) and A's little sister (another M) were there. We spent probably as much time eating as we did swimming but that was fun for me :D Somebody cut the back of my foot with their toenail and I didn't really notice until wayyyy later. We were sitting on the deck of the pool for like 5 or 10 minutes when I look down, and there's a puddle of blood on the floor and the back of my foot is totaly covered in blood. Ew! It took me and S a littl while to get it to stop but that was the most interesting thing that has happened to me in a while. Then, this cleaning lady threw away M's retainer!!! I'll let her tell that story but don't worry, they found it. Then S, Jessica, M, and me (I would say and I but I think the letter would confuse people) went back to S's house. M stayed for a little while and then left but me and Jess stayed the night. The next day, A, M, and me (I did it again) went to this Kid Festival thing and then after that I went to see a show at UAA called Kismet and it was delightful :) I went with a girl named Katie from my Russia trip because our translator, Jhenya (long story comes with that name ) was in it. He actualy had a pretty big role and he did really good, so I'm glad I went. Today I got up before 8 so I could get to church early and run the powerpoint. Lovley. And today I have been doing tons of homework. So there's my weekend in a nutshell, I know this wasn't a very interesting post but this kind of thing is strictly so I'll remember it in days to come.
-K

H2OCrisis

Ok, so S invited us all to H2Oasis for some Homeschooling thing. It was pretty fun. EXCEPT for one event that almost ruined my relationship with my mom. So we were eating pizza and having laughs when we all got up to refill our drinks. While we were doing that this Korean (I think she was Korean) lady comes and clears off our table of trash and stuff. Unfortunately, my silly habits put my retainer in a folded napkin. Thus, when were almost done eating I realized to my horror that I had just lost my very expensive retainer. So, I go to the Korean janitor lady and I tell her what happened... at least 10 times. (With motions and everything) She finally understands that we threw something very "OOOH! YEAH! Very Expensive" (she says pointing to her teath.) "'bout two thousand dollar." We just smile and nod. So, three trash cans and ten minutes later, we found them (miraculously). A and me (following K's suit) went to the bathroom to wash our hands. I soaked my retainer in listerine for an hour when I got home.

-M

M Word of the Post
Megaflop- n. a thing that is a complete failure

Tears from my eyes, and into the well

"Amanda. Come here."
"Why?"
"'Cause I want you too."
"Give me four good reasons, then I will." I waited as my little brother racked his brain for good reasons.
He didn't take long.
"1) because I have a question; 2) because I have another question; 3) It will be really good if you say yes; aannnnd 4) because you have nothing better to do."
My heart caved in (as it often does with him) and I walked over, trying not to laugh. I went over and asked, "What?"
"You should become a book reader."
"Ummm...I already am."
"No, I mean like Jim Dale. Read books on tape."
I gawked. I have been reading my favorite books to him. Right now they include the Percy Jackson series and Artemis Fowl (which he liked so much he wants me to read them again). I do all different voices and everything. (cool, I know)
Since I had nothing to say (I was kinda in shock), he filled the silence:
"You'd be really good. Especially if you did Artemis Fowl..." he kind of trailed off, seeing my weird expression. I knew I'd make him uncomfortable if I started crying, so I held it in (I really wanted to though!).
"Well..."
"Do you want to?" he asked
"I've thought about it." And I had.
"'Cause you'd be really good," he said again.

Afterward, I realized that he didn't have a question. He had a suggestion. One that made me want to cry. That's the second nice, genuine thing he's said to me. :) I was touched, and my heart broke. (I also looked back at reason number 3) ;)

On another note: My sister asked,
What was the difference between a cadaver and a corpse?

Anyone have any thoughts? I answered her, but I wasn't entirely positive in my answer. Also, it seems like a good discussion topic. haha, you could use it to start conversation!
haha. No seriously.


_Amanda

p.S. I just ate an orange.

Easter Weekend

Sooo....it snowed. And all I have to say to that is- I knew it!! I knew this would happen. But I let the world convince me to let my guard down and then BOOM!-snow.
Anyway, I am here to update you about our recent endvorings. I don't think that's a word...whatever.
Ok! So, this weekend we all went to A's house on Friday night and watched Hello Dolly! :) Fun stuff. We stayed up late and covered some seriously deep issues...intense.
And we, of course, talked all about characters and how much we wish it was summer. We went on two walks, once to the park and once around the neighborhood. When we went to the park Amanda found a random jacket on the ground and put it on, and some guy ran up out of no where and said "that's my coat!" so she had to give it back. Bummer, it was awfully stunning on her. Anyway, the rest of the playground visit was really just standard stuff- pictures, swings, battles, boxing matches, ect. I think we all had fun. I saw a mailbox with 2012 written on it, which is when me and A graduate :D NOT THAT IT MAKES US ANY BETTER THAN YOU TWO!! Geez. So touchy.
Alrighty! So I think that's all I have to say...Oh! I went to A's grandma's house for Easter and met her family, and I must say...I am beginning to understand why she is the way she is. Haha! Jk. I love you guys!
-K