all in a week

hey all! last week our computer's motherbord got all screwed up because i had so many pictures and music files and was running them and the internet and blah blah blah... so bottom line, i screwed up the computer and we had to go get it fixed the day after christmas. we got it back yesterday and today i spent hours getting everything loaded back on and re-arranging files and what not. but now its better and working faster so all is good... and then i found five dollars.

warmth in winter is coming up so thats pretty exciting. our design team committee is having a hard time finding a time to meet concidering the time we had was the same time and day as the big meeting.

hope everyone had a good christmas. stay safe celebrating that last day of 2006 tomorrow.

peace

xmas eve

merry christmas eve!!

-em

we are methodists

kinda long, but funny and true!

Garrison Keillor on Methodists

(Adapted from an essay by Garrison Keillor)

We make fun of Methodists for their blandness, their excessive calm,their fear of giving offense, their lack of speed and also for theirsecret fondness for macaroni and cheese. But nobody sings like them.

If you were to ask an audience in New York City , a relativelyMethodistless place, to sing along on the chorus of "Michael Row theBoat Ashore," they will look daggers at you as if you had asked them tostrip to their underwear. But if you do this among Methodists, they'd smile and row that boat ashore and up on the beach! And down the road!

Many Methodists are bred from childhood to sing in four-part harmony,a talent that comes from sitting on the lap of someone singing alto ortenor or bass and hearing the harmonic intervals by putting your littlehead against that person's rib cage. It's natural for Methodists tosing in harmony. We are too modest to be soloists, too worldly to singin unison. When you're singing in the key of C and you slide into theA7th and D7th chords, all two hundred of you, it's an emotionally fulfilling moment. By our joining in harmony, we somehow promise that we will not forsake each other.

I do believe this: People, these Methodists, who love to sing infour-part harmony are the sort of people you could call up when you'rein deep distress. If you are dying, they will comfort you. If you are lonely,they'll talk to you. And if you are hungry, they'll give you tuna salad!

Methodists believe in prayer, but would practically die if asked to pray out loud.

Methodists like to sing, except when confronted with a new hymn or a hymn with more than four stanzas.

Methodists believe their pastors will visit them in the hospital,even if they don't notify them that they are there.

Methodists usually follow the official liturgy and will feel it is their way of suffering for their sins.

Methodists believe in miracles and even expect miracles, especially during their stewardship visitation programs or when passing the plate.

Methodists think that the Bible forbids them from crossing the aisle while passing the peace.

Methodists drink coffee as if it were the Third Sacrament.

Methodists feel guilty for not staying to clean up after their own wedding reception in the Fellowship Hall.

Methodists are willing to pay up to one dollar for a meal at church.

Methodists still serve Jell-O in the proper liturgical color of the season and think that peas in a tuna noodle casserole adds too much color.

Methodists believe that it is OK to poke fun at themselves and never take themselves too seriously.

And finally, you know you are a Methodist when: It's 100 degrees,with 90% humidity, and you still have coffee after the service. You hear something really funny during the sermon and smile as loudly as you can. Donuts are a line item in the church budget, just like coffee.
When you watch a Star Wars movie and they say, "May the Force be with you," and you respond, "and also with you."
And lastly, it takes ten minutes to say good-bye!

random quote

"life moves pretty fast. if you dont stop to look around for a while, you could miss it"

-ferris bueller's day off

coffee house

last night, hendersonville first umc had a coffee house to benefit the homeless. to get in you brought either a clothing or cash donation. the music was great and even quinton parker preformed! he did a great job. jonas, jonathon's 5 yr. old, was crushing on johnathan jones' little sister, that was as entertaining as the music! i thought the whole thing was pulled together great.
now hermitage is doing one and i think we might make ours a benefit for darfur. we'll probably do it in march. if you dont know about darfur and the genocide, then i go to darfur.com to get more information about it.
i've heard rumors about this "outdoor laser-tag" and i think i might be going to one next week. jonathon was tellin me that in like a week and a half, we might be going to one. guess we'll find out..

some snow

yes! it finally snowed. i consider it snow anyways. i think that if you live in middle tennessee, then whatever went on friday morning was snow. im just surprised that it actually did anything with how warm it had been.
so today is jonathon norman's one year anniversary with being at hermitage. (<--random)
and also, one of my friends went to the preds game yesterday and when they got back to their car, it had been broken into! her mom's laptop and xm radio had been stolen. they had to call the police and file a report so just keep them in your prayers.
also finals are coming up so i dont know how much blogging time i'll have. so this might be all for a while! ttyl

em

birds are amazing

this has nothing to do with anything, but i think its really funny

today, i was in my kitchen. and i there is a window above our sink. well, as i turned around to wash my hands, a blue bird came flying at the window and hit it! it was loud, too! then it just flew away. when it hit i screamed (and i never scream at anything) my mom was behind me and asked me if screamed because i saw my reflection. if you dont think this is funny, i guess you just had to be there. but it was really funny to me. so yeah


-peace

happy thanksgiving!

happy thanksgiving everyone! i love getting ready for this day... makin soo much food! i love to cook and this year we have a lot more people coming over than usuall so that means more food. almost everyone we have comin over is bringing someone and that person bringin someone else. this year my grandpa is also coming. lets just say my family doesnt really get along with him. i dont have a problem with him but my aunts and some of my cousins do. but we'll get through it. this "black friday" i'm planning on going shopping. yay for everything on sale!

happy thanksgiving!!

bonfire!

ahhhhh! the bonfire was sooooooo much fun! we had a bunch of people show up and even with the little bit of sprinkling it was amazing! we were talkin this morning after sunday school and we were like, hey we should invite gavin and hendersonville to come. then we were all like ohh yeah! then jonathon was like, thats too short of a notice but that could be fun some other time...... and then i found 5 dollars. so anyways, tonight we got through all the hoopla and actually sang some songs (which was great because we never sing at youth), everybody had a great time and i cant wait to do it again!!

-peace

2 days of school left!

bleh..

i was sick all last week and still pushed going to school. that was a bad idea... today i just chillaxed and didnt really do anything. tomorrow we will be having youth at my house! can you say bonfire? i've been looking forward to this for so long so its pretty exciting. its supposed to rain so im praying that it doesn't. we've already pushed it a few weekends. any longer and we'll be watching for snow.
i decided i have a new favorite band - the fray. they are amazing! all their songs are good.
for our ski trip we're having a t-shirt design contest. this could be interesting. i figure if you want a shirt you'll like, design it yourself. so thats what i did.
only two days of school this week! yessss. happy thanksgiving!


-peace

fall retreat!!

the jr.'sr. high retreat was amazing! we didnt have as many people this year but i think it almost worked out for the best. we all split up into workshops and each workshop planned something for the evening or morning worship. mine was the video workshop. we made a video. go figure. the only bad thing was i was sick all day yesterday and today. i also had a charliehorse the whole weekend. over all, this weekend was fun. i got some good pictures from worship, too.

up next - warmth in winter!! = )

-peace.

nothing to do

this past week has been so laid back for me. 3 things i had going on all got cancelled and now im packing for the jr./sr. high retreat at paris landing state park. thats the most exciting thing thats happened in a while. im on design team so thats pretty good.

since the bears made it to the play-offs, we get a full spirit day tomorrow!! if you dont have a strict dress code at your school then you dont know how exciting it is to have a full dress down day. those rock the school. ttyl

peace. = )

they made it!

our football team made it to the play-offs for the first time in 6 yeas! go bears!

on another note, i just finished a spanish project on los días de los muertos. it was pretty fun. i got to make bread. i guess its not that great if you dont like cooking. i got an extra point on my final grade for makin the bread and i also get another point for goin to this festval at cheekwood saturday.

fall retreat in one week!!!! if you've never been, go this year, it is sooo much fun!

peace = )

the chin...

while we were waiting for our pumpkins to arrive, we made a movie. it's really stupid and has no point but is so funny!

no pumpkins = (

sooooooo today we were supposed to get a half load of pumpkins in addition to the full load we got 2 weeks ago. well, the place we get them from is having some financial problems and couldnt send a truck and didnt bother calling to tell us that. we really need some more pumpkins because we only have like 1/3 of what we started with left! when jonathon called them this afternoon to ask where they were they said they werent coming but could send a truck towards the begining of next week. yeah well. whatever. well since we thought we were getting pumpkins, jonathon told everyone to jus come after school and start unloading. we did absolutly nothing but hang out. some of us went and got pizza n ice cream sundae stuff and brought it back so we could just have like a party at the pumpkin patch. it was fun anyways. we can try agian next week! = )

PUMPKINS!!!

they have arrived! we got an entire semi-truck full of pumpkins and we unloaded them all. actually they've been here for about a week but we still have so many and we get another half a truck load in about a week! come buy some!!

also we went to a refugee camp for youth over at centennial park sunday. that was really fun and i learned a lot about the refugee camps. the day before that was the celebration of cultures at centennial park and also went to that with my mom. she knew the person that organized it and she knew a bunch of other people there. the parthenon was free that day so we went to check it out. let me be the first to tell you that its not worth paying for. im glad it was free because it wasnt all that great. thats what i thought anyways.

my great aunt died sunday morning and today was her funeral. just keep her and our family in your prayers.

have a great rest of the week! i know i will with no school. i am working pumpkin patch though so come pay a visit!

break? yeah right

this first week of break has already been busy and will continue being that way. i have 3 design team meetings, several volleyball games, and the pumpkins come tomorrow! the first load of pumpkins are coming in tomorrow around 4. i'll have all of next week to work the patch so come buy some! this is a fundraiser for the youth who work it and the hours you work give you credits towards trips. pumpkin patch is so much fun. = )

lawsuit for praying in public schools

my elementary school is now under a lawsuit. it made the front page of the tennessean yesterday and i think its just not worth the trouble. here's the article-

"School-based religious activities, heralded by some who welcome a return of God to public classrooms, came under fire in a new lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee this week.
The lawsuit claims that a series of Christian meetings and prayer events at Lakeview Elementary School in Mt. Juliet violated the constitution al separation of church and state and illegally subjected young children to "religious proselytizing."
But many involved in public school education say that religion is exactly what's been missing.
"I know there is going to be some conflict and controversy about this … but I believe we need basic religion in our schools to teach children the way God would have them go," said Will Duncan, a member of the Sumner County Board of Education. "If we don't, somewhere down the line we are going to lose a whole generation of children."
But others say that exposing children to God and religion is clearly not the role of public schools.
"Parents should be the ones to decide which religion, if any, they should expose their children to," said Rob Boston, assistant director of communications for the Washington, D.C.-based Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "When school officials step into that role and start promoting particular faiths, they are usurping parental rights."
It is a perennial debate. In 1999, parents of some fifth-graders in Warren County public schools took issue with educators who allowed representatives of the Gideons ministry to distribute New Testaments in school.
That same year, members of the Putnam County Board of Education vowed to continue to begin their monthly meetings with prayer, despite a federal appellate court's ruling that such prayer is unconstitutional.
A few years earlier, in Lebanon, the Mighty Men, who perform feats of strength in between testifying about their Christian faith, canceled an appearance after school officials became concerned, in part, about the performance taking place during the school day.
The ACLU's lawsuit was filed on behalf of two Old Hickory parents, who said their son — a kindergartner last year — was exposed to religious events and messages that were "coercive" and "highly offensive."
The activities included a "Praying Parents" group that regularly met in the school cafeteria during school hours and dropped off fliers in classrooms to let children know they'd been prayed for, according to the suit.
And it says that the school observed "National Day of Prayer" by holding a competition for students to draw posters promoting the day, handing out stickers that said "I prayed" to students who'd participated and encouraging students to link up for the day with "prayer buddies."
Those students without a prayer buddy or a sticker stood out, "disfavored and isolated," the suit said.
ACLU attorney Eddie Schmidt said he did not object to religious events that took place on school grounds before or after the school day, as long as they did not involve the endorsement and promotion by school officials. Some of these events, however, did take place during school hours and established a pattern and practice of endorsing not only religion, but a particular version of Christianity, ACLU attorneys said.
But that claim, in the view of an attorney with the Christian legal group Alliance Defense Fund, is "absurd on its face."
"Essentially what (the ACLU) fails to distinguish is the critical difference between government-sponsored speech and private speech, which is constitutionally protected," said Memphis based attorney Nate Kellum, with the Alliance Defense Fund, who read the ACLU's suit but is not involved in the case.
School officials would not comment Thursday on the lawsuit, but several parents who were told of the legal action as they picked up their children from school said they stood behind the school in offering the religious activities.
"I think it's absurd that anybody would sue over that," said Donna Crowson, as she sat in line to pick up her two grandchildren at Lakeview. "They have a right to do that, I believe. The child doesn't have to participate. Parents don't have to participate."
Other parents said they were drawn to the school because of its Christian activities.
Mike and Cindy Davison, who have a kindergartner at the school, moved to Mt. Juliet from Davidson County eight years ago. The environment at Lakeview was a big factor in the decision, they said.
"As far as the curriculum and the environment and the staff, it's as close to a private school as you can get. I believe that goes along with the Christian theme they have," said Cindy Davison, who said her family reads the Bible every day.
The suit names the Wilson County School System, the system's director, Jim Duncan; Lakeview Elementary School Principal Wendell Marlowe; Assistant Principal Yvonne Smith and school teacher Janet Adamson.
Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, the suit seeks a preliminary injunction, asking that defendants be stopped from engaging in any future, similar religious activities. It also seeks attorneys' fees and compensatory or nominal damages for "emotional distress."
The suit says the parents repeatedly tried to discuss their concerns with school officials but were rebuffed and ultimately pulled their son out of school to home-school him.
The suit does not name the parents or child. It asks the court to allow the parents to pursue the action anonymously, saying "they fear community reprisals and attacks, and ostracism, and because their minor child, James Doe, remains of tender years and sensibilities."

homecoming week

homecoming week is over and the seniors actually didnt win, the juniors did. the sophomores did horrible and didnt win any thing. even the freshmen won two of the dress up days.

NO MORE SCHOOL!!= ) well for 2 weeks anyways. i'm not going anywhere so i get to just stay home and relax. i really needed this break
too.
this is ashlyn on tacky day

homecoming week!!!

and its also our last week of school until our two-week break!! this week we dont have to wear dress code so instead we get to wear... our pj's, the tackiest clothes we can find, dress up like a super-hero, and have just another school spirit day. homecoming week also means class competitions like the penny wars (which is just which ever class has the most pennies at the end of the week wins but other coins and bills count against you.), class floats, and a parade on friday. this friday is just going to be like one big party. we dont have to do much of any work because thursday is the end of the grading period and we have a pep-rally and a parade, and all the teachers will just be busy getting ready for intersession (summer school in the fall). this will be mj's best week ever!!= )

Gavin and Erin-September 23rd, 2006

today's the big day for gavin richardson and erin foster. they're getting married!!!! it's so exciting to finally see the two getting married. = D

mi madre is much better

my mom is back at home after spending two days at the hospital. she came home wednesday during the day. she stayed home yesterday and is doing much better.
we also didnt have shcool yesterday so we rented movies and just took a day off.
there's a football game tonight against lebanon so we had a pep-rally and spirit day today. the seniors won, of course. next week is homecoming week so we get 4 dress down/up days!! so pretty much my week has just been uneventful. maybe next week will be better. peace.

mom's sick again.

saturday my mom had another attack and she was feeling bad all night and into sunday morning. my dad and i went to church and i guess it was like 10:20 when my sister had to take her to the ER. my dad and i met them there after sunday school. he stayed and me n sarah left. we just hung out all day then i went to youth. my dad picked me up from uth and my mom was in the car. they had decided to let her out but i really think she didnt feel well enough to be out because this morning she went back to the doctor and he's holding her there over-night. my dad is there with her now and he'll be there for a while tonight. i dont know how long she'll be staying there.
this hasnt happened in over a year. like 2 years. it used to be this bad before her surgery but it hasnt since then. 2 weeks in a row is pretty unusual. just keep our family and especially my mom in your prayers.

long time, bad week

so these past few days have been pretty busy for me. well the entire past week really. saturday was a busy day starting with the end of a lock-in then going to a design team meeting. after the meeting we went out to lunch and thats when i found something out that i really was hoping wasnt true. one of my good friends has a problem thats kind of obvious and bad but we're working on the situation.

for those of you that have known me for a while know that my mom has this disease with her intestine that cause her A LOT of pain. well she had surgery to fix it about 4 years ago. it had been about a year and a half since she's had an "episode" as we like to call them and saturday night she had one. she had to go to the ER and spent about 6 hours there. she came home from the hospital that night and just rested all day sunday.

monday i found out that one of my other good friends' step-mom stabbed herself 3 times in the stomach on sunday around 3. she went to the ER and she's still alive. she's been in a mental home for the past few days and now she's going to her home for a week to see how things go.

yesterday my mom was at a meeting somewhere and she tripped over a curb and fell all the way to the ground and bruised her hand and knee. she and her doctors were surprised that her hand wasnt broken or even sprained.

on a better note, tomorrow night is our first home football game and from what i hear, we really arent that good this year. so i guess it really isnt such a good note. we did however beat hendersonville in volleyball tuesday and i think it's safe to say that we didnt just beat them, we killed them! well our JV killed them, anyway. i think the final score was like 10-25 the first game and 16-25the second game. varsity beat them in the first 3 games so i guess they did kill! all i remember is that it was not a close game.

peace.

AFJ!!

mission trip 06
Originally uploaded by hermumcyouth.

i hear so much about how cool buddy Christ is. well you know what, Action Figure Jesus(AFJ for short), Francis Asbury, and John Wesley go on our mission trips and they actually do some drillin. they did so much more than just drill, they put on sunscreen, ate sandwiches, hung out with a jack sparrow cut-out, hitch-hiked, uh i mean.. gave a thumbs up to the people driving by, rode bikes, and had a wonderful adventure in a tree. and to make all that more fun, AFJ has wheels instead of feet and bendy arms that ocationally fall off. but then we can still give him emergency surgery if needed. i have to say that this fine trio beats buddy Christ alone. well, they are all equally cool. they're kinda like the Y-guys. they're all different but all equally cool.

Pluto, WHAT!

so i found out this morning that pluto is no longer considered a planet! all my life, learning the acronyms and think that it was a planet and now one day all the scientists just decide that it isnt! so now does that mean that we have 8 planets in our solar system? and whats with naming a planet oprah? i personally think it's just all messed up. i guess its just another thing we have to live with

tomorrow is our big game against wilson central. i have heard that they are really bad this year so i'm sure we'll beat them. we get a dress down day, too. just because we are playing central and it isnt even a home game, but i'm not complaining. whatever mel brown feels he has to do. he's the coolest principal ever and he's like 75 years old. or at least he looks it. peace

-em

a lot to do

tomorrow morning i get to get up at 530 and go do a service project for school. we will be handing water to the people in the wilson county bike race. if we do three service projects we get to go on the class trip at the end of the year. i think it also goes for our service hours for tennessee scholars.

the second week of school is over and i have had a bunch of homework. i'm taking world history this semester and the teacher is new this year. he gives a lot of work and requires us to take so many notes. i have a feeling that i will learn a lot though. i like the people in most of my classes and volleyball season has been kickin up so i've been going to the games. well, the home games anyway. i should probably go work on my homework now. peace

-em

what a beautiful wedding

tonight i went to my godbrother's wedding. it was amazing! his brother played guitar and sang for part of it and he was so good. weddings always make me so happy and i cant stop smiling the whole time. everything about it was great. they aren't going on a honeymoon right away. i think they are waiting until september but tonight when they go back to their apartment, they will walk into a room with champaign and rose pedals on the floor. my family had to sneek in after they left and set it all up. we also had music playing. it was so beautiful.

so many people!!

tonight at youth, we had like 50 people show up and i think more than half of the people there were 6th and 7th graders. i could not believe the amount of kids runnin around. im not complaining because it was amazing!! we played underground church.. sort of. that's what jonathon called it anyway. after that we had a mini contemplative service. it was so great tonight.

on wednesday my godbrother is getting married!! its pretty exiting considering the women he's marrying and him have been together for like 3 years. i heard its not true that throwing rice kills birds. if you have no idea what i'm talking about, people said that the birds eat the rice, the rice swells up in their throats and they die. well its not true.
--peace
em

summer sizzler

this past weekend i went to summer sizzler!!! it was a blast and since it was a confrence event, hendersonville was there. we all got to see gavin and a few of the h'ville youth. jonathon n. was hanging out with his old youth from blakemore and west nashville. one thing i thought was really neat was that our speaker, jacob armstrong, graduated from mt. juliet in '98. i know a lot of people that graduated around that time and he did too. it was so random but i thought it was really cool. i had so much fun just hangin out with everyone and this year i was a small group leader with adam burgett. it was my first time being a small group leader and it was fun. the only bad thing is that it was sooo hot and humid. i strongly suggest to everyone to go next year. next up-jr., sr. high retreat! then the oh so famous warmth in winter. see every one there.

today is cara's birthday!!!! i didnt see her today to tell her but if you get the chance, tell her happy b-day!

dang, son!

ok, so yesterday was our first day of school! today was our first full day and yesterday was just a 2 hour day. no school tomorrow though. but we go back friday until we get out for fall break.

my classes are all good. i have a media concepts class and if you have comcast digital cable on your tv then watch channel 9 and see what we're putting up. channel 9 is MJHS's educational channel and we put up slides of stores in mj and school announcements and things like that. if you watch between like 11:15 and 1:20 you will see our news. that class is my only fun class though.


my next classes are just spanish dos, world history, which i'm taking because it talks about world religions, and honors geometry. maybe i'll have better classes next semester.

mission trip to south carolina

this past week i went to john's island, south carolina to do some mission work. it was incredible! we helped a woman with her house. we painted it, gave her a back porch, built a pump house, and gave her a working sink. we had a ton of fun every night for our sabbath time. we went to a baseball game, seafood jamboree, ghost tour in charleston, and we went to the beach a few times. the group that went couldnt have been better. i think that it was the perfect group for the trip. everybody stayed on task and was willing to work. it was here and gone like that.


well, school starts tomorrow and then its summer sizzler time. things should cool down after this week. matt bell, our summer intern, is leaving sunday, also. we will all miss him.


mission trip pics. soon to come

time to leave again

well, i just got back from beersheba a week ago and today i am departing for yet another trip. we're going to johns island, south carolina to do some mission work. as soon as we get back from that, it's time for school to start! august 1st. that weekend is summer sizzler but after summer sizzler there's nothing until november. im not playing volleyball this year so my fall will be focused mainly on school. blogging might be slow when school starts back but i'll do what i can. well i guess i better go pack. wont be blogging this week for the obvious reason that i wont be here.

peace

week of adventure

so this past week, i went to beersheba. it was a load of fun!! the first day was just checking in and chapel, first day stuff. the fun began tuesday. we went on a hike/swim at the fiery gizzard. strange name but fun stuff. then we came back and just hung around until dinner then we had a scavenger hunt.
the next day i went repelling. that was my first time repelling and it was just what i expected. that night we had kangaroo court which was just a bunch of silly things that the campers had been doing all week and their silly punishments. jonathon ended up being "charged" for something because he dropped off his youth then left and came back 2 days later.
on thursday a group of us went white water rafting on the ocoee and we had to be ready to go at 445 in the morning! it took like 2 and a half hours to get there but i think it was worth it. thursday night we just had regular chapel but we were suppost to do a faith walk. we just didnt have time.
friday was our last day and we didnt do anything except group picture and get our t-shirts. hermitage had to leave earlier than the rest of the churches so we didnt stay for chapel.
this week was a great experience and i wish we had had more than just 6 people from our church go. i am really looking forward to next year but it might overlap with youth 2007 if they dont change the dates.
the only thing i didnt like about the camp was that i came back sick. i got ovet that though.

too much fun!

so today, my dad was like "emily, what are you doing today?" and i, of course, wasnt doing anything at all so he asked if i wanted to take a day trip up to fall creek falls. we did and we left around 11 and is was me, my dad, sarah, and alex. we got there around 2 after stopping for lunch and the first thing we did was take a hike out to the overlook of one of the falls. after getting back down from that, we went to the swimming area and we were over there for about and hour. it was so much fun and partially because it was totally random. i think we are planning to do another day trip on saturday, too. after that its off for beersheba!!!!

the 4th

happy 4th of july!! we decided to go out on the lake and tube today and we weregoing to eat at a marina in h'ville. well... that didnt happen. we were out on the tubes and we hadnt gotten very far from the docks when the engine turned off. my dad figured out that the engine had overheated and fried itself. so we called some friends of ours to come out and tow us back in. they took like an hour to get there and it rained hard! all 6 of us had to squeeze into the little cabin on the boat. then finally they came out and we got back to the dock. we got the boat on the trailer then went out to eat. it was like 3:00 by now and i guess we got to the lake around 12ish. even though we didnt get to do what we wanted, it was all pretty fun.

on another note--im very exited about next week. its the murfreesboro district camp at beersheba!! i went last year for my first time and it was a blast. i cant wait to get there. the rest of july for me is pretty packed. i get back from beersheba then have to get ready for the mission trip to john's island, south carolina. after we get back from that, its time for school to start. then summer sizzler. it's all exiting and im looking forward to all of it.

ttfn

vbs

this past week at our church we had vacation bible school. the theme this year was fiesta!! the youth would do things after because it was only until noon. well on thursday we went to see nacho libre! i guess it was pretty funny but it wasn't all that great. i think the best part about it was that jack black was in it. last night i went to my first drive-in and i have to say that is something i dont plan on doing again. it may have been that the movie was just bad (the breakup) or it could have been that i was uncomfortable.

for my birthday my aunt gave me a gift card to target so i went on wed. after vbs and got 3 cd's for $14! they were all the old switchfoot cd's. it was the legend of chin, new way to be human, and learning to breath. i think they're all relatively good. its hard to believe that switchfoot has been around for 10 years. when their first cd came out, i was in first grade. 1997. they have plans for their next to be out before the end of the year. it will be their 6th. the beautiful letdown is their best cd though. good for now.

switchfoot conerts, random trash, and no sleep

yesterday after the 30 hour famine, i went to a switchfoot concert! it was free so that made it even better AND i got like 4 things autographed by all the band members! it was so incredible.

before the concert at the 30 hur famine, we went to north nashville and picked up trash off the streets as our service project. it was so hard to do because most of us hadn't had any sleep and we, of course, hadn't eaten in like 24 hours so it was kind of hard to do. we found some of the most random trash when we were picking it up. actually the service project itself was random and unplanned.

the night of the famine cara, toria and i didn't sleep at all. well we may have dozed for like 20 minutes or so but for the most part we just stayed in the warm bathroom in the fellowship building on foam pads that our hand bells people use and talked. after everyone was around and our camp was cleaned up, we did yoga. it was pretty fun and it was cara's mom that taught it. we broke our fast by eating out at cracker barrel.
my entire weekend has been great and this week starts vbs so i now have something to do this week. i think it's safe to say that my summer has been close to great so far.

30 hour famine

so today we start our 30 hour famine. by we, i mean our youth group and we started at 7 this morning. we wont eat for 30 hours and we are raising money to send to darfur and zimbabwe.
tonight when everyone gets to the church, we will walk from our church to the fellowship building. after we get there we will build a "refugee camp" out of cardboard. that is where we will be sleeping. we arent going to have watches, cell phones, iPods, or even toothbrushes. i think it will be mucho fun. im really looking forword to it. we will break our fast by eating out tomorrow at a buffet. it will be great.

fun day laying back

on tuesday night, cara and toria came over and we watched the ringer and It. they were both good. the ringer was very funny and It was just good all around. they spent the night and yesterday we all went to nashville shores. we didnt do much but just lay out. we only rode a few slides because the water was freezing! toria got the most unusual sunburn. its so random i cant even explain it. sarah left to go on a mission trip with cooks umc on sunday. it was so random. her boyfriends mom signed them both up to go about a week before they left to go. they went to a place in mississippi to help with hurricane relief. she calls every day and she says she is having a really good time. vacation bible school starts next week so im not sure if i'll be on much. today i am going with the youth group to go see cars. i have heard that it is really good and i am looking foward to seeing it. if it were friday we would go see NACHO LIBRE!!! i am determined that i am going to see that sometime within the next 2 weeks. it looks so funny!! ttfn

Happy Birthday to me!!

for those of you who dont know, yesterday was my birthday!! i got an iPod and my learners permit. it was such a busy day. we sarted with my iPod then went to the dmv to get my permit. when i was taking the test, there were these two girls sitting in the waiting area and they were reading my questions and telling me the answers! i was already almost through and only had like 4 left but it was still so annoying!! after i got my permit, we went to cinco de mayo and since it was my b'day i got to wear a sombraro. after we ate at cinco, we went to target because my sister "forgot" to get me a gift. then we to the apple store in green hills and that took forever. when we finally got home, mi madre make me a cake then we went to longhorn for dinner. basically it was just a bunch of little things but it felt action packed. today i had to baby-sit a 14 month old baby and she was so fun to babysit. im pretty tired from everything but it was all great.

no more!

yes! school is now officially out and i am officially a sophomore! i got my report card and i got straight A's. to reward myself, i went shopping at kohl's. before we went to kohls we went downtown to eat lunch with mi madre. it was hard to find because that was the first time my sister and i went there by our selves. last night was graduation for mt. juliet. i didnt go but i know some people who graduated and it makes me sad. i'll probably not see any of the graduates much anymore. best wishes to them. volleyball starts back tomorrow and we have to start at 8 in the morning. after tomorrow it will be starting at 7 in the morning. i think that is crazy. i will soom get over it though.

--ttfn

teen repellent

chances are that if you are over 30 years old, you will not hear this...

teen repellent

i heard it. can you? here's the story, there was a man who had some teenagers hanging aroung his store at night and he was trying to figure out a way he could create something to make them leave. well the man created a sound with such a high pitch that only the majority of people under 30 could hear. only a few people over 30 were able to hear it. thought that was pretty cool

H-A-I-R

I got my hair cut!!! woohoo!

a picture is soon to come...

oh man!

yeah hoo! school is almost over! only 3 more days. yesterday my parents let me drive. i have never driven before so yesterday was my first time. i get my permit in like 2 weeks and so i guess now is an okay time to start practicing. well yesterday i drove around the neighborhood and i was doing really well the whole time but when we got home i pulled the car into the garage. well, halfway. when i had just started pulling the car in, i hit the side of the garage and knockd off the side-view mirror on my mom's car! i also broke off the little flappy thingy that seals the garage from the garage door. it was not good. my mom wasn't as agrivated i she could have been because she has knocked off both of her side-view mirrors before. it was kinda scary because i thoght i was going to get into a lot of trouble but i didnt and it's all good now. btw my birfday is in 16 days!!

time to get cought up

so i know i havn't blogged in a while but school has been so busy. today i took an end of course and last week i was doing gateway. lots of studying. this past saturday i got to go to the renaissance festival. it was so fun and a total surprise. i had told my mom that i wanted to go and she said she really didnt want to take me. so friday i asked her what we were doing saturday and she said she thought she would take me to the festival. so we went all day and it was great.

mother's day was a success for me. we went to church then to eat at hermitage steak house. after that, i took my mom hiking at long hunter state park. she really enjoyed that. my mom likes wildlife and we saw a bunch. we saw wild turkey, baby geese, deer, and of course squirrel.

there have been so many season finales on lately. i have to say that the best one was grey's anatomy. i have only seen one episode the whole season but i really got into it last night. it was three hours long and i thought it could have been a movie since it was longer than most movies. right now boston leagal season finale is on and that is such a funny show.


so yeah that pretty much wraps up my week... and last week.

Not again!

so tonight we had a wonderful well-spent time at the bounce factory! it all started with everyone trying out everything and sayin hey to the people from the other (hfumc) church and then people started getting hurt. not really but we did get floor burn from the slides. it was pretty fun until the end. i decided i wanted to race jonathon on the obstacle course. well i couldnt find him. i looked and looked and finally, jonathan from h'ville came in with a thing he called a "peace treaty" he wanted me to sign it.i was asking him what he had that could make me sign it. he said our youth leader! yeah, jonathon was kidnapped by those rambunctious youth from hendersonville. the only way we could get him back was by signing the peace treaty. well, i signed it but a random youth tore it up. our secret sources got a hold of gavin and told him about the peace treaty. he told us if we wanted our youth leader back, we would have to come and retreave him. well i dont really know if he told us we had to retreave him but that seemed like the only way to get him back. so we went and got him and safefully reterned to the bouce fatory to get jon's car. who knows what will happen next...

--emily

happy Cinco De Mayo!!

Happy Cinco De Mayo, everyone!
last night i wanted mexican food and my dad was like well let's have it tomorrow. i said, but tomorrow is cinco de mayo. everyone is going to be eating at cinco de mayo on cinco de mayo. they will be packed at both locations.
i was right. i heard so many people today say that they were going to cinco de mayo tonight. its crazy. i like mexican food. so we had mexican last night and i still havent even eaten dinner tonight yet. i did have chips and salsa though.

my sister got back her pictures from the central prom today. they were really good exept for the ones with her boyfriend in it. he didnt smile good and his face was red in every picture. i like my allergy medicine. i really like it when i dont have any-- not really because then i have really bad allergies. like right now.

falling apart while being extra hyper.

so i'm almost sure that i have been extra random/hyper today. when i got to church around 230 i was just regular me but then i started getting random and shouting random things. it wasnt random to me but i'm sure to the people listing to me i was being pretty random. then when youth started, i was like a maniac with a frisbee. i think i almost whacked off jonathon's head with the frisbee. (not really or that would have been bad. the frisbee just almost hit him a few times.) then came the water fight. it was jonathon and michael. i think i will honestly say that i started it. i just really wanted to have a water fight. all i did was splash water on them but then they teamed up with brent and some ice ended up in my pockets and down my shirt. let me just say the out come was not good. it ended up with me wet and ice and water all over the floor. ok i wasnt that wet but we had fun.

i think i might be falling apart-- literally. i just got a manicure yesterday and already half my nails have chipped. i have this really cool braclet that i got for Christmas and 2 of the charms on it are broken. my watch that i got for Christmas has a slash in the band where it's rubbed against the hook and it's fixing to break in half. maybe i'm just rough with my stuff or maybe i just like to complain.


--woo-hoo!
emily

no time around

so i'm not going to be around for a few days. i'm going camping and i'm not going to be back until sunday. it will be mucho fun. (haha--shortest blog)
= )

HUMC seeks revenge

so today we (some youth of HUMC) went to hendersonville first UMC and did a little wraping.

it started with just a little furniture and a Y-guy but then somehow, all the furniture got involved, a ping-pong table and about 5 poles. it was alllll wrapped together with plastic wrap. lucky for us, gavin's office was unlocked and our Y-guy just happened to be hanging out in there. so of course we took him back. we tried to be "non-violent" so we didn't take their y-guy. right when we got there, jonathon was suppost to call me when thier youth room was clear of gavin. well we waited for about 10 or 20 minutes for that call while hiding out. when we thought we just missed the call we decided to just go up there. well, gavin was still in his office but thankfully, i heard gavin in his office before we started doing anything so we just went back outside. then we waited some more and finally got that call. we went in there and did what we went to do. we got in, got out, and did a little to gavin's car. (nothing to damage it) it's almost like we had perfect timing. when we were wainting at the red light to turn out on the main road, who else would be sitting there but jonathan! not our jonathon, but jonathan from the HFUMC youth. he looked out the window and saw us and we showed him that we got our Y-guy back and then we told him to check out his youth room. he then picked up his phone and looked like he was calling gavin. it was the perfect end.

now i think we might be signing a peace treaty to get all this to stop. who knows what's next! = )

friday night.

so yesterday night was really bad for almost all the people in middle tennessee... not for us. i was in hermitage during most of the storming last night and it barely rained. it's really weird to think about how close the storm was and how if had noved only 2 miles south or 2 miles north it would have hit us instead of h'ville or lakewood. around 6 o'clock we left and headed out on our retreat. it was at penuel ridge retreat center in ashland city. it seems like the whole night all it did was a little bit of rain and even less lightning. we were suppost to go with the hendersonville first UMC people but all of them decided not to go.

the retreat was really great. it was a great time to just think and be by myself even though i was there with 8 other people. the weather never got really bad so i could walk on the hiking trails. i really liked being able to not have a planed time and just do whatever. i also liked hanging out with the other people from our church. it was a good time for silence and thinking time. i think everyone should do something like it at least once a year. yeah, it was that great.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5,....

just thoght i'd let everyone know that tomorrow at 1:02 and 3 seconds, it will be 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06. the time will be 102:3, and the date will be 04/05/06. i thoght it was cool.



so i'm really looking foward to this weekend. i have many things going on. well actually only two but it does seem like more. the youth spirituality retreat is this weekend and then that night is one of my good friends 15th birthday party.

i went to the new target in mt. juliet the other day and it is AMAZING! they have a starbucks in the target. they also have a pizza hut but i found that kinda off. they have soo much stuff and it's like the greatest thing ever. well not ever but at least in the past week. the belk was open when we went to target so we went over there to look. i found this really neat skirt that i almost got but my mom was like "its either this or a new pair of jeans"... i chose the jeans. i haven't got them yet but they are soon to come.

this past friday was so much fun. a group from church was going to go see a play at the MTSU campus on friday. we were running a little late because someone got to the church late and we couldnt leave without them. so we were in a hurry and i guess just a little too much of a hurry because we ended up missing the exit by like 30 minutes and we ended up some where in williamson county waayyy past the exit. we were all like "well, we're not gonna make it. what do you want to do?" becca suggested bowling but she was like the only one that wanted to do it. then some one said chuck E. cheese and we were all like yeah. we went to cool springs and we went to chuck E. cheese. it was the most random night but it was so much fun. (by the way, during all of this, we were in the county with the tordano warnings and driving through all the horrible weather.m yeah, that part was bad.)

thats pretty much it.

whoa, where are the couches?

so today i walked in the lobby like i do every wednesday to say hello to our "Y-guy" and i noticed he wasn't there!

yeah, he was gone. so then i went to the person i would go to in any situation like this-jonathon. he was very informative and he said it was the youth of hendersonville first UMC. they had taken our Yguy. that wasnt all they did. they also decided to do a little rearanging in our youth room.

as soon as i walked in our youth room, i noticed something was different but i wasnt quite sure what it was. then i noticed that there were no couches! did hendersonville take them, too? oh good, no they didn't. they just decided that they would take them all and put them down the hall. not a bad place for them, i must say but they were most deffinatly better where they were. i started looking around for a note when i found one on the table where you first walk in. in return for our Y guy they wanted 6 boys of our youth group to dress up like girls and come retreve our Yguy from the evil people of hendersonville....


yeah right!
all i have to say to the people of hendersonville first UMC is: watch your backs...

first post

oooo yeah, first post. so i just got this so i could leave a comment to someone but i think im going to keep it. im leaving tomorrow to go on a family retreat and i'm really looking foward to it. i have a myspace: http://www.myspace.com/emily1057

go check it out. i cant really figure out how to get a picture on here yet but one is soon to come.