Day two of the Ingathering

I got to the village last night right after the burning. :( It was a big bummer but I was glad that I was there for some of the singing and talking in the tent afterwards. It was an amazing feeling to be standing in the big white tent that was filled with God's people who all had one purpose in mind...to serve and worship Him with everything inside them! I was overwhelmed with it all at some points. Everything that was said and even the feeling was convicting yet encouraging to me. I would like to do things like get together and talk about God and praise Him a whole lot more than we do. I think it would help everybody stay on track more with following God. I am very excited about what's happening tonight and tomorrow. I don't want to miss God in anything that's happening! Well, I had better get back to life. I have a dance practice and help with dinner soon. I hope to get on later to post some new pics.

Ingathering!! :)

Well, today is the big get ready for Ingathering day! I just got back from the mall. Yeah!! I finally found a top to match my skirt I'm wearing to the love feast!! I went out last night for like 2 1/2 hrs to every store in the universe but didn't find anything. :( Right now I'm supposed to be packing for three and a half days plus getting camping stuff together. I guess this just sounded funner. :) Last night I did a lot of prep work for leaving today. I made muffins, helped pack up the non-fridge food and typed up a packing list and a food list.
I might not be able to get on for the next couple days, but if I have a spare moment I will try. I will also try to post pics from the Ingathering.
Well, I'd better get off now if I want to get to the village on time for the burning. :)

Busy, busy, busy...wedding

Wow! My life has been so busy lately with sewing and cooking. Out here in Memphis has been very hectic. I don't really have much to say now. Maybe I'll get on later tonight when I can think. Right now I have to take care of some kids and do some other things more important than blogging. :)

The above r a few pics of the wedding last weekend. :)

Recipe

I was too busy yesterday to blog, plus I wasn't home yet. Nothing much happening today; everyone's shopping or fishing here.

Here's the recipe for the Healthy (Sleepless) Muffins for those of you who told me you wanted it. :)

1 c. whole wheat flour                                Serves 18
1/4 c. wheat germ
3/4 c. oatmeal
2 T. cinnamon
1 t. salt
2 t. b. powder
1 egg
1/4 c. oil
3/4 c. milk
2/3 c. honey
1 banana
3/4 c. raisins

Mix the first six ingredients together in a bowl. Then mix egg, oil, milk, honey and banana in smaller bowl. Add to first six ingredients and mix. Next mix in the raisins. Spray muffin tins with non-stick cooking spray then spoon in the mixture until tins are 3/4 full. Bake at 325 degrees for approx. 20min.

Hope this works out for you. Enjoy! :)

Sleeping in a cave

Here is a picture of all our sleeping bags laid out in the cave. This is where we slept. :)

Tired, sick...dead!

Ok folks, this one isn't about Life in Memphis either. :) I'm not in Memphis at the moment so how can it be? I didn't think I'd get to post anything today because I don't have the laptop with me that I normally use, but a friend is letting me use her computer. So I had an idea earlier of blogging a little about where I went yesterday with a bunch of girls. Most of you who are going to read this were there, but oh well, I hope you get a kick out of it. :)

About nine of us girls left yesterday morning around eight to go spend the night in Cumberland Caverns! Personally, I have never liked the idea of going inside caves. I'm like so totally afraid of heights, cramped places, being closterphobic (or however you spell it) and anything else like that. So with all that in mind, you can imagine how I felt about being in a cave, much less sleeping in one! I ended up having a lot of fun considering. We went on a commercial tour then on a wild tour (I think that's the name of it). At some points we were crawling on our stomachs for about seven feet through a ten inch slot between two rocks that looked like they were going to give way at any second! I had a couple life threatening moments in those small spaces. The friend that was on front of me blocked my view entirely so I couldn't see what I was up against next. (I do feel bad for the girl behind me too.) Once you got in, there was no turning around. I mean how could you? I could barely move forward! I didn't get a chance to enjoy the senery because my brain was in survival mode. All it cared about was getting done with the torture that I was putting it through. It was rough trying to crawl when your helmet isn't tight enough and keeps slidding down over your eyes so you can't see. I think my helmet and brain were teamed up against me or something. My brain kept getting these weird signals from who knows where that I was in mortal danger and that there was something aweful awaiting me around the next dark turn. (My helmet wanted to save me from seeing that something.) At one point through the pits of the cave there was a spot where it was all muddy. To some of you this might sound fun. "Yes, I love mud, especially when there's a lot of girls to throw it at!" But this was no ordinary mud...this was cave mud!! This cave mud was very friendly. It loved people, but the only problem with that is it didn't not want the people to go away. It was very selfish cave mud. It would grab a hold of the bottom of your shoes, and the sides if it were deep enough, and hold on for dear life! You had to practically use every muscle that God every gave you to fight against this dreaded cave mud. It almost took of my shoes at one point. That would have made me...well...let's just say not happy! I mean what more could this cave mud do to me besides get me all dirty and make me almost fall numerous times? Did it have to take my shoes too? No it didn't! I was determined to win this fight fair and square. Well, I did win, but it did succeed to get itself all in my finger nails and caked to the bottom of my pants and shoes. I was not happy about that, but I guess that's why we have soap and water. Ok, so obviously I survived the tour and after that, it was chow time! Yes!! I've always dreamed of eating nachos and cheese, candy bars, chili...well, I haven't really dreamed of it, but it has been a nightmare. It was about nine and we were all starving or else I know I would've skipped dinner. Oh well, at least we have food to stuff our faces with. Along with that wonderful meal, most of us girls got a french vanilla cappiccino. That wasn't exactly the smartest thing for us to drink. Our sugar/caffiene high kicked in a little later on and not even the Hulk himself could've settled us down. After we became half way sane again, we settled down to sleep...well, atempt to sleep. It was a little freaky sleeping in a cave. You never know what's down there or what you'll encounter in the night. I took pictures of all of our sleeping bags in a line and the cave rocks in the back round. It's pretty neat, but unlucky for you I can't download them onto this dino computer. :(
I hope you don't think that I didn't have fun because that was the most fun I've had in a while!! Our time wasn't exactly as bad as I've made it sound like. I did exaggerated when telling those stories to make them funny, or at least I hope you thought they were funny.
All the hiking, crawling, fighting, squeezing, etc, plus my major lack of sleep, on top of my sickness relapsing has really taken a toll of me, which explains the title of this blog. So I think I'm going to take a brake from typing now. I'll be back on tomorrow. :)

I can't sleep :(

Ok, I got in bed at 11pm and layed there w/ my eyes closed for one hour. I couldn't go to sleep worth anything! So I decided to get up and make the most of it. I made my bed, finished packing for an upcoming trip (today) and read the Bible. It was now 1am and I still wasn't tired, so I decided I felt like baking. So I went in the kitchen and found an easy healthy muffin recipe. So now here I am; my muffins are cooling and I'm still not tired!! I think what's wrong w/ me is that I've been sick for the past three days and I've been sleeping nonstop, so my body is telling me that it is on overload when it comes to sleep. Last night I layed in bed for two hours before my body finally gave in to sleep. It's crazy!!
Now that you've read my nonsense stuff, I'll let you know a little of what's going on out here in Memphis. I won't be able to blog later on today because I'm leaving at 9am to go to Cumberland Caverns somewhere in Tn. I'll be leaving my house between 6 and 6:30am to go to Selmer, Tn (where I used to live). We are going to be staying overnight in a cave!! Kinda scary!! We'll be back tomorrow afternoon. So I'm going to stay all tomorrow and half of Saturday and then coming back home Saturday after lunch. From there I've got to sew my dad's mantle! Wow! The ladies out here are doing tons of things to get ready for all the upcoming events that r taking place soon. We have two weddings, one in a week and the other the second weekend of October, an Ingathering, and a passage. I still don't have anything to wear to any of those events :( We are going to be doing a lot of driving throughout this month!
It has been very frying lately between school, planning the menu, attending every event, sewing, shopping for material, shopping for nice clothes...and the list goes on. I haven't been able to help w/ anything really because of my sickness. Today was the first day since Saturday that I've been up for breakfast and have been able to teach and cook.
Before I'm done blogging I wanted to let everyone know that today's my mother's birthday!! We are going to celebrate it in a week though since we'll be out of town today.
Well, I guess I didn't really have anything to write. Oh well, I said I'd try to write everyday. Next time I'll tell what's going on more w/ everybody else. I'm not totally tuned in w/ them right now because of how out of it I've been. :)

(something's really weird w/ this time thing. it says that I wrote this on Wednesday but it's thursday around 1:45am)