3 months later...

A few pictures from the last couple months:

July

I went home for the fourth of July for a fun time in Oklahoma with my mom's family.  I "worked from home" (or was on call? - I don't know, but I didn't actually do much!) that week while spending a few days at the lake enjoying the extended family while baking in the Texas/Oklahoma heat!  Somehow I didn't take a single picture that week, so the few here are courtesy of Natalie's blog.  She came to visit me for a few days before the family headed to Oklahoma for our reunion.

Super fun to see Natalie!  Can't wait to meet her sweet baby girl, due at the end of next month! :)

The parents. So thankful for both of them!

La Hacienda!

My all-time favorite: La Hacienda fajitas.  What more could a girl want??

This isn't actually from my weekend at home, but I didn't want to leave Laura out.  Here we are in New Orleans in June!

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The week after Oklahoma, I went to New York with a few girls from church.  We had a great time exploring the city, but my favorite part was seeing The Lion King on Broadway.  It was so fun and I was thoroughly impressed by the level of skill of the actors!

In front of a Central Park fountain - me, Cerrelle, and Brooke.  Not pictured is Dorle.

August

August I had a sweet birthday celebration with some friends.  It was the night we got the hurricane (and the week of the earthquake!), so it was a memorable time.  I have just been so blessed by the people I've met here!

Can you tell we took this on auto off a bookshelf? :)

Our hurricane damage.  Thought the hurricane wasn't bad until I walked down the street...

Thankful it wasn't this - just a few blocks south of us.

Our earthquake damage consisted of a broken mirror that fell off the wall and shattered and two cracked windows.

September

The fun suprise for September was a weekend with Dad in NYC.  He called me last Sunday night to say he was going on a last-minute trip to New York for work.  I worked four 10 hour days, took off Friday, and rode the bus up Thursday night to see him.  It was a lot of fun!  It was a short trip because I had to be back in DC by Saturday afternoon, but we got to spend some good time together trying a couple restaurants and walking around in the pouring rain.  The hotel was just a couple blocks north of Times Square, which was really awesome.  The last time I spent extended time with my dad was also when he was on business - only in Botswana!

Taking advantage of a dry moment for a picture - yummy hamburgers at Bill's!

And a not-so-dry moment in Times Square!

Also, in September was a trip to the fresh fish market with a new friend that resulted in a delicious dinner of salmon, PW "Crash Hot Potatoes", and a couple other yummy sides.

Settling in

I've been at my job for over a month now and I've gotten to the point where I actually feel like I know what I'm doing.  A definite plus!  The job is a bit different than what I was expecting, but mostly in good ways.  The range of things I do is huge.  A sample: refinance property (what???), grocery shop, change homeowner's/car insurance, pick up dry-cleaning, register a non-profit as a 501(c)3...

So I'm never bored and I'm daily having to do research to know what in the world I'm talking about.  I literally knew nothing about mortgages, car insurance, homeowners insurance, non-profits, or even reconciling accounts before I started this job.  Sometimes I feel like I still don't know anything, but I'm learning. And go0gle is a wonderful thing! :)

The family is wonderful.  They are very kind and respectful and I have enjoyed working in their home.  Today, my boss brought me ice cream in exchange for staying a few minutes late to chat about a few things. Obviously she's learning my weaknesses...

In other news, I spent a fun weekend in New Orleans for my cousin's wedding two weeks ago.  It was great to see everyone and we had a fun time!  It was the first time in a very long time that the whole extended family (minus one) was all together, so it was a great opportunity to catch up.

Life in D.C. continues to be a big adventure.  I am LOVING my church.  It is filled with people who are seeking after the Lord and I have been stretched and challenged immensely.  I am so, so thankful.  I've had the opportunity to meet lots of new friends and there have been some great opportunities to serve as well.

There's more to share, but it will have to wait until later.  And maybe eventually I'll post a picture of something cool...

Eeeek!!

I have a job!!  After a little over two months of searching, about 8 interviews, and over 100 resume submissions (can't believe it was that many!), I have been offered a position and have accepted.

The job? Personal Assistant to an interior designer here in D.C.  I know. Kind of crazy.  I will be helping with a wide range of her needs, but my focus will be assisting with her business and a non-profit organization that she just helped start.  I am very excited!  It fits well with my past experience, will prepare me for just about anything in the future, and will be fun!

Oh, and I start tomorrow morning. I accepted the position at 4 this afternoon.

And in honor of my last day of being a stay-at-home-not-mom (as one of my roomies would say), I baked bread and cleaned the kitchen.  I will miss these days of domestic bliss (truly, I will), but totally loved them while they lasted!  I got to do SO much that I never would have gotten to do if I had jumped straight into working.  Examples?  Babysit adorable kids from my church, and in the process meet their sweet moms.  Meet with my language partner and share the Gospel with her (more on that later because it's awesome).  Host my awesome mom AND my sweet friend Hannah from Tennessee. Ride the Metro and explore the city.

Thanks for everyone who prayed for me, encouraged me, and offered their assistance in my job search.  It means so much and it's hard to believe that this period of searching has officially ended.

The Lord has truly been faithful and I can't wait to see how He uses me in this job and in my life in D.C.!

...

The last couple weeks have been a flurry of business, yet with an overwhelming, ever-present sense of God's grace.  Seriously, I have yet to even be stressed; I'm just enjoying spending time with people here before I transition to new community in D.C.

I went to Oklahoma a couple weeks ago to visit my sweet friend Natalie and her husband, Matt.  Natalie and I have been friends since kindergarten and had a great time catching up.  They just moved from D.C., so they gave me lots of super helpful hints on living in the city!  Here are a couple pictures that Natalie took while I was there.  There are others on her blog.

Last weekend Mom and I went to New Orleans for a couple days because I really wanted to see my grandparents before I move.  It was a GREAT trip.  We visited Oak Alley Plantation, the WWII museum, ate lots of delicious Cajun food, and visited a lot of family.  The trip ended far too soon, but Mom and I both had a blast.

The Grandparents with a Model A at Oak Alley.

At Oak Alley.

The WWII museum with the grands and Dad's Aunt Gloria.  My grandpa is a WWII veteran, so he got to wear a "WWII Veteran" necklace and people thanked him for his service the whole time we were there.  It was really neat.

 
Until next time...

Miss this...

Christine is my super fun, Jesus-lovin', friend and Ugandan sister.  She and my sister Laura got to meet when Laura came to visit me.

We went and ate pizza at a restaraunt on Lake Victoria and it was awesome.

Miss you, Christine!!

17, 25, and 21 (almost)

Has it really been over four months since I've posted?  Yikes!

I'm alive and well and just about fully adjusted back to America (though I think there are some things to which I will never completely adjust).  I've been busy, though not doing a whole lot to speak of.  I worked at a day care for a few months and it was just not a good fit for me.  Now I'm working at Crate and Barrel, which I LOVE!  Never thought I would say that about retail, but it's true.  There are awesome opportunities for conversation and it has felt a bit like ministry at times. :)  Starting today, I'm also hard-core job-searching.  If you know of any opportunities, let me know!  I prefer Washington D.C. or Dallas.

Just a few things to note:

Conner turned 17 in December!  We had fun celebrating his birthday and Laura made this awesome cake - a perfect representation of his interests this year.

My parents celebrated their 25th anniversary with a trip to New York City.  They had a great trip and Conner and I had a great time hanging out for the week.

Laura turns 21 in a few weeks.  She'll be back at school by then and who knows if I'll remember to blog it, so happy early birthday, sis!  Here we are at Murchison Falls on the Nile.

And here we all are on Christmas Eve.  I had to work, so I didn't join the rest of the family for church.  Plus, we had to wear tacky sweaters to work.  So here I am in a awesome Christmas sweater with the rest of my family looking great!  (I decided to leave it un-cropped because that makes the picture that much better.)

Home

I arrived safely home Thursday afternoon! In the past 36 hours I have eaten La Hacienda, Chick-fil-A, homeade hamburgers, and Braum's ice cream. And I've had a Dr. Pepper. Nice.

Plus, I've hung out with my family, which has been awesome (more awesome than the American food I've eaten).

I'll try to catch up on blogging in the next few weeks. I have a lot of cool stories and photos to share!

Can't wait to see people and share stories and pictures in person!

Happy Father's Day!!

Because of a combination of poor internet availability, crashing computers and busyness, we have been having a hard time making blog posts. We actually have a couple that are almost ready to be posted but saved on a computer that isn’t working, so we’ll try and update you on the latest happenings. This will be a joint blog post between the two of us.

Laura is leaving early tomorrow morning and will be back to the States on Wednesday; she’ll put up a few more blog entries and then Ashley will start posting by herself again.

On to the big news, Father’s Day was on Sunday! To say a proper Happy Father’s Day to our Dad, we thought we would include a couple of [very manly] animal stories from both of us:

Story 1: Killing, taking apart, cooking and eating a chicken.

Ashley: Learning how to properly “prepare” a chicken was on my maybe list of things to do while in Africa. On Sunday I happily moved it over to the “I’ve experienced this” list. I guess I can really only halfway check it off the list because Kent did the honors of the chop while Laura and I looked on. But it really wasn’t bad. I’m pretty sure I could even do it on my own in the future. I’m also equally as sure that I wouldn’t want to, but at least I know I could if necessary. And the biology lesson that fresh chickens provide is quite interesting. Nerdy? Maybe, but true.

Laura: The chicken was eerily warm inside afterward. After holding it in my arms as it snuggled against me, I wasn’t about to chop its head off. Once it was properly dead, however, (it is true that chickens don’t exactly stay still right after they’re killed) taking it apart wasn’t quite as bad as I had imagined. Surprisingly, I was even able to eat it when we were finished! We had very good chicken spaghetti: if you ever need some fresh chicken for dinner in the future just give me a call…

Story 2: The white ants.

Ashley: This was the second and largest swarm of white ants that I’ve experienced. It’s hard to understand how many bugs swarm during these times. Literally 1000s. You can hear the wings through the windows.

Since Ugandans eat white ants, we helped collect the ones that were making their way into our house. I would say at the end of an hour we had collected somewhere between 200-400. It was quite disgusting, but a very Ugandan experience. And our night guard was happy to have the extra bugs that we collected for him.

Laura: Despite the name, these look nothing like ants. They are oversized, fat termites each possessing four wings, and there were 1000s of them. Since our house is in the middle of huts, the light attracts the swarm. Being outside when one of the largest swarms came, I might have had more bugs hit/crawl/sit all over me in that 1-2 hours than I have in the rest of my life combined.

Because of a varied audience, we thought pictures would be best kept off the blog. If you do want to see some of these experiences just let us know. The videos and pictures are great! Happy Father’s Day, Dad! We love you!!

On Being Sick in Africa

For the most part, my four months in Africa have been pretty healthy. Apart from the first couple of days of sickness when I first arrived and a couple of days of giardia also in the first month, I’ve not had any trouble.

And unfortunately, sickness had to present itself during my sister’s time here. Ugh.

I got sick on Wednesday, but it was a different type of sickness than I’ve ever had. The only symptoms I really had were severe nausea and a general “weak feeling.” But the nausea was to the point of I couldn’t eat. Which is obviously bad.

The first step was ruling out malaria. Which we did. Three times.

Over the course of two days, I visited two clinics and the hospital (which probably sounds extremely over-the-top, but with the crazy diseases that run around here, it's just best to be extremely cautious). It is quite intense to let someone take blood from your arm at a hospital in Gulu, Uganda…definitely brings trusting in God for health and protection to a whole new level!

(For those of you who will worry about the trip to the hospital, I made sure they changed gloves before touching me and I watched them open any needles they used. Plus, the places I went have western-trained doctors and good reputations. Between the two, I was about as safe as possible!)

The first doctor I saw at the hospital was basically a joke. She didn’t really ask any obvious questions and seemed to focus only on “you’re too thin, you must be anorexic,” to which I wanted to say, “I’m here because I’m not eating. The two can’t go together.”

The second doctor was awesome though. I felt fully confident that he knew what he was talking about and he took time to explain the blood test results to me. I am so thankful for him!!

The only thing they ever really determined was that I had a slightly elevated WBC and thus started me on antibiotics (which thankfully were manufactured in the UK).

Sunday I was finally able to eat three small meals and I seem to be getting a little stronger, although I’m still not completely feeling normal.

The hardest thing has probably been that I feel so bad about being sick while Laura is here. She’s been awesome about it though and even went to the village without me on Saturday! She’s also cooked, cleaned, and been a great encourager for me. Plus, with our neighborhood ministry being so fun, she got plenty of time to play with those kiddos too.

Plus, being sick really allowed others to take care of me, which is not something I usually appreciate in any way! Jennifer, at Café Larem, was SO worried about me that she made me take a nap on the couch outside the café. Definitely a little awkward, but it did help! Also, the Foresters let us stay with them a couple nights and were so gracious to feed us, put up with my laying in bed, and offer encouragement and reassurance when I was getting really discouraged. My friend Lowna was also amazing and went with us to the clinic and the hospital. She’s probably the toughest woman I’ve ever met in my life and was a great advocate to have by my side! Finally, the ECM staff have been really kind also. Simon drove us around, Pato went with us to the hospital, and everyone else has just been really encouraging!


Oh, and as of tonight, the neighborhood kids now know the hokey pokey AND the limbo. And the adults still like to stand outside and laugh at us. But, TIA and I’m totally OK with that!! :-)

Also, on a short trip to the market this afternoon, we got to pray over an elderly woman and set up an appointment to share the Gospel with her on Sunday (when we can have a willing translator)!

Some E-mails Home

These are e-mails Laura and I sent to our parents the day we got to Gulu. They both thought you all would enjoy reading them as well, so I am posting it here. Sometimes I don't know what's interesting or useful information, but they informed us that these would be good for the blog. So here they are. (Andrew is the intern we picked up at the airport.) Thanks for the suggestion, Mom and Dad!

***

I think Laura had an "oh wow!" moment when she saw my house. And the the lizards. And the spiders. And heard the bats in the attic that also call this place home. Nevertheless, she's adjusting really well and enjoying everything so far. Today will be her first day in the village and my first day back in a long time. I can't wait!!

The bus ride truly was great. I did my best to educate both Laura and Andrew on all I know about Uganda, its history, culture, etc. and they got to see a lot of the country, which was really nice. It is funny to watch them see things that I don't even notice anymore - like chickens and cows roaming the side of the road, women carrying babies on their backs and fruit or water on their heads, or a bunch of people piled into one vehicle!

Laura is feeling great! It was definitely a really nice thing that we stayed in Kampala a couple extra days. It let her adjust and we had a good time too. I was really glad to see Christine and I know Laura really enjoyed meeting her as well. Plus, I love Sheila that works at MAF so it was really nice to spend time with her as well.

Andrew got in a little after 8 on Thursday night. He had time to eat dinner, sleep a few hours, and then get up early to experience Kampala traffic and a 6 hour bus ride. He did great though! Didn't even seem tired! I think we freaked him out a bit - we greeted him with a sign that said Go Vols! and Gig 'em Aggies! all over it. He goes to Baylor. He's a nice guy though and we enjoyed talking to him.


***

Ash and I had a pretty eventful day and are taking our showers now (she just got out; the shower is soo cold, I have to slowly move myself into it, last night I still lost my breath). I met many of the sponsor kids today when we went to the village. They are very welcoming and clapped for me with this clap to a beat and sang a song for me. It was very sweet and thoughtful.

Then I ate in a hut, that was very different but it was pretty cool inside (temperature wise). The "Mamma" also had spoons for us to eat with which was cool for my first time! Slowly adjusting! Many of the people laugh at me a lot because mostly I just smile and say "ok" when interacting with them. Ash says they still do that for her; I would just laugh with them very confused. The children play hand clapping games though so that is nice. They are different than the ones I know but not too much. I feel like that can connect us some!

We also got the car stuck in the mud/small stream on the way there. I opened my door to put the car in four-wheel drive and the tire was over halfway in water. So today I touched my first natural African water with my hands and feet, but not too much. Many people were helpful though, and we got it out after a while of trying and a broken rope. Tonight we ate with Becky and the 4 Forester girls. They are adorable, they now have two headgehogs as their pets that they caught in their yard. I have to say, the things are stinkin' cute! Conner,you could get one..

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Mom! We love and miss you so much.

Have an awesome day!



In honor of your birthday we made signs and played with kids.



And had fun making faces for the camera.



If the Internet was faster, we would post more craziness, but this will have to do.

Munu's First Blog Post!

Hello everyone! This is Laura, blogging in Africa for my first time. It has been an exciting and wonderful first few days. I have a few observations/stories:

So first off, my airplane landed next to a dirt road. And goats. And Ugandan families walking along with their goats, children and baskets/bananas piled on top of their head. This was definitely not America. It was amazing though. To my right was Lake Victoria, which is absolutely beautiful. Also, since it had been an overnight flight, I had previously been able to look out the window and see millions of stars. This was a great start to my journey, I was so excited to see how the God of College Station stars is the God of the stars I can see in Uganda as well, and He is just as holy and righteous over here as He is everywhere in America and worldwide.

The next thing to notice is driving. The roads are totally insane and awesomely fun. Today a car came like 6 inches from hitting me, enough for Ashley to actually pull me to the side with very wide eyes. Here, cars have the right-of-way, not pedestrians, and the vehicles certainly don’t mind reminding you of that. And boda-bodas, kind of like mini-motorcycles, are intense. It’s like a high-speed adrenaline junkie game, filled with driving on the wrong side of the road towards oncoming buses, swerving literally inches around potholes that, if hit, would probably throw you a good 25 feet onto a hard dirt/concrete road and almost hitting those small children who don’t get out of the way fast enough. It was soo cool, and I’m excited for my first time to ride side-saddle. The women here do it pretty flawlessly, it should be fun to try!

On a more serious note, many of the people here are wonderful. The poverty level in Kampala, one of the more wealthy areas of Uganda, is almost unbelievable and it’s hard to not become disheartened. God has been so gracious to teach me a few things from this. The first was from 2 Timothy, in which Paul speaks of how “the Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely to His Heavenly Kingdom. To Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen” I love how in the midst of suffering and pain, Paul knows that the important and everlasting thing is that Christians will one day be united with Christ, and that is such an awesome promise! The second thing I learned was from the people. I had the opportunity to sit down with three Ugandan women, all of which certainly have been in much different situations than myself, who encouraged me by telling me of how they know that Jesus deserves to be glorified and praised, even when their day was very difficult, enough to “make me want to cry”. They have hope through Christ, in situations much more difficult than mine own, and I loved seeing how He carries them through each day with such love.

I would love to hear from all of you and am praying for many of you as you embark on various adventures over the summer. Please email or facebook me and let me know how you are doing and how I can by praying for you more. I love you all!

Still in Kampala

We are currently still in Kampala and are waiting until Friday to return to Gulu.

Laura was feeling pretty sick yesterday, so we decided it would be best to wait an extra day before taking the long, hot, and bumpy bus ride to Gulu. She is mostly better today, although she had waves of nausea throughout the day. All to be expected after long amounts of air travel with very little sleep!

Plus, I was supposed to be picking up an intern for another organization in Gulu. His flight got delayed due to the volcanic ash and he will not be in until Thursday night.

Since we don't go to the village on Friday anyway, it made no difference if we returned to Gulu on Thursday or Friday, thus the decision to wait until Friday.

Our time in Kampala has been great! We are staying at the Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) guest house and it is very nice and comfortable - a perfect place to begin adjusting to Uganda. We took a walk this afternoon and had a fabulous view of Lake Victoria. Way cool!

Tomorrow we are going to a Bible study with Sheila, who works at MAF. Then we will head out to Entebbe early enough to walk by Lake Victoria and have dinner before we go to pick up Andrew at the airport.

Oh, and somehow we will figure out a way to get the FOUR suitcases, two backpacks, two purses, plus whatever luggage Andrew has, to the bus on Friday morning. Should be interesting...

And in Laura's defense, almost none of the stuff she brought is for her. It is almost all donated clothes, which is AWESOME!! I can't wait to hand out everything! Once again, people were very generous and we got lots of donations for the kiddos.



View of Lake Victoria - only a 10 minute walk from the MAF house!

P.S. I made Laura an "author" on my blog so she can post some about her experiences here. I figured most of the readers know both of us, plus it might be nice to read experiences from a new set of eyes!

Arrived!

Laura arrived this morning after over 30 hours of travelling. She's exhausted and feeling sick, but it's so nice to have her here!

She wanted to try a boda-boda today, so we went into Kampala to eat lunch and pick up a few essential supplies (soft toilet paper) and not-so-essential supplies (Ugandan greeting cards).

Other than that, it's been a restful day and I'm hoping that by tomorrow she'll be feeling normal again.

I'll try to post pictures soon!

Is it possible to O.D. on hydrocortisone cream?

If so, I'm in trouble.

Last week, I walked through the deep bush to visit a family (Opiyo Denis from a few posts ago). In the process, I got bitten by what I think were flees. And when I say bitten, I mean that I have at least 150 bites on my legs. I know because I had kids that counted them. Basically, my legs looked like I have a severe case of chicken pox or some other weird African disease.

They didn't itch the first couple of days, but the day before yesterday they started itching like crazy! Now they are almost gone and I am very happy.

***

In other news, I'm in Kampala for a couple days because my sister gets in tomorrow morning! She almost got stuck in Dallas thanks to the volcano, and things look good so far for her to leave London on time as well.

Since I'm already here, I'm also picking up a friend's visitor. We will all three ride the bus back to Gulu on Wednesday morning. Neither have been to Africa before. Should be fun!

Prayer Request

Tonight, my dog got out of the compound and bit a neighborhood kid. It wasn't a super bad bite. It was on her hand and his teeth only broke skin on one finger. But still. He bit a kid.

I knew the dog had gotten out. I was outside the compound with my nightguard, Cosmas, looking at the road to my house, which is now blocked (another story). I even saw Odie jumping around Bridgette and heard her screaming. But this is common because most Ugandans are terrified of dogs. I would have never dreamed he would bite her.

So, we called Odie and went home. Not five minutes later, Cosmas knocks on the door and Bridgette and her sister Joy were standing on the porch. Odie was barking and growling, Bridgette was crying, Joy was yelling that Odie had bitten her sister, and Cosmas was telling me to take the girls inside. I'm pretty sure I stood there open-mouthed staring at the scene for at least a few seconds before bringing the girls in.

Luckily, I had a few medical supplies at the house. I didn't have gloves though, so I handed Joy the supplies and instructed her on how to clean and cover the wound. Then I fed them cookies and chocolate while I sat there trying to figure out what to do. It was pouring down rain and dark, so I obviously wasn't going to the clinic by myself in spite of the girl's persistent asking.

Instead, I called Simon (ECM staff) and asked him what I should do. He assured me that it would be fine to wait until morning to do anything and promised to come over first thing to help me talk to the girls' grandmother. Cosmas talked to her as well and told me it would be fine if I just took her to the clinic in the morning.

However, there is a widely held belief here that it is entirely acceptable to take advantage of Westerners whenever possible. I am praying that this will not happen. And really, I believe that it won't. But still there's a little worry in the back of my mind. So please pray for that!

Simon and I will go talk to the grandmother in the morning and then I will take Bridgette to the clinic. Please also pray that things go well at the clinic - I've taken kids from the village by myself before, but obviously the circumstances are entirely different. Simon could normally go with me, but we have visitors in town who need to be taken to the village early.

Other than that incident, this week has been good.

I've been staying with friends most of this week because I don't like staying in the house by myself. It's been really nice and I'm so thankful for their hospitality!

Laura comes Tuesday morning and I can't wait! It's hard to believe that she'll be here. In Uganda. In just a few days. Crazy!

Thanks for your prayers!!

Gaborone

I got back Saturday after almost a week in Gaborone (pronounced ha-bore-own-ee), Botswana with my Dad.

He was there for business, so I flew down and stayed with him in the fancy hotel while he worked then we got to spend the last two days together.

Botswana does NOT feel like the Africa I've come to know and love. There is a lot of wealth, consistent power, you can drink the water, and there are no shouts of "mzungu" - it was so strange to be anonymous! I was definitely in for quite a bit of culture shock, but I had a great time. Of course, it was awesome to get to see my Dad!

I saw TWO movies in theaters - Ironman 2 and Date Night. Ironman 2 was out before it was released in the States and it was totally awesome. Date Night had a couple of funny parts, but I wasn't a fan. I ate popcorn during the first movie; they didn't add butter or salt, but it still tasted SO good.

Everyone on the trip had brought family with them, so when Dad was working, I hung out with two of the wives and one of the sons (who randomly went to Tennessee his first two years of college). It was great to meet them and we got to do a lot of shopping and "American things."

I was freezing most of the time there. I am so used to the heat now that anything below 75 feels cold and the air conditioning is really cold! We went on a "nocturnal safari" one night. It was totally lame, as all of the animals were imported from other areas of Africa and we really didn't see much. Plus, I was once again freezing. The cool part was that we got to see billions of stars. This trip was my first time in the Southern Hemisphere and it was really neat seeing the different constellations.

And I ate steak every day. It was pretty awesome!

Here are some pictures from the week:



By the hotel pool.



At a fancy dinner the last night. We had steak, mashed potatoes, and grilled veggies. SO delicious!



Before our safari. They had a restaurant there that was really cool.

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms from Gulu, Uganda! Especially to my mom, I miss you and love you very much. You are awesome.



I didn't have a picture of just my mom, so here's our whole family a couple days before I left.

Florida Vacation

Just got back from a fabulous week of family vacation at Fernandina Beach, Florida. It was my first time ever in Florida and I definitely don't know how I survived 22 years without ever going there. It was absolutely wonderful and I will definitely be returning as soon as possible! Highlights:

• Got to spend LOTS of family time. This has become increasingly more important to me as I now live far from them and, come January, there will be an ocean separating us.


• Layed on the beach for hours every day. Boogie-boarded, swam, played volleyball and bocce ball, and walked along the beach searching for crabs at night.


• We saw dolphins every day, including one day where they jumped up out of the water almost 20 times. It was truly incredible.


• Went sailing-another first for me. Super relaxing. Except for when a disoriented bat flew out of one of the sails and started flying around the boat. That was a little more stressful...but memorable!


• We visited the historic town of St. Mary's and spent the day walking around, eating seafood, and touring a historic home.


• Celebrated my 22nd birthday!

Here are some pictures of the week:

This is what I woke up and saw every morning - fabulous!

Me and the younger brother. He's a little tall.

Taking a walk on the sand dunes.

Sailing!

Our little friend who sailed with us.

At some historic house in St. Mary's.

Family picture on the beach.

Dad and the girls.

I really have no idea...

Conner's Visit

Conner came in last Thursday and stayed until Tuesday morning. We had a great time! He got to meet most of my friends, we did lots of fun activities, and ate a massive amount of junk food.

On Friday we went tubing down the Little River in Townsend, TN, just outside of the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. The water was absolutely FREEZING!!! I spent most of the time trying not to touch the water. There were a few areas of pretty good rapids, which was a lot of fun. We both really enjoyed it and it was nice and relaxing for the most part.

After that, we went camping with 5 of my friends in Elkmont Campground. That was also great fun. Conner and two others braved the approximately 50 degree water temperatures and swam in the river that runs along the campground. It took him over an hour to warm up after! We got to see a bear, which was my first since moving to Tennessee and took an easy hike up to a waterfall on Saturday morning...overall a very successful camping venture.

Sunday night we played disc golf, made cupcakes, worked out, watched a movie, and took quizzes on his iTouch. The quizzes were hilarious. The questions were things like: "Would you rather listen to music by eating CDs or see bands in concert by licking those in the concert around you?"

The movie was absolutely horrible. We rented "Knowing" with Nicholas Cage. It was creepy and pointless and it was a very good thing we lightened the mood with the quizzes before going to bed.

Making cupcakes was quite entertaining for all involved. It began with expired eggs, which, according to the Internet, are still good as long as they don't float in water. Problem solved. Cupcakes could be made. The egg dilemma also brought on a bet between Anne and Conner that it's impossible to break an egg with your bare hand by squeezing it. That's true, by the way. You should try it. Conner lost the bet.

Before going to play disc golf. The level of excitement is a little disproportionate in this photo.

Finally, this is Conner being the drill sergeant for Anne and I. You should see our muscles after this intense workout.

I wish I had more pictures, but I just forget to take them. Plus, some of them got deleted off the camera somehow.