A Dream in Three Parts, by Grace

I slept really hard last night with lots of crazy dreams... And I mean, REALLY crazy. So I feel really refreshed despite all the adventures I had...

First, I was racing along on a broomstick with two other people. There were other broomsticks around us. I decided I should try to witness to the people with me. They seemed interested, but I couldn't get through the gospel before we landed suddenly at our destination: a corrupt school/town, where everyone was becoming sin zombies!! Their skin was beginning to fall off according to how bad they were. The leader was this tall woman who had no outer layer of skin. Her veins were very much still there, holding together a white layer of flesh to cover her organs and muscles. She had no eyelids and she had a high ponytail of veins on her head.

Then this girl and I were running from this woman in my mother's second-hand store, trying to push bookshelves and clothing racks on top of us to keep her from being able to reach us. After a bookshelf trapped her legs, she used up her last effort to reach us with her arms, which were made of twisted veins. In our only method of defense, we began to untwist her arms so she couldn't use them. She died... or so we thought. Suddenly, she wiggled all her veins at us, and then died for real.

Act II: I was wandering around the old main street buildings in Halstead, looking for a bathroom. It ended up turning into a cowtown-like maze, and I kept wandering through empty and forgotten wild west hotel rooms until I finally found the bathroom which had an old fashioned toilet. Then I ran into an old friend who was with her boyfriend and his buddies who had discovered the place and were living in there. We talked for a while, but I felt like I was intruding, so I moved on to Act III...

I walked into my parents' church for the wedding rehearsal, only to find two extra bridesmaids: one I didn't recognize, and Emma, a teammate from cross country. My bridesmaids had appointed Emma as the Maid of Honor and the wedding coordinator boss. She began telling everyone how the ceremony would go down, and I was happy that someone was there to take charge on the day, but everything was really weird, besides the fact that there were seven bridesmaids and five groomsmen.
A wedding had taken place a week before, and the sancuary was full of rather strange furniture, but it matched my colors, so we left the strange couches and chairs there. Tim was supposed to stand a step lower than me, but then he got down on one knee, so in order to kiss him, I had to double over to reach him. I put my foot down at that idea, and suggested that we switch places. Then everyone sitting in the pews began to discuss whether wedding ceremony kisses were gross or cute.

Then I woke up.

Oh, Blogger, how I've missed thee!

Dear Emmaus Bible College,

I just want to thank you so much for taking me off your mailing list for my years of jucco! It meant a lot to me that you never seemed pushy in your phone calls or letters, and although I heard the Emmaus talk at camp a million times, it wasn't all that bad! Thank you also for filling the minds of young-folk with good, Biblical knowledge! We need more of you in the world!

Now it's time to transfer, and I got your letter again. Thank you, Emmaus Bridal College, but I'm already engaged.

Your Friend,
Grace Page

Cat Farm

I wish I had pictures for this post, but I don't, so you'll just have to bear with me.

So you know how most front doors actually have two doors? On a typical house, one might see a glass/screen door, followed by a pretty wooden door, and when you leave one open, it's okay because there's still a glass door.

Anyway, our house is in the country and we like to have very open windows so lots of sunlight can be let in. As some might say, "We're not really drapes." OUR front door is a glass storm door, followed by a glass door with a wooden frame.

Our pets like to whine to be let in on the other side of our storm door.

Recently, my father added one of those fancy contraptions to our outside door. You know the type: It has a tube and uses air to keep the door from slamming... and then towards the end it shuts quickly? Yeah, normal people have those, and we just got one!

Yesterday, we all came home from a trip to Halstead, and by the time we were all inside taking our boots off, the outside door was still wide open. The cat was a little too late to sneak inside, and got the main door slammed in her face. "Look at the cat!" my dad said, with an anticipating grin on his face. We all watched and waited for the cat to realize what was happening before she took off running, but she just continued to meow and beg to be let in.
Finally, the door slammed shut with just enough time for her to pull her tail in. She turned around with a bewildered expression on her face (if cats can have expressions) and we all laughed at her.
"What are those things called when you have pet ants?" my dad asked. "Ant farms?" I said. "Well, this is a cat farm!"

Recent Happenings

I haven't written, but I've been feeling the need to write for a while now. Here are some recent things that have happened:

• The biggest deal is that I got engaged this Thanksgiving while at Immanuel Mission in Arizona, visiting my Aunt Anne! My favorite quote from the trip was this: Dale: "So Joel, what was your favorite thing that you did on the trip?" Joel: "Grace getting engaged!" It made me laugh, and reminded me of another similar quote from three years ago... Sarah: "So Tim, would you rather have a girl who's really athletic, or one who's really musical?" Tim: "Uh... Grace!" Aw, you both are so sweet!
• Me being engaged leads to me thinking about a wedding, which is quite an adventure when you're on a tight budget! We have a place down, and a date (June 26th, by the way!) so now I can, for the most part, relax. I am getting ready to go on an excursion with my maid of honor to search second-hand stores for a hidden gem of a dress waiting for my expertise to fix it into something wearable... who knows? Maybe we'll find something!
• Speaking of my ability to sew... This blog post has mainly been an excuse to procrastinate a bit more of my task to finish five bridesmaid dresses for a wedding coming up on New Year's Day. Wanna see some pictures?! These are of my sewing adventures so far:
  

Here is the old Pfaff sewing machine I have to work with. She's actually pretty sturdy, and if anything goes wrong, my dad is a great help to fiddle with it for a while.

When I got to this point, Joel said, "Oh, so it's gonna be an Aladin wedding, and all the girls will look like Jasmine?" just to tease me, of course, but he tried one on for a picture!
I've gotten a lot further since then, but I am very ready to get these finished so I can focus on my own wedding! I am determined to have fun with this all, and to only focus on what really matters.

It's Coming!

These last few months have been very interesting, but I am so ready for them to be over.
Wish me luck! We leave for Texas on Thursday!
We'll be sure to not mess with it while we're there.

One day in Spanish Class...

Ayer, en la clase de español, mis compañeros y yo estabamos aprendido gramatica. La professora hablaba de comparasiones de igualdad, y nos preguntό para ejemples. Mi amigo Charlie siempre me llama “Dale” porque el cree que es un nombre comico. El escribiό “Dale es tan arrogante como mi tía.” Despues de compartiό con la clase, la professora dijό, “She’s gonna get you back!” y yo creía que fue un buen idea. En la proxima vec, recordé que Charlie tiene muchos gatos. Compartí con la clase, “Charlie tiene tantos gatos como una vieja loca! Se rieron.

Luego, un otro hombre no entendía la frase y el dijό, “Michael Jordan casas tanto como coches.” La professora fue paciente y le ayudό. El dijό, “Michael Jordan teno casas tanto como coches.” Finalamente, despues de más ayuda, dijό, “Michael Jordan tiene…” Todos los demas fueran impaciente, y yo pensé, “TANTOS, TONTO!!” y empecé a reirse.

Another Thought I like to Think

"You can tell you're in Kansas when..." is something that always runs through my head when something seemingly normal happens, and then I realize that if I weren't a Kansan, I'd think it was strange.
I came up with three such phrases in a single trip in my car yesterday when each of the following actually happened:

"You can tell you're in Kansas when it's raining when you leave the school, then it's really sunny, and then it rains again, and is sunny again before you arrive at your destination."

"You can tell you've spent most of your life in Kansas when you go over an overpass and your ears pop from the altitude change."

"You can tell you're in Kansas when you're on the highway and you drive past a farmer (in typical farmer wear) with his hands in his pockets surveying the task before him. Which, of course, is to replace a wooden billboard with a sign that reads "GOD LOVES YOU!" in giant red letters."