alrite so for the past week i've been in kentucky. indiana. umm .. oh yea st. louis. bt for the most part i've been in chicago. yep .. n it was real fun. ok so the holiday vacation thingy i had startd like this:

Wednesday May 28

alrite so the day startd at like 10 i guess. i walkd over to the church to go catch the bus and start the ride up to the monastery .. um yea it was cool there. the monks were hillarious. there was this one dude thats been there since he was 15.. man the dude was 95 or somethin. he said he was there the year before WWII so .. y'all do the math. u kno my brain turns off wen school's out. shoot .. my brain's turnd off in school too. lol .. i guess u cud say its one of my many talents .. sad huh. i have a talent for being naturaly stupid. alrite so wen we were at the monestary. we saw the many tasks that each monk is assignd throughout the day .. they range from cooking. to doing laundry. to makin shoes. its really cool but one of the coolest things they do there is they make their own fudge and cheese .. yea. i think its cool. we watchd this video on how they made it and stuff .. yep pretty cool stuff right there. i didnt get to try any cuz they were kinda expensive .. well more than i wantd to spend. bt .. im sure they tastd good.

after talkin to the monks we went to their service which by the way they have 7 services a day .. yea thats a lot of times to be worshiping Jesus. i mean dnt get my wrong JC is my homeboy bt thats alot of .... alrite never mind. i shouldnt have even went there. MY BAD JC!!! lol ..

anywas .. we sang for the monks wit our angelic voices ... :D yea rite. u kno it was flat. wel anywas the monks were real glad we was there. they gave us the 2 thumbs up. and they said they were glad to hear us cuz they dnt get to hear a lot of young voice and not alot of female voices either .. so yep they enjoyd it and we enjoyd being there. the monastery was one of my fave places that we went to.

alrite so after the monastery we made our way our way to the Mone'to Retreat Center, IN. ( a 2 1/2 hour drive from the monastery) yep .. there i had a room with keller, sarah kathryn, me and erin [wind u dnt kno her .. bt she's cool. she goes to brentwood academy] so we stayd there for the night and we we're heading for chicago the next morning. by the way ... if u recal in my last blog. i forgot my pillow at home. i kno. sad .. bt luckily the retreat center had pillows on their couches so i jst used that for the night. it was good.

alrite so we had devotion and were off to sleep.
guess what .. the nxt morning . sarah and keller said i snored! crazy rite.. wel i dnt always snore and keller was a lil confused cuz wenever i sleptover at her house i never did .. bt i snore wen im super tired. and i guess .. that nite i was super duper tired. cuz keller said it was so loud she got up to go get her towel and put it over her head to drown out the sound .. lol .. my bad!!!

Thursday May 29

okay so its off to chicago.. it was abt a 5 hour drive. yea.. it was like torture in that bus sometimes. it was so hot. and sweaty. n sticky. n stinky .. well not all the time thank goodness bt sometimes it was like that.

wel before we got to chicago we had to stop at walmart cuz me and sarah kathryn forgot to bring black pants. man .. i didnt know black pants were on the list!! .. apparently they were a part of the uniform. :( and everybody knows .. there arent a lot of cute clothes at walmart. and im a very picky shoper when it comes to clothes .. very very picky. lol. so it took me awhile to find me some black pants .. and. and they werent cute. or fit good. bt they did the job so i got them anywas. :( i kno it was probably one of the worst moments i had on the trip. and guess what those ugly black pants werent even cute. i spent almost $20 on them!! crazy huh .. man. i dont even like them. eww ..
yea so i was really mad when i had to get them because i had some black pants at home .. i jst didnt pack them cuz i didnt think i would need it. yea .. that was a bad bad decision that costd me 20 bucks!!

alrite so wen we got to chicago we checked in at our hostel .. and mite i say .. that place was THE BOMB!! .. yep. loved it there. and guess what .. it came with linens .. aka .. I HAD A FRESH CLEAN PILLOW THAT I CUD USE!!! yay! thank goodness for that .. i dnt kno wat i would do if i didnt have one .. yea so that was good news. we got unpackd and dressd up for diner .. we went to italian village .. where i got me some nice tortellini .. or somethin. it tastd good anywas. lol
yea and after dinner we did a lil site seeing as we walked to the theatre to watch WICKED! . it was awesome. i loved it. it was my first time going to a play .. or a musical. whatever ur suppose to call it. and yea .. im definately gettin me a copy of the soundtrack. it was great.


alright so after that we walked back to the hostile and the day was done.

Friday May 30

ok so the day startd at 7!! shocking huh since last night .. the play was over at 11. and u kno we didnt go to bed until 12.. or maybe even later. who knows. i dnt have a watch. thats what keller is for. u dnt know how many times i asked her "what time is it?" and how many times i got.. "summertime" lol .. keller. u gotta love her.

alrite so anywas. we left for the presbyterian nursing home. we gave them our whole concert. it was awesome. they liked it alot. old people are so fun. it was cool talkin to them. alrite so after that we went to .. the baha'i temple .. it is so big and architecturally beautiful!! yea .. bt its a place of silence and u kno meditation n whatnot .. and lets jst say our music director gayle got a little carried away and startd to sing. lucky marie claire told her it wasnt alot before the old lady that worked there told her. i mean. imagine being in trouble and told off by a old lady and ur a grown woman. i dnt kno abt u bt dat jst sounds sad to me.

alrite so after that we had lunch and went to music camp at the marcy-newberry association where we sang and made crafts wit some kids that were like idk .. i guess no younger than 7th grade maybe. i dnt kno . wel it was so fun. the 3 kids i kickd it with were herbert. derek . and kaila. well .. i startd talkin to herbert. i think he was like a 6th grader .. i think they all were. alrite so herbert came down to the arts and craft stuff [thats where i was working .. we were divided into groups] and yea so i was working down there and i asked herbert what songs they sang up in music with gayle [our music director] cuz she was trying to get us to teach them some song abt a monkey .. it was horrible and oh so embaressing. she made actions that ... umm .. it was nt cute. let me say that. so anywas. he didnt remember what songs they were singing and i was like what?! u jst came from up there .. bt yea he didnt remember so i told him that i would give him some time to think abt it and he could sing it to me later. lol. yea .. well .. he ended up nt singing anything. and yea .. we were jst joking around. alrite and derek. he was like herbert's best friend i guess u could say. i was asking derek what's herberts fave song cuz herbert didnt want to sing anything for me. and then ..it ended up making derek tell me all his fave songs. and he had quite a few which he did sing some of them to me eventually . well those guys were so funny and yea it was cool chillin wit them. and kaila. man she was jst the cutest little girl ever! [pix will be posted on nxt blog] she was funny and so talkative and stuff. she was jst full of joy. she made everyone smile. yea and love her. she was great.

alrite so yea it was cool hangin wit them after arts and craft we went up to the gym to go play and these kids were doing back flips it was tight. there was abt 4 or 5 of them .. dude they were really really good. they were the bomb i have to say.

ok so after music camp we went to a greek restaurant. yep i got to say that greek is definately nt my fave. it was my first time experincing it and im glad i did.. bt i dnt ever want to eat greek again. im sorry .. greek is definately nt my thing. lol yep .. bt anywho. after the restaurant we went back and chilled at the hostile.

Saturday May 31 ok so this was our last full day in chicago. we were walking all over down town. we got some good sites. bt in all seriousness. let me tell you . it was definately TOO HOT to be walking around in that burning heat. i mean. the city was gorgeous everywhere you looked and im glad we got to see all that bt really... it was real humid.

bt anywho .. enough complaing [by the way .. anywho is my new word i got off of miley cyrus's video. lol] ok so we visitd the fourth presbyterian church. the window work was gorgeous bt let me jst say that walkin there got me so dehydrated that thank goodness we were allowed to go shopping afterwards cuz we went into this one store that gave free margarita samples. mmmmm good!! dnt worry wind. it was the alcohol free kind. yea so we were allowed to go shopping in groups of 5 [me. sarah k. keller. erin. and kate] yea and we went to the disney store [ where we took lots of pix with the disney merch including nemo .. from finding nemo. [duh] and sully from monsters inc.] bt most importantly we took pix with zac efron and corbin bleu pillows!! awesome. totally love them pix .. lol yea that would be the high school musical merchandise.. yep gotta love that. oh yea and keller took some pictures of peter from the chronicles of narnia to send to nathania cuz keller says nathania (sp?) is in love with him . yea and we spent the rest of our shopping time at niketown. it was cool ..

yea so then we met back up with everyone and headed for the united methodist temple. it was the first church in chicago. its in the middle of downtown and get this...

ITS A SKYSCRAPER!!

yea its really tall .. and it has a chapel at the very top of the building. its cool. its call the sky chapel and wen we looked out the window we could see the whole city. awesome huh. alright so enough excitement here..

our next stop was millenium park where we got some really cool shots of this mirror thing that was shaped like a bean and really really big. lol im nt so good in explaining this bt i promise.. i'll post up pictures wen i can. yea so we were there and then we played in this water park thing. it was cool. definately another one of my top faves of the trip. lol

ok so after that we went back to the hostile and we relaxed for a while before we went back out to dinner at Giordano's pizzeria where we got to try the famous chicago pizza .. very delicious!!
and then we played a game of whirlyball. now wind .. u might be thinking .. what the heck is whirlyball?? well .. i'll tell you

whirlyball is only the coolest most intense version of bumper cars combined with a lil lacrosse and some bball action too .. yep its intense. bt i loved it!! it was so cool .. probably one of the most fun filled nights of the trip. yea .. loved it. (again .. pics later)

Sunday June 1

yep this was the sad day that everyone knew was coming .. we left chicago this morning. *sniff*sniff* tragic huh. yea it is .. i already kno. ok so anywas we packed up and headin for st. louis (home town of nelly .. mite i add. wind if u dnt kno who he is. jst kno that he's one of my fave rappers. im sure u heard some of his stuff bt jst didnt kno who it was. bt yea. its nelly) yea it was awesome we got to go inside the arch and ride this thing to the top where we could see out and look at the city. it was cool loved it .. dnt worry . i got pics and .. BONUS , i got a video of this too. its funny. im sure you'll love it wind.

yep .. after the arch there was a mystery trip that was getting frozen custard. yea .. me and keller had strawberry flavor. it was good. i loved it. yep so .. besides that. oh wait.. that was all that night. after the trip to the get the ice cream .. it was back to the church where we campd out and slept in a classroom. it sounds weird. bt it was the best!! i slept the best there .. and we slept on the carpet. crazy huh? wel what can i say .. that carpet was soft. and guess what . you'll love this part. it had a pillows!! yea pretty cool .. and lots of them . and different colors . i chose a red and blue one (they were dominick inspired colors .. lol)

Monday June 2

alrite so this was our last full day on the trip before we get to go home. yay! i was anxious to get home at this part of the trip. anywas. today we had to go sing to a nun retirement home called st. agnes yea .. this day our singing was definately not on point. everyone was hoarse and there were definately some flat notes. lol [keller even sang at the wrong time so she definately had some unexpected solos in there .. and a really red face after them. lol] yea so that was our worst singing ever and none of us felt like singing.. bt whatever.

alrite so after st. agnes we went to Basilica. okay basilica was most definately one of my all time fave moments on the trip. its like this temple i guess you could say and its full of amazing artwork all over the walls and the stained glass windows. it was like italian and english and american artwork. really really beautiful.i definately plan on visiting that place again. yea [again .. i have pics] its so beautiful and when we sang there ... our chaperones said it was definately our best singing throughout the trip. lol i loved it there.

alrite so after basilica we headed over to our retreat center where we had dinner and me. keller. rebecca [french class] and this guy name sam talked for like 2hours abt movies and stuff .. it was awesome just to chill out on this deck that overlooked the lake. really beautiful. lol after that we had a campfire and we made smores .. mmmm loved it! and then we sang a couple of campfire songs. and me and keller sang the "im a barbie girl .. " song . lol yep and then we had our devotion and went to bed.

Tuesday June 3

yea .. we left the blue mountain retreat center and made our way back to nashville. and luckily we stoppd at starbucks to get some drinks. i got a straberry and cream frappachino (sp?) yea wel wind .. u definately need to try it its amazing!!

yea and then we got home at 5 and we left the retreat center at 8:15. yea bt thats the whole trip
oh and i met T. Roper at the church. [he went to HHS and was in my economics class] yea he was waiting for avalon.. they're like best friends .. i dnt kno if u know her wind bt avalon went to our school too.


ok wel i got to go
bye!