Spring Break!!!

Wow! What a wonderful, fantastic, adventurous, busy, crazy, fun week!!! I don't know if I told you guys, but I had been invited to go on a trip to Vancouver Island (in Canada) with one of my friends and her 3 roommates! Obviously I said yes because who would turn down such an amazing offer?!?! So on Friday after class Sarah Anne, Rachel, Hilary, Tracy and I drove to Sarah Anne's parents house in Stevensville to stay the night. Mr and Mrs Daley were super nice and just lovely people :)

In the morning we drove straight through Idaho to Seattle where we had an early dinner with Sarah Anne's brother and then drove to Canada!!! It was soooo cool to cross the border! We had to wait in the line for ages though... but it was good. I think we were all a little crazy from all the driving :P Thankfully they let me into the country :) and then we met a lovely older couple who led us to their church where we were staying for the night! We got there around 9:30 and basically unpacked the car and fell asleep on the floor in our sleeping bags!

Sunday morning, we drove to Tsawwassen and got lost looking for the ferry which was really very easy to find :P and spent 2 hours floating across to Vancouver Island! We stood outside for half of the time and wandered around, played ninja and took lots of photos :) Once we drove off the ferry, we headed into Nanaimo for lunch and had super yummy organic smoothies and found our way to Sarah Anne's aunt and uncle's house!

Monday and Tuesday we explored around Nanaimo, did lots of different hikes, walked along the beach and basically had a wonderful time!!

Wednesday we started the long drive back home with another ferry ride :) and another border crossing and thankfully they let me back into the country! We drove to Saettle and had lunch at an amazing seafood restaurant, then drove to Post Falls, Idaho and spent the night with Sarah Anne's sister.

Thursday morning we left Sarah Anne with her sister and parents and drove to Anaconda, where we left Rachel and Tracy at Rachel's parents house. And Hilary and I drove the last little bit back to Bozeman! And now I'm staying at the girls house until Sunday when I can move back into my dorm room.

So there you have it! A majorly shortened version of my amazing week away with new friends and lots of new memories and adventures!!! Now for the photos... I took more than 300 photos in the last 7 days, so bear with me :P

First up here's the vague route we took to Vancouver Island! We drove over 1500 miles (more than 2800 kilometres!!)

Here's the 5 of us crazy people! Sarah Anne and Hilary in the front and Tracy, me and Rachel in the back! :) (from left to right) 

The Peace Arch on the border

The church we stayed at in White Rock... and all our stuff :P 

Hilary, Sarah Anne and I on the ferry 

Hilary, Sarah Anne and Tracy playing ninja with crazy hair :D 

The beach at Nanaimo!! This was literally just down the hill from where Sarah Anne's aunt and uncle lived. So perfect and close!  

Some crazy group photos... 

At the church

About to get on the ferry

One morning at the beach we decided to get up early to see the sunrise. Thankfully it didn't come up till 7:40! 

The roomies :) Rachel, Tracy, Sarah Anne and Hilary (from the left) 

On one of our hikes around Nanaimo. This was at Cathedral Grove, it was super beautiful and all the trees had moss all over them. So so pretty! 

Hilary and I were twins for most of the trip!! We both had similar colour jumpers, jackets and even black pants!!!! :D 

Random stuff...

So here are some more random photos and stories from my adventures in Bozeman :)

This is the most amazing blanket I bought at Walmart. It is super soft and warm and I LOVE it!

I bought a Bobcat!! The mascot of all things MSU. Isn't he cute?!?! 

More snow :) Believe it or not I still love the snow!! 

I had a major desire to play my cello the other day... so I went and played the piano instead :) It was nice but not quite the same... 

My heater stopped heating over the weekend... when it was -25 outside... Thankfully it just wouldn't get warmer than 15C. But it was still cold!!! 

This is my February... the dots are things I had planned... I was so busy!!!!! :D Lots of socialising and school and church and awesomeness! 

And all these name tags on my door keep appearing!! This was the first one...

Valentine's Day <3 

And St Patrick's Day coming up soon :) 

Ta daaaaaa!!! :) 

Socialness!

Howdy everyone!

It's been ages since I've written a post... sorry! I've been super busy with uni and homework and assignments. Also with being social!! I'm such a little social butterfly ;)

For example, the other night I went to an international student dinner at my friends house and someone from Saudi Arabia cooked us some amazing Saudi Arabian food. YUM!! When I got home at 10:30, I got a call from another friend asking if I wanted to come over for a spontaneous sleepover! So I went over to her house with another friend and watched movies and hung out. It was great! :D

But I think the most exciting thing coming up is SPRING BREAK!!!!! YAY!!!! I am so excited for Spring Break... partly cos I would love a break from uni work and partly because I'm going to Canada!!!! :D I'm going with my friend Sarah Anne and her room mates to Vancouver Island for most of the week. We are gonna road trip up there, hang out at her aunt and uncles place and then road trip back home again! :) Pretty exciting!! And I promise I'll take a million photos to show you all ;)

It's been majorly cold lately... over the weekend it was -25 and with the wind chill it was -32! So cold! And there's been some snow storms too, which was pretty fun!!

I also went to my first basketball game! It was pretty fun... although we lost :( 

Me, Alyssa and Candice :) some of my friends from Hapner

I have some wonderful friends here. I was telling Natalie how I was getting sick of my 3 outfits of clothes I had and her and her room mates had just cleaned out their closets so they let me look through all their clothes and take anything I wanted!! So now all 10 of my hangers are being used and I am SO EXCITED!!!! :D It's nice to have clothes :)

Life in Bozeman

Hello strangers!

I have nearly been in America for 2 months!! Can ya believe it?!?! Amazing! I feel like I've been here for ages, but also that I've hardly been here at all! I've finally gotten into a bit of a routine which is nice :) So I thought I'd tell ya what my week normally looks like!

Monday
I start class at 8:30, so get up about 7:00, get ready, have breakfast and walk to class. At the moment I am doing book club at a primary school in the after school program so I have that at 3:45 to 4:45. I've figured out the bus system and it gets me there and picks me up at the perfect times! :) The rest of the day I do homework and eat... seriously I feel like I eat all the time... I'm gonna be so fat when I get home!!! :P

Tuesday
Class starts at 8:00 today, then I do homework/hang out till lunch and the go straight from lunch to class at 3:00. That's the end of my Tuesday of classes so I just do homework, meet up with friends, hang out. Ya know... nothing much....

Wednesday
I get a sleep in today! No class till 11:00!!! Then lunch and class at 1:40. After that I hang out, have dinner with some friends and we all walk over to Jennifer's house for Bible study at 7! It is so much fun :) Normally there's about 15-20 of us girls squished in Jen's little house. It's great! We get home normally about 9 / 9:30 and then I sorta go to bed...

Thursday
Class at 8:00, then more homework... there really is a lot of homework to do every week :P I have lunch and then class again at 1:40. And then at 7 is CrossLife! The college age Bible study at Grace Bible Church (my church). So normally I have dinner with some friends and we catch a ride over together :)

Friday
I have class at 8:00... it's my super long one... 2 1/2 hours!!!! For one class!! Crazy! Especially at the end of the week at 8:00... not so fun... :P After class I normally don't do too much. I've sometimes had a nap... walked to the town library... gone shopping... whatever! I also normally Skype my family today!! :) So if you want to be added to the Skype list let me know ;) I also have been going to an International student Bible study at Sarah Anne's house on Friday

Saturday
I don't do too much normally. I sleep in! Do homework, hang out, walk up the main street, all sorts of things! Hang out with friends :)

Sunday
Church doesn't start till 10:45 so I get another sleep in and then if I'm walking I leave at 10ish or if I'm getting a lift not till 10:30. So then the rest of the day I hang out with friends, watch movies, don't do that much :)


So there's my week! Nothing too amazing... but still really fun :) Snowy days are my favourite, although it makes it hard to go anywhere :P The last week has been really warm... like in the positives!!!!! Amazing!! :D

I feel like I've been doing so much but I dunno what else to tell you guys! Class and homework seems to take up a lot of my time... but I still spend heaps of time with my new friends :) I had a sleep over the other week, which was really fun! And just basically lived a Bozeman life!! With snow and all!

Snowy Adventures

Well hello there!

It feels like I haven't written anything is ages!! ...although it really hasn't been too long :P I've been doing so much though!! So just a warning... this is gonna be a big blog post!

To fill you all in on a few things I've been up to...

• I went and watched Frozen last weekend! It was awesome :) 
• I went to a Chinese New Year party with really good food ;)
• I had waffles for lunch... and they were amazing! Sunday breakfast in the dining halls goes till 11 and it is always really good on Sunday!
• I watched some of the Super Bowl with 2 of my international friends... although we really needed an American because we had no idea what was going on!! We were watching and Googling at the same time trying to figure it all out! :P
• I've had lots of homework this week... lots of group assignments to do 
• It has been a majorly cold week!!! I think the warmest it has been is -16. The coldest has been -30!!! That is super duper cold! Although I have realised that it gets to a point when every temperature is just the same... freezing!! So I'e been wearing basically all my clothes all week :P 
• My heater stopped heating my room... not so fun... then someone came and fixed it and now I have a warm room again! ...very fun :)

And now I'm up to the weekend!! (bear with me... this may be long...) So, the church I'm going to, Grace Bible Church, had a Women's Advance (a retreat, but we are advancing in our faith, not retreating!!) We went to a little campsite about 30 minutes out of Bozeman called RockHaven (owned by a Presbyterian church). We got there Friday afternoon and unpacked, had dinner and then had a speaker talk to us about modesty. It was really great! Talking about how we need a modest heart as well as modest clothing. We then played games and hung out till lights out at midnight. 

We woke up at 8 and had breakfast and another speaker, the pastors wife. And she talked to us about having a gentle and quiet spirit. We had lunch and then a whole bunch of us headed out to go exploring!! We found an area with lots of different activities (the type of ones we do on school camp... team building ones) So we did some of them and then most people headed back because they were cold... it was super cold outside... like -20 probably :P 

But I did not go back! I was ready to explore and hike all through the snow :) So me and 3 other girls kept going. We ended up climbing up this mountain through knee deep snow to a bit of a rocky ledge. It was so much fun!! Hiking in the snow is really hard though... because it's pretty slippery and easy to slide down the mountain! 2 of the girls kept going up a super steep bit and I stayed with the other girl and then we all met up again down the bottom. Going down was so much fun because you just gotta crouch down and slide on your feet all the way down!!! It was awesome :) On the way back to camp I made a snow angel!!!! The snow was super deep (about knee deep) so it was really hard to get out of but it was such fun :D

The rest of the weekend was more speakers and making friends and hanging out :) It was such good fun. I really loved it. Over the weekend I took 132 photos :P So I won't put them all up but I'll put up some for ya all. It was absolutely beautiful!!!!!!! 

It's hard to see but this bit was really steep! The trees were good to pull ourselves up with :)

This is where I stopped and 2 of the girls kept going. It seemed nearly vertical!!! It was steep and slippery but I bet the view was gorgeous! Kelly and I just sat on the side of the mountain and tried not to slip down!

Cold nose! :P

My beautiful snow angel!!! :D You can even see the top of my beanie made a mark! 

This is the 4 of us that went up the mountain... me, Keona, Kelly and Sarah :)

Sarah decided we needed to plank the bridge... I tried and failed... but Sarah and Kelly were really good!!! :D

This slide would be fun... 

This is Steph. I had lunch with her today and she is about to do an exchange to USQ in Toowoomba!!! We were both so excited to meet each other and talk about Toowoomba and Bozeman and traveling and studying abroad and life! She is doing elementary education too :) And she is really lovely!! I am so excited for her to be going to Toowoomba. Everyone needs to be her friend!! We realised that I know lots of her friends and even one of her cousins!! Small world :)