30 posts! Ho MAN!!!!

Ok, so I WAS going to blog a little tonight, but I just realized how much I have to do. BAH!!! in short, I was extremely frustrated with one of my team leaders today, I learned a SWEET drime (I'm kind of a drinking/smoking puppet :), my worship team lead some interesting worship and I was really frustrated, and I had to teach all the kids music songs that I learned YESTERDAY!!! AGH!!! :) It was CRAZY....I'm learning flexibility!!! I really appreciate Sam, one of my team leaders, right now. He's always very calm and like, "It's going to be OK!!!" :) He's very reassuring. :) YAY!!! :) Anyway, we go to Edmonton tomorrow and fly Sunday afternoon...I might not be on here again for a while. PRAY LOTS!!! Our Visas are coming to Edmonton along with our passports...pray for that and safety and PATIENCE with each other. Ha ha...it's going ot be interesting and great and fun and scary and awkward and embarrassing and shocking and cool and encouraging and ALL THAT and MORE....So I'll try to keep this up to date. :) Thanks for your prayers...

*Caitlin

Oh my Daddy-O...

Sigh....I'm gonna miss my dad. :) I was thinking about it last night, and I was surprised to discover that I will actually REALLY miss my whole family. I've been away so much this year I didn't think it would matter too much...being gone for a month...but I'm not so sure. I told someone on my team yesterday that I HOPE that when I come back my sister (Jenevieve, she's 2) will coming running and give me a big hug. I will probably miss her and my brother Caleb (he's 16) the most. As bad as that sounds, it's true. Ha ha. Oh, yeah...and my dad. He was so nice about packing all my stuff home (believe me, it was ALOT of stuff)...it was so cute. :) Ha ha.

Anyway, I thought I would stick the names of my fellow SIERRA LEONE team members on here so you all can pray for them all. :) Here goes....

*Brandi Hall and Sam Minatra (our team leaders)
*Chris Rempel
*Myranda Harms
*Karen Ford
*Kerri Samson
*Kristine Schlamp
*Chelsie Mittlestadt
*Lisa Purdey
*Cheri Peters
*Jon McKay
*ME!!! :)

Keep praying for us...we fly in FOUR 1/2 DAYS!!!

*Caitlin

Five days....holy CRAP!!!

Ho man, what a week already. Training is nuts. Really intense. :) This morning we talked about our "Styles of Communication". And apparently I am "Action-oriented". I read all about the weaknesses and strengths of this particular style, and it was pretty much dead-on exactly like me. It was great. The scary thing is that my personality type (Driving Competant, don't ask what it means), my main spiritual gift (Leadership), and my primary style of communication are all SO similar! I'm definitely learning alot about how I work. I thought I already learnded a whole bunch about that with living in the dorm/with a roommate and such...and now I'm learning even more. It's crazy fun. :)

Anyway, last night we all talked about our fears and such, and it was so cool. We prayed about it afterwards, and everyone seemed genuinely COMFORTABLE with sharing that kind of thing. Which is new. Alot of people on our team are pretty closed off with sharing feelings (me included) so it was cool to see. I was mostly scared of how the "little things" like...LOUD noises when people are eating or when we sit around and do nothing (no direction) bug me so much. :) I've been praying about that alot, cuz I know it's definiteinly something Satan could use to his advantage. BAH!!! :)

Whoa ho!!! Answer to Prayer!!!!!! Our VISA stuff is in Buffalo, with the people who will let us into Sierra Leone! So we are getting our visas, it's just a matter of time really. So pray for SPEED!!! We need those babies by Friday when we go to Edmonton!!! :)

Ok, I'm going to clean up my stuff. I have so little here now, and somehow my room still looks like it barfed or something. Oh brother.

FIVE DAYS!!!!

*Caitlin

"Some of you are going to the most closed-off countries in the world, and some of you are going to the ARMPIT of the world!!!" -Kim Bauer....the best teacher ever...in our missions training :)

Goodbyes suck. End of story.

Ok, can I say this again? I HATE goodbyes!!! It's weird, I don't really dread them before hand....I just hate the after stuff. Like, yesterday I said goodbye to my roommate, and I didn't cry at all! Until last night I think I really realized that she's gone, we're not going to be roommates again, I won't see her all summer, she's getting married, agh!!!! That kind of thing. I also had to say goodbye to Kaleb, and THAT SUCKED. :) I thought he was going to be in Edmonton when I am, and that was all great and whatever, but apparently he might not be. BAH!!! Surprise goodbyes are even worse. :) So I cried alot last night and then my nose was all stuffy this morning and my lungs hurt. :)

Then today I hung out with Ashley B and Robyn....we walked to the store (*in flip flops and tank tops, right Ash?) and we got slushies and sour keys. Just like old times. The STUPIDEST thing was that Ashley L was at my house, and she was part of our "old" group of friends. But BLAKE was at my house too (wedding stuff with my momma) so she didn't come. It was dumb. But anyway, we walked all over town...and good times were had by all. Then I had to say goodbye to both of them!!! BAH!!! I cannot believe it...I hate goodbyes so much.

So yeah, yesterday was great. Me and my brother Caleb and sister Chanelle and Kaleb built stuff in one of our treehouses. It was fun. I had no idea that I suck so bad with a hammer, but I went out again today and finished a whole wall (woop-dee-doo) and helped my brother change another one. It was nice. Yes, there were some harsh words exchanged, but I swear it's our love language together. :) I don't even remember what was going on, but I was doing something "structurally" wrong and he was making it look ugly...or something like that. We're very sensitive and caring brothers and sisters. :)

Anyway, I need to go get some stuff out of my room. I will keep this up to date.....I leave for Africa in SIX DAYS!!!!!! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Training starts tonight....craziness. Pray for our visas to come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
See y'all later! :)

*C

Goodbyes....waaaaa!!! : )

ARGH!!! I hate goodbyes. SO MUCH. I had to say bye to Kelsey last night, cuz I won't see her again before I leave. So that was sad. Hopefully I'll see Amber yet today, but then that's it!!! BAH!!! I ALSO had to say bye to Ori, who I won't see for like, three months cuz he's headed for Japan. I'm so excited for Africa, but I hate to say goodbye.

I ALSO have to say goodbye to my roommate tomorrow. THAT will suck hardcore!!! We have had the crappiest times, but also AMAZING times, and I love her sooooo much. We were taking down pictures today, and we were both like, "This is too sad, what else can we do?" So she decided to choose(again) what she's going to wear to the grad banquet and ceremony. Oh brother. We get so distracted. I think it's cuz we really just don't want to leave. Well, we do, but we don't...Ha ha....

ANYWAY, enough goodbyes. I still have NINE whole days til I leave. AGH!!! That actually doesn't seem like very long. It kind of snuck up on me. But I'm so unbelievably excited! I packed most of my suitcase today, and that pumps me up even more. AND all next week is training...it will be intense, probably an all day 9-5 thing.

We're leaving for Edmonton on Friday at like, 2, and then we have ALL DAY Saturday to do WHATEVER we want in Edmonton! That will be fun. I think we fly for Africa on Sunday at like, 3:45 or something like that. We're stopping in Toronto, so I might call my grandparents and get them to meet us there...that would be AWESOME. Ho man, that would be exciting. Then we fly on to London (YAY!!!), and then Nairobi. I'm not sure where Nairobi is, but I think it might be in Nigeria, which is only like, 4 countries away from Sierra Leone.

By the way, HUGE answer to prayer... On Wednesday, an unamed individual :) came up to me and gave me 200 DOLLARS for my trip. I had been praying about spending money, cuz I had none, and I needed some, and WHABAM!!! 200 dollars!!! :) It was crazy. And also on Wednesday a lady from my church took me into town and bought me a whole bunch of the stuff that I need. Sandals, a litle mattress, bug spray...that kind of thing. It was so encouraging....we just talked the whole time and laughed about her missions experiences(meeting her husband!!!) and such. It was cool.

Wow, I'm going to go out of my mind if I talk about my trip any longer, so I'm going to return to the joyous task of PACKING/CLEANING!!! Woo hoo!!!

*Caitlin

Done done DOOOOONNNNNNNNE!!!!!!

Oh wow, I'm officially DONE all schoolwork for the next FOUR months!!! YES!!! I'M FREEEEEEEEE!!! :) I just finished my last exam, and it was crazy easy. It was pretty big, I was surprised, but it went fast. So now I have a WHOLE bunch of other stuff to think about, but that's ok. I don't really care right now. :) One thing I have definitely learned this semester is that usually, like 90 percent of the time, stress does me no good! It just builds up and makes everything seem a whole lot worse. So I'm working on the not being all stressed out thing. It's going pretty good. :)

Yesterday I hung out with Amber and Kelsey like, ALL NIGHT. It was great. We talked forever, about mostly really random and retarded and great things, and then we listened to some stinking NASTY versions of the Phantom of the Opera. Wow, it was awful. HO MAN!!! I forgot that Am gave me the new PLumb CD and I haven't even listened to it yet. That's awful. I'm gonna miss them SO much while I'm gone. Agh...I don't really want to think about leaving yet. I'm a little nervous about it right now. It comes and goes...but it's only ELEVEN days away. BAH!!! :)

Anyway, I really should go shower, pack, find a dish sub, plan my small group outing...you know. I always have SOMETHING to do. :)

*Caitlin

Mrs. Darley and Mrs. Dingley.

Ok, so this is worthy to be shared with the world.

Kelsey and I were discussing our FAVOURITE movie of the moment, "Pride and Prejudice". Kelsey decided that SHE got Mr. Darcy (the dark, mysterious one....kind of the strong silent type.) and that I could "have" Mr. Bingley, who is just an IDIOT, but I like him. Ha ha...through the whole movie, every time he's with Jane (his woman :) he just grins like a fool, and he's very umm..... jolly. Ho man, I loved him, he made me laugh, and Amber and Kelsey think he's a retard. Mr. Darcy is definitely wwwwaaaaayyyyyy better looking....but he's so silent, which is sometimes nice compared to Mr. Bingley's constant "chatter" as Am called it :) ANYWAY... :)

I eventually told Kelsey that the perfect man would be a combination of both Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley. I don't think that's really possible, but who knows? It would be freaking AWESOME if it was and he did exist, but anyway...... I signed my name "*Caitlin" as usual in my e-mail to Kelsey, and then I put "aka: Mrs. Darley (get it? Darcy + Bingley = Darley!!!)" She liked it, and she agreed that the perfect man would be a "DARLEY", but then she said she definitely thought it should be "Dingley" instead. Ha ha...so now we're Mrs. Caitlin Darley and Mrs. Kelsey Dingley. Oh wow...I hope SOMEONE thought thinks that's as funny as I think it is. :)

Sooo.....only three more days of school! Sort of...I have exams Monday-Wednesday, and then it's a bunch of school stuff, banquets, grad, etc...So yeah. I'm excited, as I say in EVERY post. :) And then it's only a week til I leave for AFRICA!!!! (which I ALSO mention in every post. ha ha) It's SO soon, I cannot believe it. I have so much to do, so much do buy. BUT I got an update in my financial stuff...I might have already mentioned that, but that's ok....and I only need TWO HUNDRED dollars more! I have like, $3,400, which blows my mind. It's awesome. So that you can praise God for. Keep praying for our visas to come in.

Anyway, I should really go study. I keep forgeting that I'm still a student, still in school, and I still have four exams to write. BAH!!! I'll keep this posted. :)

*Caitlin aka. Mrs. Darley

SEVENTEEN DAYS!!!

WOO HOO!!! I am officially finished ALL classes and assignments for the year! Yyyyyyyyyaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy!!! Oh wow, I'm so excited! I have four exams yet, but those don't worry me. Now I have to do some hardcore packing and studying though. That's what I'll be doing all weekend I'm sure. But that's ok, I've always liked packing. I got a suitcase for my trip yesterday, so I can start packing that now, too.

Only SEVENTEEN DAYS until we leave for Africa!!! I feel SO not prepared right now, but we have a solid week to learn our program etc... I'm doing music stuff, and I haven't even heard or seen the music. So, that will be an adventure. :) As far as I know we still haven't heard anything about our visas. So keep praying for that. We're also trying to get traveling stuff worked out, and that's a big chunk of our leaders' stress...so they could use some prayer, too. :)

Last night in our missions meeting we talked about our spiritual gifts and personality types. Apparently my Spiritual gifts are Leadership, Administration, and Pastor/Shepherd. I was like, PASTOR? I ain't no Pastor!!! (I said it just like that... :) But I read about it, and then it made more sense. And we did the DISC test, and I'm a DC...which doesn't surprise me at all. :) It's interesting to get an idea of how every one else on the team works and reacts. It was fun. :) Kerri was like, "It says I'm insensitive! I am NOT insensitive! I don't like this thing!" Ho man...she's great. We also discussed a certain dessert...in a pan...ha. Brandi would KILL me if she knew I put that on here. Oh brother.

Anyway...I should go start packing. Oh, no. I can't. Ha ha....my roommate LOCKED the door and wrote "Do not disturb until 1:00" on our board. I was SO ticked off when I found that...urgh!!! I have stuff to do!!! :) But whatever, I kind of forgot about it until now...so it's all going to be OK! I'll keep this up to date with my trip stuff...visas...prayer...etc. :)

Peace out.

*Caitlin

Caitlin- "Oh, what's this darn thing doing here?"
Kendra- "WATCH your phraseology, young lady! And not one more poop outta you!"
(Loving roommates at 1:00 am. :)

"I kinda wanted to date you right then." -Kerri to Vanessa...I'm not sure why. :)

Oh Spring...

...how I love you. :)

THREE CLASS DAYS, FIVE EXAMS, AND ONE ASSIGNMENT.....and I'm DONE for four whole months!!! :) Oh wow, I'm so excited. I can hardly take it.

Today we signed up for rooms/roommates. I SO wish my roommate (Kendra) was coming back, cuz I would SO be roomies with her again...but she's gettting married, so that's out of the question. But yeah, there was an interesting turn of events as far as my roommate situation goes.

I'm on third floor next year (cuz I'm someone's care partner) and when I went to sign up for a room, the room I wanted (301) was already taken by an upperclassman. I reeeeeally wanted a freshman roommate next year, so I signed up for another room on the OTHER side of the building ("The Dark Side") at the other end of the hall! I was kind of disappointed, but I was like, whatever, as long as I get a freshman roommate.

THEN a care leader who hadn't picked a room yet picked MY room! So I got bumped. Ha ha....I was therefore STUCK living with an upperclassman. I looked at the available roommates and almost panicked!!! I would have had a VERY hard time with most of them, and the other one is my friend, and I really wanted someone I didn't know at all. So then, I looked at "my room" (301) and HURRAH!!! The girl in there is someone that I don't know, but I have seen her around and been like, yeah, she's pretty awesome.

So yeah, I went to talk to her to see if she was ok with me being her roommate, and she was totally gung-ho! The only thing I'm a little nervous about it how MESSY I am. She asked me one question, "ARE YOU CLEAN???" And I was like...uhh....I CAN be. (Heh heh....AGH!!! :) No, really, if she's clean, that will help me be clean. :) And I talked to her current roommate and she said that she's really not that clean. So it will all be OK!!!

So now I'm SO PUMPED...I got the room I wanted (it's right on the corner on the top floor on the SUNNY SIDE!!!! And my future roommate seems awesome. I'm excited. Oh yeah...ha ha....her name is Rachelle Bouthillier. (Ra-shell Boo-thillier) :) Woo hoo.

Anyway. I finished my second-last assignment today. That's really exciting. And I'm not even worried about exams. I don't mind exams, so next week won't be too bad.

TWENTY days til I leave for AFRICA!!!! wow...I'm all mixed up about that one....some days I'm SUPER nervous, and other days I'm like, "Just let me GO NOW!!!" :) Pray for the team's VISAS to go through and such...we haven't heard anything about them. So yeah, your prayers would be greatly appreciated by the whole team.

Ok, I'm off. GO OUTSIDE!!!! It's spring!!! Agh!!! :)

*C

4 hours...blehhhh....

Yo. So uh....someone (LISA!!!) asked me to say more about my evangelism class, and that was kind of the plan for today...so here we go. :)

The class (like, 24 of us I think) got to the mall at about 11:20 and hung out there til 12:30 ish. It was so weird. We were kind of supposed to go by ourselves, so that was intimidating. And then our my professor told us that we couldn't just go ahead and share our faith. We could only talk about that if we kind of directed the conversation that way and they asked about it.

So I FINALLY, after like, half an hour, worked up the courage to go sit with some random older lady and eat my lunch with her. She was totally wierded out that I asked to sit with her, and then she wouldn't really talk. Eventually we started talking about her family. She was up visiting her daughter's family and babysitting her grandkids...stuff like that. I could tell she really liked to talk about them :)

Later on I sat with another older lady who seemed to enjoy my company, which was a nice change from the first lady. :) We talked about her grand-daughter's wedding and how she couldn't find anything to wear. It was cute. The whole time I was kind of frustrated that I couldn't seem to move the conversation in a "spiritual" direction. But I eventually figured that maybe all they needed was someone to talk to while they waited for their husbands to pick them up. Maybe they just needed that company, even if it was quiet alot.

So I'm not sure how it "went"...I wasn't really sure what the outcome of that trip was supposed to be anyway. :) But it was a good experience.

Last night I was up until 4:00 working on my second lesson plan for my teaching course. Then I went to class at 8 and I've been up ever since. Ha ha...it's great. I have like this constant headached right in between my eyes. :) I'm so out of it. In class I wasn't sure if I had the urge to laugh hysterically or bawl my eyes out. Weird. I KNOW! Josh and Spencer loosened me up a little, they always make me laugh and look at the positive. We took some sweet pictures, and some nasty ones, of us dancing. Ok, whoa. I was NOT doing the nasty dancing, don't worry! Josh and Spence do their "party boy" dance...I will spare you the description. But it's funny. So I quickly took a picture and then proceeded to turn my eyes away!!! :) Lol...so much fun.

Tonight I'm helping with youth group cuz my youth pastor is recovering from some sick plastic surgery. :) He basically smashed his face on a tree while he was snowboarding, and had to have it..umm...repaired. I don't know. But I'm helping out...basically in charge of games and such. It'll be interesting that's for sure. No one else seemed interested in committing to anything much, so hopefully there will be willing and able assistants waiting for some serious delegation! :)

Ho man....RAZE just came on...ugh...reminds me of grade 8.

Anyway...I'm gonna go do some more homework before I have class.

ONLY FOUR MORE CLASS DAYS, TWO ASSIGNMENTS, AND THREE EXAMS!!!!! YEEAH!!!

*Canadian National Railway

I forgot...

I wanted to post this quote, because it made me laugh...

"She was a nun. He was a monk. They made an odd pair."

-Kat Brundige on Martin Luther and his wife. Ha ha hee hee ho ho ho..... BYE!

*CNR

The Blue Bruiser and Summer Days :o)

"Summer days, looking so fine..." UGH!!! I wanna watch "Grease"...mmm John Travolta. :)

Oh wow...it was like SUMMER today. I LOVE summer!!!!! I went to town with my mom (we had civil conversations and LAUGHED...it was great!) and it was SOOO stinking hot in our van. We cruised in the "Blue Bruiser" listening to Amy Grant with the windows down. Woo hoo...it was very refreshing. Oh yeah, "Blue Bruiser" is what one of my friends called my van once. :) It's so perfect...) I had an orthodontist appointment that didn't hurt...thank goodness, and then Mom and I went to get some stuff for my trip. It was sweet.

I spent a fair bit of time outside today, which is awesome. It was so gorgeous out! I'm so glad it was Tuesday today and not Wednesday, cuz then I wouldn't have gotten to enjoy the weather at all. Warm weather just makes me happy. :) I was outside doing my New Testament World creative project, and Josh (dishes Josh) and his friend Kyle came over and threatened me with snowballs. I scared them away...or so I thought. They came back 2 minutes later when I was talking to Jenice and chased me down. FIRST they hit me with really hard, icy snowballs, and THEN they rubbed their cold, wet hands on my face and neck. To quote Vanessa, "SICK DAWG!!!" I was kinda ticked, and slightly creeped out. You just do not touch my neck, dude, especially for that long. It was weird. :) And then I ALMOST got Josh back, but it went RIGHT in front of him as he running past. SO close...we laughed lots. What fun summery times...with snowballs.... ? :)

On Thursday for my Evangelism class we get to go to the mall and hopefully share some of our testimonies to random people hanging out there. I'm SO pumped. Last time we went, all we did was observe people and pray for them. I was like, FORGET THIS, I want to go talk to them!!! And now we get to! Yay!!!

I talked to my brother last night about something that happened to him at youth group. Basically I was raging because of the way he was treated, and he was pretty upset, too. But it was cool, we can talk a lot more now that we're both older and slightly more mature. He's grown up a lot this year, it's really nice. :) Sometimes I wonder about him, but he's learning.

Anyway...only EIGHT more class days and four assignments left!!! WOO HOO!!! The assignments are all really big, but whatever. I'm just SO pumped to be done. I think that makes 26 days til I leave for Africa, which freaks the crap out of me, but it's also very exciting. You all can pray for that...the team still has a lot of prep to do and we still need about $15,000 support. So PRAY!!! We could use it!

Anyhoo....I need to go do my creative project for my dad's class. Over and OUT!!!

*CNR

Oh Mr. Darcy...and my good friend NAZ-T!!!

Oh brother...I am....silly. :) I'm so not myself these days, and I kind of know why, but not totally.

I had an awesome talk with Josh and Spencer in the dish pit today. Those guys are awesome. I talked to Josh earlier this semester about being careful with girls...cuz frankly...he wasn't. And sometimes he's not. But since then he has obviously been working on it, and that's AWESOME! Yay Josh!!! :) Spencer...oh man...he's just a goof. But he's great. We have good times. Once we took pictures, and I was supposed to pretend to smack Josh with my dish-water-hand, but RIGHT when Spencer was taking the picture, Josh grabbed my hand and smeared the water all over my face. It was nasty...ha ha....NAZ-T, hey Vanee? :) (Naz-T is definitely Vanessa's name....if she was a rapper...and black.) ANYWAY....we have good times in that dish pit. Oh wow...I will write a book in both those boys' yearbooks I'm sure.

So...only 3 weeks of school, a week of training, and I'm off to Africa! AAAAGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!! I'm kinda freaking out. But I'm really excited for what God's going to do in me and through me. Wow...SO EXCITING when I think about it like that. :) I had an awesome talk with one of my team leaders (Brandi) last night until like, 2. It was great...I'm so thankful that she's on the team...she's kinda like my big sister. :) Awww......isn't that SWEEEET?

So anyway....ahem...Mr. Darcy is one SWEET boi.

Lol...for those of you that do not get that, I'm sorry, watch Pride and Predjudice, and take notes...it's AWESOME!!!! For those of you that DO get it...you rock my partay. :) See y'all later...

*Caitlin . . . There's alot of these ... in my posts...hmm....that's odd.....

"Are you WACK?!?!?"
- my wonderful Theology professor...Mr. BUD J. in class today.