why must you leave me, spring break? i thought we had something special...

spring break experiences
my last chorale tour: and my last set of homestays! needless to say, tour was packed with laughter, concerts, exhaustion, and cattiness. but alas, the finality of it all made the tail end of tour a bit more emotional for us seniors. and the best high school choir i have ever heard sang "there will be rest," which we sang our freshman year. ah, throwbacks.
my first bowl of french onion soup: self-professed foodie here. i love flavors and smells, and cooking is one of my relaxation and boredom avoidance techniques :) . however, i have always steered clear of french onion soup because it looks so brown, scary, and full of onions. i was a bit skeptical when hannah's cousin corrie placed the mug in front of me. but the smell of carmelized onions and cheesy goodness was so welcoming... she melted it all together so the bread and cheese was one glob of gooey deliciousness. it was salty, sweet, and altogether delectable. om nom nom.
my first after-wednesday-night-church mcdonald's walk: this past wednesday evening around 9:00 pm, a group of slap-happy young ladies terrorized the streets surrounding Peoria Apostolic Christian Church as they ravaged the area in search of shamrock shakes and french fries. narrowly avoiding a ghetto gang and a posse of pre-teens, the gaggle of girls giggled all the way, no doubt waking the entire neighborhood. they are likely to strike again.
Princess Mononoke: continuing on my anime kick, hannah and i watched our 5th Miyazaki film, princess mononoke, on tour. it was definitely one of my favorites. the story was more mature than his other films, and it had some great themes on the destructiveness of greed and recognizing the beauty and value of nature. a solid 4.5 stars from me.
mini-visits: amanda and i visited erin and oliver on thursday. i couldn't help but think about how lonely it would be to stay home with your baby every day. babies are great and oliver is especially adorable, but they sure don't offer much stimulating conversation. i used to have this notion that i would want to stay home with my first child and never leave them anywhere with anyone...but that's an opinion quickly reformed. after our visit i headed to eli's for some coffee and quiet time, but the weather was so nice that i walked over to Imagine Artists to see taryn and kristi. they were quite busy, and the visit was more awkward than the weather persuaded me to believe it would be...hehe. oh well, i returned to eli's and basked in the sunshine for a good chunk of the afternoon. then friday i visited marla (and girls), which further reformed my opinion. do what you can when you have one kid, because when you have four it is impossible to do anything else! one would think that i would have learned this already, but i am, in fact, a slow learner :) .
a delicious amount of quiet time: this break has given me a great opportunity to draw closer to God and fill my time with Him rather than with whatever strikes my fancy.
spring cleaning!!! well if you know me, you know i'm a bit bipolar when it comes to cleaning...i don't clean often, but when i do, i clean EVERYTHING. case in point: thursday afternoon, around 4:00, i got home from my erin/ia/eli's excursion and started my laundry, which had been strewn about my half of the room. while doing the laundry i noticed how much dust was on my things and on the floor (wood floors are not very forgiving and need to be swept often). so i started to dust off my furniture and then sweep the floor. let's just say my clean-freak frenzy progressed to the point of me taking all of hannah's and my things off the floor, moving all the furniture around, dusting, sweeping, and murphy's-oil-soaping the floor. around 9:30 i sat down to watch ghost adventures with hannah. by 11:00 i was too terrified to go downstairs and finish my laundry, so hannah and i watched a happy episode of naruto and then i drifted to bed around midnight.

ah, spring break. must we part ways so swiftly? you are but a tease. summer is calling me, and i must refrain from answering until my schoolwork has been completed! alas, our love connection has been formed. i will revel in my weekends and hold you in my heart until may :)