Step #3: Place in Partial Sun

The summer is over and another school year has begun!  I can’t believe I have already finished one year at college!! ….Not that, that means anything, seeing as I will be going to school for who knows how long until I figure out what I want to do. I think I may have found a profession I am willing to stick with though! I am testing out photography this semester and so far I am really enjoying it. But first let us recap the summer! ‘Cause it was pretty awesome :P

Ahhhh to be back in AZ!! I gotta say after the daily life of white it was uh-may-zing to see some brown!!! I missed my family and friends so much and it was a blast to be with them again! Although I must say I realized some negative effects of this double-life. I had jokes and stories I wanted to share, but no one really quite understood why I found some of those stories so hilarious… and then there’s the feeling of being out of the loop. Aubrey, Courtney, and Kellie aka A.C.K. had so many inside jokes and had done so many things it had made me sad… but let’s face it A.C.K. doesn’t sound near as cools as B.A.C.K!! I got over it though, as my group shared their jokes and stories with me. 

While in Arizona I got to go to Phoenix Comic-Con! It was nowhere close to the size of San Diego Comic-Con but it still rocked! Mainly because I had an awesome Claire Redfield costume and my totally amazing, talented cousin had made it for me! AND she was running her own booth which was exciting! We were an entire resident evil crew!

In the end of July, I finally got to go back to Yosemite National Park!!!! Oh goodness I missed it so much! The giant granite cliffs! The waterfalls (and this year there were tons flowing! We actually saw Ribbon Falls one my family had never seen before then!) The rafting…err floating... Renting a raft has gotten ridiculously expensive and so Courtney and Kellie (who came to Yosemite with me and my parents) floated down the chilly Merced River! THAT was an adventure! We also hiked up Lembert Dome…and is there a hilarious story with that one!

So basically Dad, Courtney, and I were faster than Mom and Kellie because Kellie has a bad knee and well…Mom has a bad back (and is an old woman…..…teehee! Just kidding! FORGIVE ME MOMMY!) :P  Annnnyway, the hike was the devil! Uphill BOTH ways! Ok well just uphill really steep one way, but it was killer because there was less oxygen since the dome is so high! So our faster group reached the base of the granite dome at the top of the mountain, and decided to rest while also waiting for the two stragglers. While waiting we snacked and then decided we had time to venture over to the neighboring dome: Pothole Dome. The side trip was well worth it. We got to get a nice perspective of Lembert Dome and a look around the valley.

The problem arose when we had returned to our position near Lembert’s base…and there was still no Kellie or Mommy… Well Dad ran down the trail to see if they were still struggling up the mountain. I think he went like ¼ down before returning back…straggler-less. We were beginning to wonder if they had given up and gone back to the car. There wasn’t much else we could do, so we began the climb up the dome. Halfway up the dome to the point before the steep rise to the top…we noticed two very familiar figures sitting down. It was Kellie and Mom! And do you know what they did when they saw us? LAUGHED! Pointed and laughed! They had been there for almost 30 minutes! I guess they had passed us up while Dad, Courtney, and I were exploring Pothole Dome.  The hike was a blast, the three of us successfully making it to the tip top and exploring the entire surface of the dome. All five of us felt very accomplished and proud of ourselves when we reached the parking lot again….and also like someone had cursed us with a Jelly Leg Jinx.

The summer coasted to an end, but ended with a BANG! Time for the Six Flags Thunder-run rundown!! So yeah I really wanted to end the summer big, and I also just really wanted to get back to Six Flags. Well we (being Courtney, Kellie, Jessica and Daniel Sadoway, Tom Mintzer, and myself) drove out early Friday, morning around 4am, straight for Valencia California. We arrived at the park around 10:30am, so only 30mins after it had initially opened. Once inside the park we all headed straight for the X2!! …kinda a bad idea since the line took 2 hours to wait through and it shook me around and gave me a headache to live with for the rest of the day. We hit almost every ride: Tatsu, Déjà vu, and Apocalypse being my favorites. The Riddler’s Revenge is usually my favorite because it’s the stand-up coaster, but not this time around. It ended up being my last ride for the night, because without my realization my headache had caught up with me and transformed into a migraine…resulting in me throwing up while on the ride… Other than that is was an incredible trip and the exact weight of an elephant in amounts of fun! :P

The summer was exciting and relaxing but soon began to drag on and I was getting anxious and excited to get back up to my second home! I am rooming with three of my original roomies from my first semester: Alicia Malloy (aka Alithia), Julie Ricks (aka Ju Lee) and Melanie Smith (aka Mel).  My room-roomie is the cutest girl in the world and my personal Asian knight Ashley Takeuchi. (Don’t ask about the knight thing…our apartment relationships are complex) :P The five of us have been partying so much we had to restrict ourselves from home in order to get homework done!!!

Well I’m going to take a break for now and describe all the crazy, exciting, complicated events that have been happening here in Idaho on a different post….since this one I feel is long enough! Well see you all soon! (Hopefully with some sample pictures of my photography!!!)