Roadtrip!!! =D

Last weekend we (Sarah and Rachel) went on a road-trip with Dad to collect Daniel from Patrick Henry College where he was waiting to be picked up after working at iGovern West camp. :)

Who can say "ROAD TRIP!!!" ;)

Sarah's pretzel masterpiece--perfect for a split second before Dad hit the brakes and scattered it hither, thither, and yon. :)

Aha. Here we are and here we go. 206 miles of riding in a swanky Jetta that didn't belong to us....long story, that. ;)

Sarah and I at the start of the trip.

Me displaying the charms of the new Not-Ours car. :)

The first rule of road-trips is this: Never, Ever, Ever go more than twenty miles before stopping for a frappuccino. Important. Vitally important. You will simply shrivel up and die and run out of gas if you do not stop.

It also helps one to have an apple-pie to keep you company, as Sarah displays. See her happy face? And though I despise McDonald's usually, I have to admit their fraps are great, and their pies are baked...not fried...I digress.

A river--we are now wondering what river and why the river picture...Let me guess...it isn't the James...it isn't the Elizabeth River....it isn't the Nansemond...maybe it's....I don't know. But I was *so* excited because we crossed Bull Run!!!! You know, the Battle of Bull Run? I don't remember what happened there, but I do remember that something of great importance to American history happened, so crossing it was prestigious...sort of.

Trying desperately to make a bubble out of chewing gum. It popped right as I took the picture. Thus my surprised expression.

We mildly tortured ourselves by listening to country music because it was the only clear station...anyone for "Old Red" or "Made in America"? No? How about the "My Bad, Come Back" song? Oh..I see. I have to admit, after 1/2 hour of listening, I fully agree with the joke:

What do you get when you play a country song backwards? You get your wife back, your truck back, your gun back, your dog back.... :) (And that probably won't make sense to anyone who hasn't survived country music.)

The ultimate road-trip snack: Pretzel sticks with a Coke Slurpee. Or any kind of Slurpee, for that matter. You must try it. Sounds weird, tastes beautiful. :)

Scenery...I believe this was our first glimpse of the Blue Ridge Mountains through the rain.

Oh happy day! A Roy Rogers car!!!! Ain't it great, Agnes? I fell in love with this car and Sarah strained her back to capture a picture of it for me. ;)

A rather fuzzy, terrible picture of us all in the car...Sarah set the camera on the dashboard and it flashed and here we are!

More lovely scenery. Anyone for a three-mile walk to Netherfield?

Of course, after arriving in Purcellville, we had to stop for lunch. 900 degree pizza. Amazing. :) and yes, Sarah got a bad picture of me. It happens often enough. :P

I believe I am about to do something evil to the pizza. Dad is Gollum trying to bite off my ring...or maybe it was just another Strange Picture. ;)

Pepsi-cola company + Blue cup + pretty ice = refreshing. :)

And we have arrived at Patrick Henry College--home of brilliancy and nobility--a small group of buildings with huge impact. I feel rather motherly toward it. ;)

Our Gentleman is finally where he ought to be! ;) In this picture he was revealing all the funny and interesting stories of a week in the Rockies! :)

Aww! I love this one! :)

Don't know if you can see it well, but this was one unique house! The shutters were red with white polka-dots all over them! :D

And we couldn't pass this wonderful clock by without snapping a photo!

Beautifully green scenery....but something's wrong here...

"Oh. Um. We're supposed to be taking Route 15..."
"We are!"
"--We're supposed to be going south...."
"Oh..........:P"
Yep! It was fun. We got lost, and almost made it to Frederick, Maryland. :D

Here are our "Lost" faces. ;)

Yes, that is red nail-polish...."New Love" to be exact. No, it didn't stay on long. Just to match Rachel's outfit for the day. :P

Our friend, Grace, had also been in CO, so she was along for the adventure as well. :)

We were all really psyched to find ourselves on this route! ;)
(anyone wanna watch Cars? ;)

Time to stop for dinner! :)

Finally! One with all of us together! :)
Cutie. :)

Being hungry and looking at this picture at the same time is not fair. :P Five Guys makes the most delicious hamburgers ever. *AH!* :)

So that was the glamorous, wonderful, tiring, exciting road-trip! There was sunshine, heavy, heavy rain, the discovery of a secret weapon under a seat of the swanky car, laughs, meetings-of-new-people, stories told, and pictures taken. Gotta love family! :)

~Rachel and Sarah

Our Hectic Week. :)

"Jane...Jane stop struggling so like a wild, frantic bird!"

(Pardon my lapse into a quote)

We have had rather a crazy week--thus the lack of posts! Last Sunday Dad, Sarah, and I took a roadtrip up to Patrick Henry College to collect Daniel who was just flying into Dulles airport from iGovern West in Colorado. That was oodles of fun, and we took lots of pictures! (There will be a post about that later)

Then mid-week we had an exciting little earthquake.

Then Thursday we had company and I went out for a birthday/graduation day with the T. girls.

Then Friday our black lab/shepherd mix, Licorice, got hit by a car. :( Her femur and a spot in her hip are fractured (spiral-style.) and the price to fix it would have been monumental (think $2,500 or more) so we were left with two choices:

Put her down or amputate her leg. We chose the path of the tri-paw'd. We have been keeping her crated and taking her out now and then to go to the bathroom, but the vet didn't want to do the surgery till Monday.

Then our stunning vet-tecchy-ish friend, Abigail, said that their office could do the amputation much cheaper, so tomorrow Daniel and I (and maybe Sarah) are off to drive down to Warrenton, NC to get poor Licky fixed up. She'll have her surgery Tuesday morning [I think], then recover overnight at least, but perhaps into Thursday. We can't know until we see. :)

It was a hard knock for poor Licorice but I am overjoyed to get to spend the better part of the week mooning around Abigail's house! ;)

Oh! And as if the week wasn't busy enough, we had a smashing storm! Hurricane Irene came through and though she didn't have *quite* the winds they thought she'd have, we got at least 12 inches of rain from her!!! (Some places along our corridor got 16!! I'm not sure if we were in there) We had all the Walkers here too, since their mobile home was a little scary in the high winds. So 21 people, an injured dog, a perfectly fine dog, a hyper cat, a sleepy guinea pig to keep us company! :) Interesting, interesting week! But for the record, apart from the car hitting the dog, it's been a blast! I love intense weather--I can feel God's power so clearly in it! And the scouring of yesterday is resulting in absolutely drop-dead gorgeous weather this morning!

Church was cancelled for today due to the hurricane so we are just hanging out here, will probably have some family worship-time, that sort of thing. I ought to be going!

~Rachel

Disney Favorites

So, I was reading this post by our lovely, Jo March the other day. I really loved her post about the wonderful "magic" we have all experienced as little kids while watching Disney movies! :)

It's funny to say this, but all the old movies make me remember the times as a little girl, when we only had *3* kids (!) holding my breath during the scary parts and sighing when the Prince finally rescues Sleeping Beauty. :)

Anyhow, I thought I'd do a post showing my favorite good guys, and villains, too! What do you think? Well, here I go!

Good Guys:

Rapunzel. Not one of the ones I'm looking back on, yet a very good addition to the whole crew!

Robin Hood! Who couldn't love this self-less and charming guy? ;)

Aww! Both Todd and Copper are so cute and decidedly friendly. :)

Haha! Now, this trio work together so horribly, but you have to admit, they are funny in their oddness. :D

Little Roquefort! :D He's so small but does all he can to help when the need arises!

Flounder has been one of my favorite Disney characters for years--Mom evens says my personality has always matched this guy's. :D And you can't leave Skuttle out!

Now for the not-so-well-loved ones:

Now for Mother Gothel. The most conniving, sneaky, tricksy villain, yet there is something in her that can almost make you believe her motives are not evil. :P

Sir Hiss! :D Several of my friends use his quote all the time! :) Such a bad guy, yet he still gets bullied by Prince John.

We can't leave out Cptn. Jas. Hook! ;) You know, he's one of the villains, I almost *do* like! ;)

Gaston. You already know how large his ego is! ;) (and this guy got up here, due to Rachel ;)

Shere Khan, the tiger, is a charmer.

Cruella De Vil has an amazing theme song and I love her name! Such a fitting one, too. ;)

And last, but not least, "The Siamese Cats". Due to recent studies by our household, this pair almost tops the creepiest of them all. :P And their song is real......disconcerting? Also, the harmony sounds super twangy.

There are *many* more where these came from, but there are a few you can go off of. :)

Well, there you go!

~Sarah