White Water Rafting

This weekend was fantastic. I went white-water rafting with Liz, the Basiles, a mission team from Church of the Vineyard (Jennersville, PA) and some friends of the Basiles. It was so incredible! We had a blast, and it was great to play with my brothers, even just for a little bit :D. The rapids were great, we had a lot of fun, and I jumped off a bridge twice and even went on a zipline into the water like 5 times, it was so fun. We went through the rapids and we all were wearing helmets and Caleb and Matt (Basile) were hitting me in the head with their oars every other second, Liz can attest. haha. It was fun though, lots of fun. It is so weird though because we only met Matt (the oldest, he just turned 18 on Sunday) last Saturday but it feels like I've known him for years already. He reminds me a lot of Hunter.
I also made the mistake of telling them a lot of things about myself (which is so bad) because now they know that my best mile time ever is 10:41 (which is awful) and so they're determined to make me run an 8 minute mile or something like that. (I'M SO SCARED) but the hard part is, we're at 7,000 feet right now, so I'm freaking out haha. They're telling me, no it's good, you'll be able to do a 7minute mile when you get back to the states - HAH! sure. They also want me to climb to the highest peak in Mexico which is close by, and that would be taller than anywhere in the U.S. (minus Alaska) which also sounds totally awful, haha. (BTW for more information on the highest peaks in Mexico, see wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mountains_in_Mexico which will tell you that 4/5 of the tallest mountains in Mexico are found in Puebla (my state)).

So yeah, then Sunday we went to church with the Basiles again (yay church!) and during the service a couple renewed their vows, and it was so sweet. It was the first time the Pastor (Juan Manuel) said anything I disagreed with though, and he was talking about gay couples and how that was awful and how they are even allowed to adopt in some places and I was upset. I understand that homosexuality is not the way that God intended it, but I really want gay people to be able to raise children if that's where they are gifted! I mean, I would much rather have kids raised by a couple of wonderful gay men or women than have them raised by heterosexual drunk child neglectors, hello! Also, kids raised in gay households are 0% more likely to be gay, just in case that is an issue some try and talk about. They are a lot more likely to be okay with their sexuality, accepting of other people's sexualities and what not, but they are not more likely to be homosexual themselves. But yeah, back to the vow renewal. I just thought it was the sweetest thing, because the couple had been married by the state before and they wanted to make vows that included God this time. It was soooooo sweet and precious. You could tell they were so happy to be able to share that moment with everyone and it was really beautiful :). The pastor talked a lot about marriage and stuff, and of course I took notes, but I realized that I had heard all of what he said from Pastor Jeff about a thousand times already. So that was good, I was glad that Pastor Jeff had talked to us about all that. :) Yay Jeff!

After church Sandy (the mom) dropped us off at the grocery store and Liz and I bought the stuff to make 2 cheesecakes (oreo) and then we took the bus back to school, changed, got our homework, and then went over to the Basile's house to make the cheesecakes and do homework in the meantime. We ate lunch with them, met Matt's best friend Mark, made cheesecakes and hung out doing homework for awhile. It was a lot of fun and we didn't want to leave. Then we came home around 7 ish and gave the cheesecake (we left the other one with the Basiles for letting us use their oven - they seemed to like it :D) to Sandy (our suitie) who had just turned 18 on Saturday (but we weren't here). Then I went to my room, did homework and texted Matt for a little bit and then went to sleep because I was pooped.
This morning I got up at 6am, because I got like, 9 hours of sleep, and started doing some stuff on the computer. I also made myself some lime juice (hot) with honey to drink because my sinuses are about to explode into my throat and it hurts. I think it might have to do with getting water all up in my ear while rafting, idk. It also might have to do with the elevation and driving a total of 8 hours this weekend through crazy mountains lol. I would like to find my sudafed, which I know I brought because I had it on the plane, but I have noooooooooo idea where I put it. I might just have to run out and get some (but I realize I don't know where a pharmacy is). Maybe they have it at the clinic.

In any case, I should get going, I am in for it if I do not finish my reading for today and tomorrow like pronto! So I'll write soon.

Love and hugs,

Nora

p.s. pray for me:
Health
Homework (tons of reading)
Suite mates
Friends who talk to me in Spanish
The Basiles and our friendships with them :)
Liz and me
How much I use English