This school really needs to get over it's religious-like devotion to the grass on campus. Okay, I can handle not walking on the quad. Heck, I'll even stand them mowing the grass every day the temp gets above 40 and it's not raining. But must we manure every spot of non-sidewalked ground on campus?! Honestly, I'm just glad there's none outside my window today...I can't imagine having to keep my windows closed on a 70 degree day. Really Mrs. Paxton. Your obsession over dating & marriage is enough...just let the grass issue go!

A good reminder passed on to me from Dani:

Girls are like apples on trees. The best ones are at the top of the tree. The boys don't want to reach for the good ones because they're afraid of falling and getting hurt. Instead they just get the rotten apples that are on the ground that aren't as good but easy. So the apples at the top think that there is something wrong with them, when in reality, they are amazing. That is why we just have to be a little patient and the right boy, the one who takes a chance to find the good, right apple will come someday....

Well, the vacation has drawn to a close, and in true Erin & Malinda style we have procrastinated on just about everything: homework, packing, and yes, updating my website. Sorry for the delay. I'm sure you were all waiting anxiously to hear more of our exciting adventures.

Vacation post for 4-18-03
Friday started out bright and early (we were both up by 6am). We spent the day at a local middle school observing for our Psychology of the Exceptional Child class. Malinda has noticed that early mornings are a common theme (along with spiders) in this vacation. I had fun coloring pictures in the morning with children who have been labeled mentally retarded. Malinda got to play the memory game with some children with learning disabilities. In the afternoon she joined me for Easter egg coloring. Although we didn't get too much practical observation (what do you expect for the Friday before their vacation?), it was still fun to meet the kids.
After school, my friend Danielle and I took Malinda candlepin bowling. For those of you not from New England, it involves 10 pins the width of the thinnest part of a big pin. The bowling balls are about the size of a grapefruit and don't have holes in them. Malinda did very well, and even beat my score the second game! It was a lot of fun and I'm sure there will be some interesting pictures from that event. We ended the night with dinner and a movie at my house. We watched Minority Report and Malinda slept through about half of it (too complex and too late for her to stay awake on a long day).

Vacation post for 4-19-03
Saturday was spent mostly in the car, but it was still very fun. My parents took us up to Maine for the day, and we had a great time. After Dad got himself un-lost, we visited the Nubble Lighthouse and York Beach. We had lunch at a great seafood restaurant and then walked around historical downtown Portsmouth, NH. After a nice nap on the way back, we decided it might be a good idea to crack down and start some work. It made for a long, tiring evening, but at least we were productive. Malinda would also like to point out that at this time she talked to Emily on IM for a while. It was the highlight of her evening.

Vacation post for 4-20-03
Easter Sunday was another bright and early morning. I was up at 5:45 and the whole family was out the door by 6:30 for the sunrise service with our Bible study gang. It was great to see everyone again and we had a fun time of fellowship. Malinda dazzled me with her amazing power of learning names. In just about an hour she had about a dozen new names down pat. After we had some time to get ready and then it was off to church. The service was very nice and it was good to see all my Riverside friends one last time before heading out. This afternoon was very lazy. We did some work, watched Rush Hour, cleaned up the space on our computers, had a wonderful Easter dinner and enjoyed some carrot cake in honor of my upcoming 21st birthday. All in all, it's been a great vacation and we both have many memories (and pictures) to take with us.

But for now it's time to finish packing and make the long trek back to good old Grove City. However, that means seeing all our wonderful Grover friends, like my dear roomie Skippy!!!

Vacation post for 4-17-03
Today was a pretty normal day. We slept in (again) and spent the afternoon shopping at Old Navy and visiting CCS. After a nice drive through rural NH we went out to T.G.I. Fridays with my parents. The evening was spent looking through (as Malinda puts it) "adorable baby pictures of Erin."

Vacation post for 4-16-03
What an absolutely fantabulous day! Our morning started around 7 a.m. We caught the 8:30 bus from Manchester to Boston. Unfortunately there was an accident on the NH/MA border, so we had to take some back roads and the trip took about 1 hour and 45 minutes. However, we arrived in South Station okay and after a little bit of confused wandering, found our way to the Red Line. Malinda and I had so much fun finding our way around Boston on the T. We only took the wrong train once, and that is just because it was poorly labeled. Malinda attributes our success to my amazing directional skills, but I think it was a team effort. I have decided that my favorite line is the Blue line and I can't stand riding on the Green line. Avoid it if you can!

Our first major stop was to the New England Aquarium. Malinda got to see oodles of penguins and that made her very happy. =) The cool thing about it is that you can see the penguins from almost anywhere in the aquarium. We also saw a 600 lb turtle, icky jellyfish, massive fish, and like 6 million elementary school children! It was just another confirmation that I don't want to be an elementary school teacher and was even enough to make Malinda hesitant about taking field trips with her future students. However, it was a lot of fun and we saw some very interesting creatures.

After that, we caught the T up to North Station and took a ferry boat down to the southern piers. If you have not ridden on a boat in Boston harbor, we highly recommend it. I think it was one of Malinda's favorite parts of the day. We felt like we were in some sort of movie. It wasn't as cool as the Sr. Semi boat, but still a lot of fun and a gorgeous day for it! The southern piers smell very strongly of fish (big surprise, I know). We ate a late lunch at the No Name Restaurant on Fish Pier Street, which is a great place with amazingly cheap prices and a nice atmosphere. Malinda enjoyed shrimp and I had some scrod.

After a great lunch, we walked across the bridges towards South Station (took a couple tries before we found the right building). We took the T over to the Prudential building (or the "Pru"). This was also a lot of fun. We went up to the 50th floor and enjoyed the view of the city from their skywalk. We saw sailboats Charles River, the Hatch Shell on the Esplanade where the Pops play for the 4th of July, Fenway Park, the Harbor, the Commons, and lots of other cool places.

Our last stop for the day was Fanieul Hall & Quincy Market. Here we unexpectedly ran into the GCC Touring Choir. You just can't escape those Grovers! There are lots of little shops in that area, and we had fun looking at the different shirts, gifts, and unusual tourist souvenirs. We made our way back to South Station, where I introduced Malinda to the joy that is Strawberry Creamsicle Coolattas. The bus ride home only took 50 minutes and we spent most of it napping, our feet glad for the rest!

The evening ended with a visit to my dear friend Dani to wish her a happy 19th birthday. We swapped presents and laughs and enjoyed delicious desserts made by Jamie and Dani's mom. Needless to say, Malinda and I both slept well last night!

Vacation post for 4-15-03
Hmm...so between our busy schedule and the internet being down for a day, we have been slacking on the posting. But as Malinda just reminded me, that's what break is for! So, what do we remember about Tuesday? It was hot on Tuesday. We spent the morning in downtown Manchester waiting for my car's CD player to be installed. We ate breakfast at the Merrimack Restaurant, a local hot spot frequented by presidential candidates. Although we never saw anyone famous (except for ourselves), there were pictures of Bush, Clinton, Gore, and others taken from the restaurant. Then we went over to the library to get some work done. We passed through several memorial parks and saw many pigeon-covered statues for WWI and WWII. The library had some interesting characters in it...to say the least! And there were many people rushing in to pick up their tax forms at the last possible second. Ah, procrastination! So after we picked up my car, we both enjoyed some nice loooong naps! I went to the eye doctor to get a routine checkup. My eyes are still the same (20/200 in my right eye and 20/600 in my left eye)...blind as a bat! =) After that Malinda & I had fun at Wal-mart & Kinkos. Malinda was excited at the lack of tax and the good prices she found at Kinkos (there's the nicest guy who works there). The evening was spent relaxing and planning our trip to Boston.

Vacation post 4-14-03
Well, today was an interesting day. I slept till 11:30 and Malinda was up around 10. It was the most sleep both of us have gotten in a loooooong time. We tried to be productive. We wanted to be productive. Yet somehow...we failed miserably! The time just sort of ran away from us...we're not really sure what happened. I read some depressing Am Lit selections and Malinda searched the internet twice over for a good case study for her Psyc class (no luck so far). We picked up my car, which now has fully-functional brakes. On the way back, I saw Mom getting lost, yet she still managed to beat us back home...go figure! We went for a nice walk before dinner, and even displayed our explorer side through a brief detour in the woods. After dinner we looked through Renee's pictures from her trip to Jamaica (14 rolls, 360 pictures, all in 7 days...Mike, I think she has you beat...although no grass pictures). Lots of laughs and such tonight. We watched Finding Forrester and were semi-productive as well.

However, the day was not lacking in drama! Malinda says I'm her new hero now. I was sitting here checking my email, minding my own business when suddenly I hear "Erin, I think you should come over here." I walk towards the kitchen where I see Malinda intently staring at a spot in the middle of the floor. As I rounded the counter, I realized that there was a spider the size of a half dollar calmly chilling on the floor. Malinda was hoping that she was halucinating or that it was dead. However, I had just walked through the kitchen not five minutes earlier and knew that this could not be the case. Spiders freak me out. They are just gross and should not be allowed in NH. And to be honest with you (don't tell Malinda I said this), I think she's bringing all these bugs up here. This is the third bug encounter we've had in 2 days. And with the increase in size, I'm nervous for what tomorrow's events hold. But I digress... So I knew that Malinda wouldn't kill the spider and I wasn't going to chance it sitting still while I woke Dad up. So I took a glass from a cabinet and slowly walked around to behind the spider. Then I attempted to close the glass over the spider. It moved at the last minute, but I still managed to get it without suffering mortal wounds or a heart attack. So at that point we had a spider under a glass in the middle of our kitchen floor! I grabbed a piece of computer paper and slid it under the glass, creating a type of container. With Malinda's help I brought it outside and threw the spider and paper into the bushes by the porch. The paper is still out there. I'm not getting it back! So now we're terrified to sleep and I'm beginning to consider Emily's theory on spider family revenge a bit more seriously. Who knows what tomorrow holds!

Vacation post 4-13-03
Erin's thoughts:
Well, we've been home for about 26 hours now. The trip was pretty eventless. Malinda & I had some fun conversations on the way up. We managed to get Skippy (the fish, not Emily) here safely...didn't find him soffocated or boiled from being in the car all day. Malinda was a great navigator and even set the image design on my cell phone. (We opted to not use the "Robert Frost" image). We stopped down in Fitchburg for some coffee and "real smiles" from Jay, which was fun. Then on to NH! It was good to be back home and see my family and also to share it with Malinda =)
Today we went to my church, saw all my crazy-go-nuts church friends, enjoyed some good old-fashioned pot luck lunch (there must have been 20 crock pots). After we helped Renee pick out a dress for her Jr/Sr Semi and then went to Methuen to see "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" at the IMAX Theatre. A late dinner and two tired chicas proved to be a humorous and messy experience. I'm sure we'll have more fun stories as the week goes on!

Malinda's thoughts:
So far I'm loving New England! Fortunately the car ride did not seem neear as long as I thought it would be...pretty uneventful trip but at least the weather was gorgeous and sunny. After lots of talking, CD's, sermon tapes, and meeting Jay at Barnes and Noble, we finally made it to Erin's house. But before that we stopped to get a picture of me standing in front of the 'Welcome to New Hampshire' sign (the first of many pictures i will have from this trip :) For those of you who have never been here let me tell you that this area is absolutely lovely! Erin's family is great and are definitely making me feel right at home. I got a personal tour of Erin's house last night, had dinner with her family, and got lots of sleep! It was great to just turn my brain off and relax! We've kept ourselves pretty busy today, but it's been lots of fun! Went to church this morning and met a few of Erin's friends, who seem to be very neat girls (and "spazzy" according to Erin :) Anyway this afternoon we went shopping at New Hampshire's biggest mall, and I found out that this state has lots of neat stores that are nonexistent in PA...I'm jealous. I got a fun pair of sock at the mall with froggies on them because i forgot mine at erin's house (the froggies made me think of emily so that made me happy :) Then we went to a "real" movie theater as erin would say and saw "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" which i think is definitely a cute movie. Then we were back at Erin's house for the night and let's just say don't let erin and I in the kitchen alone anymore...could be a dangerous combination. We're attemting homework tomorrow, but i'm sure we'll have some humorous study breaks in there as well. But for now I'm looking forward to sleeping in!!

As soon as I get out of this class, I will not have another one for 12 whole days! Happy Easter Break everyone!!! =)

Well I have no idea who wrote this song, but I love it and it is a favorite in IV, so I thought I'd post part of the lyrics.

Waterfall
Oh my Savior, I give You glory
My Redeemer, my God and King
There is no one O so holy
As the One who sets me free

I can't think of anywhere, anywhere
I would rather be more than with You
I can't think of anything, anything
I would rather do than to give You glory
Holy Spirit, speed the hour
I will shout outloud the message
"Freedom is coming and the kingdom is now"

Let Your rain fall down, all around
Let the thunder sound, shake the ground
Let the waterfall pound, breaking down
All the lies You found under me
Let the sightless see, let them see
Set the bound ones free, set them free
Water fall on me, waterfall
I have sought Your heart, hear me call