Whew, What a Busy Month

Wow! What a busy month I've had. I was just thinking about it and realizing just how busy I've been lately.

It all started when I was horse sitting. The lady Abby and I horse sit for has six horses, which isn't really a lot until you get into just how detailed you have to be about feeding them. Three of the horses food you have to let it soak down to mush so that they can eat it. And for one of those three you have to do it three times a day! So that meant going over there every four hours, just to feed one horse! I didn't mind doing it, in fact I enjoyed doing it, it was a just a big change from my lazy schedule of doing what I want, when I want. Course, I was getting fifty bucks out if it, which is always a good thing in my book. xP

So we horse sat for a week and then we came home and packed for the Live and Learn Conference, which we left for the next morning bright and early! Mom, Audrey, and Cece had already left for Tennessee with Deana and Kelsey so it was just me, Abby, Dad, Ben, and Benji in the car (Nick had been in NC for a week already so we didn't have to worry about him).

We got to Asheville in the early afternoon on Sunday and checked in at our resort, were we later met the ladies, who'd been in Tennessee visiting Kel's family. We went out to dinner that night at http://www.thelobstertrap.biz/, the food was delicious, everyone was insanely nice, and there was good live music. He even sang No Woman, No Cry! Quite possibly my most favorite song ever, and definitely my most favorite song by Bob Marley. All in all it was probably the best time I've had out at dinner in a long time.
Monday we walked around Asheville for a couple of hours in the late morning/early afternoon and had a blast! Kel and I found this really cool shop that if Monk never would be able to go in. Lol. It was very cramped and disorderly with loads of cool stuff. Kel got the most awesome pair of pants! And Deana got a matching pair. We also found this Indian store that had the coolest music, clothes, bags, jewelry, and sculptures of the Buddha and such things. I ended up going home with a tote and a CD called Asian Massive. It's an awesome CD.
For lunch we went to a little diner that had 8oz. Glass Coke Bottles that you actually needed a bottle opener to open! It's amazing the little things in life that fascinate and amuse you. Needless to say Kel and I loved 'em. We brought them home, but I'm not sure were they went in the excitement of the conference, and the chaos of unpacking. Oh well, I'm sure they'll turn up. Maybe when I move out...

Tuesday Dad, Audrey, Abby, Cece, and I went to Biltmore, were we met up with Deana and Kelsey. It was so much fun! I'm a HUGE history buff, and it was cool seeing the HUGE house. More of a castle really, it was crazy. The dining room was my favorite room, it was big (I think length wise my house could have fit in it :o) and had really high ceilings. Like, really high. Probably thirty, forty, feet up. It made me think of Running With Scissors when Augusten and Natalie decide they need to higher ceilings so they put a hole in the kitchen ceiling. I feel the same way, I need high ceilings for all of my crazy Monkey Gemini ideas to float around in. As well as my angry poet ideas, or maybe temperamental poet is a better description. I'm not really an angry person...Anyway, I'm getting off topic. After we toured the house we walked around the gardens, then we went down to the wine tasting. But before we got the to wine tasting we got to look around were they make the wine and champagne and learn how it was made. I wasn't really interested since I don't like wine or champagne, but the tanks were huge. That much I remember. Then we went to the wine tasting, were Deana and Dad were mistaken for a couple and Cece, Kel, Audrey, Abby, and I their kids. So that was the joke for the rest of the day. The grape juice they gave us, the kids, was really good.
After the wine tasting (or rather grape juice drinking) we went down to the farm yard and saw the Draft Horses, the sheep, the goats, the donkeys, the chickens, and the peeps. They were so cute! And, of course, I loved the horses. Big Belgian Draft horses named Bert and Ernie. They were sweethearts.
Ten minutes later we went up to the creamery and bought some ice cream. Then we got wrapped up in watching the blacksmith make a key chain, it was so cool! It started as a metal rod about two feet long and 1/4 of an inch thick and he turned it into a leaf key chain! I ended up getting one in the gift store. So finally, after many fun hours at the Biltmore we headed back to the resort, happy and fun filled. That evening we learned a dance to Crank That, which we decided to perform in the talent show.

Wednesday dawned and we packed up early and headed to the conference. Yay! Finally! When we got there we checked in and then went up to our cabin. About half an hour later Mom called me and told Audrey, Kelsey, and I to meet her and Dad at Lee Hall to start setting up for the Tye-Dying. So we walked up the treacherous hill that we learned to hate (and love) over the next five days. Once to Lee we started mixing dyes, setting up tables, filling buckets, all that good pre-tye-dye stuff.
At 12:30 we headed down to lunch (which wasn't actually that bad in my opinion), and then back up the hill to guard the stuff while Mom and Dad went down to lunch. At 1:30 they craziness started. We then proceeded to tye-dye for the next five hours! I am not kidding you, I think I met everyone there in the first five hours of the conference.
Dinner that night was disgusting, I don't even want to know what kind of seasoning they put on the chicken cause it almost made me consider going vegetarian. Which is a big deal for someone like me! xD That night was The Rocky Horror Picture Show. You have no idea how much that movie means to me. It's a chance to dress up with very fun, revealing, clothing and act like a tramp without being arrested. And it was great fun because we not-drag queens kicked the drag queens off stage merely because we're better than them. Then we danced along, sang along, and yelled obscenities at the screen. Who wouldn't have fun?

Thursday I went to the letterboxing workshop and bugged my good buddy Danielle while meeting a new buddy I'd made friends with online. I also made my tassel belt for the belly dancing workshop, which I took later that day. And can I just say Wow! It was American Tribal Belly Dancing and it was amazing! And so much fun! I loved it. I'm now looking for a belly dancing place here in MD. They converted me. Bad Mindy, bad Andy! Lol. I then walked with Danielle and Jules down to the talent show, were Danielle ditched us to go write clues for the letterboxing and notes for her talk the next morning. I know, she's a terrible excuse maker. I should offer her lessons....

Friday I hung out with Em and Jules all day. I love those kids. Hell, I love that family. They're an awesome bunch of people that I am so blessed to live near. And poor me, I can't see them every Monday anymore due to work. :'( But that Friday we played in the steam (creek?), went to funshops, hung out at their cabin, and goofed off until that afternoon when I went to Wal Mart to buy some stuff for my Fairy God Child, as well as some glow sticks for Sam, Emily, and Julia. And myself. xD That night was Belly Dancing in the talent show night, as well as the Crank That dance. It was fun, I love being on stage and entertaining people. Then I gave the girls their glow sticks and slipped one on Danielle's head.

Saturday I once again was at Danielle's letterboxing, only this time I wasn't making a stamp and I wasn't bugging her, I was just there because I had nowhere else to sit and knit. Or so I thought at the time, but see it turns out Fate had me sitting there so that my Long Lost Monkey Twin Sister Diana would come up and talk to me. The beginning of a beautiful friendship. That night was the dance and I was pumped for a night of dancing and making Danielle head bang damn it! Surprisingly I succeeded in making Danielle head bang, it was only once but I did win! Mwhahaha. And surprisingly, I didn't get to dance the night away because my knee started hurting something terrible and I had to sit down and knit. Which made no never mind to me, except that I had really wanted to dance. But Danielle did fret a little (don't deny it), which always makes me feel loved. And no sarcasm would've been in that sentence had you been listening to me instead of reading it. After a couple of hours of hanging out down at the dance with the adults, which involved knitting, duck duck goose, some burping causing Danielle to gag and almost throw up, and just hanging out talking I went up to Diana's cabin for a coupla hours. I was going to dread her hair, but seeing as how we didn't have a flea comb I couldn't and therefore just hung out. It was great fun, but at 2:30 I was so exhausted that I had to leave and collapse in my own cabin bed before collapsing on her floor.

Sunday dawned a sad day. The conference was ending that day. So sad. Alyssa, Cece, and I raided Diana's cabin and ate her food, drank her drinks, and failed miserably at guitar hero. That afternoon was the good bye picnic. We only stayed for a little while before leaving, we had a long drive home and we just wanted to get in the car and sleep. Except Nick, who was content to stay with his er....friend for the rest of time. Or at least longer then we planned on staying.

The drive home was miserable. They were okay when we were little because we could all fit with no problem, therefore we could sleep with no problem, but we're all basically five feet tall (except for Cece) and the seven of us can't fit in a seven seater van with shit packed in all around us for eight hours without getting miserable. Course, Mom would probably say it was possible if we just wanted to not be miserable, but I haven't mastered that technique yet so I was miserable. When we pulled in at 12:15 I was grateful for my bed.

The next two days were days of getting into our fall schedules. I coached some 5,6, and 7 year olds Monday night and had dance class after that. Tuesday I just kinda hung out and lazed around. We all felt a little bad from something we think Nick's buddy Alec gave to us, so we were also all a little stuffy and headachey. Then on Wednesday was my first day of work. At my first job. I've now been working there three days and they already love me. Lol. And no, I'm not making that up. My boss Allison told me madre when she picked me up on Friday. I have this amazing gift for charming the right people, and I don't even know how I do it. I just know I have a gift of charm. Or something like charm. Mommy says it's just because she and Dad breed well, which you can't deny.

So that's my crazy month. New friends, a new job, and a much busier schedule. I feel like I've been thrown that much farther into the adult world this past month. I'm going to start learning how to drive sometime in the near future (hopefully) and this time next year I'll be two days away from getting my license. As long as I don't grow up completely I'm okay with that.

Oh, and a funny side note. I was in JoAnn's today looking at yarn and my pants ripped almost completely in half. I am not kidding you my whole flippin' ass was hanging out. It was so funny. So I had to walk around with my shirt pulled down over my butt. And to top it off I really had to pee. Story of my life. Lol.

<3
Olivia