Winterfest!!!

This past weekend I got to go down to Arlington, Tx for a youth conference called Winterfest. So we took the "prison bus" and a van down through Salina, Ks where we stopped at a church/ghetto motel type thing and stayed overnight Thursday. Then we drove the rest of the way on Friday and stayed at this motel a hop, skip, and jump away from six flags. And as we were driving, a brilliant idea popped into my head when I saw the Colleyville sign and was like "OH MY GOSH! Maybe I can visit my aunt!!!!" And BAM I was workin like a mad-lady callin my mom gettin numbers and all that meanwhile I'm unpacking and scrambling to get to Praise Team practice at the convention center. I finally call my aunt and she didn't recognize me at first and it kinda made me laugh but we knew we'd try to work something out since it had been at least 3 years since we'd seen each other.

Sidenote to story: This was such a huuuuge deal to me since Aunt Chris is like one of my closest aunts. When I was little, she would hang out with me all the time and fix my hair and let me play with her pom-poms. I felt like the luckiest girl ever and knew that I was loved. As time passed, we both got busier, things happened, I got old, she got married and had kids etc etc. and we just haven't been around each other and I've missed her sooooooo much. Like she's been my role model forever-and still is. So this is why this was major.

Anyways, continuing on: I was already half sick/lost my voice which was perfect of course since I sang (ok so i eventually had to lip-sync) in front of 4 thousand kids. But I did it and nothing really happened that anyone knew that I wasn't singing. That night Holly and I adventured to a gas station to get snacks and cold medicine...good times haha. Next morning, I venture out with all the adults on a quest for coffee. Holly must have been tired cause she drove...well...lets just say it's good there weren't pedestrians on the street corners and we were sure to check some curbs...But we finally found Panera and I got my coffee fix just in time took book it back to the convention center to sing. There were some really neat lessons, but then Holly, Amanda, Aunt Kari and I went to eat at a bbq place and ditched more....lol. It was awesome and Kari is a crazy driver we all about died laughing. Then finally I got to see Aunt Chris, Uncle Christopher, and my cousins Weston and Taylor. And oh my goodness Weston has grown soooo much!!! I loved seeing them both and getting to interact with them. They both seemed to like me from what I could tell which made me really happy. Taylor was a hoot we would sit on the kitchen floor and he'd crawl over to me :) After our short but AMAZING reunion, I had to go back and Chris still had twenty-million things to do-I don't know how she does it-she's amazing! Then I went back and saw my old youth minister and all his family which was really hard because I miss them sooooo much but I'm glad they're doing ok in Fort Smith.

Now, Saturday night was CRAZY. I was up in Holly's room and some kids were out around 1ish at buffalo wild wings eating late dinner/really early breakfast and I was the only one up in Holly's room she was in the shower. I look outside to see who's out there in the parking lot and whether I could go downstairs to my room pretty soon. And I find this guy sitting in his car with a big black stick and he's just tappin it in his hand and was out there for a good 45 minutes and then there were these gang kids and we found out that there were cocaine deals going on downstairs as well as a prostitute. So needless to say everyone was freaked out and we won't be staying at the Ranger Inn next year. I'll write more gotta go!