Oh the memories....

I can't sleep... So i shall do a but more...

I can't help but reminisce about the many places I have been.. How thankful I am for it all...







...First off....
Walla Walla, Washington... my birthplace... the name just rolls off my tongue, followed by giggles.. I love it... The land of Klickers Strawberries, perhaps the juiciest, most succulent berries I have ever and will ever taste... The Balloon Festivals... tons of beautiful hot air balloons slowly coming to life... arising from the ground.. Brightly colored, oddly shaped, we all stood out in the field, waiting...watching....





Next is Vancouver, Washington... Hazel Dell Little league... twirling on the sidelines of my brother's soccer and baseball games... climbing the fence to play with my neighbors... picking flowers in the huge meadow on the way home from school, getting stung by a bee and having my brother's friend, Brian kiss it better for me... playing all day... hours on end.. inside and outside... birthday parties with pinatas... endless games of Red Rover... climbing trees to be like my brother and getting stuck up at the top... climbing up the homemade fort and entering a whole new world, the crystal palace of my dreams complete with gingerbread sidings and never ending piles of candy-from M&Ms to Skittles to Tootsie Rolls... Cutting my own hair and it ending in disaster (in MY opinion it was pretty, but my mom looked on in horror)... Gymnastics and tumbling....
I also remember playing on the soccer field and having the soccer goal fall on a little boy who was climbing up on top of it..the metal bar on top crushing his abdomen... the ambulance was racing through the soccer field. I still remember the tense hush that enshrouded the field as no one could believe what had just happened/...... Another time, I was riding my tricycle around, saw a big poof of smoke in the air, along with a loud *PWANG!* like in movies, i pedaled around the corner, and saw a little red convertible with flames shooting out of it, licking the sky...... And Kyle telling me that Freddy Krueger lived across the meadow, lurking down in the tall grass, waiting for children to come his way so he could shoot them.... And the little band of mean black elves that lived in a small patch of trees near the meadow, he even brought home a huge butcher knife one day that seemed to have bits of crust, rusty blood on it....

Gig Harbor... Where do i start? Speed boat, flying around the Puget Sound, sometimes towing us kids in the intertube, past Bill Gate's mansion., underneath the Tacoma Narrows Bridge (where supposedly GIANT Squid reside I always squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that a giant tentacle wouldnt coil around ourboat, taking us under).... our beach house, on Sunrise Beach, spending hour after hour painting it, playing N64 inside with my brothers while rocking the cushy yellow chairs so hard we flipped them over, running as fast as we coiuld past the little ankle-nipping dogs that we had to pass in order to get to the rope swing... Blackberry picking opportunities at every turn... running down the street, yelling "THE MOO MOOS ARE COMING! THE MOO MOOS ARE COMING! QUICK! RUN INSIDE!!".... leaving cookies for the newspaper boy-Tom-who was my Sensai and worked backstage with Rachel and I... painting with our feet the "Techie Table"... Tossing bouncy ballls around the halls during passing time and lunch time... going to Sam's house and, for the first time ever, talking to boys... getting laughed at in my face as i asked a boy to go out with me... Sneaking into Rebecca's uncle's "secret closet" and finding his stash of Playboy (W.O.W.).... chasing Toby arond to put diapers and bonnets and dresses on the poor cat... Going on adventures down to Rite Aid to stock up on candy and spend the rest of the night eating it and submitting ourselves to sugar comas... Rachel and I going to the Renassance Fairs.... having fights with foam jousting swords... Kilt Boy (LOVE YOU KYLE~)... Emily and I interveiwing random people about Mrs. Chen (do YOU remember that Rachel?)..... playing Diablo for hours, loving the fact that poeple loved me for ME and my silly antics and quirky personality.. scouring the "Cut your own tree" Farms at Christmastime, finding the PERFECT treee, shouting "TIMBER!" and lugging it back to the house, setting it up and having it touch the top of the 13 foot ceiling...