An Update + Bookish Doings + Anne of Green Gables

The flowers blooming on trees nearby. So pretty!

Well, adventurers, I've been gone quite a while. There's no excuse, so I'll just get to the actual post. (Apologies can be somewhat bothersome anyway, can't they?) ;)

Life's been busy, but in a pretty good way. School, everyday errands, fun movies, games, books (BOOKS, people.), and other odds and ends. I'm kinda excited because spring is finally here, so it's getting warmer. And warmer means the pool opens. And the pool opening means I can swim! I used to take swimming lessons, and I really enjoy(ed) it, so I'm thinking of going to the pool and interweaving swimming (treading, free-style, butterfly, breaststroke, etc.) into my workout schedule. It's a really fun, great way to stay fit! Agreed? Agreed. I miss swimming, so this seems like it'll be fantastic. I'm gonna be looking for a new swimsuit... ;)

Aside from that, we've been trying to go hiking more often. We'll be acquiring some rock-climbing gear, and going rock climbing as well! Since Jesse (my older bro and the official rock climber in the family) moved a month or so ago to Colorado, we'll be climbing on our own. Ashley is actually really good at climbing herself (I plan on improving too, guys! ;) But I did do MY FIRST LEAD CLIMB the last time we went hiking with Jesse and his family. It was INCREDIBLE. I was so excited! Jesse thought I did really good for my first lead...), besides the fact that we're also planning on top-roping most of the routes we do, so climbing will also be coming along pretty soon! I'm excited to try harder climbs.

Moving onto BOOKS. The reading challenge I created for 2016 has been going pretty well. I am fifteen books into it. The last book I read was The Young Fur Traders by R.M. Ballantyne for the category A book written at least 100 years ago, which I just finished today. Gosh, some of Ballantyne's novels are so fun! The Young Fur Traders included. He really has a knack for descriptions - scenery and people. Somehow he manages to let you have a glimpse of someone's character without being overwhelming. And his descriptions of the beautiful North American mountain ranges and lakes really are well done... He writes about some things in such a way you can kind of tell he's done it or seen it. (Because he worked for the Hudson Bay Company, and Fur Traders is actually based off of his own experiences! That is SO cool!)

The rest of the books I've been reading? Here's the list.

The books I've read for the challenge so far:

A book set in a place you want to visit: Made to Last by Melissa Tagg
A book that is under 150 pages: Three Little Words by Melissa Tagg
A book set in your favorite time period: Prairie River by Kristiana Gregory
A book that has a main character that is your opposite gender: Renegade by Ted Dekker (This book annoyed me so bad. And then, of course, there was this part in the that brought me to tears. Or I was teary-eyed, at least. It was a fantastic part about God's love...for a character that had abandoned his friends and his mission and God even, in a way, to pursue power. It showed God's love for a renegade, someone who ran. And it's beautiful.)
A true story: End of the Spear by Steve Saint
A fictional book about a historical event: Iron Scouts of the Confederacy by Lee McGiffin
A book by a New York Times best-selling author: Blink of an Eye by Ted Dekker (This was so cool. I'm already thinking about a re-read. And I read it last month. That's how exciting it was!)
A book your friend recommends (and loved): The Princess Spy by Melanie Dickerson
A book that you read with/to a sibling or friend: Fighting the Flames: A Tale of the London Fire Brigade by R.M. Ballantyne, which I read to two of my siblings.
The first book in a series: The Sparrow Found a House by Jason McIntire
A mystery: Wild Rescue by Jerry B. Jenkins
A book you own but have never read: A Chance to Die by Elizabeth Elliot
A book you've already read once: Millie's Courageous Days by Martha Finley (updated by Kersten Hamilton. I love the Millie Keith series! I very highly recommend it!)
A book set in a country outside America: Take This Cup by Bodie and Brock Theone (Enjoyed this one! Lots of deep spiritual insight that I really liked picking up on.) 
A book written at least 100 years ago: The Young Fur Traders by R.M. Ballantyne 

To-read:

Some books I'm reading and/or considering for the challenge. (That's my Nook by The Columbus Code, which has Emma on it! :))

A book over 400 pages: Black by Ted Dekker (His books are exciting - which makes them a little dangerous. You have to take breaks while reading so you don't...well, keep reading? All day? 'Cause you probably would. ;))
A book with royalty in it, real or fantasy: Captives and Kings by Craig Parshall
A book that intimidates you: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (I am going to finish this one - finally!)
A nonfictional book: Facing Up by Bear Grylls
A book (going to be) published this year, 2016: This is going to be either (probably) Like Never Before by Melissa Tagg or A Boy and Wild Horses by Joanne Bischof. Probably the latter. (The first book in the Wild Air series, To Get to You, was so cute! <3)
A book you started and never finished: *inward groan* Probably going to be The Gorilla Hunters by R.M. Ballantyne. Maybe I'll switch it up... ;) (Which would be The Columbus Code or A Home for My Heart.)
A book with a beautiful cover: I don't know! I haven't seen any covers lately that I love, but maybe A Boy and Wild Horses will have a fantastic cover - I really liked To Get to You's! In that case, it would be Like Never Before or Where Hope Prevails by Janette Oke for A book (going to be) published this year!
A book made into a movie: Emma by Jane Austen
A book set in/about the outdoors: Facing the Frozen Ocean by Bear Grylls

And there's that! I keep wondering if one of Bear Grylls' books is going to pop up when my sister draws for me... So far, it hasn't! Maybe next time. (Because, yes! my sister and I draw for each other. We put all the book category numbers on pieces of paper, drop them in a hat, and pick. It's actually been really fun...)

One of my favorite scenes! <3

And Anne of Green Gables? I watched it recently! Yeah, I'd seen it before, when I was pretty young, so I didn't remember a lot of it, and what I did remember was people being mean to Anne - hence the fact that I didn't like it! But, I decided to re-watch it recently, and I found, happily, that it's actually pretty cute! I enjoyed it, and have even been contemplating watching it again... Seriously. And the first two are six hours long. ;) Gilbert is adorable, and Anne is fun (though a bit dramatic sometimes... ;)). Do I recommend it? Yep - if you like period pieces! Speaking of which, anyone up for Pride and Prejudice? I've been thinking of re-reading the novel, actually, because I don't remember much of it. I think that might be due to the fact that much of the time I was reading I was thinking of the scenes in the movie that corresponded with the part in the book that I was at... I AM going to re-read it sometime! Just so I remember... ;) And a friend of mine (Mikayla, I'm looking at you! ;)) just re-read it, so that kinda...encouraged, egged me on?... to re-read it too.

I put my hair up with one o' those snap-bun hair thingies yesterday! Yes, that's random. ;) But I really liked it! It's cute, and it keeps my hair and my bangs, specifically, out of my face ALL DAY. I would totally recommend getting one and using it. Pronto. ;) 

Besides all this randomness, I am planning on another post soon, so stay tuned! Oh, and I just bought two more books today... Chaos by Ted Dekker, which is the fourth book in his Lost Books series that my sister and I are currently making our way through. Also, From the Start by Melissa Tagg. I recently read Melissa's first novel, Made to Last, and have a feeling I'll be reading more of her books in the not-too-distant future... For now, however, my mom is going to read them. And then I might... ya know.

(I had two 20% off coupons for Barnes and Noble to use, so yeah... I guess you shouldn't give me a coupon that involves books if you don't want me to use it. ;))

Is it spring where you are? Swimming (or not swimming, I guess)? Are you doing the reading challenge (or any reading challenge) this year? What books do you have planned for that?

The Advenutres of Rock Climbing

Isn't the valley beautiful?

This post has been sitting in my Draft section on Blogger for...a long time. A really long time. Like, a year.

That's probably due to the fact that... I never thought the rock climbing outings that my family and I went on were worthy of a blog post. (That's just...me, I guess. ;))

However, a few weeks back, we took a trip to Vantage, Washington for one of the longest days I have ever spent hiking and rock climbing. It was pretty crazy. Adventurous. Plain standing-on-the-edge-of-a-cliff. Yeah, that last one...

I finally thought: This day is worthy of that blog post.

This blog post. The one you're reading right now.

This is it.

The story? Here goes:

5:36am on Sunday, January 31st, I woke up. (From this horrid dream about dinosaurs and Star Wars and robots all mixed into one. If you spend enough time with me, you'll probably find out that I do not like dinosaurs and robots. They kind of freak me out.) Anyways. I woke up and just stared at the clock, mostly, until 6:00am, the set time to get up for the soon-to-be-crazy day. I got ready, made sandwiches to take along, and at about 7:00am we marched out the door to drive to my brother's house.

8:30am: On our way to Vantage. It's a two hour drive. But it didn't feel that long. (I don't mind drives so much as I used to. 45 minutes used to be a long time to me. ;))

Random (not so random): I occasionally make notes of funny bits of conversation that happen among my family. This was one on the drive to Vantage:

Passing by a bunch of junkyard-worthy items and a trailer in a field-ish area:

Mom: "What a dump."
Ashley: "What an eyesore!"
Jeremiah (oblivious to our surroundings because he was playing a game on my mom's iPad), head popping up: "What?"
Mom: "All those campers and old trucks."
Ashley: "And a boat!"

Hahaaa!!! I just had to record that. ;) (The Memo app on my phone rocks - at least, to me. I use it quite frequently. You would find bits and pieces of scene ideas for my book on one of the note-pages. And many other random subjects...)

So, we're almost there (we arrived between 10:30am and 11:00am, I think). Most of what we were seeing was rolling hills and snow-capped mountains in the distance. But, THEN, we took a few turns and came upon this huge area that looked like a smaller version of the Grand Canyon. I think everybody was pretty surprised! It was beautiful there. We even passed by a waterfall quite a few hundred yards to the right beyond a wide valley. We were driving on the end of the canyon, a railing and a deep drop between us and the valley floor.

This was Vantage.

Long story short, we parked off to the side of the road, hiked up a short hill and through two rock walls, and did three climbs on the other side of those walls (after checking it out beforehand and using the restroom a little ways down the road. Worst bathroom experience of my life so far. That is all.). ;)

I ended up finishing one route on that wall. But this wasn't really what we came for. There was a rock wall called the Sunshine Wall (thus named because it stays in the sun all day long. Except when it's cloudy. More on that later.), and that was where Jesse had been planning on going before he ever even brought up this excursion. So we packed up, drove about one minute down the road (literally), and parked.

This was where things got crazy.

Since no one in our group had ever been to Vantage to climb or hike before, we didn't know exactly where we were going. Thankfully, a buddy of Jesse's (who also climbs) had a book on Vantage, which included climbing routes and the hiking trails. But, even so, we got lost! Took a wrong turn.We were right by the trail that actually led to the Sunshine Wall, but didn't realize it. (The trail was not incredibly visible from where we paused.) Hence us getting lost. Jesse found a trail in front of us a little ways and thought that was where we were supposed to go.

The cliff-trail. (That's actually me in the distance, followed by Jesse, and then Jeremiah, who's smiling off to the side.)

 But the trail was on the side of a cliff. It was pretty much a foot-and-a-half wide. (Yeah...)  We hiked on for a bit, assuming we would arrive sooner or later. Jesse finally stopped, looked at the book, and told us we had to turn back.

When we had made it back to where we originally were confused, some hikers came down from a trail on a hilly area and told us this was the way to the Sunshine Wall. There would be a tunnel through rock walls that we would climb through, and then five feet of down-climbing out of the tunnel you could 'shimmy' down (that
was the word the hiker used), then another bit of down-climbing.

So on we went, stopping for 20 minutes or so to make and eat oatmeal with my brother's new camping stove he had brought along. Then came the tunnel. (pictured below) Through it we went, having just enough room to make it through with backpacks still on our shoulders. (I got a new hiking/camping/climbing backpack from Jesse for Christmas. I gotta say, it's really cool having my own! And this was the first trip it had ever made. ;)) The down-climbing went all right, even with the fact of having to pass my niece, nephew, and our dog down.

Did I mention we brought our dog? ;)

Through the tunnel.

Around another bend and we had made it to the Sunshine Wall. We were walking along the side of a steep, steep hill with broken shards of rock all the way down. Looking out, what you see is a huge, horseshoe-shaped valley leading out to the snow-capped mountains with slowly moving windmills sitting atop. It was amazing. The climbing routes were all about eighty-feet tall. I attempted one, rated 5.8. I didn't make to the top. I think that was a mixture of the fact of me never having been up that high before, never having climbed a route that tall, and being a bit worn out from the day already. But I made it about halfway. AND THEN...

Jesse, Jackie, Ashley, Travis (the buddy of Jesse's that lent him the book), and I all went back to Vantage this last weekend. And it was fun! Although, it was rather cold... I didn't plan on it being cold - it as the Sunshine Wall, right? But it was cloudy, and windy, and brr-worthy. And I had dressed semi-light. Fortunately, Jackie had pulled out an extra winter coat and we had brought it along. All three of us girls shared two jackets, exchanging them when one of us went to climb. We finally sat next to each other with a rope bag on our legs - a windbreaker, people! ;)

This time I finished two climbs. *happy dance* A 5.6 rated chimney climb that wasn't too bad, and I conquered that 5.8 I hadn't finished before! I was so happy (and really proud of myself) when I got back down from that one. ;) I also cleaned it - my first time - which means I took down the anchor. Granted, it was really easy to do (slip the rope into two clips on the anchor, take the clips we had been using to hold the rope up off, clip those to my harness, and come down), but I was really nervous! I triple-checked it - and I was so nervous that, though I had already checked it probably two times, when I told Ashley, who was belaying me, to lower, I then shouted "Wait!" and checked it again. Yup. 

Climbing the 5.8 (the first time around)!

But I made it down safely.

The funny thing was, that I wasn't nearly as nervous about the height of the climb and the cliff as I had been the first time we went. I was actually pretty relaxed (climbing up to the actual climb - the belay spot - and just sitting when everyone else was climbing), and when I climbed I didn't really think about how high I was getting or even was at the moment. 

Overall, Vantage was an adventure I won't ever forget. 

And the sunset, back at where we parked. Gorgeous, isn't it?

(We came back from the second trip and ate steak and rice at my brother's house with the kids and my younger brother and mom, who babysat, and watched Antman - which, actually, pretty surprisingly, was a lot less dorky and ridiculous as I had at first made it out to be. I mean, a guy who shrinks and can take out people when he's the size of an ant!? But it was...sorta funny, and definitely not as intense as, say, Man of Steel was. Though Man of Steel is by far my favorite superhero movie. I got to watch it in theaters a few years back, and I came away amazed and totally hyper! Hehe...yes. I was soooo hyper. ;)) 

I plan on being back soon with a tag-post... So, be on the lookout for that. ;)

~Micaiah K.~

More tunnel.

The first view you get of the valley after exiting the tunnel.

The climbing walls! The climbs are either on the face of these pillars or in-between them - either in the crack next to it, or literally between two climbs.

A Bee and a Caterpillar - Photography

First of all, HAPPY JUNE!!! We are almost halfway through the year - can you believe it? This year has gone by so fast...

Also, I thought I'd drop in and share with you these pictures I got of a bee and a caterpillar - both while on vacation in the Seattle/Poulsbo area (though, on two different trips)! I was happy to grab these pictures while I could! :)

We found this little guy (well, multiple 'little guys', but this is just one caterpillar) at a park we went to in/near Poulsbo.

Showing the difference in size (of the caterpillar to my sister's finger...): ;)

And this bee I found on the sliding-door screen of a friend's house! He stayed still while I took the opportunity to take some pictures of him. ;)

Look at those weird blue eyes...

I'll have another post up as soon as...well, let's just stick with soon (hopefully within a few days). ;) It'll include some more pictures,  a bit of randomness, and a few updates of what I've been up to lately!

-Micaiah-