Snow Day, Holiday Concert, Last Day of School and Joe Dumar's

All in all, a fun week.


So, on Monday when we had no school because of the snow, all of us kids went to this big sledding hill with Doug. It was so much fun - the hill was really steep on the side we went down and Courtney and I had a sled together so we were even faster... my butt hurt a couple days after that though coz there were some really mean bumps in the ground.
Tuesday was one of my best days ever. Not because we had school again... the snow day was very nice of course ;) ... but it was the day of our holiday concert in which I was going to play with Symphony Band as a flutist and with Jazz Band as the piano player. Since the Symphony Band is split (one half in 5th hour, one half in 6th) we were supposed to have a combined rehearsal in 5th and 6th hour on Monday - which didn't happen because of the snow day. So we had a shorter combined rehearsal on Tuesday in 6th hour. In the beginning of the hour, I had just put my flute together, one of the teacher aids came over to me and told me that Mr Conaton wanted me in the office. So I went there, expecting something about Jazz Band (I was right about that) and when I entered the office, Mr Conatan goes "Maria! I have some music for you!" And I was like "... Music?" "Yes, for tonight!" "Oh..." "You think you can learn it by then?" "I really don't know..." "You know what, why don't you just take this hour to practise in one of the practise rooms and I'll come and help you so then you'll be fine for tonight." "... This hour." "Yes, this hour. What are you doing right know?" "Erm, playing the flute?" "Aaaah right. Well, anyways, just take this hour to practise this." Oookay. This one big American thing: spontaneity. So I did as I was told, practised that piece full of chords (I always hated chords... they make me mess up), didn't get to practise with the whole Symphony Band, went home after school, got home at like, 2.40, ate, packed my stuff and had to be back at the school at 3.30 to pick up my uniform. After that, I went back home (Doug gave me rides all day, I felt bad for kinda surprising him with that), changed into my concert uniform and shortly after that, we had to leave again because I had to be at JAPAC (John Armstrong Perfoming Arts Center, belongs to the Pankow, a building that belongs to L'Anse Creuse and has some of its classes in there, it's about a 15 to 20 minutes drive from L'Anse Creuse I think) at 4.30. At JAPAC, we (meaning the members of Jazz Blue - the Jazz Band I'm in - who had to be there first) set up everything first and then we rehearsed a little - that's when I actually finally got that new piece although it still was far away from perfect. After that, we kinda hung out and watched Jazz White and the Hand Bell Choir rehearse. The concert started at 7 and Jazz Blue were second to perform after the Hand Bell Choir. I was really nervous, but then when we started playing, I just had so much fun that I calmed down and everything went really good, even that piece I had only known for one day. We played "Silent Night", "What a Wonderful World" and "Feliz Navidad". After our perfomance, we had to get right back to the back room were we kept our stuff and were the Symphony Band had already set up for tuning and a last rehearsal before our performance. Then after the intermission, we got out on the stage to perform "Christmas Calypso", "Nimrod" and "Hallelujah Chorus". It was awesome.
After this perfomance which was my last for the night, we kinda just hung out in the lobby of the JAPAC, talking, messing around, having fun and all that. Gary was their, too, to drive his sister home later I guess. The whole night was just amazing. I don't like the uniforms for the girls though - they kinda look like dresses but are actually pants which is comfy and sweat-pants-like but it looks kinda weird. And they make every single girl, no matter how skinny, look pregnant.
Oh, and I also got my christmas gift from Sam on Tuesday :) it was a USA flag and a baseball - so cool! I'm gonna put that up in my room in Germany somewhere.
Wednesday was our last day of school. I had a Chemistry quiz and a Precalc test and because of the concert, I didn't really study for any of those... but I think it still went pretty well. Later that day, I talked to my mom on the phone.
I don't think anything exciting happened on Thursday...
Yesterday, Courtney and I did the rest of our christmas shopping. Sheila gave us a ride to a new mall around here - I love that mall, it's kinda like an outside mall and really pretty. And they have an H&M store, and a Claire's, and a reaaaaally really cool store called Love Clture (yup, without the first u) which has incredibly cute clothes. I didn't buy clothes though because we spent all our time on christmas presents... but next time I need clothes, I'd like to go back there again. Oh, and they also have a Levi's store.
Sheila met us in the mall when she came back from taking Michaela to a birthday party and we finished our shopping. When we went out to the parking lot, we suddenly saw the van moving as if it had been hit by something really hard - and yes, a girl, probably younger than me, had hit Sheila's van. Her dad just arrived on the scene that moment, too and so Sheila and he figured everything out... that girl left a big dent in the van, though.
The car still worked though, and on our way back home we stopped at Walmart for some last christmas gifts and groceries.
After dinner, Courtney and I went to bed right away because last night, we had our Youth Group Lock-in at Joe Dumars, some kind of sports and activities center. I got up at 9pm, and around 9.30, Sheila drove us to Ashley's house (that's where we had that pool/hot tub party in summer where I met Meaghan). Some of Ashley's friends, including Meaghan, were already there. Later, Ashley's mom took us all to Joe Dumars where we were locked in with our Youth Group and a couple other groups from 12 midnight to 5.30am. It was okay, there was a lot to do but unfortunately, Meaghan and I were kinda the only ones our age there. Well, except for the employees maybe. So we just hung out together, talked a lot, spent some time DDRing, kinda non-seriously played volleyball with the others in between, did the minigolf course and played lasertag with the other girls. Oh my god. That is definitely one of the most FUN games ever! We probably have it in Germany but I never noticed it. I thought I'd probably be really bad, and there were some guys playing who were showing off and telling us that they were going to shoot all of us, and then I ended up getting 2nd place ;) hehe... not bad for my first lasertag game ever!
About an hour before the end of the whole thing, when everyone was pretty tired, we found some of the ex-Thecla girls (who had been at Ashley's house earlier) talking to those 3 black guys in the volleyball area, so we joined them and had a pretty funny conversation because Meaghan's sister Sarah was talking a looot because she was so tired and everyone was making fun of her.
Doug picked us up in the morning, we arrived home around 6. I ate something because I was really hungry and then I went to bed and slept until about 1.15 pm.
In the afternoon, we cleaned the house and I helped Sheila with some cooking for the next days (all the christmas celebrations). Later, I wrapped christmas presents with Courtney. Now they're all under the tree already :)
Tonight, we watched Pirates 3 all together. I LOOOOOVE that movie. Although the first 2 are better. But this one's pretty awesome, too.
And nooow I gotta go to bed.

Happy Birthday, Ronja! Hope you had a wonderful 8th birthday :) :-*