oh yeah.
That's what I have to say about this year's tour. I was a little doubtful at first, about the whole shortened tour/11 hour bus ride down to Georgia and back, but IT WAS WORTH IT!
5:30, Wednesday morning, our fearless team pulled out of the church parking lot. The long drive down was actually not THAT extensive, and we definately found ways to amuse ourselves. We played card games, word games, electronic games, musical chairs, and extreme makeover. Emily had this awesome (and slightly addictive) lip gloss called "Lip Inflation" that make your lips tingle and well....supposedly become more voluptuous. Anyway, the vibrations of the bus evidently affected the mental capacity of several guys in the car, and they allowed us to paint their lips with the feminine concoction.

Our first stop was at Sam's church--and I enjoyed every bit of it. The weather was gorgeous (70-80 degrees!!!) and Sonnie, Danielle F., and I stayed with Danielle Alexander and her mom--the awesomest people ever. They live in part of this totally sweet cotton mill, provided 2 pizzas for our consumption, (as well as a loverly breakfast the next morning) and made us feel completely comfortable and at home.
Yeah Dani!

Anyway, after singing for their church then their school, we visited an army base thing also known as the "home of the infantry" pretty interesting and awesome--They showed us the towers where the airborne guys get dropped with their parachutes, and took us to the museum there. I enjoyed it and I didn't get lost. Hoowah!

Later, we left for Shiloh Hills Christian School to attend their dinner theatre.We got there pretty early and amused ourselves outside for at least 20 minutes.

It was absolutely beautiful--until Joey ate a worm for 2 dollars and Luke decided to roll down the rather steep hill in his khaki pants. But about the play---Hmmm... I guess I laughed a lot...(I'll leave the explanation to someone more capable than I. But for those of you who have experienced the movie "Prehisteria III", this had many amazing simalarities.

The next day we sang for their school chapel. They were nice. Among the people we met however, were two "Jesus girls" and Caleb. Somehow the latter ended up with our e-mail addresses after a 2 min. conversation. Maybe he just needs friends?
Oh my. That afternoon we got back on the bus for a drive to Mammoth Cave. And no (much to Emily's surprise) it is not shaped like a Mammoth. The tour guide was really friendly, and seemed to enjoy talking. We'd start out talking about the cave and end up discussing the atmosphere, war, and his childhood.

It was fun though. It was so weird to think that I was underground---and to see (literally) the acres of rock ceiling that was high above our heads. I asked the tourguide if he had ever gotten any strange questions about the cave.
"How much of the cave is underground?"
"How much of the cave is still undiscovered?"
These were only two of them (both asked --surprisingly--by females) No one in our group added to his collection of dumb questions however, although a certain someone was paranoid of bats, sudden noises, sudden movement, lung cancer, and the whole cave in general. Hehe--Emily--what would we do without you? With the aid of her vast scientific research, our group also came to the revolutionary discovery that the ostrich was the fastest flying bird in the world. But anyway, back to the cave. We visited one place in the cave where church services used to be held called echo river or something like that. Basically, it was called echo river because the church choir voices would echo when they sang. The tour guide then, having learned that we were a singing group, asked us if we'd sing a song for the rest of the people on the tour. IT WAS SO COOL. Not just the echo and the fact that we were singing in a cave, but a surprise ministry opportunity to all the people that listened to us sing "Almighty and Everlasting God." It was weird--singing underground in the dark, surrounded by huge rock formations and dusty limestone walls thinking about the people that sang there before us hundreds of years ago. Sigh. So cool.

Thus ended our tour and began the long drive home. Besides that fact that the window directly in front of my seat was practically falling off the bus and blasting cold air and rain in my face until I had enough sense to get up and move--the ride was fine. We were all glad to get home. Adrienne came home with me because my family's in Peoria now and coming home to an empty house is sad in a strange sort of way. Anyway, we stayed up till 2 watching Anastasia, (o yeah!) said our last goodnights of human civility to one another (it was a given that when I had to wake her up the next morning at 8 she would hate me :)) then went to bed. This morning has consisted of random attempts to get caught up on everything, but has been strangely relaxing. I'm glad I could get away from all the distractions for a while. I feel refreshed and refocused.

I'm ready for you life.