I’m spending my summer working in Lake Arrowhead and living with Mom. I’ve been here for about 6 weeks now, and I’ll be here until early September. Work was a bit crazy at first, but now that I’m getting the hang of it, I have enough time and energy to write a little about my summer so far.

First, here is a picture of Mom’s house:

Mom's house in Cedar Glen.

Isn’t it cute? You can’t tell from the picture, but it’s out in the middle of nowhere. Mom lives on a dirt road, has 1 neighbor and her property faces National Forest. Just how she likes it.

Next, here’s a view from the back windows in the dining room:

View from the dining room.

It’s a very nice view, don’t you think? From here you can see all the deer and bears that come by.

My job is going pretty well. I’m a Supervisor for the first time and I’ve learned a LOT. It’s been tough at times, but I’ve already used the skills I’ve learned in other areas of my life.

Speaking of other things I do, last weekend was the first SCA event I have ever Autocratted. I first started planning for it back in January and it was great (and a little scary) to see it finally come to fruition. I think it went very well, and I have to admit that my recent work as a Supervisor gave me a lot of confidence on the day of the event.

Here are some pictures from Lyondemere Anniversary:

The Lyondemere pavilion.

I got an award at Court!

The Order of the Lion's Paw - Lyondemere's baronial service award.

Here I am, showing off my new award. This dress is new too – I wanted to look my best for my first event as Autocrat!

New dress, new award!

Mom was there too!

(Chris came too, but he was taking the pictures and therefore isn’t in any of them. Thanks for being photographer, Chris!)

Like I said, the event went really well. Whenever I started to get panicky, I reminded myself that most of the people there are friends of mine, and they’d help me out if I needed it. An unanticipated challenge was fighting off the flu a few days earlier, and having Bronchitis during the event. I didn’t feel too good, but it certainly was a memorable day!

I’m visiting my Dad in Winston-Salem, NC, for Easter. Winston-Salem is home to a lot of Moravians and we’re going to participate in some neat cultural activities tonight! Winston-Salem is known as the “Easter City” because they really get into Easter celebrations here (and there are  a LOT of churches!) The Moravians have a pretty interesting (kind of crazy) tradition for ringing in Easter. They get up in the middle of the night and groups of musicians wander the streets playing Easter music. They work their way to their cemetery (the one that goes with their church, where their friends and family are buried) and they time it so they arrive just before sunrise. Then they have a Sunrise Service in the cemetery and lo – it’s Easter! Then everybody gathers at the church for an Epic Southern Breakfast. Dad says there will be biscuits and gravy that only Southerners can provide. I don’t really care for biscuits and gravy, but I’ve never had real southern biscuits and gravy, so maybe I’ll like it when it’s done right!

I’m excited! I’ll take pictures. ^_^

This was my second sailing training day and my goal for this time was to go up in the rigging and help set sails – and I totally did it! And Patrick & Brenda brought a camera…

Going Aloft

It was scary at times, but not as bad as I was expecting! I also went up again to help tie up the sails on the way back in (which I wasn’t expecting to have the strength left to do!) Go me!

So now I’m almost ready to go on trips with the kids groups – I just need to get fingerprinted and take a drug test. They have 3- and 5-day trips and some of the crew encouraged me to sign up to volunteer on a 5-day trip right away (which I was already contemplating…) I think it’ll be fun!

Here’s a few more pictures:

Just got down off the rigging! Triumph!

Brenda and I are big dorks!

Patrick hauls on a line!

Also, I’ve been kicking butt and taking names in Algebra:

Algebra exam #2

Algebra exam #1