Monday, September 26, 2011

The Story Of My Summer Part 2

  Ahem, now for part two :)

  Our days where pretty full of work; we got up early in the morning, had breakfast, and started right off working with Heidi in the garden til lunch. But all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy; so after lunch on most days, unless we were preparing for a retreat or were doing some odd jobs, we spent the afternoon having fun. Our activities included playing volley ball, (one of my absolute favorite outdoor games) horseback riding, basking in the sun down by the river, swimming, hanging out with friends, and playing pool (which I also love!)~ that's not all of course, but just to name a few. :) We also spent a lot of time with Heidi and her husband Leval. They always liked to include us in the things they where doing, and wanted to make us feel welcome. Well, just this summer, Leval bought a speed boat to take out on the river and to the lake. He invited us to go out with him several times, and we always had such a blast! When he floored it, that boat went about 65 or 70 mph. Now that's what I call a boat ride lol! Alas, I have no pictures of it; I would have liked to take many pictures while I was there at the ranch, but I didn't have a camera. Ruth was very gracious to allow me to borrow her camera while we where on the hike.
   Another fond memory I have is the day us girls (Heather, Jess and myself) worked away in the warm sun bucking hay! Yes it was such a welcome change from working in the garden pulling weeds; we actually enjoyed the manual labor very much surprisingly! :) Leval helped us, and we bucked a 9 acre field in about 7 hours. Some of the bales were around 60 lbs, but most were 80-100 lbs bales. We loved it, and that night we slept out on the hay stack. Not to comfortable naturally, but in that area of Washington, there is almost no light pollution, so the sky was absolutely beautiful in all it's wonder! We gazed at the stars for hours, talking of it's vastness and pointing out constellations. It was such a clear night; we could even see an arm of the Milky Way! Oh, and how many shooting stars we saw! I would so do it all again!
  Then there was the music camp~ the highlight retreat of the whole year! And we prepared  for it many days in advance. But it was all so worth it.:) We worked hard in the kitchen too so that we could have more time during the retreat to visit and play music. One of my favorite things about this retreat was the singing~ I LOVE to sing! So we had a whole choir and orchestra and we practiced every day of this week long retreat for the performance at the end of the week. And there where specials every day...some people sang, and some played their instruments. I did a special with some friends~ we organized a quintet (5 violins) and played two hymns; 'Channels Only' and 'Once And For All.' It was four part harmony, and sounded just beautiful!

Practicing for our special
  L-R: Victoria, Yours Truly, Anna, Charles, and Natalie   
  In the free time between sessions, we all just gathered around and played our instruments together. Guitars, violins, penny whistles, flutes, and banjos. Oh, and you can't forget the harmonica!

Anna, Zack, Mrs. Sherman, Daniel, Nathan, Mr. Owens, and me
  Those were the times I loved~ when everyone got together and played. I just enjoy the company of Godly people. That's what I like the most about this ranch!


Gotta love this picture of Nathan and my baby brother Micah; he's so darling, and he was Nathans' little buddy all week :) Everyone enjoys this sweet boy!

  Now I'd like to thank my parents for raising me in such a Godly way, and for teaching me to love the Lord. I missed them so much while I was at the ranch and I prayed often for them. I appreciate their sacrifice in allowing me to spend my summer at Peniel Ranch~ as you can guess, it was a little of a challenge for some of Moms best helpers to be away for a while! But God worked in all of us, and blessed us mightily too! :) 

 L-R: Gracie, Marisa, Lindsay, me, Kathy, Katelyn, and Kathlyn.
 Some of my wonderful friends and I at the ranch.

  So that's how my summer went.:) I miss the ranch naturally, and can't wait to go back, but it's good to be home and be with my family.

For now, good night world!
~Dani 

4 comments:

Heluvsme said...

You sure can't tell that Micah is a LaVelle :P He is so big!!!

I so wish someone would have taken a video of you playing/singing!

Dani Marie said...

Actually Kim, Marcus did film it. I'll see if he can send it to me somehow so I can upload it. I'm thinking of getting my own youtube channel for just such things as this. I'll let you know.:)

Raquel said...

Yay! I'm very glad you were blessed by the ranch, just as much as you blessed them with your help. :)

Thank you for letting us all know about how it went. It sounded great!

(I love the newly added music to your page, by the way. It's so peaceful.)

Dani Marie said...

Thank you dearest Raquel! I love this music too~ my favorite.:)