Attack of the puppies!

Abstract:
Happy Easter! Bible studies and puppies and bush dancing! And don't forget about Chubby Bunny!

It was so hard to wake up. I was still cold, even though we had a fire going and it was much warmer. I decided to just stay in my sleeping bag for breakfast. That meant that I didn't need to go and get dressed before. Sheri and Helen also had trouble getting up. I wasn't sure how our team was supposed to help with breakfast the next day! Sheri slept through her alarm every day.

Breakfast was the only time that I got an "Easter egg." I told people that I wanted to go look for eggs in the chicken coop, but no one else seemed to think that was a good idea. I just wanted a picture of looking for eggs on Easter, but people always looked at me weirdly when I said it. I didn't end up getting a picture at the chicken coop because it was close to the puppies, so I just ran to the puppies whenever I was near it.

After breakfast, we had quiet time. Then I actually got dressed, answered the reflection questions, and read the next part of Philippians. We had our third session, morning tea, and our third Bible study. We finished our Bible study early, so we went to go see the puppies before lunch.

There were about six of us that went down this time, so the attacking from the puppies was a little less. This time we actually went up to the box of the puppies and to the mum. Last time we stayed on the outside of the fence, but this time we went in. The mum was chained up, so we got to pet her this time. We found out that the mum's name is Lexie because that's what the doghouse said. We also found out last night that the owners are keeping one of the puppies and her name is Tess. She was the one with the mark that looked like a white mohawk.

The puppies were so cute and fun. I loved playing with them. Whenever I was holding another puppy, the one that I named Caloola came over and fought her way to get onto my lap. That little puppy loved me. We weren't able to stay for too long because we had to go back for lunch. I promised the puppies that I would come back during my free time, but they wouldn't let me leave!

Everyone else was able to make it out past the gate without the puppies hold them back. I wasn't able to do that. They all grabbed onto my jeans and kept pulling me back. They didn't want me to leave! I was trying to just walk out, but it was proving very difficult to not step on them. It was quite hilarious! I kept trying to pick them up and take them to the box.

I eventually was able to get out of the fence, but they kept following us! We tried to close the gate, but a few of them were on the outside when we closed it. We had to go around to the side of the fence to another gate to place them back in it. One of the puppies just sat in the driveway after we dropped it off and stared at us as we left. It broke my heart, but I promised them that I would be back and I was going to keep that promise. Plus they're puppies and I knew they'd still love me when I got back.

We quickly ate lunch. Then I went outside with Helen because she wanted to go wipe her shoe and we ended up going to see the puppies right away. They were calmer this time. I think they were a little bit worn out from when we saw them just a little bit before. Caloola still got jealous every time I was holding a different puppy. First Helen was holding her, so I got another puppy. Caloola got jealous, so I switched puppies with Helen. Then the same thing happened with Kirsty when she was holding Caloola later and I grabbed the boy puppy. We each held a puppy and they kept falling asleep on our laps. One by one, everyone else left, and I was left alone with the puppies. When I left, I made sure to give them each a kiss goodbye as I placed them in their box to take a nap. They were mostly sleeping already. I also kissed Lexie and thanked her for letting us play with her cute babies. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to see them again, especially since two of them were supposed to be picked up that afternoon.

When I got back, I took a nap, we had afternoon tea, and the our last Bible study group. This part of Philippians talks about how anxiety is a sin. As someone who suffers from clinical anxiety and needs to take medication to control it, it's really hard to hear. I guess that it is human nature and humans are inherently sinful, though. It makes sense because if you trust God fully then you have nothing to be anxious about, but putting that into practice is a hard thing to do. Especially to walk the fine line between trusting God entirely and still taking responsibility to do your part to make things happen.

Then we had dinner. After dinner, I saw kangaroos outside, so I went to take a picture. Since the zoom on my camera is broken, I wasn't able to get a good picture. I had to try to move closer, but they were all watching me. They scattered as soon as I got kind of close, so the picture is kind of far and it's hard to tell that there are kangaroos. I clearly need to get a new camera.

When we all returned to the building when we were staying, we had a bush dance. From my understanding, it's kind of similar to square dancing in America. It's country-themed line dancing. The dances that John were teaching were from the 1800s. I didn't really want to dance. I'm kind of weird about dancing. I used to square dance with my dad all the time at daddy-daughter dances when I was in Girl Scouts and I would only dance if it was choreographed dancing like that. I was also a Dutch Dancer, which isn't something that I told everyone at the camp. I think that I just don't like learning new dances unless I get to see them first. For example with Dutch Dancing, I had seen it for years before I was finally old enough to do it myself. Anyway, I just took videos of almost all of the dances. It was fun for me to watch everyone dance. They got into some big messes trying to figure them out and I think they would have just frustrated me, so I had more fun watching.

After all of the dancing, we had supper. We were initially going to have a bonfire, but it was too late to start one by the time they finished dancing. Instead we just had a fire in the fireplace. The supper was still marshmallows, though. Not many people were eating them, so I challenged Kirsty to Chubby Bunny. I was telling her how I had a big mouth and we should play. Then I went to eat a marshmallow and said "chubby bunny" and I had to keep going. I got 7 of the marshmallows in my mouth. They were the big ones. Kirsty got 4. I wasn't content with just beating her, so I looked for someone else to play. Jess attempted, but she got five. Then Helen tried and she also got 7. We took a picture as co-champions. We're pretty awesome. That was my first time ever playing Chubby Bunny. I actually ate the marshmallows after I played, which I guess some people think is weird, or at least Rohan told me that other people think it is weird. But I don't get it. They were in my mouth already!

Pictures and videos, although some videos were too big for flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9602956@N05/sets/72157633140149496/