We arrived at the retreat center on Thursday night and stayed until Monday. Every morning, when we woke up, this is what we saw out the window. I know, I know, it's not garbage trucks and cracked up roads and row houses, and there were absolutely no sirens... but you know, I could see myself getting used to it...
You may recall from my previous blog post that the retreat center we were at was located at the very top of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland.
So, that view every morning, and bonfires every night (note the firewood... I was excited...) yep, I could definitely get used to it...
This is Larry the Kitty. He apparently comes with the retreat center for the weekend.
He liked me.
Early morning sun on the early morning water... don't worry, there will be plenty more pictures in this genre...
and then, just when I thought things couldn't get any more perfect, there was a hammock.
Good morning, David. David is the king of bed head. This weekend at the retreat, he finally had a chance to share it with everyone doing LVC on the East Coast instead of just the four of us he lives with, which was good, finally, because really, a gift like that should be shared with the world. ... so I'm glad I took a picture and am now posting on the internet...
morning tea.
Ang, Jill, and Mary, excited for our morning session. The retreat was great, really, because they built into the schedule lots and lots of free time to relax and do things outside, like, for example, canoeing. But this picture is not of those things, it's of us being good and doing a session. Good job!
I did my best not to stare out the window during the sessions, since they were so comparatively few... it helped that the windows were all steamy and you couldn't see outside them very well...
The different houses took turns cooking meals during the retreat - meals for 37 people at a time! Here's Luke, dutifully washing dishes after we cooked lunch the first day.
And here's Jill, peeking at me in the mirror. Hi Jill! :)
Ruthie, Marisa, and Ellie love the food we cooked! Good!
These are two of my favorites, Ang and Kristin. Both of them like to smile. Apparently Kristin also likes to pick her nose.
Jessica, Annie, and Katie eating outside.
After lunch we had a good little chunk of time to do things outside, like, for example, take pictures.
... or go canoeing...
... or hang out on the dock...
... or to hang out with your housemates... this is our newest family picture, and may or may not beat out that other one from orientation week for our '07 Christmas cards... stay tuned...
Jill usually also opts for the free-time activity of "picture taking."
Every evening met us with a beautiful, beautiful sunset.
... that I took a good couple hundred pictures of...
(this red tree was my favorite)
... it's pretty much perfect, isn't it?
(view from the dining room)
Just because it's dark out doesn't mean the camera gets a rest! Thanks to the beauties of the "long time exposure" option, I continued to have lots of fun well after dark... just wait til Jill shows up with the flashlight...
Chesapeake Bay la nuit.
(ok, ok, fasten your seat belts, here comes Jill and the flashlight...)
tada!
I'm in this one too...
hm, it's hard to know what to caption on photos like this...
after the hand tracing warm-up, we started getting down to business about the important stuff: writing our names in the sky!
Jill prefers standard roman characters to cursive
but I don't think I could finish my whole name in 15 seconds without writing in cursive... I certainly couldn't peek out from under my name...
roomies! aww!
After a half hour our so of long-time-exposure-fun-times, we went back to the campfire to make everyone look at the pictures we'd taken.
Apparently while we were gone, Luke and Larry had gotten very cozy.
Jill and Kristen
Then back to work, out on the dock this time, where we were very careful not to accidentally fall in the Chesapeake Bay.
("an artist's inner expression of meaningfulness cannot always be contained in words and characters of mere mortals"... or, "Jill dancing with the flashlight")
Ok, ok, the next day was the day of the now infamous canoe trip. Please see http://shanagoestowashington.blogspot.com for details, if you have not already.
It's amazing, looking at this picture now, the water doesn't actually look choppy at all... :-\ Anyway, that little spurt of land is where our retreat house was
Ah, the canoe. What a beautiful sight.
Off in the distance, the town of Perryville.
... when I started understanding just exactly how much harder it was going to be rowing back than it was rowing out... for the record, in the 45 seconds it took me to find my camera, open it up, turn it on, take a picture, and tuck it back away, I drifted backward about 75 feet. (totally worth it though)
Hanging on the wall back at the retreat center was this ariel photograph of the area, which I took so I could show everyone where I'd canoed, just in case googlemaps didn't have a good, detailed display of it. But google maps pulled through just fine, obviously. So never mind this picture.
Ellie, enjoying the hammock.
Swing, Ellie, swing!
Kristin, enjoying... pretty much everything, actually.
Another sunset...
... and that tree I like again...
sitting out on the dock with my house, talking about all things serious and important.
(and of course, taking pictures of it)
Carl, for example, suggested we bring the dock back to DC with us. And perhaps also the body of water it was in.
This picture is going to be the cover of our 2008 Emmaus House Calendar. This is also going to be the month picture... for all of the months.
Dualing cameras
Carl, looking.... intense...
and beating Luke
(this is domestic abuse)
David and Angie
Ruthie
Jill and Shana :)
Marisa and the DC girls, Ang, Jill, Ruthie and me
Marisa
Jill's looking just a little bit mischievous with that camera of hers... I would also like to take this moment to refer you to her photos of the retreat, which were awesome: http://flickr.com/photos/jilliam/
oh, hey, look, the 15 second exposure is back!
no more goofy light pictures though, just goofy people pictures.
Jill, me and Kristin
Keira and Amanda
This was the little cabin I slept in
The next morning the water was SO CALM AND STILL... what the heck??
(in DC, most of the trees are still mostly pretty much green... it's so creepy...)
calm and still water...
seriously
oh, this is Charles Spring sitting contemplatively on the dock in the early morning sun. Charles is the DC coordinator for LVC. He likes to ride his bike, play ultimate frisbee, process Americorps paperwork, and sit on docks in the early morning sun.
Kristin, Jill and I went out canoeing... in the calm and still water... after my canoeing experience the previous day, this nice calm trip actually felt kind of weird.
you know, like, good weird.
Jill, thinking about whether or not she feels like paddling anymore...
flying south :)
Ah, there it is. Direct and shameless, sun on the water.
Seriously. Look at how calm and still that is!
This is maybe one of my favorite pictures ever.
(Jill likes hats)
The canoeing dream team.
(I spy Larry the Kitty)
Me and Chris.
Jac, Chris and Larry.
It was Amanda's birthday! She was turning 22. She was also wearing a turban on her head. She left in on all day. How about that.
Our transportation to and from the retreat was a giant, 15 passenger van.
(the turban fell apart a little)
Apparently Luke smiles in his sleep...
... and Jill makes goofy faces...
oh, and so does David, good job guys. But after a great retreat like that, you can't help but make some happy goofy faces. :)
