Yesterday was my first CI Day (community impact day) with UWP. We were working with the Coalition for the Upper South Platte(CUSP) to help restore the forest after the biggest fire in CO's history. The Hayman fire of 2002 burned 138,000 acres of land, and CUSP is trying to restore the forest to its original state. There were three worksites, one spreading seeds of wildflowers and indigenous grasses, one planting baby pine trees, and one pulling weeds.
I was in the group pulling weeds, and this was no normal weed, it is the Russian knapweed,
Centaurea repens
grows to 3 ft tall
flowers are pink to lavender, solitary and turn straw colored in the fall
stems are covered in a soft gray knap
deep creeping roots are hard to control
stands can live 75 years
very poisonous to horses and kills other plants
This weed is poisonous to all other plants, and once it has been in an area the soil becomes sterile because of the poison it leeches into the soil. It is also very irritating, if it touches your skin you get a rash, and if you touch your eyes after having touched the knapweed your eyes will swell shut. It is on Colorado's list of noxious weeds, and is a native of Russia, coming into the US in the late 1800's. Only the Southeastern US is free of this weed.
For obvious reasons we needed to pull all of this weed from the land, which was already devastated by the fire, so we spent all morning pulling the weed, and stuffing it into bags to be burned (apparently if you don't burn it, it will just come back stronger, and it will only burn after 1200 degrees F). We pulled all of the weeds from the property and still had time left, so I went to help the tree planters. In four hours we (cast B 08) seeded 1 acre of land with native plants, planted over 100 trees, and rid the area of the Russian Knapweed. This was an awesome first CI day, and I can't wait for the next one!
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Scavenger Hunt and Host Family Weekend
So the end of this week was a Friday afternoon "Regional Learning" time. This included a trip to the Colorado Capitol Building and a scavenger hunt around downtown Denver. The Capitol Building is beautiful, with lots of cool history and unique stone. here are some pictures...
After we left the Capitol Building we realized that we had lost our scavenger hunt sheet, so we just spent the afternoon hanging around Denver, went to the library, got ice cream, and walked around the 16th street mall. After Wrap-up, I went outside to catch the bus to go home, but Daniela didn't get out there 'till 5:31. Now, on a normal day this wouldn't be a problem (the bus comes at 5:32) however, the bus was early on Friday, coming at 5:30, and I wasn't going to ride without her, so I let it go by. When Daniela came out we could still see the bus stopped at a red light, and ran to catch up, but whenever we got close, the light would turn green, this continued for about 5 blocks before we went to another stop and had to wait for the 6:32 bus home, so we got home late that night. The positive to this is that I finished New Moon, the second book in the Twilight series :)
Saturday was our only Saturday off in the four weeks of staging, so we all packed up and went to Rocky Mountain National Park for a day of "hiking" which consisted of 100 yard walks to scenic overviews and lots of riding up curvy mountain roads in the SUV.
There was beautiful scenery and lots of wildlife,
from the fighting chipmunks,
and the rock-licking marmot,
to the lounging elk, this was an amazing place.
When we got to the lodge at the top of a ridge I hiked to the top to see the view. Nobody would go with me, so I went alone to the top and had a friendly tourist take my picture to prove that I was there.
In the second picture I am over the top of the ridge that is in the first picture. The sign reads, 12,005 ft 2.3 miles above sea level. I also got a picture from the top of the path.
After leaving RMNP we drove to Winter Park and went to a jazz festival and to an art festival that they were having there. We stayed overnight in a hotel and then this morning went up the ski lift to the lodge at sunspot, in Winter Park. The view was amazing and there were lots of mountain bikers going up the lift then riding down the mountain. After going back down the lift Daniela and I rode on the alpine slide, a half-pipe concrete slide that you ride down on wheeled sleds. It was so much fun!
We then left Winter Park, and on the way back home stopped in Empire to get ice cream, I got an amazing banana split. When we were leaving there was a sheltie that was just walking up with his owner, and I had to stop to love on him. That little sheltie may be half as big as Shep, but it made me really miss my Puppy puppy.
Tomorrow we start week three here in Denver staging and we have the cast photo. I hope that this week isn't as hard as the past few, but I doubt that it will be, I think that I've finally acclimated to the altitude, humidity, activity, and time here, so I'll keep on keeping on. I'll update soon, so check back.
~Mandy
After we left the Capitol Building we realized that we had lost our scavenger hunt sheet, so we just spent the afternoon hanging around Denver, went to the library, got ice cream, and walked around the 16th street mall. After Wrap-up, I went outside to catch the bus to go home, but Daniela didn't get out there 'till 5:31. Now, on a normal day this wouldn't be a problem (the bus comes at 5:32) however, the bus was early on Friday, coming at 5:30, and I wasn't going to ride without her, so I let it go by. When Daniela came out we could still see the bus stopped at a red light, and ran to catch up, but whenever we got close, the light would turn green, this continued for about 5 blocks before we went to another stop and had to wait for the 6:32 bus home, so we got home late that night. The positive to this is that I finished New Moon, the second book in the Twilight series :)
Saturday was our only Saturday off in the four weeks of staging, so we all packed up and went to Rocky Mountain National Park for a day of "hiking" which consisted of 100 yard walks to scenic overviews and lots of riding up curvy mountain roads in the SUV.
There was beautiful scenery and lots of wildlife,
from the fighting chipmunks,
and the rock-licking marmot,
to the lounging elk, this was an amazing place.
When we got to the lodge at the top of a ridge I hiked to the top to see the view. Nobody would go with me, so I went alone to the top and had a friendly tourist take my picture to prove that I was there.
In the second picture I am over the top of the ridge that is in the first picture. The sign reads, 12,005 ft 2.3 miles above sea level. I also got a picture from the top of the path.
After leaving RMNP we drove to Winter Park and went to a jazz festival and to an art festival that they were having there. We stayed overnight in a hotel and then this morning went up the ski lift to the lodge at sunspot, in Winter Park. The view was amazing and there were lots of mountain bikers going up the lift then riding down the mountain. After going back down the lift Daniela and I rode on the alpine slide, a half-pipe concrete slide that you ride down on wheeled sleds. It was so much fun!
We then left Winter Park, and on the way back home stopped in Empire to get ice cream, I got an amazing banana split. When we were leaving there was a sheltie that was just walking up with his owner, and I had to stop to love on him. That little sheltie may be half as big as Shep, but it made me really miss my Puppy puppy.
Tomorrow we start week three here in Denver staging and we have the cast photo. I hope that this week isn't as hard as the past few, but I doubt that it will be, I think that I've finally acclimated to the altitude, humidity, activity, and time here, so I'll keep on keeping on. I'll update soon, so check back.
~Mandy
Monday, July 21, 2008
NEW!
YAY!!! I finally got the Alevy's wireless network set up, so now I'll be able to add pics to the blog and blog more frequently!
here are just a few pics that I wanted to add when I wrote that first post...
This is a pic of Faith, Ken, Daniela, and I on our outing to lookout mountain.
This is me at Red Rocks amphitheatre.
This is only my second week here, but I've learned soooo much in such a short amount of time that it seems longer. My typical day is waking around 6:40, eating cereal for breakfast, catching a 7:32 bus from our house to the Sherman center (a 45 minute ride)getting to the Sherman center and starting the UWP day.
8:30 Morning meeting- opens the day, gives announcements and reminders as well as informs you of the rest of the day's activities.
9:00 Workshop- blocking, vocals, dancing or a lecture/activity on various subjects (today we had blocking from 9:00-12:00 AAAHHHH!!!!)
12:00 lunch- I don't really think I need to explain this... but the food here is very iffy
1:00 More Workshop- same as morning workshops, today was vocals
3:00 Break- a little time to change, eat, or socialize
3:15 Cast Movement- the exercise time from hell, jk, but it really is pretty exhausting, two hours of constant dancing, with one two minute break for water (sometimes...)
5:15 Wrap up- more announcements, a time to , wow, wrap up the day
5:30 Host Pick Up- some people's family's come to pick them up, we ride a 5:32 bus home, another 45 minute ride,
Once we get home, Faith generally has dinner prepared and ready to eat (THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!), at this point, you are hungry enough to eat a whole Buffalo, well, not quite, but close! I then take a shower go to bed around 9-9:30 and get up the next day to do it all again.
This crazy schedule would be responsible for my lack of updates here, so I'll try to do better, but we have really full days.
A Few More Cool Notes:
I now have a language buddy! this means that I help someone who doesn't speak English as their first language, making sure that they understand all instructions, announcements, and anything else that confuses them. My buddy is Victor from Brazil, who is barely fluent, but I'm so happy to help him get better! This presents a challenge however, like this morning, trying to explain what a cinnamon bun is when I don't speak Portuguese and don't have one handy to show him, I never could describe it in a way he would understand... I'll have to take him one tomorrow...
I finally read Twilight by Stephanie Meyer! (45 minutes on the bus each way, each day makes for lots of reading time..) the book was awesome and I definitely recommend it.
Well, I love you all and hope you enjoy reading my updates!
~Mandy
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Denver!
So I'm finally here in Denver! When I first arrived here in Denver and got off the plane the UWP representatives weren't at the airport yet, but I saw some of my cast mates that I recognized from Facebook all standing around. I went over and got to know everyone before going to pick up my luggage. By the time I got back from getting my luggage the UWP representatives were there and checking everyone in. After everyone was checked in we were all sent out to a charter bus that took us to a recreational center(like a YMCA) were we had registration. Registration included getting my official UWP nametag, finishing paying for the trip, learning about my host family, and filling out emergency contact info.
Once everyone had finished registering we were all sent to another room that had some tables with games on them to hang out until everyone arrived. I was on the first bus taken to the recreation center, so I was one of the first people there. As everyone was arriving I was trying to learn names, but there are almost 100 people in my cast so its really difficult!
As we waited we played Jenga, Mad Gab, Frisbee, and some card games. By dinner almost everyone had arrived, so the little room was very crowded. We had a dinner of pizza and salad, then had more socializing after dinner. After dinner I was at a table with two girls from Japan, two girls from Ethiopia, and two other boys from the US. We had a deck of cards and started teaching each other games from our different countries. When we had played a few Japanese card games, we from the US taught the other girls how to plat BS. It was so funny trying to convey the point of the game, because both the Japanese girls and the girls from Ethiopia are only barely fluent in English, so you can't use harder vocabulary words. One of the girls from Ethiopia in particular couldn't understand that even if you didn't have the right number card to put down that you were supposed to put another number down and try not to get caught. When she didn't have the right number she would just go ahead and take the whole stack of cards. After about an hour all of the host families were ready to pick us up.
This was at 8:30 Denver time, so I was really tired (also putting into consideration that I had been up since 4:30 Eastern time). Once we found our host family, we went home and got a short tour of the house before going to bed. I am staying with Faith and Ken Alevy, who live just west of Denver, and are grandparents. There is also another UWP member staying with the Alevys, Daniela from Monterrey, Mexico.
On Saturday we had a free day, so I slept in. When I got up we all got ready and the girls went to the grocery store to buy foods that Daniela and I like. After a long time at the store we all came home before going for a drive. We drove to Lookout Mountain, where Buffalo Bill is buried, as well as visiting Red Rocks amphitheater. Red Rocks is an amazing place, with a natural beauty that is unrivaled by anything I've seen. After driving home we had pizza (again) for dinner before I crashed in bed around 7:30 Mountain time.
Today we got to meet Faith and Ken's younger daughter, Joanna and her two kids Sabrina and AJ. After having waffles for breakfast we all sat outside and talked. Today from 3-5 we have opening session for UWP, so I'll fill you in when we finish.
Once everyone had finished registering we were all sent to another room that had some tables with games on them to hang out until everyone arrived. I was on the first bus taken to the recreation center, so I was one of the first people there. As everyone was arriving I was trying to learn names, but there are almost 100 people in my cast so its really difficult!
As we waited we played Jenga, Mad Gab, Frisbee, and some card games. By dinner almost everyone had arrived, so the little room was very crowded. We had a dinner of pizza and salad, then had more socializing after dinner. After dinner I was at a table with two girls from Japan, two girls from Ethiopia, and two other boys from the US. We had a deck of cards and started teaching each other games from our different countries. When we had played a few Japanese card games, we from the US taught the other girls how to plat BS. It was so funny trying to convey the point of the game, because both the Japanese girls and the girls from Ethiopia are only barely fluent in English, so you can't use harder vocabulary words. One of the girls from Ethiopia in particular couldn't understand that even if you didn't have the right number card to put down that you were supposed to put another number down and try not to get caught. When she didn't have the right number she would just go ahead and take the whole stack of cards. After about an hour all of the host families were ready to pick us up.
This was at 8:30 Denver time, so I was really tired (also putting into consideration that I had been up since 4:30 Eastern time). Once we found our host family, we went home and got a short tour of the house before going to bed. I am staying with Faith and Ken Alevy, who live just west of Denver, and are grandparents. There is also another UWP member staying with the Alevys, Daniela from Monterrey, Mexico.
On Saturday we had a free day, so I slept in. When I got up we all got ready and the girls went to the grocery store to buy foods that Daniela and I like. After a long time at the store we all came home before going for a drive. We drove to Lookout Mountain, where Buffalo Bill is buried, as well as visiting Red Rocks amphitheater. Red Rocks is an amazing place, with a natural beauty that is unrivaled by anything I've seen. After driving home we had pizza (again) for dinner before I crashed in bed around 7:30 Mountain time.
Today we got to meet Faith and Ken's younger daughter, Joanna and her two kids Sabrina and AJ. After having waffles for breakfast we all sat outside and talked. Today from 3-5 we have opening session for UWP, so I'll fill you in when we finish.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Getting There
So, the day has finally come! I'm sitting in the CLT airport waiting for my (delayed) flight to Denver. Two hours delayed... I want to get out there so I can finally meet my UWP friends!! Thank you so much to anyone who has helped me make this trip possible, I'll be updating soon, so check back!
~Mandy
~Mandy
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