Four Days=Countless Amounts of Fun!

Due to the fact my teachers needed not one, but two 'teacher work days', that took up yesterday and today, my fellow students and I received a four day weekend! After school on Friday I went to lunch with my madre at the 'Joe Caribe Bistro and Cafe'. They specialize in 'fresh, ethnic and Caribbean flavors' according to their website and I would certainly that their food is not only fresh but amazing! My personal favorite is the Vegetarian burrito which not only has your average burrito ingredients but whipped sweet potato, which might not sound good but it definitely is! Anyway, after a late lunch and some car shopping for my sister I headed home exhausted after a long week at school.
The next morning, I joined my school's Key Club to take part in cleaning up the Bear River, my school's namesake actually. Donning elastic gloves and grabbing trash and recycle bags, we set to work combing the river banks for any trash that inconsiderate and laze people left over the summer. Although we mostly found cigarettes, glass shards, and bottle caps; we did find a surplus of butane gas, a suspicious head of a genie sculpture, a goat skull with a feather wired to it(I suspect homeless voo-doo), and a food-saver. I hope our Key Club and the other groups who were taking part in river clean-ups across Nevada County and elsewhere made a difference for the environment and our community.

Beautiful Morning cleaning at the Bear River.

After I headed home, I went to the 28th annual Draft Horse Classic hosted every year at the Nevada County Fairgrounds. We arrived mid-day, the perfect time since this is when the barns are primarily open, and set to going through each barn.

This big guy wasn't very happy to be getting a bath!

You can't tell in the picture, but these horses are nowhere near regular size!

Some random mules mid-Draft Horse

After eating a baked potato(they're the best around) and getting a 'Nevada City Cappucino' which is actually a lot like a frappucino...just better, I went home and got ready for a Comic-Con Dance, hosted by a Mormon Church in Nevada City. Of course when I heard the words 'Comic-Con' I at first held back the tears that I didn't attend San Diego Comic-Con and meet the beautiful Benedict Cumberbatch and of course the numerous other beloved actors and then I realized I could be Benedict...or Sherlock actually. So, acquiring my mother's purple shirt, my great-grandmother's coat, and my father's magnifying glass; I transformed myself into Miss Sherlock Holmes, or as my Dad put it 'She-lock Holmes'.

Yah I did spend 10 min. taking selfies of myself with this magnifying glass. No shame...

Complete Sherlock Outfit

Megan, Kaely, and I(I'm that white flash in the corner) 'sherlocking' while Anya looks really excited for some reason...

I ended up having tons of fun at the dance with Megan, Kaely, Anya, Andrea, and numerous other people all dressed up as everything from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Avengers. Megan and I both went as Sherlock, while Kaely was John Watson(both Megan and I's "best 'friend'-'man') and Anya went as the Tenth Doctor, which she nailed especially since she had gotten a pixie cut earlier that day.(which looks adorable by the way).
The rest of my weekend was spent taking my first Driver's lesson(since I'm permitted and all that!),  facing the smoke from the King Fire to take a short trip to Nevada City on Monday, and doing homework(since the Teacher's had to give us tons!). If you take a closer look at my Draft Horse Classic pictures you'll see a haze in the background similar to the haze in this picture...

This isn't a Delta fog setting in this is smoke from the King Fire, that has burned thousands of acres and made a cloud of smoke big enough to see from space. I hope everyone affected by the fire is safe and I want to thank all the firefighters for trying their best to keep this basically uncontrollable fire under control! I hope everyone else had a wonderful weekend(four days or not)! Jewel.

Bright Lights, Small Town

Once a year, Butler Amusements rolls into my town for the Nevada County Fair. Maybe it's the bright lights, the laughter, the spinning rides, or the end-of-Grease feel that makes me love the fair so much or maybe because it's also the time when my eldest sister, Ashley, visits from SoCal. Either way it's a week filled with fun right before school starts the next week.

After Ashley,my niece Emma, and Ashley's sister Sierra arrived on Tuesday; I ditched them Wednesday for a solid 13 hour day at the fair. Joined by my friends: Maddie, Isabella, Sam, Megan, Anya , Kaely, and Chris we enjoyed amazing food and plenty of stomach-flipping rides.

Matching shoes because we're cooler than all ya'll

The 'Footloose'...almost as amazing as the movie(the original one obviously)

Chris excited about the ferris wheel, then again who isn't?

The Zipper...my personal favorite

Refueling with cotton candy at about 10:30...

Although the fair was chock-full of fun, I had to say ta-ta to my friends until school to spend the rest of the week with my family. Although a majority of the week was spent undocumented (bad Jewel), we had tons of fun going to the river, the lake, Lake Tahoe, downtown Grass Valley and Nevada City, and the fair(one last time).
While we were on the lake my sisters and I took a shot at wake-boarding, which is actually a lot harder then it looks. Although Kenna was by far the winner going a good 1/4 a mile down the lake, Ashley and I gave it a good shot.

Sunning my toesies

Emma modeling the windswept hair 

Mi familia bella

Rafting is fun at any age...from 5 to 29

Kenna and I went on a slightly wilder ride, gliding over the water at terrifyingly fun speeds

A few days later at the fair...again looking fabulous!

What's cuter then a Sierra and an Emma carrot?

 Overall, it was a great week with family and friends and I cant' wait until next year when the bright lights of the fair and the bright light that is my sister rolls back into town. Jewel.