Week One...

3-1-12 (Thursday)
I started today off with a run early in the morning, trying to get ready for when physical training (PT) starts.  After breakfast, we went into classrooms and had training on how to respond to disabilities.  After lunch, we went to a local cemetery to learn about tool safety and to clean up the cemetery.  Tool training consisted of a quick overview of what the tools are and what they are used for.  Most of the tools are garden/landscape tools such as axes, rakes, shovels, shears and that type of thing.  Then we worked for a couple of hours clearing brush in the cemetery.  Afterwards we came back to the campus that we are staying on, cleaned up the tools, ate supper and relaxed for most of the rest of the evening.

3-3-12 (Saturday)
Yesterday was just a day of training...don't remember exactly what happened that day.  In the morning we helped volunteer at a local 10k run with a 5k walk.  It was in the Vicksburg Military Park and was called the "Run through History".  After helping with the run, we came back to campus, had lunch, relaxed for a while, then went on a scavenger hunt as a team.  We drove all over Vicksburg getting pictures of different places.  one of the places that we stopped at was a nice little coffee shop with an art gallery upstairs.  Another stop that I enjoyed was the Tomato Place.  The Tomato Place is a mix of a farmers stand, an outdoor restaurant and a smoothie place.  (I had Heavenly Blues, which was a blueberry and yogurt smoothie, it was delicious!)  Once we were finished with the scavenger hunt, we tried to find a place in town to eat dinner as a team.  We ended up going to a small Italian place with a gourmet dessert place next door (it was at a strip mall).  I was too full to get dessert, but instead saw the large teddy bear next to the front door.  It was about half my size--I had to give it a big hug--the guys teased me, asking what I would do if it suddenly hugged me back.  I told them that I would just give it a bigger hug then.  After coming back to campus for the night, I ended up watching The Nightmare Before Christmas with my room-mate and another girl.  By the end of the movie, all three of us were falling asleep, so we cleaned up and headed to bed.

3-4-12 (Sunday)
I was able to go to a Baptist church service in the morning, which I really enjoyed.  In the afternoon, most of my team went back to the Tomato Place, had food and smoothies and hung out for a while.  In the evening we were reassigned to different temporary teams that will last until next Tuesday when we will find out our teams for the rest of the year.

3-5-12 (Monday)
Today started bright and early...needed to be at the military park at 6 am for baseline training for PT.  We stretched as a group, then were timed on how many push ups we could do in a minute as well as how many sit-ups in a minute.  We were allowed to modify the push ups and sit ups, so I ended up doing crunches and half push ups.  I did about 30 of each in the 2 minutes.  Then was my favorite part (NOT), the 1.5 mile run/walk.  I am proud of myself, I was able to do it in almost 16 minutes.  The rest of the day was spent in diversity training.