【推荐2】Kimberly and I had planned a trip to Europe for a long time. Getting the departure time wrong, however, we had to ________ from the original train trip to a ship one.

Boarding the ship, we ________ it was not like a roomy hotel. The room was incredibly tight. The________ in the small bathroom was just a spout (喷头) connected to the sink. You turned it on and sprayed yourself, ________ the rest of the room.

The week-long ship travel was full of adventures. There were people from ________ backgrounds speaking different languages. We had stopovers on islands of all sizes, where we cycled 30-40 kilometers. Then there were whole gales (狂风) — so ________ that even the buses couldn’t pass for safety ________. So finally, we ________ back home.

At all events we appreciated the experience. Our real passion was about the ________ rather than the destination — the missed rides, the ________ ship, the mixture of cultures, and all the ________.

Sometimes people are so ________ to their comfortable life that it scares them to break away from the ________ route. Yet, once out of their comfort zone, the different experiences are what actually ________. Mixing things up, trying new things, seeing something open to adventure — this is what we call unique ________.

【推荐3】I’m Grace, 13 years old and in seventh grade in Florida. I was in the six grade last year. That school year was _______. My family and I spent that year _______ all over Europe, seeing amazing places, meeting all kinds of people, understanding different cultures, and getting _______ in the process.

When my _______ decided to travel to Europe, we were excited. _______ we had a problem. We couldn’t rent a car that had enough _______ to work for our five-member family, so my dad bought a bigger one. It became our new _______ during the trip. I had to leave a lot of my things behind because so little of it would _______ into my tiny new room. We had to be careful to save our water. And we were doing homeschooling, _______ worked out great. We lived in a (n) ________ home, but my family ________ got along really well.

No matter what, I made sure to ________ my window every morning, because the view was ________ every day--- England, then France, Italy, Greece … each special in its own way. We toured around country after country, tried to pick up little bits of the local ________, but that didn’t help us much. Luckily, we kept ________ people who knew some English. Everywhere we went, we saw the most amazing things. I love reading about places, in my text-books and then getting ________ our car midway to look right at them. I can’t pick a favorite one, because every place we were at seemed to be the ________.

After our ________ ended, we moved back to Florida. But it makes me ________ that my family had this great year long ________ together. I’m thankful for that.

【推荐1】Once upon a time, there was a poor man. His home was also very poor — a small and empty house, which was _______ with spider webs (蜘蛛网). People tried to avoid coming into his house as they didn’t want to come to such a _______ place. And the poor man thought that poverty (贫困) was the _______ for his unlucky life.

Then, the poor man _______ a wise man and told him about his poverty. The man felt sorry for the poor man and gave him a vase (花瓶). “This will save you from _______,” the wise man said. The poor man took the _______ from the wise man and wanted to _______ it at first and then spend the money on drinking, as usual. Besides, why would he _______ such a beautiful thing? But then he started looking at the vase carefully and decided not to take it to the market. He brought the vase back to his _______, put it on the table and started watching it again.

“It’s not ________ for such a beautiful thing to be ________,” the poor man thought. So he ________ some flowers and put them into the vase. It became even ________. “Not good that such a beautiful thing stands next to a spider web,” the poor man thought again.

So the poor man started ________ his house. He cleaned the dust, washed the floor and whitened the walls. And it became clear that his house wasn’t poor, ________ rather warm and comfortable. And the poor man wasn’t a poor man anymore, but a hard-working host, who had no time to think about poverty.

【推荐2】My father sold everything we owned, took all the money and disappeared from our life. My mother suddenly found herself _________ to care for five boys. I worried about the situation, but my mother stayed _________, and assured us that she would keep us together as a _________safe from harm. Although small in size, she could _________ heavy horse-drawn ploughs (犁). Besides, she found time to help us with homework.

As Christmas _________, my mother didn’t seem to smile as much. I _________she had no money to buy us presents. Considering myself practically grown, I hid my_________.

One day, my mother took a saw(锯) into the forest and _________ with some tree branches. She left them in the barn(畜棚) and did not tell her _________ children what they were for. She worked on her project__________ I was in school, but I looked __________ into the barn whenever I had a chance. Several days later, I still couldn’t __________ her purpose. When later I saw she used nails and paint, I __________ that she must be making presents.

By Christmas week, my mother was her __________ happy self again. Her project was apparently __________, and she obviously kept it secret because I’d looked everywhere without __________.

On Christmas Eve, I lay awake for a long time,__________ Christmas morning.

The next morning, my mother handed out the handmade presents happily in front of her delighted kids. Many difficult years would follow that particular Christmas, but I never again doubted my mother’s __________ to care for us. We were never hungry, and she made sure we got a(n)__________ in school. She taught us to have faith in our own abilities. That faith __________ me still.