Scripps National Spelling Bee

I LOVE to watch the Scripps National Spelling Bee. I'm not really sure why. I guess it has to do with my love for words. I often get out a piece of paper and try to spell with them. Of course by the time I get to the final round, I have no idea what they are even saying let alone how to spell it! LOL

At any rate, the Spelling Bee will be on ABC tonight beginning at 8pm EST. I'll see how many words I can use in a sentence or even perhaps find some new words for my next Boggle game. :-)

Violin Recital

Jasmine's Violin recital was this past Friday. It was supposed to be held at the park, but was moved to a church because of the rain. I am actually glad that it was moved, because on Wednesday when we went to practice at the park, it was very hard to hear her playing. I'm sure part of the problem was that fact that there was a tractor off in the distance, but still the acoustics of playing outside are very different than being in a church building.

The violin recital began with a prayer from one of the Fathers. I love this group. Who goes to a violin recital that begins with prayer?

All of the children did a beautiful job. It's so nice to watch their progress over three years, and it is so nice to watch their personalities shine through as they perform on stage.

I tried to use my digital camera to record Jasmine's duet with her violin teacher,but the recording is very choppy. If I can get it fixed, I will post it for your viewing pleasure.

It really is quite amazaing to see how much she has grown in her playing. When she first started, if I was on the phone with my girlfriend when she was practicing my girlfriend would get off the phone. Now she actually brings people to the phone to listen. :-)

Mental Clutter

This Sabbath, while leading praise and worship, I forgot the words of the song I was singing. Now, for those of you who are afraid to speak in front of crowds, that may be perfectly understandable, but for me, someone who has been singing solos since the 4th grade when I sang the part of the interjection (another post for another day), to forget words is not a normal thing. Especially for a song that we sing ALL the time. The whole church knows it!

At any rate, the whole point is that the reason that I forgot the words is because of mental clutter. I don't have any scientific definitions of mental clutter, it's just a term I use to refer to your state of mind when your thoughts are jumbled, and you have mixed feeling about a variety of topics related to your life.

The interesting thing is that mental clutter and physical clutter are related. I looked around my house and realized that I have many years of clutter that I have collected. I still have papers from college. Why in the world do I still have papers from college?? What am I going to do with them. I still have bills from when I lived in California in 1999!

So , little by little, I am working on dealing with getting rid of the clutter. I am starting to feel better already and am ready to tackle life issues that I have avoided for quite sometime.

So please keep me in your prayers as I spring clean!

When Silence is Golden

Below is a conversation that took place in the car with my kids, Christopher age 5 and Jasmine age 9:

Christopher: Mommy, What is sex?
Me: Uhhhh, well, Ummm, well...
Jasmine: I know!
Me: You do??
Jasmine:Yes...there are two kinds; male and female
Me: Yes, that's exactly right. Good answer.

Bible Bowl Update

Our Federation (local churches) Bible Bowl competition was held this weekend at my church. We had a wonderful time. All of the teams from my church (Junior Youth, Senior Youth, Young Adult and Adult) won and will advance to the next round to be held at Campmeeting in June. My team won by default, because no one in our division showed up.

All of the teams, including the teams from the other churches did well. It is always amazing to me to watch young children so clearly recall information from the material that they have read.

Here are some pictures of the front and back of the medal. If you zoom in, you will see an oil lamp on top of a Bible.

Each participant of the competition received a medal to wear during the games. The children were surprised when we passed them out before the games began. "Did we win already", some of them asked. "Yes", I replied. If you have opened God's Word and read it, you have won already. :-)

If you do not already have a time set aside in which you and your family read the Word of God, I strongly encourage you to do so. You will not be dissapointed.