Too much to do!!

That's all I seem to be saying these days. Just this past week...

• Ecology project (due tomorrow): Find a bunch of leaves and pinecones and moss and pine needles, glue them to a cardboard box, and label everything. This took me about 4 hours to complete.
• Vignettes (due today): Small, graceful literary sketches. I was given a list of topics to choose from. We had to write three, all on a different topic. 300-500 words each. 30-45 minutes each, total of 2 hours.
• Sensory Snapshot (due Friday): Write a quick piece of literature using all five senses. The story you write about must tell about the sentence: "It was weird." You may not use am, is, was, were, are, be, being, been, or ain't. Took me about an hour.
• All-NW and All-State Ensembles Audition music: Very difficult pieces of music for my flute that I must perfect by Tuesday. I've already spent 45 minutes on it, and I only got the music today.
• Playing test in band (due Friday): Well at least I know the pieces! Still gotta practice a lot. 2 hours so far.
• Read through chapter 4 of Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, and fill in packet (due today): Each chapter takes like an hour to get through, fill out the pages, and figure out every single symbol in the novel so far. We have to read through chapter 7 by Tuesday. 4 hours.
• Unit test for World History on Civilizations (Friday). We must create study guide based on assessment questions throughout our daily reading. Our study guide is due before the test. Mine was 5 pages long. 2 hours.
• Articulo (due tomorrow): For Spanish 2, each month we have to read an article about something with reference to a Spanish person, country, or tradition. Then we get to write a 300-word summary of our article, completely in Spanish. Aaannndd I lost the original file when my computer died since I forgot to save it, so I had to redo the whole thing tonight. 4 hours total.

Add three volleyball games this week, a doctors appointment after school, and Bible study on Monday with my girls group, I'm beat.

I'm not playing well at my volleyball games, I barely have time to get in the Word, and I have absolutely no time to relax and just get a breath of air. I wasn't even able to make it to youth group tonight. But what I love about Jesus is that we can cast all our cares upon Him; we can rest in Him knowing He's got everything under control. It's just one of those weeks when I can dump all this stuff on Him, and He can carry it for my with no trouble at all.

Also my Cowboys are playing Monday Night Football so that makes my week a lot better! :D

Thanks for reading! : )

I'm Sick

"I'm sick... I'm dying... bring me some supplies."
"Okay, okay, what do you need?"
"Bring me medicine... and chocolate."
"Chocolate?"
*cough, cough* "I'm sick..."

As I write this blog, I'm sitting on the couch in my sweats, watching the Sunday Night Football game, blowing my nose every two or three minutes. I really hate being sick on Sundays because I can't go to church, then I'm stuck doing all my homework with a headache, and I can't go to youth group. To make matters worse, they don't usually nationally broadcast the Dallas Cowboys games either.

Today was especially bad because the Cowboys lost. There were like 3 turnovers in the first 5 minutes, Jason Witten dropped three really critical passes and Dez Bryant just did awful. But if my favorite team is gonna get a good beating it may as well be from my second favorite team, right?

Anyways, I did get to get into my Bible today. I'm a ways into 1 Kings, and right now Queen Jezebel is scaring the life out of Elijah while Ahab is in control over Israel. So far I've read through the lives of like six or seven different guys who "did what was evil in the sight of the LORD," and, lately, "did more evil than all the others that had gone before him" or something like that. It's pretty bad.

Throughout the entire Old Testament, God continually shows us why we need a Savior. Especially in the chapters I'm reading. My dad always says that "God gave us the Old Testament so that we can learn from others' mistakes."

What they did do was sin. We sin too. Can't really do much about that. We are, after all, by nature, sinful. But what they didn't do was repent of their sins and go after God. That's where they really messed up.

So take a lesson from those who would tell you to repent after seeing the eternal consequence of their sins. God will forgive you and welcome you with open arms.

Have a good week, and let's hope the Cowboys have better luck next time.

Thanks for reading!   : )

Just Awed.

My, it's been a busy week.

School started on Tuesday. It was so great to see all my friends who live in the Bellevue area that I don't get to see very often when we're not in school. I remembered all my classes, which was quite the accomplishment for me. (Mostly from memory, anyway...)

Then on Thursday our volleyball team had our first game at Vashon High School. It was my first volleyball game since, like, seventh grade. We won the first set, but lost the last two sets so we lost the match. But JV 1 and Varsity both won their game! I love watching volleyball in general, but it's so fun to watch your friends play and win.

 

This is me on the left and my teammate and my amazing friend Janelle on the ferry over to Vashon Island for our volleyball game.

And this weekend was our school's Symphonic Wind Ensemble and Concert Choir retreat at Camp Casey on Whidbey Island. This is my first year playing in the select band, so I met a lot of new people that go to my school. Both the band and choir teachers are new this year too. I had such an amazing time getting to know the people on the retreat. We rehearsed quite a bit, roasted marshmallows around a good ol' campfire, star-tripped, had a fun time sleeping in a bunkdorm with my band and choir buddies, and played Sardines at the old military fort up the hill from the camp.

This picture was taken yesterday evening. The sunset was amazing! I wish I had brought a better camera to the retreat. It's hard to show something so beautiful in just a picture taken with a phone.

Something I really loved about this retreat was this morning. I decided to wake up an hour before our morning devotion and have some Jennifer-Jesus-talk-time and Bible reading. And just let me tell you - 7:00 in the morning on the beach, sitting on some driftwood watching the tide go out, not a person in sight, just a couple birds dawdling along the shore, the first rays of sun touching the water... and knowing that the God who created all of this cares about me? It's the most humbling thing.

So, thanks for tuning in. I've really had a great week, and I hope y'all did too. And a special shout-out to Mr. Benjamin Lee for being my first follower! Thanks bro! :D

Thanks for reading! : )

Labor Day Weekend!

So this weekend, we had some family from western Oregon come and visit us for a couple days. Jaci (my sister) and I are really close friends with our cousins Corina and Elise, so we had a blast hanging out with them. We jammed to their Just Dance 3 wii game, went shopping at the outlet mall in North Bend, played Disney Apples-to-Apples, did some awesome music stuff, and watched one of my favorite Disney movies - Hercules. Good stuff.

 

Me, Josh Hutcherson, and Corina. We found this thing at the Toys R Us while shopping on Saturday. I personally think Josh Hutcherson looks way better as a brunette. But being made of cardboard...that's a bit different.

 

Elise, me, Corina and Jaci visited Snoqualmie Falls after church on Sunday. It's a great place to visit, especially on such a nice day!

 

Funny story I have to share... Sunday morning before church, I couldn't find my cell phone. Since there were thirteen of us, my dad, Uncle Jeff, Corina, Elise, Jaci and I rode seperately. While we were on the drive there, my dad turned around and asked me where my phone was. When I told him I didn't know, he said that he had just received a text from my phone that said, "come to churh.it is josiah." Then I was even more impressed when I got my phone back and saw that Josiah (my 7-year-old brother) had also texted "it josiah i love you." and sent a picture to my cousin Ryan. Wow! I don't think I would've been able to figure that out until I was at least 10. When I was 7, I played Snake on my mom's phone...

Anyways, I am about 6 or 7 chapters into 1 Kings. I'm really enjoying reading through all these books, and I'm amazed at how God is able to work through His servants. I also love seeing how King David and King Solomon are reflections of God. So cool!

I've loved having all this free time in the summer to read my Bible, but I know that as soon as school starts I'm not going to have very much of that because of volleyball and all the schoolwork. So I guess I just gotta stay disciplined in this area of life.

School... ugh. I'm so not ready to start. Summer just isn't long enough. But I have Saturday to look forward to!

Thanks for reading! Tell your friends! : )