Skip-Bo Characters

We have had some celebrities participate in our family Skip-Bo games this week!  Last night Batman was here!  (I didn't get his photo; he was too quick!)  He beat us all!

This evening Little Red Riding Hood stopped in and played with us.  She was very pleasant to have around, and we enjoyed her company.

I'm not sure what this character would like to be called...

Someone suggested Gomer Pyle?  Boomhauer, maybe?  He is nicer than he looks in this photo, so we let him stay.  Plus, he has nice "guns."  ;)

Crafty time!

I've lately come to love the bulletin board site, Pinterest.  It's a great place to pin ideas that inspire or things I'd like to try later.  A month or so ago, I came across this cute idea on a blog and pinned it so I'd remember for summertime.  I just thought Annah would have fun doing this simple craft and having it for her room.  She put it together this morning in no time, had fun doing it and is pleased with how it turned out.

I think she did well.  We covered a shoe box lid with solid colored paper first.  Annah chose patterned paper scraps that had colors that would compliment her room and used my butterfly punches to create the butterflies.  Then she folded the butterflies in half and used Glue Dots to stick them on.  Cute stuff!

HOT summer has arrived!

Ughhhhh it's HOT!!!  Sylvia had a friend over this afternoon.  They hibernated upstairs in the air conditioning and played Barbies for a while.  But, soon, they needed cold water relief!  We got the sprinkler slip 'n' slide going!

Baseball...finally!

After a few rain-outs, Caeden finally got to start baseball today!  I think he was nervous, because when it came time to get ready, he kept saying he didn't want to play baseball anymore, he didn't like it, and so on. But once we got there, he jumped right in, listened to the coaches, tried hard, hustled, and obviously had fun!

The BIG Regional Quiz!

We were all up early this morning, and had breakfast in the ONU cafeteria at 7a.m!  We came for the big Regional Children's Quiz!  Our local church is part of the NWIL District, made up of many Nazarene churches in Illinois.  Today, we are representing our district in the quiz of all the churches in our Region, which includes all of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin.

We have been studying 1 & 2 Samuel since September, and we are ready!!!

The Red Level Quiz started at 8:00 a.m.  Sylvia and Caeden both earned a spot on our NWIL District's All-Star Team of 5 kids, so there was a bit more pressure to quiz really well for the district!

We never did figure out exactly how many questions Caeden missed, but it wasn't very many.  For the red level, today they did 3 rounds of 15 questions with 3 possible answers.  We *think* Caeden only missed about 6 questions total.  He was really feeling the pressure after the 2nd round, and needed quite an encouraging pep-talk.  We were just amazed that he earned a spot on the All-star team as a kindergartener!  We were very proud of him for that, but he was afraid he was letting his team down by missing questions.  We just encouraged him and told him to do his very best for the Lord and his team.

When the Top 10 Quizzers were announced, we were so excited when Sylvia was among them.  She was actually the last one announced because she didn't miss a single question and had 3 perfect rounds!   

Wow, we were proud of her!  She received a huge trophy for her hard work, handed to her by Toby the Tiger (Olivet's mascot) himself.

Sylvia's friend Carly was on the All-Star team for our district too, as well as Annah's church camp friend Gracie.  We knew that Carly also had 3 perfect rounds and Gracie had only missed 1 out of the 45 questions.  We didn't know how the other boy on the team, Logan, had done.  As many questions as Caeden thought he had missed, we didn't really consider that the team would place in the awards.  

I had kept score for a row of quizzers from a Chicago district team, and they had done really well.  So, when they received 3rd place, I didn't see NWIL District placing above them.  2 Districts tied for second place.  Then NWIL District was announced as the 1st place team!!!  Oh wow, we were so surprised and excited!!!

It was really neat to see two of our kiddos on the team to win the entire Regional Quiz!!!  

Our regional directors were really excited for them too, as they are resigning after 12 years of ministry and it was the first time a team from our district had even placed at the regional quiz!  What an exciting day!

4 of the 5 NWIL All-Star Team with Toby...

Even though we aren't ONU alumni, Jeremy and I randomly chose to wear purple today.  (It is our alma mater color too, actually.)  Annah took this photo of us on campus.  I should have taken my glasses off.

After lunch on campus, it was time for the Blue Level Quiz to start at noon.  Annah had qualified as an alternate for the All-Star team, but wasn't needed for the team today.  (Just like last year.  She was a bit disappointed, I think, but still excited to quiz.)  

There were at least a couple hundred quizzers in each level at the quiz today!

Blue Level quizzers had 3 rounds of 20 questions with 4 possible answers.

Annah missed 1 question in the first round, but was feeling pretty good about it.  After the second round, she had missed one more, and was pretty discouraged.  But, at the beginning of the 3rd round, it was announced that there was a mistake with the question she thought she missed in the second; she had actually gotten it correct.  She had a perfect 3rd round, so only missed one question out of 60.  We were very proud of her!!

waiting for Blue Level awards...

Aren't we cute? 

a little sibling torture while waiting...

I had scored a row of quizzers with several who didn't miss any questions, so I had a feeling that the Top 10 were all going to have 3 perfect rounds.  Blue Level is tough!!  And, yep, there were actually 16 quizzers who all had 3 perfect rounds.  I think Annah was a bit discouraged to have missed 1 question and have been so close to perfect.  But, we assured her she did an amazing job!!

Here she is receiving her participation medal.

So proud of our quizzers!

Ribbons, medals, trophies, or not, the greatest reward is having a better knowledge and understanding of the scriptures and God's heart!! 

What a fun weekend!  Thank you, Lord!

"Your word is a lamp to my feet

         And a light to my path."

- Psalm 119:105

Visiting ONU

This evening, we arrived on campus at Olivet Nazarene University.  After we registered, we went on a scavenger hunt (which was really a tour around campus) for a couple hours.

The first stop was at Burke Administration building, 

where all the kids in the group yelled hello to Dr. Bowling.

Milby Clock Tower

the sibs, walking together

At the clock tower, the group was to form a circle around the tower, grab hands, and sing, "Ring around the Rosie."

I thought Jeremy looked kinda college preppy today. ;)

At the planetarium, the kids all lined up shortest to tallest.

They posed for a group shot in front of the school sign, but you can't tell that it says Olivet Nazarene University. 

4 ONU students took us around campus.  At the eternal flame, the kids did a silly-face photo.

The new Centennial Chapel is beautiful.

The kids spelled out O-N-U on the lawn by the gazebo.

Then we went inside the chapel...

One of the gorgeous stained glass windows, including the Lord's prayer...

the pipes and horns

On the lawn of the Warming House, they played Duck, Duckc Goose!

We left the scavenger hunt a few stops early so we could have ice cream in the cafeteria.  Afterwards, we took our things to the on-campus apartment where we were staying for the night.  The kids were more than thrilled with it.  It was quite nice for campus housing!  There were 2 bedrooms, large closets for each student, a kitchen area, living room area with 4 desks and a.c., and a bathroom--of course.  Sylvia said, "College students have the best life!"  

We spent a while reviewing some more questions for the Quiz in the morning, and then all went to sleep.

Well, I didn't sleep a wink.  Kinda odd sharing a room with Jeremy but sleeping in our own twin beds! Ha!  I stayed up until midnight finishing a book on the Kindle app on my phone.  (Leota's Garden by Francine Rivers...I quite enjoyed it.)  

I am glad we stayed on campus though, and had the tour so the kids could see more of the university.  It is beautiful.  They all thought it was pretty cool, and all said they want to go to college there.  Maybe Uncle Travis and Aunt Erin would be proud.  :)

Visiti with Marci

We had the pleasure of visiting with our friend Marci for a little bit today in her home!  Sadly, we haven't seen her in several years, and had never met her children in person until today.  But, it was like picking up where we left off...one way to know a true friendship.  

Caeden and Trey had a great light saber duel!

   

Addison and her mommy, so sweet.

What a huge blessing it was to get to see Marci and meet her two precious kiddos!!!

One of my BFF's.  :)

We were so glad to spend a bit of time with Marci and her kids, chat and catch up a bit, and realize it's only a little over an hour and a very easy drive to get to her house.  We will have to do better at visiting in the future!

Marci has been such a wonderful friend, and a real blessing in my life!

"A friend loves at all times..."

-Proverbs 17:17

Going Home

It was a gorgeous morning, and everyone was looking cute as usual, so we took a few quick pics before we headed out...

Krampa/Bapa and Gram and all of their grandkids (and Shadow too) in the backyard

the silly one

just the kids

-------------------------

We did some geocaching on the way home today, to help keep us awake, and because it was such a gorgeous day.  This one was in Goodland, IN at a baseball park.  It was 8 feet in the air, and nothing to climb on, so we had to get creative, especially in putting it back!  A fun challenge.

We found 3 other caches, and were unsuccessful with 2.  We did see a young doe that Annah spotted walking out of the woods though.

We missed Jeremy SO much this past week, and wished many times that he had gone with us!  But, we were really glad to get back home and see him this evening!!

He demonstrated his new way of watering the roses for us... ;)

They are looking beautiful!

And, our pink lilacs are blooming right now, for the first time in many years!  They are so unique (at least to me!  I've never seen them anywhere else.) and so pretty and fragrant.  While I was taking pictures of them, this tiger swallowtail butterfly flew right into my photo!  Double beauty.

The bushes are getting pretty big.

The lavender and white ones are blooming too.  Some of the blooms are really full; they look like the exploded!  Poof!

Next week...pruning...

Such a nice welcome...home sweet home.

"“You heavens above, rain down my righteousness; 

   let the clouds shower it down. 

Let the earth open wide, 

   let salvation spring up, 

let righteousness flourish with it; 

   I, the LORD, have created it."

- Isaiah 45:8