ACT your age, you Graduate.

I got my ACT scores back this last Wednesday. I received a 32 out of a possible 36. I was happy. Elated. Pysched. Exuberant. Shocked. Dumbfounded. Praising the Lord.

The 32 means I'm ranked in the top 1% of students in the State and in the US who took the ACT in April. It also means I can most likely get another $2000 per year if I go to MSU or DU. Plus I'm now eligible for the highest academic scholarship at MSU, which includes room/board/all tuition paid and access to the a special Library and entrance into the Honors Society. But...they only give 40 of those scholarships out per year. I'm actually really hoping to be accepted into Drury. I'd rather go there than MSU. We'll see. I'm going to apply to both schools. In case I don't get the full ride at DU, then I can go to MSU and get all my tuition paid for even if I don't get the Presidential Scholarship (the highest award).



Oh, I'm exhausted. This last weekend was the SHEM Convention. SHEM stands for Southwest Home Education Ministry. Basically, people from all around the country come to sell their respective cirriculums and talk to new homeschoolers about different ways to teach their children. There are speakers that teach on different things, from Creation Vs. Evolution, to the meaning of Classical Education, how to help/teach children with learning disabilities. There was nearly 100 vendors that came to sell and promote their homeschooling tools. The convention started Thursday evening, and went until Saturday evening. To allow the convention to run smoothly, there had to be volunteers, of course. And I love to help at stuff like this, so I volunteered. I knew what it would be like, since I had helped last year.



All Thursday afternoon, vendors came and unloaded vans, trucks, and trailers. And guess who was there to help them unload and set up their booths?? The Pages, those special people that have a heart for service. I'm not boasting here. Yes, I'm one of those people, but I have a deep sense of respect and appreciation for all the other pages and volunteers who made the convention possible. It's not a one or two person job. It takes many, many people to make something like that happen.



Friday evening, after the vendor hall had closed, SHEM hosted its annual homeschool Graduation. 12 young people graduated, including one of my best friends, Sam. The Play His Praises Homeschool Orchestra and the Sing His Praises Homeschool Choir both participated in the graduation. The Orchestra played Pomp and Cirumstance for the graduates as they walked in, and played Fanfare and Frippery No. 2 as they walked out. The Choir sang It Is Well right before the Speaker addressed the audience, and sang a benidiction/prayer/the seven-fold-amen right after the parents had finished giving their young adults their congratulations.



That's a really cool part of the Graduation. You get to hear the parents of each of the graduates come and talk about their child for a couple of minutes. Charging their graduate to keep following the Lord, and to continue in the way they were trained. Often, the parents would read scripture, or relate some time in the graduate's life were they reached an important milestone in their faith.



All that to say, I'm bushed now. I kind of wished I'd had a pedometer while I was at the convention. I would have really liked to know how far I walked. It was several miles, I know. I've never had such sore legs. Oh well. I'll get over it.

Focus, Dude!!

My extended family just left. We had a really fun time while they were here, but I hope it doesn't kill me in the next few weeks as I try to make up school that I've missed while they were here.

We went to the Dixie Stampede, Bass Pro Shops (the obvious stop for any out-of-towners from the East Coast), and went out to the S-'s to shoot the .22. They had never shot a gun before (at least the kids hadn't), so that was a new experience for them. I thought it would have been really funny to let them shoot the .22 and tell them that's about how much kick an average gun has. Then give them a 12-gauge shotgun and let them shoot that. And video how far backwards they fall. :)

I took my cousin Max to the Knight's track meet. I figured that'd be the only chance to introduce him to some of my friends. Poor thing, having to meet of all them. I think he survived, though.

I didn't get as much time this week to be in the Bible as I would have liked. I struggle with some things, and if I don't focus on God, then I very quickly get down and depressed. I hate it when that happens, and I end up getting angry at other people too. But hey, at least I realize I am acting like the way I am, and I know what the problem is, and how to fix it. The Devil's sly as anything, and he'll take any opportunity to snatch your heart, thoughts, and mind away from God. And trust me, it doesn't take very long for me to get irritated when I'm not focusing on God.


Nothin' can wash away my sin
Nothin' can wash away my sin
Nothin' can wash away my sin
Nothin' Nothin'
Nothin' but the blood of Jesus

Nothin' can make the devil run
Nothin' can make the devil run
Nothin' can make the devil run
Nothin' Nothin'
Nothin' but the blood of Jesus

Nothin' can bring me peace with God
Nothin' can bring me peace with God
Nothin' can bring me peace with God
Nothin' Nothin'
Nothin' but the blood of Jesus

Nothin' can lead me to your throne
Nothin' can lead me to your throne
Nothin' can lead me to your throne
Nothin' Nothin'
Nothin' but the blood of Jesus

Nothin' can make your people one
Nothin' can make your people one
Nothin' can make your people one
Nothin' Nothin'
Nothin' but the blood of Jesus
~ Chris Rice

Birthdays are Symphonic, and the evil Demon, Stress, is not.

This past week, two of my best friends had their birthdays. Happy Birthday, Josh and Owen!! You're one year closer to Jesus!! :) Oh, and I think this Thursday is Holly's Birthday. Happy Birthday to you too...I can't remember if you read my blog or not, but I think some of your sibs do. And if they don't, they need to. :0

Last year, so of my friends went to a Leadership Camp, called Worldview Academy. It's a camp where you can establish what you believe, based on what the Bible says, and learn about other worldviews. Once you've ascertained what you believe, and you've learned about what other people believe, and the potential problems with their worldviews, then they send you out in teams to talk to people on the college campus that you are living on. You take what you've learned in lectures, and try to get people to really think about what they believe, and why they believe it. All too often, people believe something only because they've been raised that way. And once they are forced to start thinking about why they believe it, questions quickly come to their mind. So this camp is to make sure you aren't a "christian with a biblical worldview" just because you've been raised that way, but to make sure that your faith is really YOUR faith, and not just what your parents have taught to you for years. The nice thing is that the staff there don't just say, "this is what's right and true, believe it or you are wrong." They show you what the Bible says about important issues, and leave it up to you and what you've learned from your parents to come to grips with what you believe.
Now, everything I've just written above is what I've heard about the camp, either through the website, through promo vids from the staff, or from my friends that have gone. So if anything is not accurately portrayed, it's my fault, cause I probably misunderstood something. Once I get back from Worldview, I'll be able to present a much clearer picture of what WVA is about. Anyway, the camp is the first week in June, in Warrensburg. I'm pretty excited about it.

I went to the Symphony Concert this past Saturday with a bunch of my friends. The guest artist was amazing!! His name is David Kim. He is the Concert Master of the Philidelphia Orchestra. He played Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, and oh my word, he was incredible. I would pay a lot of money to hear him again in concert.
The Violin Concerto was three movements long. Now, if you've ever been to the Symphony, you know that you aren't supposed to applaud between movements of a song. Well, after the first movement of the aforementioned concerto, when Kim had really had a chance to show off his skills (which are sweet), Ron (the conductor) ended the movement with a flourish, and turned around. Well, he usually does that only at the end of an entire piece. So everybody started clapping, and ended up giving Kim a standing ovation. Quite possibly, Ron might have meant for that to happen, since the first movement was so good. But the problem was, that the audience proceeded to clap after every movement after that. So they clapped after the 2nd movement of the Tchaikovsky, and then after every movement of the Brahm's 4th Symphony. It aggravated me to NO END. At one point, I thought the audience had been cured, and there was about 5 seconds of silence in between movements of the Brahm's. But then, just as I turned to my friend in silent approval of the...silence, people started clapping again. AARRRGGGHH!! :) oh well.

I've got a test in every subject this week. Plus I have the ACT this Saturday. And I've got family from Connecticut coming on Saturday evening. Stress cometh quickly. I must go back to fending the evil demon off. Farewell, and prayers are appreciated. Later.

Ahhh...Catch up, quick!!

My word. It's been forever since I posted. Sorry.

I think it's funny, though. I get 70-80 hits on my site every week, even when I don't post.

In case you haven't noticed, I got a new play list. It will automatically play the songs when you load up this page. It doesn't have as many songs as my previous player (which I still have on the page) did, but you can see and select any song at any point in time on this new player. Most of the songs are Christian genre, of course, but I do have a couple that aren't. The first two are by a couple of artists I found while searching for music on project playlist. I liked them, so I added them. :) And I happen to really like Josh Groban's voice, so I added a couple of his. Hymn to Red October is from the movie, Hunt for Red October, starring Sean Connery and Alec Baldwin. An excellent movie that I highly reccomend. The only caution is the language, which really isn't too prevalent.

Okay, on to other things. Unfortunately, I received a 4 in my piano solos. So that means I have 44/45 points I need for my 3rd gold cup in piano. *sobs* But, hey, I like performing, so it'll give me the wonderful opportunity to memorize a full length concerto and perform it next year. Yipee. :/

Our church had a Easter Production that I was involved in. I played the part of one of Jesus' twelve Disciples. Only Peter, James, John, and Judas were actually named, and had speaking or definite action parts, so I don't know which disciple I was supposed to represent. I decided I'd be Luke, who was a doctor, since I also want to be a doctor.

We had two performances, one on Saturday evening before Easter, and one on Easter morning. Our Saturday evening performance had about 250ish people there, which is quite a good turn out, I thought. Sunday morning had 700ish people, so again, not too shabby.

Hilary, I don't know why you sometimes faint when you are nervous and your knees lock. I just know that it happens, and that I didn't want it to happen to me. :) I'll look it up when I have a little more time, and post the answer.

One of my best friend's sister, Rachel, got married this past Saturday to another one of my best friend's brother, Colin. Yeah. Get those families all intermarried, and make it confusing, why don't ya. :) If you want to see pictures, go to my sister's blog. But here's a picture on my blog, just so you can see who it was and what they look like. Jessi's got like 8 pics on her blog, I think.

This Saturday the Symphony performs...I can't wait. It's been too long since the last performance. Like, a whole month.

We have family coming down from Connecticut in 10 days. I don't know if they read my blog or not, so I won't say anything else about them. They are a wonderful family, have 3 great kids, and have never come down to visit us. Hehe...we'll show 'em what it's like around here. Show 'em how real hillbillies live. Van bench on the front porch and all.

Okay, back to school. Post later. :)