Congrats to Joy our Honor Star!

Here she is before the ceremony!

I had so much fun doing her hair!
Here she is with her sweet Daddy!
It was a beautiful evening.

I was just sure I would be a teary mess up on the stage, because I get all choked up when girls I don't even know get crowned... ; )
But, I made it!

Here we are.

(minus Nathan who was delayed in Chicago)

(thank you Jamie for taking pictures for us!)

A sweet family paid for all the girls to have a ride in this:

And they were so excited! They went somewhere "really fancy."

~To Mc D*nalds for sundaes! : )

Now, if you have a daughter who becomes an Honor Star and someone hands you the piece of cake with her picture on it and she is off in a limo having a sundae, DON'T eat it!

It may cause her to be scarred for life and your family will tease you forever. Plus, it's really a weird feeling eating your daughter's face. -Trust me on this one! ; )

~Becky , who is hoping to live this down someday!

We are together again!

We are all back together again! Woo-hoo!

To celebrate, Joy and I just made a blackberry pie! We also just finished watching his podcasts of the week. They were pretty cute.

We picked up him up at the airport last night after the Honor Star ceremony. They had a long delay in Chicago.

I just can't say enough good about the Teen Bible Quiz ministry! We saw a whole different side of it this week being at nationals.

It turned out to be totally worth all those fund raisers!!! LOL ; )

~It was an awesome experience!!!

The other teams' coaches and quizzers were so sweet. They encouraged our kids after matches and asked them how old they are and would tell them what a good job they did etc... One opposing team member gave Nathan tips on how to answer scripture text questions, it was really nice. On more than one occasion we heard people say that they thought that "in three years" we will have a championship team. ~Wow!

One coach of 20+ years told us that he'd "never seen a team this young come to nationals and do this well before!" Praise the Lord!

We have an awesome coach, by the way. He is a blessing and now we all understand his absolute passion for Bible Quiz!

We all had a wonderful week together.

If we make it next year, it will be in Missouri. ~'Hurray' for somewhere a little closer to us! Now, its time to start memorizing the book of Mark!

I want to give a big thank you to my kiddos who kept our household running beautifully while I was gone and Dad was at work.

~Thank you to Joy who did all the laundry...no small feat! ~To Zach who did the cooking and dishes. (and it wasn't mac and cheese and p/b&j either. He ambitiously chose some difficult meals and I hear that ate really well while I was away!) ~Thanks to Andrew who covered Nathan's daily chores as well as his own.

A HUGE thanks to Zachary for being one very responsible guy and taking great care of his brother and sister during the day. I was very grateful for the sweet emails he sent me while I was away that let me know that all was well on the home front. : )

~Becky

I'm home and we have a winner!

So, life in a 5 star hotel full of Christians is fun...
And so is not doing any laundry or cooking...


But there's no place like home!


I'm so glad to be back with the rest of my family!



A dear friend brought us over dinner last night and it was such a blessing for me after being stuck in our nation's capital for more than 3 hours. : )

Nathan is still in WI.
~He called last night while we were having dinner to say that they WON their last two matches! How exciting!!!
That makes 7 for the week. (more than double what they hoped for. PTL!)


I came home early because tomorrow Joy is being crowned as an Honor Star at church.
Woo-hoo!!! This has been her goal since she was in kindergarten and I'm so proud of her. It was a lot of work.
~And unless Nathan and his team spend some extra time in an airport or two, he'll be back in time to meet us at the ceremony. : )

I have lots more to share about the trip but for now we have a WINNER.....


I had Joy pick a name out of the bowl (aren't we techie?!)
and it was....

And since Joy actually knows her, she felt guilty and she wants the bloggy world to know that she didn't pick her on purpose. How cute it that?!

Congrats Jamie! I imagine you may want to share it with your Honey who really wanted to win and whose comments crack us up! LOL

~Becky

Hi from WI!!!

The team is doing really well!
Our coach's goal was that we have 3 wins this week and we have 4 so far. Hurray!
Nathan has had two exciting matches where he got positive quiz outs and the extra points for that caused their team to win those VERY close matches. He was so excited!

Our days here are very full. There's breakfast, a devotional and then its off to quiz four rounds until lunch. Then we eat and head off to quiz five more rounds. By then, its about time for dinner. They have some chill out time right after dinner and then the coach has them practice quoting all of the material (which takes about an hour) and then its time for bed at 10:00.

The team is bonding and making some fun memories. The boys made Ephesians into a rap the other night. Nathan taught all the kids to play poker with m&m's yesterday. And someone who I know wishes to remain nameless, taught us all to play '21' for candy bars last night. LOL!

I better run. There's a line for the computers!
~Becky

I found a computer!!!

Yesterday, I discovered the 'business center' of the hotel. Yahoo! Free computer use! But I won't be able to post any pictures until I get home.
What made my day, besides finding the computers was when the lady I asked about them glanced at me and said "You have to be 18 or over to use them." I said that I'm pretty sure I qualify and laughed. I didn't realize she was serious!!!! Then she looked at me and she apologized. LOL! I said "Don't apologize, I'll take that as a compliment." Too funny!

So, hello from Green Bay. Or as the sign at the airport said "Welcome to the land of the Packers!" I think they are serious about their football here. ; )

All is going well here. The kids have had a blast. But today, starts the QUIZZING!
So there won't be much more time for playing in the glass elevator and swimming...
Its too funny to see how much fun they have riding this elevator! Nathan and his buddy ran around on all 8 floors of the hotel the first night, meeting people and finding out what state they were from and playing elevator 'tag.'
Last night we heard 10 or 11 kids preach 5 minute sermons from the books they memorized this year. They were awesome! I heard an adult say that the next generation is in good hands! Amen! Nathan and his buddy will have to do sermons the next time they make it to nationals. They would be great at it. We missed the dramatized quoting which I'm sure was awesome. The kids needed a break and so we all played a card game.

The hotel is filled with 200 or so teens who know LARGE portions of the N.T. by heart. Its a neat environment. The high level teams are practicing 6 and 7 hours a day!!! There are college scholarships available to win this week. We heard a senior give our Sunday morning sermon and he'd been in Bible Quiz so long that he knows 10 or 11 books by heart! How amazing is that?!
I better run.
Things get mighty serious today as the matches begin soon....
Blessings from WI!
~Becky

And if you want to enter a give away, see the post below!!! : )

I'm going away and having a give-away!

Happy fourth of July!!!

~Lots and lots of fundraisers later...

it's that time and Nathan and I are off to Wisconsin for the Teen Bible Quiz nationals!

It has been a bit overwhelming but I'm starting to get excited about the trip. It will be a fun adventure and I know that Nathan will remember this forever!Thank you to all our sweet friends and family for your words of encouragement and your financial support to see his team go.

While I am in Green Bay having blogging withdrawals, and wishing I had a lap top...

I thought I would host a give-away! : )

It will be for a $10.00 gift card here:

Woo hoo!!! So, if you'd like to be entered in this drawing just leave a comment! I'll get one of our cute kiddos to be the "random number generator" (How techie is that?! LOL) We will choose a winner next Friday.

And if you think of it, would you pray that their team does well and that they don't get discouraged? They will be the (inexperienced) underdogs in all 19 of these matches since this is their first year. Thinking about this makes me want to quote all my favorite lines from Facing the Giants, but I better go pack instead.
Thanks so much!

~Guess what? It is in the 50's at night in Green Bay!!! How glorious is that for us Floridians who are melting!? Bring on the cold! ; )

~Becky

Wednesdays in the Word

Yesterday the kiddos and I studied Ephesians 5:20-21. I think I need to make these verses my motto!

"...giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,"

Giving thanks for ALL things. Giving thanks for the blessings is easy but the trials aren't so easy. How about giving thanks even BEFORE we see

Rom. 8:28 happen. - "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose." Gotta work on that...

And verse 21, which I like how the NIV words it:

"submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." Now that one is really speaking to me right now.

The kids and I discussed how submitting to others is a way to honor the Lord. And honoring the Lord is something we should be desperate to do.

So, we submit and not necessarily because:

~someone is right

~someone is nice about it

~someone knows what they are doing

~we feel like it or because it makes sense

But because in so doing, we honor Jesus.

~Becky