Three Words

To my Daddy,

You are awesome!

My favorite dad!

Happy Father's Day!

I love you!

~Kiki

Capitol Days 2007

During the spring we went to four Capitol Days once a month hosted by THSC. They describe the experience like this: "THSC representatives, legislators, and legislative staff members will educate attendees about the legislative process and train them to lobby. Each month there will be different speakers and topics, depending on the current issue of concern for Texas home educators. In the afternoon, students, parents, and chaperones will head to the Capitol to meet and lobby legislators; then finally reconvene for a debriefing."

February

Debra during Role Playing (practicing what we were going to say when we lobbied later in the day).

Rattlesnakes in the outdoor rotunda of the Capitol annex.

Close up.

"Ain't she a beaut'! "

The fangs. Yes, the REAL fangs.

It's not every day you get a picture with a rattlesnake in the Capitol.

One of the staff whom we lobbied.

With Mr. Lambert afterwards.

March

Our teammates.

With friend and representative from San Antonio, Nathan Macias

April - We have no pictures from April because Paul had the camera while visiting Sequim, Washington.

May

Training.

This time there was no homeschooling bill that THSC thought needed lobbying so we delivered cookies instead.

"Would you like some cookies?"

Grace and I in the underground Capitol annex. Our families had been put together on a team.

More cookies.

On the Capitol steps.

Debriefing afterwards.

Two men conversing about important issues.

Two ladies smiling about a job well done.

~Christy

Discovering A New Word

The joy which comes from God is inexpressible.
The extent of God's peace is incomprehensible.
The majesty of God is indescribable.
God's holiness is unutterable.
God is ineffable.

Ineffable: Incapable of being expressed or described in words; inexpressible.

~Christy

Four Years Later

From baby blankets to toy soldiers to piano to basketball to computers to community college to high school graduate to physics and now...to college graduate! That's right, Pat IV has graduated from Rice University!!! Last Saturday, May 12, Pat received a B.S. in Physics and a B.A. in Math and turned 22 years old as well (it was his birthday).

Wow! Four years... so many things have changed. All three of us kids have grown so much during the past four years:

Physically
Me: 9 inches
Paul: 7 inches
Pat IV: from boy to man (not to mention the muscle)

Socially
Paul and I: In October 2004 we had a massive change in who we spent time with because we changed churches and joined our speech and debate club.
Pat 4: College brought a whole new group of friendships from Bible study, church, Campus Crusade, classes, cross-country, Right-to-Life, Rice Republicans, etc...

Mentally
Four years of studying, listening, reading, studying some more, applying, asking, researching, probing, investigating, observing, experimenting, etc...all to learn more about the world which God so marvelously created.

Spiritually
Where could I possibly begin? As each one of us goes through new trials and struggles, we stand firm upon the promise that "we are more than conquers through Him that loves us." We fight the battles knowing that Christ has already won the war. He has the ultimate victory and will pick us up every time we fall down. Personally, over the past four years God has shown me how important and how hard walking in obedience is, how sovereign my Creator is, that I am fearfully and wonderfully made, what true service is like, what a wonderful church I have, how much of a failure I am, and how forgiving and loving He is. I want to thirst after His presence and be filled by His goodness. To overflow with His love and outpour it onto a dying world. To have a relationship with a Friend who is "closer than a brother" not just for the next four years...but for all of eternity.

A different church, different friends, different priorities, different activities, different attitudes, a different perspective on life...but the same God. He stays the same no matter what. "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever." (Heb 13:8)

~Christy

Summit 2007

Can you touch the sky?

Downtown Denver.

My mom on the capitol steps. Behind her is a statue dedicated to those who died during the Civil War and the large building is the city hall.

Simply adorable.

Outside the Chocolate Factory with an "enlargened" customer.

Denver's main river.

On a hill in Common Park. It seemed so happy there. Kites flying, a young mother tossing a frisbee to her toddler, a young couple playing with their dog, so many kids taking walks with their cute doggies...

Eating out with the Grace Covenant team.

Josh, Paul, and Corey.

Playing an arrangement of "Great is Thy Faithfulness" with "How Great Thou Art."

In the lobby of the Adams Mark Hotel.

Bible Quizzing.

I think they had a bad hair day.

The mile-high marker on the Colorado capitol steps.

Paul with his family after receiving his Citation award. That's the highest award in Awana and it means that he's completed ten Awana books since third grade.

The five Citation recipients from Grace Covenant. In total there were over 250 Citation recipients from around the nation.

Presenting the gospel message.

Zoomed out.

AwanaGames.

Paul and Josh Boudin.

The entire Grace Covenant team.

With Mr. Rorheim, the founder of AWANA.

I have no idea who the two girls on the ends or the man who is kneeling are, but the other man is Greg Stier of Dare 2 Share ministries who was the speaker at the closing ceremony.

Paul and Kevin White, the speaker at the opening ceremony.

With Brian Rhodes, an AWANA missionary.

With Danny Oertli, the worship leader.

An extra day of sight-seeing:
The Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Fascinating to say the least.

Focus on the Family. I'm standing outside of the Imagination Station a.k.a. the elevator to the part of the building dedicated to Adventures in Odyssey.

Garden of the Gods. "The Three Graces"--one of the many unique and exquisite rock formations in the park.

Pike's Peak--God is a such a wonderful Creator and His mountains are marvelous... but not nearly as marvelous as Him.

~Christy