Baptisms and Memories...

I've always been told I became a Christian when I was four. I don't really remember it, but I never questioned it. When I was 8, we went to a typical Baptist church, and some of my friends had decided to get baptized. In light of the up-coming baptism, many of the sermons began to center on verses about baptism, and I began to feel guilty and pressured to be baptized. After all, I was a Christian, so I should be baptized, right? I finally asked Daddy to take me to see the pastor so that I could get into the pre-baptism class/study that was required. But then I chickened out. Looking back, I'm glad I did.

March 24, 2003, I heard a radio program that finally struck home. The pastor's point was that if you claim to be a Christian, but still haven't surrendered your life to Christ, then you probably aren't really a Christian. And that you were particularly in trouble if you didn't remember becoming a Christian. He recommended that if you didn't remember it, that you rededicate your life to Christ and then write the date down, so that when the Devil gave you doubts you could come back with that date. I got the feeling that he was talking directly to me. I'm still not sure if I really was a Christian before then or not, but my official date is March 24, 2003, and that's when my life changed.

That summer, we joined the Christian Community Summer Club for the first time, and started going to a "house" group that met at the pool. At one of the August meetings, the pastor announced that his daughter Kara had asked to be baptized and that a baptism would be held at the pool in two weeks. I instantly knew I wanted to be baptized as well, and that it was right this time. Exactly five months after I finalized my faith, on August 24, 2003, I was baptized by Coach Matt and my daddy, along with 4 others, Kara, Matt, Sean and Kyle. It was so much more special to be baptized in an informal setting by my daddy and another man I respected, instead of a Baptist pastor that I didn't even really know.

This past Wednesday, July 22, 2009, I got to watch as all 3 of my siblings were baptized by our daddy, our Coach, and the two other men in our fellowship group, Mr. M and Mr. J. Along with my siblings, there were the rest of Kara's siblings, Rachel, Trissa and Torin, the one who asked for the baptism, Hannah J. and her sister, Rachel, and Chandler M. It was so exciting for me to see all my siblings publicly confess their faith in Christ, and so sweet to see all 9 of those children and young adults baptized. We had a meal together beforehand, and played in the pool and celebrated with dessert afterward.

Here are some pictures from the baptism 6 years ago (I can't believe it's been that long!) and some from last Wednesday.




Me, Kara and Sean... we look so young!

Praying for me to grow in the spirit and walk with God the rest of my life... along with other things. =)

With my daddy! And you thought I was short NOW...

Sean, Matt, Kara and me... I don't remember what Coach was saying. And too bad Kyle isn't in this picture. I think he was on the other side of Sean.


Pre-baptism talk... missing Rachel J. I ALMOST got everyone. :\

I'm only putting pictures of my siblings because there would be way too many pictures if I put all of them...






Praying for them...




~Lizzie

Picture overload

Here's a lot of my pictures... I took about 300. Not including when I stole Sarah's camera and took pictures with her nice expensive camera...

Christmas-y... Christmas is complete, now that we've had snow. :)


Pictures just never capture the moment...


Our dirt road, all covered in snow!

Sign at the main road.


I made orange pineapple muffins.


Then went out and took more pictures.


Our neighbor's red barn.


Our neighbor's little pond.


David and I went sledding on the big hill. (Sarah and Joel wouldn't come... don't know why...)


David getting started.


David made a snow angel.






And ate some snow.


The sun started setting.


We drove down a little ways to get some pictures of the lake and the sunset.







And I got some more sunset pictures at our house.


Snow gear drying by the fireplace.


The view from the window in my room.

Sarah got some good pictures too, which she has put on Facebook... I'm trying to get her to put them on the blog too, but once you do one, you don't feel like doing the other...

I had such a great snow day! It was absolutely perfect.

~Lizzie

Beach Vacation 6

Remember the beach vacation series back in September where I promised to post a video of as soon as I could get it to work? I finally got it to work. So here's the video.

You might notice that I say "Yeah" a total of 4 times in this video. There's a very good reason for my lack of intellectual conversation.... it was not required.

By the way, here's the script if you were wondering what David said:

David: Isn't it cool? (Meaning his skim board)
Me: Yeah
David: Lizzie!
Me: Yeah!
David: Isn't it cool? (He didn't hear my answer the first time)
Me: Yeah!
Joel: Are you doing video?
Me: Yeah
Joel: Huh.

And actually, that's not Joel playing frisbee with himself, it's Bubba.

So I finally got that posted. Whew.

~Lizzie

Mondays.....

It seems like on Mondays everyone's intelligence is lower than normal.... maybe too much TV over the weekend? And I feel so lucky that this universal daze falls on the day that I drive the most. On Mondays I take Joel and David to basketball (and attempt to finish my math book from last year to the sound of dribbling balls and hoarse shouts), then we come home, grab something to eat and I take Joel to baseball practice, drop him off early, and rush to Wake Forest to pick Sarah up from band... always arriving a few minutes late. Then we run errands and go back to pick Joel up from baseball. Today I encountered at least 5 people who didn't know how to drive, and 7 people who couldn't read speed limit signs. Nothing is more frustrating when you're late than to be stuck behind a car that's just coasting around. Hello... the speed limit's 45! Whyyyyyyyy are you going 30?

When Sarah and I got to baseball, Sean was pitching and Mark was batting. Sean threw a ball, and Mark teased, "Air ball, Sean! If it'd dropped down about 20 feet it would have been a good pitch!" A little later, they switched; Mark pitched and Sean hit. Sean hit a foul and Mark taunted, "Is that where you wanted it?" It really cracks me up how the guys are all friends but they still tease each other like that.

Joel's started taking strange drinks to baseball. On the way home he announced that no one has yet managed to guess correctly. "Christian guessed orange juice... and Sean guessed apple juice."
"Well, how are they supposed to know to guess pomegranate and mango juice?" I asked, incredulously.
We're probably the only people in the world who drink mango juice instead of orange juice. Actually, our usual stock of juice includes cranberry, pomegranate, mango and occasionally apple.

Then my day of driving was topped off with a two-mile long line of cars backed up over the 540 overpass, which we cross over on our way home from baseball. We probably sat there in that line of cars for 10 minutes.

I'm looking forward to the release of two movies.... "Eagle Eye" coming out on the 26th and "An American Carol" coming out October 3rd. I don't know if they're going to be any good or not, but the trailers look pretty interesting to me.

A video and pictures

This is Joel and David, rocking out to TobyMac.

They still don't know that I was doing video.....

A couple pics of the really dark cloud we had on Mother's Day.

Some pictures from the cold and slightly wet baseball game today.

This the cutest kid ever.....

An older kid stole his hat today.... just as a joke, and he gave it right back, but I don't know how he could do it. The worried look on T's little face... *sniff* It was so sad... and cute.
His family better watch out... someday I'm going to steal him. :P

~Lizzie