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

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.

Camping trip: Part 2

Before I get started on another long post about our fantastic camping trip, I want to mention this article that Natalie linked on her blog..... "20-Something Reasons to Live at Home". It's really good and has given me even more reasons to continue living at home when I'm older. Thank you, Natalie, for sharing it!

Now to continue with the description of our camping trip.... since there's nothing else for me to blog about and I'm sure all of our faithful readers are on the edges of their seats in anticipation.

Jess, Sarah and I were up at 6:30... and we were hungry. Unfortunately for us, all the food was in our Suburban, and the Suburban (or "Sub" as we affectionately call it) was locked. Aaaaaand, the keys were in my parents tent, and most likely in an inaccessible place (My guess: my dad's pocket). So we suffered for a while before our trying to break into the Sub aroused my parents enough to ask what was wrong with us and give us the keys. We wolfed down some fruit yogurt and popped our Starbucks frappuchinos into the cooler to get cold. The rest of our group appeared in small clusters and we played cards while we drank our frappuchinos.

Joel discovered his 3rd alternate identity...... for those of you who don't know, he already has his normal self, which goes by the name Joel. Then he has a goofy character with a high-pitched voice that goes by Lenny. He put on a camo hat backwards and found Bubba. Bubba is an Italian trucker person...... I still haven't gotten used to him. (I know it sounds like some weird thing, but really, Joel's just pretending..... he doesn't have multiple personality disorder. Just to clarify). Jess started an add-on story about Bubba, where we disclose his life story and some very traumatic secrets about his unfortunate personality. (Sarah has a picture of Bubba which I tried to upload, but as you'll see in more detail below, I'm having difficulty with her pictures.)

Then we had a full-fledged breakfast of pancakes and egg-sandwiches before heading down to the beach. We played an slightly improvised version of water polo (with no goals..... go figure), floated in floaties, swam and sailed our Sunfish. Here are a few pictures that I took:

Daddy, Marck and David on the Sunfish.

Hannah and Chandler on their "boat."

Mr. M, my dad, and Joel, putting the Sunfish away for the night.

A neat shot.... not sure how I got it, it was entirely accidental.

This is a shot of a kayaker. Believe it. Ha, I'm not sure what setting I put it on, but for some reason it "clicked" for about 5 seconds.... thus the fuzziness. I decided that it looks kinda like a modern piece of artwork and decided to share my diverse artistic talent.

And because Sarah said that she won't do a post with her pictures, I asked and received her permission to share some of her photos (infinitely superior to mine). Unfortunately, I have spent the last hour trying to get her pictures to upload to blogger and it isn't working. So they'll have to appear later. *frown* Maybe from her computer....

So anyway. This is going to sound somewhat anticlimactic.... we all watched the sunset, and everyone started heading back to camp. Jess and I hung out on the beach until it was decidedly dark, discussing serious topics.... and when we got back, there were only 2 marshmallows left! So we each got a very small s'more and then we all played Infinite Questions (near cousin to the game "20 Questions") until we turned in.

~Lizzie

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

Sarah and I were brave....

And cut Joel's hair. We had to wash it first, which I thought was a royal pain. I was wrong. The real royal pain was cutting it. We were playing K-Love on the radio and he kept bouncing around to the beat. I can't remember how many times Sarah was holding the scissors with a section of hair combed and ready to cut and his head-bobbing jerked it out of her hand and she had to comb it and get it ready all over again. She cut her finger because of him jerking around.

Some Joel quotes: "I'm pretty much resistant to pain, except getting my hair cut is like stepping on broken glass."
"Aren't you ready to kill me yet? Stop torturing me and get it over with!"
"Don't I get a blindfold and a cigar?"

All that trouble was worth it though, I think. Those of you that know Joel are probably rejoicing right now. Here's a few pictures.

(He's posing as Uncle Rico from "Napoleon Dynamite")

We're really pleased with how it turned out. I just hope Joel is... *roll eyes* Naturally, he acts like he hates it, but I think he can tell how cool it looks.

~Lizzie