HAPPY LAST DAY OF '06!!

I hope everyone had a great 2006!! My year was great, and I'm looking forward to the new one ahead!! Remember to keep Jesus at the front of everything you do!! Jeremiah 29:11~ "For I know the plans I have for you," declairs the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future." May the Lord guide your plans in this new year to come!!

Rachel

Rachel is way cool!! She is Kaeleigh and Emily's cousin, but sometimes it feels like she is related to me, too, because we are so close!! She is very sweet and awesome and really pretty, even if she doesn't think so!! lol!! Today we went to see Happy Feet!! It is a funny and sweet movie! Rachel is funny!! Kaeleigh is having fun on Monk-E-Mail. She is crazy dude!! lol! I am making myself laugh right now!! Jingle bells...jingle bells...jingle all the way...oh what fun it is to ride....in a one-horse-open-sleigh....HEY!! lol! Wow...I am going insane. jk! Kaeleigh just made me a mok-e-mail. It is crazy. I make her want to eat soup with bones and fungus all mixed together. ug. She loves my toenails. wow. that's sad. Kaeleigh is insane. Just in case you haven't figured that out yet... So anyways, Chris Tomlin rocks, so does our youth group, so does soccer, so does Rachel...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!! I hope you all have a very blessed Christmas!! No snow here, but oh well!! We are having a great day, and I'll write more about it when I have more time!! Oh yea, I GOT SAMBAS!!!! Thank you so much Grandma Barb and Grandpa Charlie!! I love them!! Have a great rest of the day, and remember, Jesus is the reason for the season, and without Christ, there could be not Christmas!

3 DAYS!!

ONLY 3 DAYS LEFT!! WOOHOO!! I finnished the necklace that I keep telling everyone about!! lol! I came out pretty cool!! lol! Today we have a day off from school to finnish wrapping, and packing cookies!! Tonight the youth group is having a Christmas party! I think it's going to be fun!! See you tonight Sophie!!

ONLY 5 DAYS!!

Only 5 days left 'till Christmas!! YEA!! WE went Christmas shopping today, I was trying to find beads to finish off one of my presents. I guess I found them! I hope my friend will like the necklace that I'm making for her!! What is everyone doing for Christmas? We are staying home. We're having pasta for dinner!! I love pasta!! YEA! I guess that's all I have to say...for now...

1 WEEK!!

ONLY ONE WEEK 'TILL CHRISTMAS!!! YEA!!! Does everyone have all thier presents done?? I only have to make one more necklace for one of my friends, then I'm done!! I'm so impatient!! It's going to be so hard to wait the last 7 days out!! Always remember, JESUS IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON!! And- DON'T LEAVE CHRIST OUT OF CHRISTMAS!!

10 DAYS!!

There's only 10 days till Christmas!!! Aren't you all so excited!! I am! Still no snow, though. :( That's o.k. Christmas isn't about the snow!! It all about Jesus! It's not about us, or the gifts, or getting the perfect present for everyone on your list. It's about celebrating Jesus, and glorifying Him!! I hope that everyone will take the time to think about the real reason for this season this Christmas!! Merry Christmas!! (not Happy Holidays)

Becca Barlow Blend

Here's another blend that I just made (this one's of Becca, though!)!! Do y'all like it??

Alyssa Barlow Blends

I just made an Alyssa Barlow blend. One of them has rainbow font, and the other has white. Which do you think looks better?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NAOMI!!

Today is Naomi's birthday!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY NAOMI!!!! I hope that you have an awesome birthday!! And a great year to come!! lol! You can put birthday wishes for Naomi as a comment if you want!! I just wanted to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

This Man

This is an absolutely amazing song. It gives my goosebumps ever time I listen to it. Jesus sacrificed so much, just so that we could be with Him.

This Man
Written by Jeremy Camp

In only a moment truth
Was seen revealed this mystery
The crown that showed no dignity He wore
And the King was placed for all the world
To show disgracebut only beauty flowed from this place

Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?
Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?

He held the weight of impurity
The Father would not see
The reasons had finally come to be to
Show the depth of His grace flowed with
Every sin erased He knew that this was
Why He came

Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?
Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?

And we just don't know the blood and
Water flowed and in it all He showes
Just how much He cares
And the veil was torn so we could have
This open door and all these things
Have finally been complete

Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?
Would you take the place of this Man?
Would you take the nails from His hands?
From His hands
From His hands
From His hands
From His hands
From His hands

(c) 2004 BEC Recordings

Quiz for Brilliant People

I got this in an e-mail from my cousin. It's pretty funny!

Passing requires only 4 correct answers...and tiny %40.

1) How long did the 100 years war last?

2) Which country makes Panama hats?

3) From which animal do we get catgut?

4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?

5) What is a camel's hair brush made of?

6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific is named after what animal?

7) What was King George VI's first name?

8) What color is a purple finch?

9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from?

10) What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane?

ANSWERS:

1) 116 years

2) Ecuador

3) Sheep and Horses

4) November

5) Squirrel fur

6) Dogs

7) Albert

8) Crimson

9) New Zealand

10) Orange, of course!

What do you mean you failed!!?? I failed, too, so don't feel too bad!!

Cassie

One of the girls in our homeschool group, Cassie, was in a cantata at her church last night. She had a solo, and also sang with the group. She was AWESOME! She has an amazing voice! Her solo was excelent! As I said before, she has a breathtaking voice! She seemed really nervous before, but I don't think that changed how well she did. I was going to take a picture of her, but I forgot! :/ Oh well, it was excellent! GOOD JOB CASSIE!!

Snow??

Where's all the snow???? I know I wrote a post about the snow falling, but it didn't stay very long! There wasn't even a little bit on the ground, it just kinda fell and disappeared! I'm very sad now. :( I want it to snow for Christmas, and I just looked on weather.com, and it said that it's supposed to rain for most of the next 10 days. :( Also, they have a map on it (here) that shows how much of a chance people all over the US have of getting snow. I think we have a 50-75% chance of getting snow for Christmas. That's pretty good. I guess. Anyways, we don't have any snow right now, and we'll probably have mud in a couple days, but I hope we'll get snow!

Blend of Bethany

Friday night, Bethany and Sophie came over to go to youth group. I took a lot of pictures of Bethany, and I made them into a blend.

Jessie Daniels Blend

Here's a Jessie Daniels Blend that I just made yesterday. It came out really good!!
I really liked how it came out! I got the pictures from a really awesome Jessie Daniels fan site! It rocks!

ITS SNOWING!!!!!!

IT'S SNOWING!!! YEA!!!!! I'm really excited {Just in case you didn't notice that!}! It's just snowing a little bit, but it's a start!! YEA!!! It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Sort of...YEA!

Yupsir...

I need to post something...not quite sure what that "something" is though...that might be a problem! So, anyways, my life is normal for this week. It's the first week in a couple weeks that has been "normal"...I'm being really facinating right now, aren't I?! Anyways....that's what I have to say untill I get something to say...still nothing to say...I could tell you about alot of wicked cool sites I like to visit, then again, you could just look at the links part...oh, well!! Soooo, here's the list (oh yea, and you get my comments on the sites, too! aren't you happy?!)-
+Barlow Girl website {They totally ROCK! They are awesome! They reflect Jesus in everything they do! Oh, yea, they're sisters, too!}
+BarlowGirl.org {THE best Barlow Girl fansite. Ever. 'Nuf said.}
+Jessie Daniels website {This girl rocks, too! Her music is awesome!}
+Sophie's Blog {She's awesome! She's my friend, too, so, what can I say?!}
+Mrs. B/Sophie's Mom's Blog {She's Soph's Mom, and her blog is cool!}
+Caitlin's Blog {She is an awesome person! Did you know, that her last name is now "Myjc"?}
+Elias's Blog {His site's o.k., he speaks 3 languages, Spanish, English, and HTML! Amazing, huh? Also, the pictures are great, even though he hasn't updated them in a while}
+My Blog {What can I say...it's great!} {lol! jk!}
+Ana Laura's Site {She has an awesome voice. And even though I don't have her cd (yet) I hope to get it for Christmas, or borrow it from a friend *cough*Sophie*cough*}
+Starfield's Site {They have awesome songs!}
+Casting Crown's Site {They have awesome songs and powerful lyrics!}
+Chris Tomlin's Site {He has awesome songs, too! I saw him at SoulFest, and he was awesome!}
+Natalie Grant's Site {She has a very powerful voice and great songs}
+Krystal Meyer's Site {She has great songs, love "The Situation"}
+Send an E-mail to Santa! {Cute site! Even though Santa isn't real!}

That's all I have time for right now! Check out all of those!! They're really cool!

The Amount Raised Is...

The amount of money I raised for the Famine is...drum roll please....$835!!! YEA!! My goal was $720, and I got $115 more than it! God is GOOD!

35 Hour Famine

Last Friday and Saturday, my youth group did the 30 Hour Famine. For me it was a 35 hour famine, because I started at 7:30am instead of noon. Ngiap challenged me to do it, and she paid me $10 for every extra hour. It was a lot of fun and a great experience. We went to the church Friday night for regular youth group, and everyone who stayed for the famine slept over. We had 13 kids, 9 girls and 4 guys. We had 3 leaders. As I said, we had regular youth group, and then we kind of helped clean up the church after Awana sort of. While we were waiting for the Koreans to be done in the sactuary, we played with the nerf guns that one of the guys brought. That was really fun! Then we had a sort of discussion time. Then we went into the sanctuary to sing and talk some more. Then, we played sardines!! Now, if you have never played sardines at 1 o'clock in the morning in a pitch black church, you have GOT to do it! It was SO much fun!! Then we went to bed at something like 2:00am (Saturday morning). We woke up around 8:30. First we decorated the church for Christmas, but after a while, we got distracted because the guys and Elias started shooting the guns at the girls. They played with the guns for about a half hour, then we went to a homeless shelter called the Lazarus House. We split into two groups, one stayed at the house and did some cleaning, and the other one (that I was with) went to their soup kitchen and moved sugar, moved chairs and a desk into a truck, and put a lot of bags of clothes into the truck, too. It was quite fun! There's a picture of everyone who was in my group sitting in the truck we packed at the end of this post. Anyways, moving on, after that we went back to the church to go to the bathroom, charge the camera battery, and get ready to go to Boston. Then we went to Boston. We took the T in. The ride was a lot of fun! One of the guys had heelies, and when the train slowed down, he would roll down the aisle of the car. It was really cool to watch! When we got to Boston, we did a picture scavenger hunt. The questions were like, take a picture with a police, with an important person, with a fountain, with as many people as you could, with a homeless person, with a street performer, and you had to get 5 signatures for no reason. It was the girls against the guys. I think the guys got everything, but the girls didn't get a street performer, and we didn't get a picture with the homeless person, the reason which you'll find out in a few. We had to give a Burger King meal to the homeless person that we were supposed to take a picture with, so that we wouldn't be walking up to some random homeless person, and being like "Hey, you're a homeless person, can we take a picture with you?". That would just be mean. So, we got everything except for our street performer, and the homeless person, and our meal was getting cold, so we needed to find our homeless person. One of the girls saw a person fall off of a bench and then not get up or anything, so we were like, oh, here's our homeless person. We walked up to him, and 3 of the girls walked up to him and put the bag and drink in front of his head and walked away. The guy didn't move, and we started walking away. I didn't really want to just leave him there without checking to see if he was ok, so I convinced our leader to go back and check with me and two of the girls. There was a couple other homeless people there when we went back and they were taking they guy on the ground's food. Our leader told them that it was for him, and offered to buy them all food. There was a lady there and she was talking us, but we couldn't really understand what she was saying, because she was rambling. They were all drunk or on drugs. So, we went to get them all food, and we found Dad, and he came with us. We went back, and gave them all the food. They were really thankful. The guy on the ground hadn't moved, but someone had put a blanket over him. One of the homeless guys who was there went to call 911, and we stayed to wait for it with them. While we were waiting, we started talking to one of the guys who was there. We told him what we were doing, and what church we were from, and why we were doing everything that we had done. He said that he had grown up near Boston, and in high school, he had gotten involved with drugs, and had gotten addicted. Somehow, he had gotten sober for 9 years, and had been a drugs counselor, and then this summer while in Hawaii, he had had a beer and gotten addicted again. He asked us to pray for him, that he would be able to get sober again. He said that everyday, God showed him two roads he could take, either to drink or not, and he always chose the wrong one. I invited him to come to our church, and he seemed very grateful for the invitation. He asked us to pray for him. So, now I'm asking everyone who reads this to pray for him too, his name is Denis. With God all things a possible. Anyways, we waited a while, and the ambulance didn't come. Then we went to where some of the people in our youth group were waiting, and the guys had gotten back. Elias was making fun of us, and it was NOT funny. I really felt like God was telling me to help those people out. It was kind of weird to see the guys faces, because all of them (except for Elias) had a look of confusion and sadness on their faces, and it looked like they were thinking something like, why are all the girls crying?! We prayed for all of the people that we had interacted with. I think almost all of the girls cried. Elias was making fun of me by saying like, "Oh, Tori's crying over some dumb homeless person." That really made me mad. They are people, just like you and me. I really wish that the guys in our youth group had been able to have the same experience that we had. After that, we went on the T back to church, and we broke the fast at our pastor's house, because the Koreans were using the church for a dinner with their church. Anyways, we broke the fast, and the whole experience is something I don't think any of us will forget. Here are some pictures-This is my group in the truck we loaded.(^)
Elias was sleeping on the table near the end of when we were playing sardines and when we were getting ready to go to bed. I took this picture at about 1am, with flash and he didn't wake up. Then all the girls hit him with pillows and he woke up. (^)

"When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take you inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me. Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?' The King will reply, "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look at me.' They will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?' He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.' Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life." -Matthew 25:31-46

I think that the homeless people that we met would be considered on of "the least of these". I'm really blessed that we were able to be Jesus' hands and feet Saturday in some small way.

30 Hour Famine

Today is the start of the 2nd 30 hour famine that I've done. If you all remember, we did it last year, too! Last year, I raised $391 to feed hungry children. This year, my goal was $720, and I'll tell everyone how much I've raised this year once the famine is over, and I've collected it all!! So, one of my friends challenged me to do it for more than 30 hours, so I think I'm starting at breakfast today instead of luch. She said she'd pay me $10 for every extra hour I did it for. I'm still trying to decide if I'm going to eat luch, though. I might eat luch at 10, so that would be 2 extra hours. Anyways, just wanted to inform y'all of that! Oh, yea, here's a graphic I made for the famine-

Rules

Here are some rules that I made up.

1. Thou shalt not touch thy older sister's camera
2. Thou shalt not touch thy older sister's ring
3. Thou shalt not invade on thy older sister's privacy
4. Thou shalt not touch or take thy older sister's cookies.

(Naomi look at #4)
My parents should take greater measures to enforce these rules. They are definitely not enforced enough at my house.