Recalculating

If you own one of these...



Then that probably sounds familiar.

Years ago, at one of our church's kid/teen events, a sermon was imprinted into my mind. I remembered it the other day when we took a wrong turn and our GPS said, "Recalculating" in that annoying British voice. Lol. :)

You see, when we take a wrong turn in life, mess up, and get lost, God "recalculates" our way again and forgives us.

I just wanted to share that with ya'll. :)

Luke has been Little Mr. Ornery the past few days. But then again he'll do the most awful thing then say, "I love you jie jie." So how can you be mad at that? hehe :) Thank God for Bob the Builder and Garmins!

Blessings,
Joy

Ears Pierced!!

Hi everyone! We're here in Nashville for a vacation :) Well, kind of. Dad has to go to this class thing here in Nashville for his work so we're going to have a little vacation. So, anyway, on with the post.

Yes! Finally! MY EARS ARE PIERCED!!

Sometime around Wednesday or Thursday last week, I was talking to my friend Katie. For a while I had been thinking about getting my ears pierced but I never really have gone far with it. Anyway, Katie was talking and this is how the conversation went;

Katie: You have your ears pierced right?

Me: Nope.

Katie: WHAT!!! Joy, you HAVE to get your ears pierced!!!!

Me: Well....I dunno....doesn't it hurt??

Katie: NO!! It doesn't hurt at all!!

Me: Well....let me ask my mom. (Ok, so that was VERY sudden :)

Katie: Ok.

Me: Mom can I get my ears pierced?

Mom: You'll have to ask your dad. Does Katie have her ears pierced?
Me: Yup.

Mom: Well, ask your daddy. It's fine with me if it's ok with him.

Mom and Dad said I could have it done in Nashville when mom took me to the mall. Well then I remembered we were going out tomorrow evening. So, partly because I wanted it over with and partly because I was excited(lol), I asked to have it done the local Claires. The answer was yes!

Last Friday evening, Mom, Dad, Luke and I set out to run some errands. FINALLY-we got to Claire's. We went in and waited for our turn. I picked out the earring that I wanted-Rainbow Daisy :) And then...well..I'll let the pictures tell the story :) Here you go, Katie. The pictures you've been waiting on! :)

And voila!! I'm soo happy. It hurt some but it was worth it :) Now I just can't wait until the 6 weeks is up and I can change earrings! :)

Blessings,
Joy

I've been tagged!

By Cassie, from Inside My Mind. Thanks Cassie!

The instructions with this tag are: Answer the 10 questions that are given from the person who tagged you, then add 10 more of your own and tag 6 bloggers.

Here are the questions:

1. In what location do you feel God's Presence the greatest?

Hmm...usually a quiet place where I'm praying and can concentrate fully on him.

2. What is your favorite craft? (i.e. knitting, scrapbooking, drawing, etc.)

Scrapbooking!!

3. How many brothers and/or sisters do you have?

2 brothers, one is 21, Colt, and one is 2, Luke.

4. Do you have an iPod?

Nope but I have a super old mp3 :)

5. Do you speak a second language?

A little bit of Spanish and a little bit of Chinese.

6. What type of food is your favorite? (i.e. American, Mexican, Indian, Chinese, etc.)

American! Or French...French is pretty good, too.

7. Have you ever eaten sushi?

Ewwww no.

8. If you had to live in a foreign country for five years, which country would you pick and why?

Probably either Korea or China. Korea-Because it seems like a good place to live if you can't live in America, and you can do mission work and I'd like to learn about the culture since Colt's adopted from there. China-I kind of miss it! It's not the greatest but it is pretty nice.

9. Can you either "speak" sign language or read Braille?

I know a little sign language.

10. Describe your pets:

Bambi-Fat, furry, loving, hairy.

Now for my 10 questions...

1. How long have you been on blogger?

2. What's your favorite food?

3. What was your first word?

4. What's your favorite form of art?

5. What's the most recent thing God has done for you?

6. When's your birthday?

7. Did you take swimming lessons to learn how to swim?

8. Have you ever taken lessons for things like dance, gymnastics, Piano, etc?

9. What's your favorite article of clothing?

10. Do you like doing tags?

I tag...

Mom at Country Girl at Home

Madison at Madcrafts

Allyson (friend with a private blog) at Green Gables Girl

Amber at Honeysuckle Cottage

Elizabeth at 4 Siblings 1 Me

Ms. Lynn at Country Heart and Roses

More posts coming soon! Thanks again for tagging me, Cassie :) Can't wait until your sister and mom and dad get home!

Please Pray-

Hi everyone! I have a prayer request for you all. My blogging friend, Cassie posted on her blog today that her parents left for China early this morning. Please keep her family in your prayers this week. They are traveling to China to adopt gorgeous girl, Theresa, into her Forever Family. Theresa is just so beautiful. I know she's going to do great in her new family and God will look after them all.



Thanks for stopping by everyone and have a great week!
Blessings,
Joy

The Upcoming School Year = EXCITED!

Let me just say that I am EXCITED to begin our school year, because the books this year sound overall exciting, aanndd, we're studying the Eastern Hemisphere (China, Korea, Japan, and India, basically). I guess you could say these books are going to have SUPER special meaning to me. :) I've already taken a peek into a few books, but most of them I've just read the description. These are the ones I'm particularly interested in:

Shadow Spinner-

Each night, Sharazadan begins another story, and each morning, the Sultan lets her live another day, providing that her story caught his attention. But alas, after a thousand nights, Sharazadan is running out of tales. This is where Marjan's story begins....It falls to Marjan to go out into the city and find stragglers and travellers from all over and listen to their stories, then bring them back to Sharazadan.

The Kite Flyers-

Young-sup and Kee-sup are brothers in Korea in 1473. Both must come to terms with the privileges and responsibilities associated with their birth order.

Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze-

Young Fu, 13, enters the streets of 1920's China. Even though the world is different from Young Fu's time, this story still reflects Modern China-Making friends, making mistakes, and making one's way in the world.

Story-Part 2

A looonnggg time ago, I started another Story Journal Series. You can see it here. Now I'm ready for part 2!

March 3rd, 2010
Dear Journal,

Sitting on my bed with Mina, about to go eat lunch. Mina is the only one I've showed my journal to besides mom so far. Mina is playing with her pretty dark ponytail and watching me write. She wants a journal now, too. This morning after breakfast she came over and looked at my journal, then we put my paint set for painting my bike in my tote bag along with our other exploring equipment(Binoculars, notepad and pencil, water gun, etc.).

Georgi left to go see a movie with her friend Kaicee. Kale went to Violet's house, and dad and Connor went to a Red Sox game. Mom drove over to Mina's house to have a visit with her mom and plan stuff for our homeschool group which she and Miss Hailee lead. She offered to give us a ride over to her house since we were going over there anyway to paint my bike, but we thanked her and said no, we're going to ride our bikes. So we did, down the street to Mina's house, with our bags stuffed into our baskets. We passed a kitten on the way and picked it up and put it in my bag.

Once we got to Mina's house(we beat mom there!), we painted my bike with NEON colors! I found out my paints work on paper too!! We then let the paint dry while we got a snack inside with mom and Miss Hailee. While we were there, Mina's cousins, Haven and Hunter, came over. They're identical twins. Haven is really nice. I like her. Hunter is shy and quiet at first, but really fun when his personality comes out.

Haven has long black hair that she always wears in a high ponytail, she has dark-brown-almost-black, sparkly eyes, she's skinny, short, and has SUPER tiny feet! Hunter has thick, shiny black hair which he has spiked into a little point on his forehead. He has black smiling eyes and is always laughing about something. He's big, but not fat. He's muscle-y. He towers over Haven! Anyway, Haven and Hunter asked Miss. Hailee if their mom could borrow one of her skillets or something, and they got it and went back to their house. We finished our snack and packed up our bags, then went out into the woods to explore around.

We climbed into a tree and started painting it. It looks really nice. We're thinking of building a little platform up in the tree since it's big and putting some umbrellas up there so we can have a make-shift clubhouse! We painted flowers and trees, and hearts and stars, and all kinds of things really! It was fun. Then we climbed down and packed everything up and went and found our kitten, who had wandered off to a nearby stump and was napping peacefully, and put her in the basket and rode back to my house for lunch! We came up here first so I could write. Now we're going to go eat, so I'll write later tonight or tomorrow!

Finnley Hope Ryder

Hope you enjoyed!
Hugs and Blessings,
Joy

Journal Entries from China.

I kept a journal in China, which I found at Claire's for about 10 dollars. Nothing much, but I thought it was cute, and it had Chinese writing on the pages. Well I thought I'd sort of edit them onto my blog as posts, because that's what I wrote it for, to be able to look back on it. :) This was the first entry, when we were sitting in the airport.

June 17th, 2010, 3:22 AM. Airport.
Airport! I'm at the airport!It's all so new and different to me! I mean it's like Christmas! I already miss Colt, Pop, Grandmama and Bambi. :) I wanted to play games on Mom's laptop because I'm so BORED but it went dead. Now I'm looking at my "Then and Now" book and writing here in my journal.
*A few minutes later*
Now we're talking to an aiport policeman. Well I'm going to find something to do....I can't wait until I can email and blog!
Joy

Same Day 5:58 AM
I'm on the plane! We haven't taken off yet. I'm sitting across from dad, a bald guy, and a hippie! The hippie's nice though. He plays the banjo! WEIRD!! The plane is SO tiny!!! I can't wait until I can get wifi and our journey to me and email and everything! Weird people come to airports....Hope to see a movie star in the San Fransisco airport! Haha. I got a window seat! Woo hoo!
Joy

Same day 9:00 AM
Just boarded the plane that will fly us from Minnesota to San Fransisco. Hippie and Bald Man are gone now. I can't wait until we get to Beijing! Everything is just "I can't wait", isn't it? I just want to crawl into my Chinese bed and go to SLEEP! :)
Flying is sooo fun! The wait isn't fun, but still. Our plane has wifi but the laptop is dead. I have another big window seat to me!
Joy

Same Day 1:47 PM
On the plane to Tokoyo! I'm one of the only Americans. I regonize a bunch of people from Minnesota such as, the cute little Asian kid with his mom, the little girl from the airport reasturant, the guy who was singing on the escalator, etc. Our "neighbors" for this 11 hour flight are: On the right, there is a young Asian couple. They seem nice. In front of us are 2 older Asian men, one who looks like my friend's dad, and an older Asian woman. On the left is a Asian man and his son, I think. The man is reading a book. I have been drawing and reading. For lunch I had sprite, vinegar and salt chips, and a fruit foll up. By the way, the book I'm reading is "The Best Christmas Paegant Ever". Ahh, what memories!! Haha. My ears are popping. I think I'm going to eat goldfish crackers, read, then hopefully go to sleep. I dunno....I wish Christina and Colt were here, they would keep me entertained.

I hope you enjoyed! I'll post more of it soon!
Hugs,
Joy