I really never thought I'd leave. HSB provides everything that I would ever need for blogging. I love my blog and I love all my friends on here. And I love to blog though I sometimes go into "no blogging" phases. =)

Well here I am leaving. I'm moving my blog to JibeNow. Which is like a facebook/blog site for homeschoolers. www.jibenow.com/anna  I'm really sad to leave but please still come by my new blog... I know the template's not as pretty... but come anyway and leave a comment ;-)

                 ~Ness

P.S. If you link to me on your blog please change it to my new blog!

     The moisture from our breath gathered on the car windows, enclosing us, so that we couldn't see the shapes of cars and people outside, only the lights of a police car flashing red... blue... red...blue... It almost looked purple inbetween the red and the blue. The moments seemed to crawl by as I tried to stop myself from falling asleep. A climactic ending to the stress, joy, excitment, nervousness, and hyperness of the past few days at the tournament.

     So now that I have your attention (hopefuly). It was an AWESOME tournament! I actually remembered to bring my camera too, but I didn't take any pictures... no not one :P It was a very fun trip up and I got to see Josie who I haven't seen in a very long time.

       First day of the tounament was awesome, and so was the second ;-) All my debate rounds were really fun and I never didn't have something to say; but sometimes I didn't have enough time to say it all; but I usually did. They were some of the most fun debate rounds I've ever done so that was fun. Impromptu was fine filled I up my time for the first speech, almost filled it up on the second, and the third was two minutes under time, but the third was the only one that I got something other than fifth and below on! Anyway I thought that was weird, but maybe they were just happy that I'd stopped talking and wanted me to know that. All my other speeches went fine. I didn't break in debate or speech but oh well at least it was a fun tournament :) Though I would have liked it to be a fun tournament and broken! So I did get a speaker award and I was really surprised. It was the 32nd which is the lowest one you can get ;-) That made me laugh.

     ARC did really well! All these awesome people broke and made it to double octafinals, octafinals, quarterfinals, semis, and my awesome brother made it to finals! :) And Toni came the second day which was so cool! So it was fun and I could repeat those four words in a continuous line for a long time but I'll save you the trouble. If and when some nice person sends me pictures I'll post those! =)

So my Mom and I were coming back from the tournament (my brother was spending the night with some friends in Houstan) abd we stopped at a grocery store and then when we were pulling out of the parking lot a car sped up right behind us. It barely touched our bumper and then swerved into a tree at the side of the road. Forgeting we were in Houstan my Mom pulled into the parking lot to get out and help them. The driver pressed on the gass and sped off down the road out of sight with the whole front of the car crushed in. So we decided to just keep going on our way since there didn't seem much else to do. A few blocks up we came upon the car pulled up at the side of the road, smoking. My mom pulled up a ways in front of it and called the police. The police came and it turned out that they were two drunk drivers. So we spent about two hours waiting for them to be done with their investigation and all. We went to bed at three in the morning and I was completely exhausted the next day. Thinking about it, we came really close to being hit.

So some cool things that have happened recently that I haven't blogged about:

My violin teacher is letting me borrow her mandolin and I'm so very happy!!!

There is the March for life on Saturday and you should go to it if you can =)

Then there is also a youth group retreat on Saturday!

Miriam gave me a sea star she got in Florida and thinking about it makes me happy... *sigh* 

I've been playing a lot of music recently.

I have an HI to write before another tournament next week.

Come to think of it the fact that we have to go to a tournament next week should be a point all by itself.

I'm completly lost at the thought of debate.

I don't know what to do to prepare for apolegetics except write more cards which I very well may not use.

Here is a brilliant idea for impromptu: write a list of all the books you've read recently and then write out all the scenes, incidents, intresting events that happened in them and read it over before you go in to every impromptu room.

I read my really short NaNo novel from this past November and I love it! I think it's the best story I've ever written even though it's only seven pages long as of yet...

I also did a lot of school this week and I just wrote two essays (rather short ones) :P

I am finished with my ramblings for the time present!

Have a wonderful week! God bless you!

                           ~Ness

I was awarded! Thank you Katy :)

The rules:

Walking through the city down the sidewalk passing by stores, T J max, Justice, Target. Making my way through pushing shoving crowds of people. Christmas shopping. There was someting about everyones faces something I've always seen in the faces of people in the city. A blankness, off in their own world. Brooding on the past or worrying about the future, I can't tell. But I think that the main thing is they aren't in the present.

I notice this expression a lot among shoppers in the city but really I've come to realize that I see it everywhere to some degree, and I've felt it on my own face. So many people don't live in the present.

Thinking about the future. A busy schedule, trying to figure out how everyone is going to get the party: who's going with who. Other times we are dreaming, imagining, lost in our future dreams; traveling the world.

Sometimes it's the past. Replaying a scene over and over. Hurting inside about something that happened to you, lacking the ability to forgive.

Both thoughts of the future and thoughts of the past go hand in hand. A thoughtless act, what will those people think?

So many minutes out of our life we are not living in the present. As people grow older they are less and less in the present. Remember "Become as a little child" ? Maybe part of that is living in the present. Not taking things for granted but enjoying every moment.

It's really much harder than it seems, to live in the present.

It takes the faith to trust inGod.          

It takes the courage to forgive and forget.

It takes the concentraition to control your own thoughts

It takes the strength to pray

It takes the ability to love people the way God loves us, even if we can immitate him to only the smallest degree.

The future is coming no matter what we do, we can't change that.

 Can't make it go faster: thinking of the future.  Can't make it go backwards: thinking of the past. . As C.S. Lewis put it:                                                                                                                    

"The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is"

Thinking in the future is a habit. If all we think about is being a teenager when we're ten then when we won't have enjoyed being ten, and when were a teenager we will only think about going to college, instead of enjoying highschool, and when we reach college we won't  be enjoying it, rather we'll be thinking of when we get married, and when we get married we'll only think of when we have children, and when there are children we'll only wait till they are old enough to speak and not cry and when they are older we can't wait till they are out of the house and we don't have to worry about what time Sally's basketball and Bobby's piano lesson. At some point as an old man or and old woman it will catch up to you: a wasted life. A life of always looking ahead and never enjoying the moment.

In the Bible it says:

This is the day the Lord has made let us rejoice and be glad in it.

psalm118:24

Have you ever met someone who lives in the present 100% , who laughs, who hears, who speaks and thinks as if this may be his last moment here on earth?

I have and it was inspiring, it inspired this post.

Live as though this may be your last day. The Bible calls us to be watchful. For the second coming will be when no one will expect it.

Again another quote from my favorite author, C.S. Lewis. "Where except in the present can the Eternal be met?"

Certainly not in our broodings of the past or ponderings of the future.

Living each moment as if it was the last: that is what changes lives for the better.

Happy New Years!

God Bless you!

                   ~Ness

Good bye 2009!

You were a truly amazing year!

I've made so many friends and had so many good times, I've learned so much, I feel so old =)

Happy New Year!!!

Welcome 2010!

   ~Ness

Christmas time is so busy. We've had two concerts and my piano recital as well as going to my friend MIriam's voice concert. She had a beautiful solo with the highschool choir, it was an awesome concert. We also had another orchestra concert we went to as well as our annual church play which I got play music in =) I don't have any pictures from that because they all came out blurry.

This is a picture from our Christmas orchestra concert.

My piano teacher and I, afterwards.

That's all for now!

Merry Christmas!

 ~Ness

It snowed!

Rather it's snowing!

I went outside and this little tiny snow flake landed on me and I watched it as each little bit of it melted on my sweater... If you lived anywhere else besides Texas you wouldn't think twice about it. After all it was a snow flake here and a snow flake there... but it's snow!!

We went out back, the kids had left the sand box open and when it rained a couple days ago it had filled up with water. Now it's frozen over with a layer of ice. I'm so excited. Well I have to go but I thought it was worth a blog post.

There I'm happpy!

Now you know.

                 ~Anna

Unless you are trying to finish a 50,000  word novel in that one month. Well if that's all I were doing it would be easy! There's just so many other things! There's so much school, and orchestra rehearsals, and speech and debate, and other things that are just fun.

      It's near the end of Novemeber, almost Thanksgiving. This time last year I was on the point of realizing that I only had 5,000 words in my novel. about four days later I was writing solidly trying to make the 50,000 word mark before the end of November... which even with all my valiant work... I failed :)

    Well, so what's happened since I last posted?  I went to my first practice tournament of the year (and only one unfortunately) It was really fun! I won must of my rounds, whcih I wasn't expecting. My impromptu speech wasn't very scary, and I didn't mess up on my DI, it was completely memorized :) It was a really fun practice tournament, and I had a lot of fun. I don't have any pictures... oh well... Afterwards we went out to eat, that was fun too :-)

   For thanksgiving we are going to visiting my grandparents. The whole ride up I will be writing on my NaNo novel, furiously trying to finish it :) When we get back it will be December... think of that. November will be over... We will have our Orchestra concert and the Messiah concert, my first piano ****** (ever!) and Christmas will be approaching...

I also just finished reading ' 'Till We Have Faces '  by CS Lewis  if you've read it tell me what you thought of it! =)

     ~Ness

"Rain Rain go away come again another day..."

For probably the first time in my life I understand how someone could feel this. Not that I do feel that way but I understand how it could be felt :) It's been raining for.... forever. Not quite. I don't really want it to go away but if it was like this all the rest of this fall and winter I probably would. Rain is great in the summer when you can play in it but now it's SO cold!

What else besides rain? I've been memorizing a speech for an upcoming practice tournament, as well as going over my cases. I'm rather excited =) I need to practice more impromptu and apolegetics speeches.

On Sunday I had a violin recital. Then we had orchestra rehearsal which was fun.

Saturday our Youth group had a big angle ball game, which was fun =)  Angle ball is a sport that is sort of like ultimate frisbee except with a volleyball. Instead a goal there are posts with basketballs on top that you have to knock off.

Friday I had a piano lesson and then speech and debate. I slept over a friend's house (hi a friend!!) and it was so much fun! She helped me with my debate cases which needed help :)

So there is my weekend now that I have fullfilled my duty to my blog I will commence with my week =)

 ~Nessy Wessy

Here are the lyrics for the song that always comes on when you get on my blog I'll post for real sometime... :)

When the last eagle flies
Over the last crumbling mountains.
And the last lion roars
At the last dusty fountain.
In the shadow of the forest,
Though she may be old and worn,
They will stare unbelieving
At the last unicorn.

When the first breath of winter
Through the flowers is icing,
And you look to the north,
And a pale moon is rising.

And it seems like all is dying,
And would leave the world to mourn,
In the distance, hear the laughter
Of the last unicorn.

I'm alive!
I'm alive!

When the last moon is cast
Over the last star of morning.
And the future has past,
Without even a last desperate warning.
Then looking to the sky where
Through the clouds, a path is formed
You can see her
How she sparkles!
It's the last unicorn!

I'm alive!
I'm alive!

I'm alive!
I'm alive!
I'm alive!
I'm alive!

~Loreena Mckeintt

Wow! need I say more?

 This next one makes me want to cry thinking of my own violin skills... *cries* =D

Check out these other pieces played by Benjamin as well:    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDLgpskt578   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Cvfu-K0loc

~Ness

The Dash
---Linda Ellis


I read of a man who stood to speak
At the funeral of a friend
He referred to the dates on her tombstone
From the beginning to the end

He noted that first came her date of her birth
And spoke the following date with tears,
But he said what mattered most of all
Was the dash between those years

For that dash represents all the time
That she spent alive on earth.
And now only those who loved her
Know what that little line is worth.

For it matters not how much we own;
The cars, the house, the cash,
What matters is how we live and love
And how we spend our dash.

So think about this long and hard.
Are there things you’d like to change?
For you never know how much time is left,
That can still be rearranged.

If we could just slow down enough
To consider what’s true and real
And always try to understand
The way other people feel.

And be less quick to anger,
And show appreciation more
And love the people in our lives
Like we’ve never loved before.

If we treat each other with respect,
And more often wear a smile
Remembering that this special dash
Might only last a little while.

So, when your eulogy is being read
With your life’s actions to rehash
Would you be proud of the things they say
About how you spent your dash?

Les

PS I made a quiz about me please go take it! Well if you feel like it... :)

My Quiz

So maybe it's time for a new post...

     Well Wednesday the weather was amazing it was all misty rain and cold. Katy and I went to the nursing home with a bunch of other people and we played music. Katy also brought her awesome, so cool, mandolin and we played fiddle music together, whcich was fun! Then we went back to Katy's house and played. (yeah played not 'hung out' that's like the teen age way of saying played... =)

   Yesterday, Friday, I went to piano lesson and I got a new song, a Chopin Waltz in MINOR wich is cool. And then we had speech and debate afterwards and I got to debate in my first LD round EVER! It was awesome and fun. I find it so annoying when you know exactly what you want to say and you can't get it out!

     One more cool thing! I wrote a song for my harp and it's sort fo medieval sounding. I also figured out how to get finale notepad to print the sheet of music properly so that there isn't any big space in between the systems. Anyways that may have sounded like      "kfhlsfgljkgja;tlkdjalk af;gfdjkg;a " but it wasn't it was awesome! 

    Well there you go and other than that I've been doing school, practicing music and working on debate and apolegetics.

           ~Ness