Doubled Joy!

Each New Year's our family REALLY celebrates. No, the change from one calendar year to the next doesn't set our hearts to dancing. The reason for the doubled joy is that on January 1 each year we're privileged to rejoice over God's gift of TWINS. This year John and Alison turned 24.

I love the look on John's face here. He and Alison became best friends before their births. They have been the most remarkable cheering section for each other. Their relationship is just what you would hope of twins. Since Alison married Eric, John and Eric have developed and invested in a close friendship. In addition, John is a favorite uncle of Eric and Alison's little guy, William. John is eagerly awaiting the birth of his twin's first daughter.

We were informed, after untold testing and medication, that I would NEVER get pregnant. As a result of that never, our joy at having TWINS is to the sun and back. Our gratitude to God for the miracle of John and Alison is limitless. The Lord has shown us great kindness.

Ready...Set...Memorize!, Part III

Cassandra (right) and new Bible Bee friend Rachel.

After posting last night, we learned that Natasha, Lissie, and Joe will be advancing to the 2nd Annual National Bible Bee competition in Chicago in November.

Amazingly, our twins, Lissie and Joe, tied (both scoring 781). Last year they scored one point apart in the local competition. How do they do that?!?

Grateful to the Lord!

~Mr. & Mrs. Beaver

Ready...Set...Memorize, Part II

Our youngest eight children competed on Saturday in the local contest for the 2nd Annual National Bible Bee (see Ready...Set...Memorize! for background). Tessa, who was too old to participate, came along to support her siblings.

In the morning, each participant recited before judges and took a written test. It is these oral and written exam results which will be used to determine which of the contestants from across the country will be invited to participate in the national competition in November.

While we will have to wait to discover if any of our family has qualified for the national competition, we did learn the local results just after lunch on Saturday.

Here's how our children fared locally:

Primary Division (7-10 year olds)
Natasha -- 1st place
Princess Bink -- 3rd place

Junior Division (11-14 year olds)
Speedy -- 1st place
Tatiana -- 2nd place

Senior Division (15-18 year olds)
Joe -- 1st place
Lissie -- 2nd place
Jaynie -- 3rd place
Cassandra -- 4th place

Even more important, all of them gained the treasure of writing His word extensively on their hearts.

As we said in our post in June, scripture memorization is significant to who we are as a family. God tells us to impress His word on our hearts (Deuteronomy 11:18). He promises blessing to those who mediate on His word (Joshua 1:7; Psalm 1:1-3: James 1:25). This, of course, is easier if His word has been memorized. Our family has experienced countless blessings through scripture memorization. Among these, we believe that the practice of Bible memorization strengthens us as unit and helps us live well together. Additionally, we believe that memorizing scripture has been key to intellectual healing for the older children we've adopted who were each exposed to alcohol in-utero and severely neglected.

~Mr. & Mrs. Beaver

Ready...Set...Memorize!

All day long the kids watched eagerly for the UPS truck...

... looking for their 2010 Bible Bee study materials. Today was Day 1 of the 2010 competition, with local competitions taking place all over the country on August 28.

What an amazing box those materials arrived in! Speedy informed us one box weighed 28 lbs and the other 7 lbs - heavy material in many ways!

Princess Bink exemplified the excitement felt by all the kids as they discovered the treasures in those boxes!

Eight of the kids from the twins down to Princess Bink will participate this year! Tessa is too old but wishes she could. She will help Mr. and Mrs. Beaver coach and encourage the others.

Joe and Lissie immediately began investigating this year's materials...

as they had participated last year and qualified for the national finals in Washington, D.C. Joe went on to qualify as a semi-finalist at that competition.

Joe and Lissie's enthusiasm throughout the 2009 competition infected the other kids. They are enthused even though they know by having watched Joe and Lissie last year that they have hard work ahead. The youngest will memorize 21 verses per week; the middle kids 42 verses per week; the oldest 68 verses per week!

T-shirts and Bibles were an unexpected bonus in this year's materials!

The t-shirts were donned even before the boxes were completely unpacked.

They even had a t-shirt small enough for 38-pound Princess Bink!

Our children's enthusiasm for this summer's Bible memory program thrills us and is closely tied to our identity as an adoptive family. We believe scripture memorization has contributed to the intellectual development and emotional healing of our adopted children. Both times we've adopted the trios of siblings, we have started them memorizing scripture even before we left Russia.

~ Mr. and Mrs. Beaver