May 2014~by Beth

May was a very busy month for us, as you will see by the length of this post.  It began with our children's piano recital.  Here are David, Christiana, Charity and Emma with their fellow students and teacher Mrs. Vander Pol.

 Next came Charity's 14th birthday.  Here she is with her cookie cake.

The next day the soccer tournaments began.  Here is Charity blocking a kick.

Charity and Emma after a game

Next came the golf field trip for our home school group.  The younger ones had golf instruction first, then played on the course.  The older students were able to swim at the pool near the pro shop.  Ten days later the older ones had the golf time while the younger ones swam at the pool

Emma with friend, Hope

Johanna at golf instruction

Charity and Emma with friend, Nina

Stephen swimming

Next was our home school commencement.  Each of our students received a certificate with a character quality displayed and an academic achievement for the previous year.  Stephen graduated from kindergarten.  He got to wear a cap and gown.

Dad and grad

The crew on the way to graduation

TaDa!!

 

 

Next came Charity's confirmation.  She did very well with her memorization and giving her testimony.  It was a great day for her and us.

Charity receives her Bible

corsage

This next week we wrapped up soccer with our end of year party.  Christiana and David both coached teams, girls and boys respectively.  Here they are.

4th place trophy

Boys team

 On Sunday we celebrated Christiana's 16th birthday, and Caleb's birthday a week early since we would be leaving the next day on vacation.

Caleb turns 21

The next day Beth left for Nashville with the 7 youngest children for our ATI conference.  It was a great conference and the children all enjoyed their programs.  Here they are at their presentations at the end of the week.  By then, Jonathan had joined us.

Stephen in his class with his teacher and 2 classmates

Christiana sings in choir in Commit.  Charity is in the upper right corner.

Johanna sings in Pre Embassy.  She is to the right of the leader.

David was a squad leader for the Cadet program.  You can see his eyes and cap in the upper left.

After leaving Nashville we headed to the Creation Museum outside Cincinnati, Ohio.  It is so good that we return as often as we can.  Here are some highlights.

Johanna holds a snake!

David shows Stephen a chipmunk on the grounds

The crew in the Japanese garden area.

At the petting zoo

Jon and I were going to celebrate our 30th anniversary the next day so we captured a shot of us.