"Now that it's all said and done..."

History Day went extremely well. We made it past our preliminary round as one of the top two in our room. This qualified us for the final round (a compilation of the top two Senior group performances from every room); we were now one of fourteen. We didn’t place in the top three, we actually ended up in 9th, but God has truly blessed us in the experience. To our complete surprise, Joel, Isaac and I (and I should mention our wonderful teacher/mother, Barbara) were awarded with the Colonial Williamsburg Award, given to the best project that has to do with a Revolutionary or Colonial topic. This topic also included a $5,000 scholarship to be spilt amongst the three of us. This was truly a great honor and blessing.

(Title lyrics from "Over You" by Daughtry)

"This is the time, this is the time..."

Well, to let you know a little bit about where I am and what I’m doing: I am sitting directly across from the restrooms at Providence, RI International Airport. You may have known this – I didn’t – but Southwest Airlines does not allow you to check your baggage over four hours from your departure time. I know. I know. Ridiculous. :)

So, Isaac and Mom took off at 8am (our time, so 5am for most of you) and my flight doesn’t leave until 5:40pm. That means until 1:40pm (East Coast) I have been and will continue to be stuck on this side of security.

Over the next hour or so, I’m going to try and whip out some posts about our trip (that is only half done for me). If I leave anything out, let me know. I’ll be here for another… 5 hours and 40 minutes. :)

(Title lyrics from "Time of My Life" by David Cook)

"You know the sun's still shining when you close your eyes..."

We're back from Boise, and the long-lost-Jordan-who-was-supposed-to-post-weeks-ago, has returned. :P Sorry about the lack of posts. NHD has made life crazy, but apparently, for good reason. For those of you who don't know, the State competition was a success. Joel, Isaac and I placed first in our division (Senior Group Performance), which was wholly unexpected. Above and beyond that, we were utterly baffled to receive the Governor’s award, given to "the best of the best" in the State of Idaho, without dividing by age, category or number of participant. That was an immense blessing!

More to come over the next few days; the trip, the competition, the bull-roundup outside our hotel and more. :P Stay tuned!

For now, I leave you with a slide-show, AJ and I pulled together (picture taken in December). Enjoy!

More pictures from IHD avalible here.

(Title lyrics from "It's a Great Day to be Alive" by Travis Tritt)

"The good Lord gave us mountains so we could learn how to climb..."

After two months of hard work and three weeks of utter chaos, scrabbling to get the project completed, Regional History Day was over after we performed at 11am. How did I reward us for all our hard work? I started a blog.

Our goal in this blog is to keep you updated on the ins and outs of the Schaefer life. With most of the literate members of the family as contributors, we hope to have fresh posts for you to read consistently. Be sure to comment and let us know what you think!

Back to History Day: For those you for who don’t know the story, after being told repeatedly since September that we would be doing a project, Joel, Isaac and myself (with our WONDERFUL mother and grandmother as leaders, helpers and counselors) finally started research on our topic in January. We had chosen as a topic, John Adams and his part in the Boston Massacre of 1770.

At the moment, as much as I’d like to, I can’t share with you about all the interesting facts we did learn about the situation and the events that lead up to, happened on and followed after March 5th 1770. What I can tell you is our Wiki page that we used during research, is being built up and should be available for browsing in the not-too-distant future. We’ll update you as soon as that is up and running.

March 15th, 2008 was our deadline and the date of Idaho History Day’s regional competition. From those in the audience and the judges, we are told that the performance was wonderful and of amazing quality. Each of the three judges gave us fantastic marks; simply gushing about the depth, superiority and measure of our research and then the quality of the performance and the actual acting.

For better or for worse, we were the only Senior Group Performance at Regional, which means we had no competition. But we were given a “well deserved” first-place and are heading to the State Competition in Caldwell, ID (Albertson College) on April 11th. Your prayers as we continue to develop our project and finalize our research would be greatly appreciated.

(Title lyrics from "Mountains" by Lonestar)