Jared starts college next week. School is coming up for Jonathan and Jessica. Quizzing is over. Life is going on. Here are a few pictures of our trip to Nashville and of a couple other things.

Tuesday, August 4th

Yesterday we won both of our games. We played Louisiana 3 and Tennesse 1. Today we played the first game of the day against Texas 4. We lost to them. Texas 4 was the defending National Champions from last year. Now we are looking forward to next year.

Checking In!

Hey everybody! We are right now in Nashville, TN quizzing at Nationals. We played our first game tonight and lost 85-75. We went into overtime and it came down to the last question which was a quotation question. Jared hit the buzzer and missed the question by a word. Tomorrow we will quiz again. You can track it at upcquiz.com.

The Past Few Weeks

Nothing really interesting has happened these past few days. Birthdays have come and gone. But for the most part right now the family is getting ready for one thing - Nationals. It is going to be a Starr family team. The parents the coaches, the boys the quizzers, and Jessica I guess will have to be the one to cheer us on.

Jared being Jared

Here is a short video clip. I want you guys to look at this and take a guess at what he is doing. The person who guesses right gets a free lifetime subscription to this blog!

Family Vacation

Here are a few pictures of our family vacation..

Finally "Finals"

Finally we have reached finals. Our team won both games and now we will turn our sights toward nationals. It is going to be held August 1-5 in Nashville, Tennesse. Jared and Jonathan made it on the all tournament team.

Trip to Texas

This is the reason why it has been such a long time since I updated the blog.

Jared's Graduation

Jared's Graduation

With Jared's Graduation being less than five hours away and already a few surprises, I wanted to set this up so you could tell his something on his special day. Just click the "comment" button below and you will be able to leave a couple of words.

Mandan Indian Village

We visited a Mandan Indian Village just south of Mandan in North Dakota. You can see what the huts look like this in this slideshow...

Quiz Tournament

We have had yet another quiz tournament. This time we had only one team. The team consisted of Jared, Jonathan, Preston, Garret, and Clarissa. There were three teams at the tournament and we were able to draw number three. This meant we got a bye, then we beat Bismarck. Bismarck went to the losers bracket came back and played us again and we beat them. We had three quizzers on the all-tournament team Jared had 95 ppq, Jonathan had 72.5 ppq, and Preston had 10ppq. The next tournament is June 20 in Minot

Jessica's Graduation

Jessica graduated from first grade. Here is a slide show of the event...

Boy's Birthday

Jared and Jonathan had a great birthday. Here are a couple of pictures of how it went...

Trip to Bismarck

Monday we took our monthly trip to Bismarck. We went to a store called TJMax otherwise known as boys nightmare. While we were there a lady came over to Jared and asked him if he knew what this logo was (the logo at the top), Jared replied by saying that it was the Twins. The lady said that is what I thought it was and went back to her shopping. A couple of minutes later her friend came back and asked us if one of us was six feet tall, we told her Jared was. The lady wanted Jared to be a model for her so she could try some shorts up to him. Jared was happy that she did not make him go try them on for her.

Jared's Graduation

For Jared the month is here the time is three and a half weeks away. On June 1st he will be able to wake up and say "I am officially graduated from high school!".

Jared will be graduating on May 31st, 2009 at 3:30 PM. The graduation ceremony will be held here at Apostolic Faith Church. The address to the church is 2929 19th Ave. NW Minot, North Dakota 58703.

Here are a couple of his Senior pictures...

In Your Face!

Every once in a while you hear about people that are just "in your face" people. Well Sunday what Jared was having to deal with was not a "in your face" person, but an "in your face" pie. They had a bid on who was going to throw the pie in his face. An elderly couple ended up winning the bid and gave Jessica the chance to throw the pie in Jared's face. When it was time for her to do it she chickened out because she did not want to hurt her nice older brother. They had to search for someone to throw the pie now. Their search ended with Jonathan who willingly but heart brokenly threw the pie into Jared's face. Before he threw the pie he displayed his sorrow by saying that "there was no one else to throw the pie". Here are a couple of pictures...

The Past Week

This past week we have had a few things happen. On the top of the list of things that have happened is Jared had the opportunity to preach Wednesday. The title of his message was "The Tragedy of a Loser's Mentality". Another thing that happened this past week was Jessica finishing up with her learning to read program. This week she has no PACE work that she has to do, but she has to read a book every day and review some of her "sight words".

News Flash (Updated 4/15)

Well, life is going on as usual here in this Starr household. The boys are doing quizzing, Jessica has started school, and the snow just keeps on coming. Hope everyone else has enjoyed their first month of the new year. A couple of weeks ago Jared messed up his knee playing basketball. We took him to the ER and they told us if he could not put his full weight on it by the next week to call an orthopedic doctor. A week later he feels like he can put his full weight on it but still wants to call the doctor so he knows exactly what is wrong with it. The doctor told Jared he couldn't play basketball for 24-48 hours. My dad said if he played after 48 hours it would be over his dead body. Jared is going to an orthopedic on Tuesday.

2/03: Jared went to the orthopedic and they figured that it was probably a meniscus tear. Wednesday he will get an MRI done and the results will be back by Friday. It would be good that his meniscus would be torn rather than his ACL or something along those lines. I will try to keep everybody posted on it.

2/05: We just got the MRI back and there is good new and bad news. The good news is that there is a slight tear in his meniscus. The bad news is that he also achieved tearing his ACL. The meniscus, depending on how bad it is, may be able to heal by itself. The only way the ACL can be healed is by surgery. Hopefully, everything will turn out alright!

2/10: Jared just got back from the doctor. The surgery has been scheduled for March 12. The doctor said that there would be five to seven months rehab. He also said that Jared would not be able to play until it was 95 percent. They have a machine that they are able to tell what the percentage of the knee is. The really sad part is that he won't be able to take out the trash or do the dishes. He will be able to sit in the corner and play the Xbox 360 though. I will keep you updated after the surgery and beyond!!!!

3/2: Today is Jared's first day of physical therapy. Last night he ran the aisles, so we are hoping he will be able to play basketball soon :) Jared is hoping that with this physical therapy he will be able to dunk by the time he is able to play basketball again. His surgery is 10 days from now.

3/12: The surgery is over! Jared has a brace on his right leg which makes it where he cannot bend his leg at all. He had to be at the hospital at 5 a.m. this morning. Jonathan and Anthony came to the hospital at around 8:30. They sat and did pretty much nothing till around 2:00 p.m. Jared is taking about 5 different medications right now. The doctor said that he had around 80% of his meniscus left and that a little bit more would grow back. I believe that he has to keep his brace on until the next time he sees the doctor, this means he will have to sleep with that thing on.

3/24: Jared went in for his second check-up since the surgery today. They took out the staples that were in his leg to keep the incisions together. He said that he was very happy that the staples were out. He is becoming very mobile again and can bend his knee at a 90 degree angle. For some reason (beyond my knowledge) he is not yet able to do the dishes. I would post some pictures of his leg with the staples in it, but I am not at liberty to post them. There is a slideshow of him at the hospital a little bit farther down.

4/15: In two weeks Jared will get the pleasure of not having to wear a brace. As it is know he does not have to wear a brace when he is inside the house. Which means to him he can go downstairs into the gym without a brace on and play volleyball with the rest of the youth group. Technically speaking he is still inside the house, but for some reason he did not what to tell the docotor about that. He is hoping that when the brace goes his job will come. He has not yet talk to the doctor about going to work with his brace on.

Here is a picture of him on crutches...

He wasn't able to bend his knee much more than that the day he hurt it.

Quiz Tournament

We had a quiz tournament in Bismarck the other day. Jared was not able to attend due to schooling reasons. Minot only had one team which consisted of five quizzers (Jonathan, Preston, Leesha, Garret, and Clarissa). Minot still was able to pull it off and get first place. We had three quizzers on the all-tournament team, Leesha led the way with 68 ppq, Jonathan had 61 ppq, and Preston had 11 ppq. We are not exactly sure when the next tournament will be.