Monday

This morning, after devotionals, we broke off into our work groups. Keith took Marilyn, Amanda and Beth along with Dave, Sam and Hayley from Minnesota to Goodwill for the day. Dave from Youthworks joined them in the morning. Their group is called the Green Monkeys (I will call them this from now on.)They sorted shoes, books, and organized the clothes racks and marked clothes for clearance. The girls also were able to shop on their breaks. Amanda and Beth picked up some shoes, Marilyn shopped wasn’t able to find anything. They work hard but felt they were productive. When ZI met them at the shower area they were all excited and eager to tell me about their day and said it was fun.

My team, the Silver Snakes (we didn’t name our teams by the way) will be visiting Village Gardens nursing facility all week. This morning we jumped right in and played “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” with some of the residents. That was pretty fun. Steven’s team won. After, we got an orientation of the facility, watered some of the gardens and ate lunch. After lunch we helped the residents with the project of filling up pots with geraniums. The kids did a great job of interacting with the residents. This is outside all the kids’ comfort zones. I think by the end of the week, though it will be a lot easier. I was very proud of them.

The evening activity was a prayer drive through some of the community, ending up in a park to play. Our snack that night was birthday cake for Amanda!

We were exhausted in the evening. I think the kids were looking forward to going to bed.

I’m seeing God working here, I can’t wait for you to hear the kids share when they get home.

Sorry no pictures yet, yesterday was so busy I didn’t have time to upload them. I will try harder for tomorrow.

Keep praying for us.

Green Bay - Day 1

We arrived!

A long car ride. Good weather and traffic was great until we hit Chicago. I swear I don’t understand traffic. You’re stopped and slow and stopped and slow for miles and miles and all of a sudden you start driving at a normal speed again, with no explanation.. No accident or construction or anything. I can’t figure it out. I find it very frustrating. I think the part where you don’t know what’s going on is the worse. When is it going to start speeding up again? How long is this going to last? We ran into more traffic just before the Wisconsin border. This time, we were travelling along OK when I noticed traffic in the express lane, which was walled by guard rails had completely stopped. People had even gotten out of their vehicles to see what was going on. I had a bad feeling since I figured this lane had to merge with ours eventually. I was right. Our traffic started slowing down, too, but at least we didn’t stop. I started thinking about how we could try to take an alternate route when we saw the flashing lights ahead of us. We realized there had been an accident in the express lane. Our lanes were slowly crawling because of gawkers! As soon as we passed the accident site… no more traffic. Egads that was frustrating. Once we hit Wisconsin, it was smooth sailing. In my car, we were listening to the first Harry Potter book on tape and reading (not me, I was driving.) while Keith’s car had good conversation and good books.

We were the last church to arrive, so we had slim pickins on sleeping space. Note to self…. get here earlier next time. We hung out awhile, settling in and then ate dinner. They made us sit with people we didn’t know. Billy and Steven sat apart at tables with all new people. The girls were more shy, and all sat together, but with new people in it. I was afraid they wouldn’t socialize.

But…

By the end of the night , the girls were already becoming friends with some kids from the other churches. During our church group time, when we recap the day, the kids were saying they were surprised that the other kids were so much like them. They had already found common interests and even though they were from different areas, they were excited to be making new friends.

Our group is divided into two work groups for the week. Steven, Billy, Lauren and Madeline will be with me working at a place called Village Gardens, a senior citizen home. Amanda, Beth and Marilyn will join Keith and a few kids from another church working at Goodwill for 3 days, then spending time at a cerebral palsy center on Thursday.

I’ll try to keep you as updated as possible. Hopefully next time I can post some pictures. Pray for us….

Scrap paper prayers

I was at one of my favorite websites recently and there was a challenge to find a piece of scrap paper, write a prayer on it, take a picture of it and upload it to the site. I found it really interesting and moving to see how people responded to this. Many people asked for prayers for people they knew who were sick or in need of healing, many people asked for wisdom, many people seemed to be hurting themselves and asking for God's presence and many more people said prayers of thanks. Some were very short, and some were very long. Some had pictures, others just words. They all expressed the writer's feelings, though.

I thought it was an interesting challenge. I'm going to challenge you to do the same thing. Find a piece of scrap paper and write a prayer on it. Send it to me. If you want to you can take a picture and email it to me or send it through the mail. I will post them here in a few weeks.

In the mean time.... here are a bunch of the ones that were posted to that site. scrap paper prayers

I love you guys!

5 wonderful volunteers got up this morning to help Cheryl and the Fellowship Team fix a pancake breakfast for Father's Day. They even got there before me, and I hadn't even reminded them on Friday night when I saw them. Thanks so much to Beth, Billy, Steven, Madelyn, and one of our new Mid- Highers - Drew. Seriously, you are awesome and so inspiring to me in your commitment to service.

Speaking of service, I'm starting to think about what I'm going to pack for our mission trip. This year I can't forget my camera (I don't know how I forgot it last year...) What do you think I'll forget to bring this year?

I hope to be blogging everyday from now until we return from our trip. Keep checking back! Feel free to post comments for others to see.

Summer Fellowship!

We had a great time playing mini-golf and go-karting today at Sportway. Balls were lost, some people took a lot of strokes on some holes, but that didn't seem to stop our enjoyment. The best part was, no one was really caring too much about the final outcome of scores. I love non-competition!

I especially had fun watching everyone drive the go-karts. It looked like all the girls were excellent drivers. Unfortunately it went by so quickly I didn't get a chance to get too many pictures.

So here's the link to the pictures I was able to take. I was proud of myself for actually remembering the camera today and taking pictures. Usually I'm so busy doing the activity I forget, then regret it when I get home.

I can't wait for more summer fun with the mid-highs!

Today, Sunday, June 7

You guys were awesome today! I heard so many great things after each service from  people who loved how you enhanced our worship today with your singing. I am glad so many of you could attend. I can't wait till we participate in corporate worship again. Are we ready for another drama? Or another song? Or maybe a combination of the two (Amazing Grace skit..... ask Beth or Marilyn)??  Let me know your thoughts. 

Working at the car wash.....

Wow- You guys did such a terrific job at the car wash today. Thanks so much for coming out and working so hard. I didn't hear any complaints from you when I asked you to hold signs, or dry the cars or anything. I loved your giving and helpful spirits. I also want to thank your parents who stayed and helped. Many hands make light work. We raised a good amount for our mission trip. You guys are awesome!

This song was running through my head all day while we were out there. It's from a movie called Car Wash (made in 1976, check out the styles!) and this youtube video has the title song plus some scenes from it. Car Wash 

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Marilyn!  Hey, I'm going to start announcing birthdays on here.... Let me know when you're birthday is. Email me!