Girls Retreat

The Girls Retreat was this last weekend, and it went great! I took all middle school girls, which I was sad that no high school girls went but it was still a great group of girls. My sister was one of the sponsors on the retreat too, which was really awesome. The girls all love her, and thought she was two years younger then me (even though she is three years older J) and it was really amazing to have her there when I taught and have her help. I taught on Deborah and realizing the gifts God has given you to use. At the end of class I had the girls make duck tape bracelets and write on them one character of theirs and is from God. They loved that part because we had like 10 different colors of duck tape. So the weekend was great, I am doing pretty great, and we are still waiting to move. Enjoy the pictures.

YS Convention 2006

What an amazing week! We are now back from the Youth Specialties Convention in Anaheim and we have so much fun! Not only did we finally get our instrumental fix for the month (and not just instruments but David Crowder Band worship) we were able to spend gobs of time with some of our favorite people that live no where near us, or even in Texas. The convention was great, David Crowder worship and our friends being my favorite part, the only let down was the Women in Youth Ministry luncheon. The main disappointment was that is was more like a bad excuse of a pep rally then an encouraging time where I met other women in ministry. I didn’t even meet one other woman from Texas, of course the table that was suppose to be for Texas woman had no one actually from Texas at it, so I just sat with Neena (and some other new friends in Phoenix) at the Arizona table. But that is my only complaint. Praise God for this break and community with friends, now I come back to hit the ground running with a Girls Retreat this Friday- Sunday and a staff retreat Monday & Tuesday. Hope you enjoy the pictures.

A Quick Update...

Ok, a quick update before I have to leave for the airport in 15 minutes! And now you probably need to know where I am going, so first John and I leave today for the Youth Specialties Convention in Anaheim, CA! I know it’s a rough life we lead. We are so SUPER excited to get out of town, to be in California, and most of all to see some of our favorite people.

Second, as for the boys that got into some trouble a couple of weeks ago in class, only one of them ended up teaching because he was the only one that showed up to work on the lesson with me. I do have to say though he did a great job, really knew what he was talking about and how to summarize the idea of the scripture. Although my favorite point during his class was when the other students were getting a bit out of control (but Summer and I bit our tongues to let the “teacher” handle it) and the “teacher” Franklin let out a huge sigh and said, “look you have to listen to me, I’m the teacher so do what I say.” I think for just a split minute he felt some of the frustration of getting people to listen. But he did great and I loved seeing him shine!

And third and last, I have a bit of a stressful and disappointing week. On top of being busy getting everything together for others to fill in for me we also got new news about our living arrangements. John sent an email to our elder, who is over the youth ministry as well as over the staff, concerning any news that he had. We had already been told that we will be moving next door to the apartment we now live in, the second floor of this duplex (which is currently two one bedroom apartments) will be remodeled into one two bedroom apartment for us. Which is wonderful, we are very thankful that they are doing remodeling and taking care of that. But then this week we found out that the apartment will not be ready when they will be tearing down our apartment that we live in now, so they will be moving us to a temporary (2-3 months which really mean 5-6 months) house somewhere around here…maybe. This is frustrating because no one took the time to prepare a place for us, and yes you could say well it’s just business…but no this is personal because it is our home. So now not only is our office space unavailable (it is still under construction from the flood in March) but now we are still in limbo with our house. And if you know me at all you know what an OCD person I am and to have both the spaces where I spend the majority of my days in chaos and unstable is almost more then I can bear. I am praying about this and trying to have a good attitude, but at this moment I just want to be angry that someone let us and our office and our home slip through the cracks.
Sorry it is so long, but next time I will have pretty pictures from CA instead of so much writing. :)

Me and My Memaw (Lou Sims) at her 88th birthday party, she is too cute!
Windows Explorer

John & I with Allie, one of the girls in the youth group. She was a citizen of the Emerald City in the Wizard of Oz!
Windows Explorer

What a Weekend

Well I haven’t updated in a long time and I know Josh gets frustrated with that, so here we go. For a weekend off it certainly does seem like I was busy the whole time.
First, Friday (yes Friday is a day off for me) I substituted in an 8th grade Social Studies class. Which as tiring as it can be I really have fun doing. Out of all the times I have subbed only once did I not have any students I knew, this time I had a few and the others came by to see me. Oh, and I had this one guy in my class, an 8th grader never failed or anything and he was 6’5” tall!!! Can you believe that? It’s crazy I tell you. Then Friday night was HP homecoming, we were lucky enough to fall into some reserved seating so that was GREAT! And at HP every game is sold out and overflows so reserved seating is a really great thing. We left at the beginning of the fourth winning 63-0!

Saturday, we first went to a little boy’s birthday party about 20 minutes away and then drove back home so I could make some GREAT sausage/cheese balls. Then we drove to Fort Worth for my Grandma’s 88th birthday! Which was so great, all the family was there; dad, uncles, aunts, cousins, 2nd cousins, and my bro-in-law and my sister. There was tons of food and cake and my grandmother looked beautiful! I love getting together with my family, but this time my sister and I didn’t dress alike…incase you don’t know usually without planning it my sister and I show up in the same outfit, well one year she did it on purpose to me; she thinks it’s really funny.

Sunday we had church and class, in which I was met with some difficulty from a few of our middle school boys, which is not unusual just more aggravating this week for some reason. I kept the boys after class and had a talk with them, which is really hard for me sometimes. I don’t like being the adult that gives them a talkin’ to, John says it’s good for them to hear it from me but I am not sure it makes any difference. The students in the youth group even have a joke about my “authoritative voice” the joke being that I don’t have one. I find teaching a frustration sometimes too, feeling that I am not doing the lesson justice because they are not getting the importance, the intensity, or the understanding from what I am saying… do you know? It just doesn’t seem like they realize where the battle is, where the glory is, and where they are being invited to be. I did not find the solution from talking to the boys either, but two of the boys are teaching class next week, I am going to help them some but they both said they felt like the weren’t learning anything and so I offered them the chance to learn it from teaching it and they took it. So we will see.
And finally Sunday after church we went to go see one of our 7th grade girls in “The Wizard of Oz.” She was too cute and did great! So in a really long nutshell that is our weekend, great but a little busy.

Just Hanging Out...

Well, I guess it’s time to update my blog. Josh (Johnson) was bothering me today on AIM about how long it’s been since I last updated, I tired to tell him I had nothing to write about but he didn’t believe me, so I am updating to appease him.

I have started substitute teaching in Highland Park ISD, which is where our church and home is in Dallas. I have only done it a few times but it has been great so far. I have even already had personal requests from other teachers to sub for them, which makes me feel super special. I sub in the middle school and high school in order to meet more of our student’s friends and just get to know the community better, because the schools are really the heart of this “Bubble” community. Even at the HP football games most of the tickets are sold out because old alumni have all of the season tickets. Isn’t that crazy? If you would like to see more information on HP just go to www.thebubble.com no really, it’s the real website for HP.

Other then that we have simply been going with the flow, still waiting on everything (refer to Aug. 23 entry) and doing stuff with the youth group. The pictures I’ve posted are from our last youth Home Invasion, which is where we go to a youth families house hang out and eat. Eventually we hope to start having devo’s too but that is in the works.

So what do you write about when you don’t have anything else to write about?

I'm an AUNT!!!

I’m now an AUNT! Ok, well I have been an aunt for 6 weeks, but now it feels real. This past weekend John & I went to El Paso, TX to see our 6 week old niece which is John’s brother’s daughter. She is just the cutest thing, and has almost as much hair as I do!
We really had a wonderful time, we hadn’t seen John brother (Richard) or his wife (Melissa) since John preformed their wedding in December of 2004, so it was definitely an overdue visit. The whole weekend was about relaxing with Richard & Melissa and getting to see our precious niece. Her name is Catherine Elizabeth, but we call her Katie. Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure!

PS: No comments about how good John or I look with a baby in our arms…we still have 3 years before any of that!

the Waiting Game

Well, I know it has been a long over due update but not much is going on. I feel like I am just in a waiting phase. Do you know what I mean? I keep preparing for stuff, and planning for stuff that won’t happen until…well until someone else does something. Waiting on other people, other committees, the church, and time itself. I feel like it should be fall already, at least October. I really wish it was fall, and then maybe we could get out of these 100 degree days.
We are still waiting to find out where the church will move us when they tear down our house, which is supposed to happen by Oct. 1st. If you wonder why we are waiting, it is because our housing is part of our salary here, which is awesome and means we can stay in Highland Park instead moving out to Rockwall (45 min away) like most of our staff. So, we wait.
Also, our church is kicking off a new Sunday morning schedule with a new children’s ministry program, which we are so excited about. We are going to an hour of Sunday class instead of a 90 min. Sunday class, who wouldn’t be happy? But it doesn’t start for a couple of weeks, at which time I will gain a middle school teacher (YEAH for Summer) who is our new youth volunteer…let me rephrase that, ONLY youth volunteer! Which we are so excited about! So, we wait.
And last, our offices still have not been restored. Six months after the flood we are still crowded into a classroom. But plans are in work and hopefully before they tear down the youth house, we will be able to have offices because where our temporary offices are is where the youth are going to meet when the house is torn down. So, we wait.
I am so sick of waiting.

A Chilly 49 Degrees

12 hour drive what? I would have driven 20 hours for this weather! Praise God for mountains, rain, 49 degrees, and no cell phone signal. It has pretty much been raining the whole time we have been here but oh it is so beautiful. We are having so much fun, LeVondrick is here with us and 8 of our students and they are freezing their little patooties off! It is a wonderful week, and I looked up the weather in Dallas and its 101 degrees today.
Oh, and today marks mine and John’s 2 year anniversary at Preston Road Church of Christ…and they still like us! What a wonderful way to spend our anniversary as youth minister too. Well that’s it, enjoy the pictures.

It's the Craziest Thing...

Well, once again we are off. We are headed to Pine Springs this Sunday morning at 5am, before God even wakes up. So when you get to church that morning at 9 or maybe even 10am you can think of John & I who will have already driven for 4-5 hours. But that’s not the crazy part.
We have 9 students going with us, which we are excited about. It may seem small but you have to remember this is a new camp for our church. As of now we are taking both of our cars, the Suburban and the Tahoe, which mean yes we are both driving the entire 11 hours and we are the only two adults going. Exciting no, doable yes. But here is the crazy part, for the past two days we have called pretty much every place in Dallas/ Fort Worth that rents 12 passenger vans…and no one has one! In ALL of DFW there is not one single 12 passenger van! Can you believe that? It’s madness I tell you.
So you might ask well just get a 15 passenger van, b/c there are tons of 15 passenger vans available…ah, but our church’s insurance blocked 15 passenger vans out of our policy b/c they are too dangerous and there have been too many wrecks in them. HA, but take three of those seats out and it is just dandy. I am just in amazement, have you ever heard of an entire city being out of vans to rent? I’m flabbergasted…what do you think?

On the Road Again!

Thank you all so much for your prayers and words of encouragement! We had a great time at Pine Springs, we were up there with Natalie & Daniel, Link, Trent, and Tanner ( and more but those are the LCU people). It was a great week of camp and so wonderful to be up in the mountains and in cold weather!

Two days after got back from camp we left with Dean (campus minister at Broadway in Lubbock) for the NACC (noth american christian conference) in KY. It was a 12 hours trip but really great for John and I to spend that time with Dean, he is a mentor of ours...and John wants to be like him when he grows up. The conference was awesome too, it is the first time that the independent christian churches had invited the churches of christ since their split in 1906...so it is a date to mark history! It was really wonderful to be a part of something that is bringing unity to the church! And John and I saw several old friends there that we didn't expect to...it was a wonderful suprise.

We got back from KY on Saturday morning 3am, then went to Celebrate Freedom with some youth and didn't get back until 2am...then did church Sunday morning (well barely, it is all kinda of fuzzy now since we were so tired), and headed out Sunday evening for John's parents house in Caldwell, TX (near College Station). Thats right this is my third week to be out of town...and I really don't mind being out of town but its the being home for only a day or two inbetween the trips that drives me crazy. Its just a tease and long enough for you to get the house dirty and rush to clean it again before we leave. Because I can't leave my house dirty!

So, what have your summer adventures been so far?

Say a Little Prayer

Well, it is 11pm on Saturday and we leave in 6 hours for Pine Springs (our church camp in the NM mountains) and I still haven't packed :). It is a 10 hour drive and we will be there until next Saturday (June 24th). Keep John and I in your prayers through out this week, we are looking forward to going to Pine Springs b/c it is such a beautiful place and so cool in the summer, but we have come to some challenges in our youth ministry and are both a bit discouraged...so when you think of it say a little prayer not that we will have a good time but that we will entertain the presence of Christ and come back renewed and more reliant on Jesus for our ministry and our personal walks. Thanks.

Good News, Bad News, Worse News

So, I have good news, bad news, and worse news. I will start with the GOOD news just to keep you in suspense! I went to the dentist this morning, my appointment was at 8:45am and I walked out at 11:30am. Whew, but that’s not the good news, this was my first appointment at a new dentist and she was GREAT! I don’t think I have ever been able to say that about my dentist but she is a member of our church, and she is so great!

The BAD news is that I have multiple things that need attention in my mouth, although none of them have to do with poor hygiene so don’t even think that. But I have a crown that needs to be fixed, a (yes a, one) wisdom tooth that has to be pulled, and ….are you ready I have to go to the orthodontist to see a about a tooth on the bottom front that is causing trouble to other teeth…oh please say I don’t have to have braces a 3rd time!!!!!!!!! If you look close in the first picture you can see one little tooth on the bottom sticking up higher then the others. And crazy thing, what I learned today is that your teeth will keep growing until they hit something to stop them, I just thought that tooth had been crowded out of line but my dentist said that when I got my braces off they didn't aline the tooth right so where the other teeth hit the top teeth and stop growing this one didn't stop until it hit my gums...which is still weird. (oh, and no my hair doesn't look that for real, that was a bad bangs cut & a picture taken 2 years ago...so don't worry).


And now the WORSE news, if you have been a avid reader of my blog you will remember when our offices at the church building flooded, and all of the fun that surrounded that glorious event. The flood happened on March 19th, the first date given to get back in the offices was mid April, then we found that the carpet had to be replaced, so mid May; then we found mold (maybe black mold) in the walls and now we have found asbestos that has been activated so a new date has been given, the earliest we will be back in our offices is SEPTEMBER! Until then I am in a church class room with two admin girls and one right out side our class and then four of the ministers are in a classroom on the second floor and John is sharing an office with the people that count money on Sundays. Oh, and I though sharing an office with John was hard but now just have a table and boxing…UH. SEVEN months like this.

Ok, so that’s all of my news for this week…hopefully soon I will be able to tell you where John and I are going to be moved to b/c the church is tearing down our house to add on to the church building in August…so it would be nice to know where they are moving us soon.

Welcome to Culture!

Welcome to Culture! John and I went to Andrews, TX this past weekend, if you don’t know where that is at think about the farthest you can go and still be in west Texas and there you are. It is about 45 min northwest of Midland/Odessa if you know where that is. Anyway, John was the bestman in his bestman’s wedding…do you follow? Everything went great and we had so much fun spending time with the bride & groom and their families, they made us feel completely loved and special. The wedding was beautiful; I even was able to lend a hand with my expertise in bow making! We had great food from cookouts, to Buddy’s steak-fingers, to the most important some Bahama Buck’s snow-cones!!!! And no, Andrews does not have a Bahama Buck’s we got it in Odessa on our way from the airport. Oh man, talk about that best snow-cones ever!!!

Moving on from the snow-cones, I never want to live in a small town in my life! I thought that when I went to Lubbock to go to college I was moving to a small town but oh was I mistaken! Andrews consists of about 10,000 people…more people fit in a college stadium! Now I know there can be good small towns, ones that hold a quiet beauty, an escape from the busy & noisy life in a city but this is not one of those towns. J It is not even nice enough to call a desert, b/c still with a desert you think of loads of sand, cool cactus, ect. Well, think of a desert with weeds and you have Andrews. Ok, I think that’s enough.

MY NEW CAR!!!

This is MY NEW TAHOE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That’s right, a 2004 Tahoe fully loaded with leather, sunroof, quad-captain seats, a DVD player, third row, and 20” inch rims ride’n on the side. I don’t say this to brag, it is an answer to prayer! We have been looking for a new vehicle since February, and this past Saturday the dealership let us take it home on a test drive, John said if they can get the monthly payments to “this” much then we will get it, and they got it $27 under that amount. Whoa, God is good. The only thing we didn’t like were the rims, which John thought about selling on ebay and buying the factory ones. Each time we get out of it he says, “we have to hurry back out before someone steals those rims.”

Another Great Weekend

Another great weekend!!! This past weekend I had our youth group Girls’ Night!!! It was so fun, and 22 girls showed! So many more then we have ever had…we began the night by going to a place called Purple Glaze where everyone got to pick out a piece of pottery and paint it, then the store fires and glazes the pottery for you. After that we went to a family’s house to swim, eat pizza, and make smores. Once everyone was done swimming we returned to the church for some classic games that are totally great to play in a dark church building; like ghost in the grave yard, sardines, tag, and many more! After a few hours of games I put a movie on in the youth house projector and they were out at 4am. Oh what fun!

On Saturday John and I celebrated my stepdad’s birthday at a park with a cook-out and fishing. It was a great day too. And on Sunday our church kicked off its financial building campaign! In which they had John and I speak on behalf of the youth ministry on why this new addition is need so badly…I know, I got to speak in front of the church!!!! Up on stage…but don’t worry I didn’t read scripture or pray or preach. And praise God we already have one anonymous family that is pledging the amount for half of the whole building!!! Hope you had a great weekend too. And here is another Easter picture of me and John dancing at the park!

Easter Weekend

I hope you had a wonderful Easter weekend. We kicked off Good Friday by spending 14 hours at Six Flags with our youth group! Talk about fun, I mean insanity. We did have a couple of girls that failed to check in with us at the check-in times, and they were 20 minutes late to meet us when we were leaving. What do you to reprimand them when you are already leaving the park? What have you done?

It was still a good day, especially for John! In one of the pictures above you will see a picture of John with his hero, Batman. He even asked Robin not to be in the picture, which is why he is standing off to the side. And then Saturday when we returned the vans we found the old Batmobile, so of course we had to go home and get the camera. John was giddy!

We also went to the Dallas Arboretum, it was beautiful, and even though we missed all of the tulips in bloom it was still great. We took some great pictures too. After our Easter services we spent the day with my family in Fort Worth, it was a great Easter.

Last week I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Nashville on a Renewal for women in Youth Ministry in the churches of Christ. It was such a blast and so great to meet other women that are in youth ministry full time, there were even two others that are a team with their husbands. There are now almost 30 women in full time youth ministry in the churches of Christ, two of which are the only youth ministers. Its exciting to see God's movement into teams of men and women. Of course you really should count all of the hundreds and thousands of youth ministers wives who work like full time youth ministers. :) Here are a couple of pictures from the weekend.

Tagged

One of the cutest little girls ever! Anyway...
I was tagged just like everyone else…thanks Monica.

Four jobs you have had in your life:
1. the Gap
2. youth ministry intern
3. gift shop in Lubbock
4. youth minister

Four movies you would watch over and over:
1. Pride & Prejudice
2. LOTR
3. Harry Potters
4. Count of Monte Cristo
Four places you have lived:
1. Ft. Worth, TX
2. Lubbock, TX
3. Atlanta, GA
4. Dallas, TX (the only four places)

Four TV shows you love to watch:
1. Gilmore Girls
2. Grey's Anatomy
3. Lost
4. ?

Four places you have been on vacation:
1. Playa de Carmen, Mexico
2. London, England
3. Edinburgh, Scotland
4. Paris, France

Four websites you visit often:
1. facebook
2. prestonroad youth (I have to check my work)
3. jeep.com (we are looking for a new car)
4. blogspot

Four of your favorite foods:
1. hamburger & fries
2. shrimp fried rice
3. steak (Salt Grass…mmmm)
4. Chick-fil-A kids meal with sweet tea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Four places you would rather be right now:
1. on a cruise
2. Wilderness Trek
3. Italy
4. Dallas Arboretum

Four people who are tagged to do this:
1. Summer
2.Lesli
3. Bret

You Like Me, You Really Do Like Me

Well, you do like me! For the past couple of weeks I thought I had lost all of my friends, or that everyone was just really busy. I mean it couldn’t be my posts, how often do you hear about being flooded out the office. But low and behold I had messed up my comments box to where I had to approve all of the comments I had…silly me.

Otherwise things have gone great, our staff continues to share an office out a classroom, its oh so cozy, it looks like it might be a week or two before we get back into our normal offices. Although in the mean time we are enjoying the change of light (i.e. the windows we have now) because we are basically in a cave usually.

Some of my great week was because of the meeting our elders, deacons, and staff had yesterday evening. It was the meeting to unite our leaders of the church before we tell the congregation that we are adding on to the church building. And I was so relieved afterwards, because I spoke for the youth ministry on reasons we need this new addition…which would include a new youth facility. I received several compliments on my little two cents. So whoop for a new building, the announcement and fundraising for the building begin April 9th, the architecture plans are already done. The picture up is where we currently meet with our youth, the youth area is downstairs and John & I live in an apartment upstairs. It is located right behind the church.

And the Heaven Poured Down

Well if you don’t live in the DFW area let me tell you about our flood that came in on Sunday. From what I know the Highland Park area was one the hardest hit areas, the street became small rivers, cars were under water, and the city drains were so full they were pumping water out. Coincidently, the church’s (my office) drains are connected to the city’s drains, so…while the heavens opened and poured down, the overflow went into our offices which are in the church basement. You will see in the pictures that in my and John’s office there is a window to the drain (I know a window that looks in the drain, yes we have a great view) well when the drain started pumping water back the widow began to fill and we had a fantastic fish tank for a few minutes, until the glass broke and put the fish tank in our office. Well, all will be fixed and nothing of great value was lost, thanks to those of us staff that were running from office to office grabbing everything off the floor…what a wonderful bonding time. And until the office is done being drained and re-carpeted we will continue to bond while we make office all together in a classroom.Oh, and all of this happened right after lunch on Sunday, that is why I am in my church clothes and John is in the baptismal waiters so his suit would not be ruined.

New Orleans Mission

Here are some pictures from our trip, luckly I was taking all of the pictures so I'm not in any of them. We worked three days and did insulation, sheetrocking, and mudding...I could be a pro at this stuff by now but don't worry I'm not quiting my day job.

John hard at work, doesn't he look lovely.












They cooked us amazing Cajun feasts everyday, this day was fresh crawfish.















And here is the whole group!

Spring Break in New Orleans

I am so excited, John just left with 13 others headed for New Orleans; I leave tomorrow morning (Saturday) with a second team of 10. We are headed to New Orleans to help with some rebuilding for our Spring Break Mission Trip with our youth group. I am not sure if you remember but during the aftermath of Katrina our church housed some families in the apartments we own nextdoor and now the families have moved back to New Orleans. Although, one family did not have home owners’ insurance and so we are going to help her with things that need to be done at her home. Keep our team in your prayers as we are gone and I hope to post some great pictures when we return.

I Survived!

I survived a night alone at our apartment. Now I know what you must be thinking, so what, no big deal. Well, it is an accomplishment for me. This past weekend John was in Seattle doing a retreat for our friend Anthony, so that left me here by myself… the reason that this is an accomplishment is because I am completely FREAKED out at night in our apartment alone…it is not that I am alone it is our apartment, I promise. In case you have never had the pleasure of visiting us allow me to set the seen for you.

Our apartment was a quadra-plex (4 apartments in one house), it was built in the 1920’s (old things creep me out), and the downstairs has been renovated into the youth house (where our youth have class & chill). We live upstairs and we do have neighbors but that really doesn’t help me much. Just imagine it, and 80 year old apartment (you think your place makes noises) all wood floors, windows everywhere, all the doors creek, and there are 3 doors that all lead to our bedroom…3! Who designed this place? One door from the bathroom which also goes to the dinning room, one door from a long narrow hallway from the dinning room, and the last from the kitchen right beside our front door, so take your pick on how you want sneak in on me, I mean really. And then the whole downstairs is empty b/c it is the youth house. But I guess it just comes down to me being a scaredy cat, but I did it and no monster got me from under the bed (of course the dust bunnies might have helped scare them from being under there J), and no ghost showed up behind me or popped out from behind a door (like John likes to do to me) so maybe someday I could do it again but not yet. And the picture is just to help you set the seen, it is not really my house.

Is anyone participating in lent? I am giving up sweet tea…in my whole life I don’t think I ever gone two weeks without sweet tea so this will be a big challenge for me. And John is giving up all cokes…which really he should be ok with. What are you giving up?

And the Winner is...

You love me, you really love me…lol. Ok, did ya’ll give some GREAT suggestions or what!?! Here are the choices I was given to choose from: Omar, Scooter, something that starts with the letter “T”, Landry, Jaws, Joe (but I know a Joe and he isn’t as cool as my fishJ) Hush Puppy, Bait, Guppy, Flounder, Pookie (but then John wouldn’t know if I was talking to him or the fish, no I’m just kidding, no really I am), Big Blue, Moby, Bruce Wayne ( I wonder who gave that one), Chris (to add some confusion btwn me and my bro-in-law), John (to confuse him and get some built up anger out, but I don’t want to traumatize the poor fish). Rusty, 728b (sorry Scott but I don’t get the joke), or Briet Hewitt Gibbons Carr (thanks for giving up your first child’s name, what a true friend you are).

After much deliberation I have chosen a name…drum roll please….Moby. I talked to my sister about it, and even read a synopsis of the book so that I could better understand the real Moby Dick. And after reading that it was a violent whale I thought it might be fitting, I mean the fish cannot be put with another beta and he does enjoy dive bombing the rocks and air bubbles. So there it is…Moby.

Though this name is not permanent and is subject to change upon my choice.

Name My Fish!

Well, I am not going to start off this paragraph with “its been forever since I have written,” because that is what everyone says and you should just expect it now that I am never going to be on schedule all the time for updating my blog. But anyway I have a new challenge for all of my friends. Are you ready?
I have a new beta fish for my office (picture above) but I have no name for it. I am told that every fish needs a name, and besides I have so many kids come in my office and that is one of the first questions they ask me. So lets see who is the best at naming fish, something short and catchy and of course cool.

How It Went

Well thank you to the few of you who lent me some ideas. Josh we must be thinking alike b/c after I had finished writing the lesson for it I looked at your answer and it was pretty much the same.
We started off the class with questions about what POWER is and who is powerful…of course at first they gave “church” answers but then we got them started on their favorite super heroes…batman, superman, spiderman. And then we asked them about being scared, what they were scared of, why they were scared, and who helped them. That is how we introduced the story, and then we had some students act it out…a 6th grade girl play Jesus, a 8th grader being the man that was possessed by the evil spirit, and a 6th grade boy played the evil spirit that was attached by piggy back and evil by beating him while on piggy back. The kids’ favorite part was when the evil spirit fell dramatically to the floor. And we concluded that Jesus is more powerful then anyone, even batman, and we don’t have to be scared because he is powerful.
Thanks for your suggestions, Chris I would have gone with puppets next. And here is the closest thing I could find to a picture of a person possessed by an evil spirit, it is John after I cast the evil spirit out of him.

A Little Help Please

Ok, I know you can't believe that I am updating my blog for the 2nd time this week, its a phenomenon, but I need a little help, any suggestions will be great. Except from Chris (my self proclaimed comedian brother-in-law)…I only expect clever laughs from your responses so don’t let me down now.
So every time there is a fifth Sunday in a month it is the youth group’s responsibility to present the children’s story lesson to them…are you still with me. So what it really seems like is that every time the children get to a difficult lesson to present they think oh lets just hand it off to the youth…for example past lessons we have had to present include the Beatitudes and 1 Corinthians 13…to 4yrs-10yrs old. So this time it is actually a story which is great, but it is the story of Jesus driving out an evil spirit from a man (Mark 1:21-28). Hello, all of the little kids are going to running out of class either acting like demon possessed kids or their parents are going to be tucking them into bed and they are going to start crying from fear of being possessed by the demon under their bed.
So, this is where you come in, any suggestions on how to present this lesson and take up 15 minutes of time with out scaring these precious children of God. I mean really, I am interested to hear from you…so if you read this I want to hear from you…lets see how creative you are…I expect at least like 10 comments this time guys.

Winterfest

Well, I got nothing. So here are some pictures from Winterfest this weekend with the youth. John enjoys torturing the youth when they get out of line. Beth spent the next 10 mins. in the bathroom cleansing herself after John was done with her. I guess she didn't care for John's feet.

LaVondrick's Week

Another crazy busy week, the day after we returned from the youth ski trip John and I flew LaVondrick into Dallas to celebrate a late Christmas with him. If you don’t know who LaVondrick is, he is John’s little brother from the Big Brother program. John and LaVondrick were matched four years ago while John and I were in college in Lubbock; LaVondrick is now 12 years old. They even have won Big Brother of Texas together in 2003. We usually try and bring LaVondrick out here 2 or 3 times a year, which means for one week 2 or 3 times a year John and I become responsible for this kid completely. What a scary thought, I can honestly say I am not ready to have a 12 year old, good thing they start younger.
Although it is a difficult adjustment for John and I, I believe that it is far more difficult for LaVondrick. To imagine the life style change from his home to ours is crazy. You see in Lubbock he lives with both parents (this month) as well as 2 sisters, a grandmother, a cousin, sometimes an uncle or who ever else in the family needs housing at the moment…all in a two bedroom duplex. He said he doesn’t like to share a room with his cousin b/c he isn’t nice so LaVondrick sleeps on the couch. In his daily routine there really are not any rules, any set times to eat, or anyone that he really has to answer to. As well as he cannot trust his own family in his house with his belongings b/c they end up “missing.”
And then John & I fly him to one of the wealthiest areas of Dallas, where all he has been taught is to want more, & think of what he could do with more money if it was his. In one week we try and teach him as much as we can, about Christ-like values, education, social skills, poor grammar, and manners. I am not saying we do any good by doing this, we may even be doing damage, I don’t know. It is just so sad because there is so much that we wish we could give and opportunities to prepare him for but everything we hope for him seems to disappear once he goes home, even the things we have bought for him. Our only hope, our only impact…the love that Christ overflows from us to him. No matter how we burden him and overwhelm him, he continually asks when he can come back, and cries every time he leaves. Praise Jesus for His perfect love. Do you have any stories or thoughts?

PRYM Ski Trip 2005

I am so sorry to have kept all of my fans waiting for so long. John and I just got back at the beginning of this week from our youth ski trip. It was awesome; we had 17 out of 23 in ski school and still no one was injured… talk about God’s intervention. And yours truly learned how to snowboard! I know I was amazed to. John thought I would give up, but I have the bruises to prove I did it for a whole three day. John also thought that I wouldn’t like snowboarding, he said “all you do on skis is snow plow the whole way down; you can’t do that on a snowboard.” Well did I prove him wrong! Leave it to me to find the hardest but slowest way down on a snowboard…backwards or as us pros call it, a toe wedge. That’s right, everyone else goes straight down or even goes down forward (a heel wedge) but not me, the easiest way I found was going down backwards. Just another thing John can add to his list of strange things about me. Sorry I don’t have any good pictures of the miracle of me snowboarding, but here is the whole gang. I am in the yellow sweater and light blue jacket... and no I am not that fat it is all of the layering. For more picture you can look at our youth ministry site.