Monday, August 27, 2007

Plane Tickets Acquired

We finally purchased plane tickets for Guinea-Bissau!!!!!

You know how we said that we were only going to be there for 3 months this time... Well... we decided to stay longer. We are leaving September 12th and we will be there until mid April

We wanted to make sure that we had enough time to finish all of the stuff we want to do and to Be the most help to the youth center while our teammates are gone.
Another reason that we decided to stay longer is so that we can have a chance to go on a few trips to see more of Africa. What's the point of traveling half-way around the world if we are sequestered inside the youth center the whole time? Most of the Guineans who work at the youth center have families that live in the villiages, and several of them have invited us to go with them to visit their family for a weekend. We never had time before because we were working so much, but this time we are going to do it. We need to make sure to take along a few live chickens for presents

Annother exciting thing about the trip is that the plane tickets cost the same amount no matter how long our layover was in Europe on the way home. So, we decided to take a little vacation. We have a 2 and a half week layover in Frankfurt, Germany and we hope to be able to travel by rail to the Czech Republic, Austria, and Italy. The money for the time in Europe isn't part of the money we are raising for our time in Guinea-Bissau, so we are going to have to spend a little dough, but we are planning on doing some camping and bargain hunting (you know Jason). Besides, how often will we have free plane tickets to Europe? Anyone interested in joining us in Central Europe for a few weeks in the end of April??? Seriously, it would be fun!

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Pictures of Camp!!!

Since I've been back in the working world for a week and have caught up on my sleep I thought I would post a few pictures from Simpson Park Youth Camp (SPYC). For those of you that have never had the privilege of attending SPYC let me fill you in. It is a week of living in a dorm with 20 Jr High or High School girls, eating camp food (which is actually quite tasty), not sleeping, serious conversations, laughing hysterically, great preaching, grass throwing, craft making, relay game playing, God worshiping, spider killing, cold showering (although not that often anymore) fun. I love it. It is literally the highlight of my summer.

Group shot of the Youth Camp Members (no one ever gets to see the funny one)


Most of you know that Jase and I got the opportunity to speak at camp this year on Missionary Day. It was fantastic. We were really really nervous and I had a bit of a rough start, but afterwards lots of people told me that I am just like my mom (
she's a Nazarene pastor).
Camp starts off for the counselors on Saturday. We went to camp in the morning, picked up our teammates and their kids, and the 6 of us headed to the airport to get Fernando. We waited for a long time at the airport and finally he arrived. He hadn't slept on the airplane so he was pretty wiped out. In true American form we took him right to McDonalds
.

After that we went to camp and did counselor training and on Sunday the Youth arrived. Sunday night is always a special time at Simpson Park. We go out under the tent on the athletic field, put some tarps down, crank up some fun music, and play some seriously messy games. Some of the funniest moments come from a game where you had to look at things hidden under buckets and try to identify them the fastest. The trick is that one bucket had a human head under it

As you look at these pictures take a minute to notice Bob. I have never seen him looking so sinister before...





A few other highlights of that night were:
The Snot Shoot - People shooting Coco Puffs out of their noses onto the whipped cream covered face of their partner...


People eating twinkies where the whipped cream had been removed and replaced with a gross mixture containing cereal, mustard, and pickle relish...
Tastes good, doesn't it Abby?


And, of course, Twister. Not with a regular twister board - the SPYC version. A tarp with thick circles of Ketchup, Mustard, Mayonnaise, and Pickle Relish...



What's wrong Katie, you didn't want a mustard facial???

The week progressed with lots more fun things and a lot of heat. We will not talk about what happened in the counselor vs Sr. High soccer challenge, but I can say that in the rematch the counselors won handily...
Go Fernando? Can you pick him out of the crowd?

We are not scared Tim. Ok, maybe a little...


Luckily kind people brought boxes of freeze pops on the back of their golf carts and sped around the athletic field.


Everyone had a good time at the Wellspring Convert...



You've got to love the banquet. This year with a camo theme...
Who knew camo could look so good


Now that's some serious committment to the banquet theme...

Oh no!!! We lost Brenda!!!!!!

That is one nice looking group of counselors if I do say so myself... Where's Jason, oh yeah, taking the picture...


And then we have the talent show...
Joy dorm rockin' it

Tim on the accordian

The next "boy" band sensation

On Friday morning we had a pretty cool service down by the pond

Wellspring unplugged


I could never leave out Gordy games...

Do not mess with Amanda...

Over? Under? I'm so confused.

The game of dislocated shoulders... classic

Who needs shins anyway? Let the bruising begin!

JUMP!!!

A Gary Bonderinko original... 4 way volleyball. Can I get a woot? You know you love it.

Watch out Brenda!!!!!

All-in-all it was a great week and I can't wait to go back next year. What did you think about it?