Sonlight Express VBS - Wednesday Night

On Wednesday night we visited Fearless Falls and learned that Jesus Cares.  The little children's train was rocking back and forth as you can see below one of the little children's car laid her completely flat while another little boy took it all in stride.  He never even became scared at all.  The memory verse for the night was from 1 Peter 5:7 "Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you,".  The bible lesson was from Mark 4:35-41 where the students learned how to trust Jesus during the difficult times of life just like the apostles did when they were on the boat during the storm. 

The craft for the night was a boat with fisherman on it.  As I took the picture; this passenger, which just happens to be my nephew, was rocking his boat back and forth like it was in a storm, and he was explaining the lesson to me.

Charlie with the 3rd & 4th graders.  He takes getting on their level seriously!

Charlie with the K - 2nd graders.  Again getting down with them so they understand.

Three of the 3rd and 4th grade girls leading our theme song "Get On Board Little Children"

   

The kids had a special surprise for Charlie for the closing assembly.  They had all learned this little rap of the song the B-I-B-L-E.  It is super cute!

Two more nights of VBS and I hope to have more pictures to upload tomorrow.  Then on Saturday we are taking a Back to School trip with the youth.  We will be leaving at 6am for Six Flags!!  I'll have to sleep the entire next week to recoup from all this excitement!

~Blessings
Krista

Sonlight Express VBS - Tuesday Night

On Tuesday we visited Mercy Meadows and learned that Jesus Leads.  It was so cute to see the children making their little sheep in the Craft Caboose.  Then they went to the bible lesson and learned to trust Jesus and to follow him just like sheep follow their shepherd.  The bible lesson text was from John 10:1-9, 27 and the memory verse for the night was John 10:4 "The sheep follow him: for they know his voice."

Charlie leading the children through the lesson.

Boxcar Games - the object of the game was to listen to the leader of your group on how to wrap up one of the children.

The Preschool kids were all proud of their sheep!

5th grade and up singing songs in the Melody Coach

Stay tuned for more of the Sonlight Express VBS!

~Blessings
Krista

Sonlight Express VBS - Monday Night

This week we are having VBS at our church. Charlie & I are in charge of our program.  Charlie takes care of all the bible lessons and I take care of keeping things organized; pretty much directing the programming.  We are very blessed to have a lot of participation at our local church.  We are averaging about 30 kids per night and about 30 adults too!  Isn't that awesome?

On Monday night we visited the Great Gorge and learned that Jesus Saves.  It was a little chaotic on Monday night so I didn't get a lot of good pictures.  For those of you who have directed a VBS program before you know that Monday night is full of excitement and lots of energy as everyone gets used to the schedule.  In the end it always turns out great!

Opening Assembly in the Passenger Car at Sonlight Station

3rd & 4th graders in the Melody Coach learning their songs for the week.

Obstacle Course for the K - 2nd graders at Boxcar Games

Preschoolers in the Melody Coach

Preschoolers at the Sonlight Station learning about Nicodemus

2 of our visitors for the night.  Anthony on the left was one of our youth from our church in Georgia and the guy  on the right is one of my brothers, Dabreon.  His children are passengers this week for their 1st ever VBS program.

Stay tuned for more of the Sonlight Express as the week progresses!

~Blessings

Krista

ROCK Solid's Blog

Our Youth Group at church now has a blog...



Check out rocksolidyouthministries.blogspot.com.

TGIF

Really, I am thanking God that it is finally Friday! Many things have happened since last Friday. Jump back 1 week...I was sick. Remember Bah Humbug...well, that was me. I am not a very nice sick person. I just don't take being sick very well. I am whiny and want attention, but yet I don't want anyone to bother me. Does that make sense? Of course not. My husband for over 18 years still doesn't understand it. I try to tell him, just acknowledge that I am ill, and then leave me alone. I will get better eventually. Charlie doesn't get the acknowledge that I am ill part. He just leaves me alone!

Last Friday night we had a lock-in planned at church. I really didn't want to go, but since I was probably going to be the only female adult supervision, I had to! Believe it or not, I made it. We had a great time. We played board games, and video games all night long. We played American Idol, which is a blast by the way, Guitar Hero World Tour, Soccer, Racing, honestly I can't even remember all the games that were played. We had a great time. We had pizza, chicken wings, chips, and I made 7 dozen chocolate chip cookies, 1 dozen at a time. Each dozen was gone as soon as I brought them out of the oven. It was a night to remember.

Then sometime during the night, I don't remember what time it was, Charlie's mother called. His uncle had a massive heart attack and was on life support. Charlie & I discussed it and decided not to tell the youth. We just continued the lock-in and made plans to go to Georgia as soon as we could. We finally made it home about 8am. Charlie and I both passed out till about 2:30. We had missed several calls from Charlie's Dad. He thought we were going to meet him at the hospital. We immediately got up, dressed, packed, and left for Georgia. By the time we arrived at the hospital they had already taken his uncle off the life support. His heartbeat was steadily decreasing. The doctors & nurses said that they didn't think he'd make it through the night. Charlie's Dad didn't want to leave the hospital. He wanted to be there when his brother took his last breath. That night became the longest ever. We stayed up all night Friday night, and it didn't seem like the minutes lasted hours, but sitting in that ICU waiting room on Saturday night the minutes lasted days. Charlie's Dad said he would leave come daylight if nothing had changed. We all left about 7am. His uncle passed away about 1:30 on Sunday afternoon. The funeral was planned for Wednesday. Charlie & I left Georgia Sunday evening so that we could come home and work on Monday. We turned right back around Tuesday morning and went back to Georgia, not returning home until Wednesday night. I am thankful that God watched over us in the many miles that we traveled. I would ask each of you to pray for Charlie's Aunt. His uncle & aunt had been married 58 years. I can't even imagine the pain that she must feel having to go home to an empty house. I know that God can comfort her and the family during this time of grief.

Of course we returned home to snow & ice. Charlie is now sick. I guess he caught the cold that I had last week. Needless to say it has been the longest 7 days ever! I am so thankful that it is Friday.

2008 Summer Youth Retreat

whheeeewwww.... I am too old for this!!!

In 1998 Charlie and I led our first Summer Youth Retreat. We started a tradition of summer youth trips to Awanita Valley SC. If you've never heard of this camp click here. Needless to say going to Awanita has made our standards pretty high. Awanita has wonderful facilities, recreation, and an awesome staff. However, we have found a camp that runs a pretty close 2nd!

Lake Francis in Crossville TN is a pretty new camp to East Tennessee. The camp caters to gymnasts and dances but they are also open to youth groups! The facility isn't as large as Awanita but for a weekend retreat it was perfect!

We were invited to join our sister church in Knoxville on this weekend retreat back in April. At first our middle/high school group wasn't interested; they really wanted Charlie to plan the trip to Awanita. After they realized that Charlie and I just couldn't do it (financially we just weren't able) a few of them decided they wanted to go on this shorter weekend trip. This past Friday we met at the Knoxville church and pulled out about 5:30. We had a great time! About 30 kids went on the trip, and about that many adults too!

It was quite interesting going on a youth trip that we didn't plan and coordinate. Charlie did speak on Sunday morning; however we didn't have the job of coordinating all the activities, food, dealing with problems, etc that we usually have. It should have been a very relaxing weekend, but it was actually very tiring. Which is why I say I'm too old for this! I walked more this weekend than I probably have in 6 months total! I'm sure I needed the exercise, but whew I am exhausted!

I have included a slide show below of all the pics that I took. You can tell that in some of the pictures it appears that I'm just looking up in the trees, well I am! Lake Francis' has an awesome high ropes course. The course is about 30-40 feet up! I was scared just watching the kids, but they have no fear. You can tell more about the course on the retreats website. They also have a huge man made lake. Charlie took me completely around the lake on a canoe. I didn't even have to row! I just looked out at the water and took in all of God's wonderful beauty! I don't have any pictures of this because I didn't take my camera on the canoe. I was scared I'd drop my camera in the water.

Now I've got to start planning the elementary & preschool trips...

Easter Family Festival

I can't believe that it has been a week since I've posted a blog. Last week was spent working on the Easter Family Festival that our church hosted on Saturday. It turned out great! We had over 200 people there. We started the day off at 9am with a pancake breakfast, then at 10am the activities started for the children. We had a giant slide, a moonwalk, basketball free throw contest, four square, and hop scotch set up! It was so much fun to watch all the children playing, and having fun. The big finale was the egg hunt at 11. I wish I had pictures to show you all so you could see how much fun everyone had.

We didn't have an Easter Bunny this year. My sister (she always has great ideas) put together a little dramatization to help the children learn what Easter is really about. We had several people dress up as characters from the Bible, and walk around the play area. When the parents registered their children we instructed them to just walk up to each character and ask "Who are you?", and to ask for the character's signature. When the children would come up to them the character would tell them their part in the crucifixion or resurrection. It was awesome! We had Pontious Pilate, Doubting Thomas, a Roman Soldier, Joseph (the man who took Jesus body & placed in his tomb), Mary Magadalene, and Mary, the mother of Jesus. If they brought all the signatures back to Sunday School the next morning they were given a prize. At Sunday School the teacher was able to go over in detail the story of Jesus' crucifixion & resurrection. The great thing about it was that after hearing the character's story the kid's all seemed to have a better understanding of what Easter is really about.

The slide was the huge hit. Everyone had to take their turn going down the slide. Our oldest member, she is 93, even went down the slide. Someone had to help her climb up but she wanted to do it. We almost had a catastrophe though! Two ladies decided they wanted to go down the slide together, and that was fine as the slide had a 600lb weight limit. So, they climbed up and as they were getting seated, a rather large child started climbing up the right ladder, and several other children had climbed up the left side. I'm not sure how this all happened because it was very quick. Well, needless to say the slide started tipping backwards. I just so happened to be close to the slide at that time, so you know what I did? Of course as I was screaming, slide down, slide down, I jumped on the bottom of the slide! I guess I thought my weight would counteract the weight at the top. Several other people also ran forward to hold the bottom of the slide. Words can't really describe what happened. I think one of the ladies passed out, and the other lady had to pull her down the slide. It was awful, but after the fact it was extremely funny!

So, even though it was very time consuming getting it all together it was a huge success! I'll post pictures for everyone in a day or two.

I hope everyone else had a Happy Easter!

Remember to check out my cooking blog at KC's Cafe!!

1st Youth Trip of 2008

I originally wrote this post on Sunday, February 24th. I didn't realize it didn't go through until today.

I have taken several youth trips in my life, but yesterday was one I'll never forget. Every trip is memorable, but you always remember certain things about each one. We took the 6th grade - 12th grade to Ober Gatlinburg on a day trip. There were only 13 youth, and 8 adults. We were scheduled to leave from the church at 10am, but if you've ever been around a church youth group you know that schedules are made to be flexible! After waiting on a late arrival we left about 10:30. It took us about 1 1/2 hours to get to Gatlinburg. I had a fabulous time on the drive just listening to the young people interact. It always makes me feel young again!

As we arrived in Gatlinburg, it was very dark and gloomy. It looked like it was going to rain, but we were determined to not let it deter us! We all left the parking garage headed for the Tram station laughing and joking about how it looked like something from a horror film. On the tram ride to the top of the mountain it felt like we were literally just floating in the clouds. You could barely see the tops of the trees through the clouds. Very frightening!

We arrived at Ober Gatlinburg around 1pm. We all basically ran to the nearest food vendor. Well, with the exception of 2 people, and of course they were my son & his girlfriend. We didn't miss them until we arrived at the food vendor, and started counting off. My son is a very reliable child. He very rarely gets in trouble, and he is the one missing!! I could have killed him. We finally found them and they were by the skating rink just watching! He said they weren't hungry yet...I said, I don't remember asking if you were hungry! I guess I shouldn't have said that, huh? So, shake it off...We get everyone together and we eat. Then we split up into groups. Some went straight to the arcades, others went to the chairlift, and still others went ice skating! I will upload pictures of the ice skating later. It was truly an adventure!

The kids all seemed to have a good time, and on the way home starting asking when the next field trip would be. Of course, my husband responded by saying "Who am I picking up for Sunday School in the morning?" BTW, the next field trip is scheduled for the summer. We are going to take them to Pigeon Forge, and we hope to make it an entire weekend trip! Let's pray we can raise enough money.