Mission Trip and Wedding

I am headed out this morning for a 5 day mission trip with the youth from our church.  We will be working with boys and girls at a children's home in a large city in our state, also doing handy-man work there.  Please pray for an awesome experience for the children and our youth.  May God work on all our hearts as we minister to the children and they to us.  I am praying for wisdom to shepherd our youth in their walk with Christ.  What a great opportunity for me to be a part of this.

It is just 19 days before Kaylyn and Jeffrey's wedding.  There are days when I feel like we have it all together and then nights when I lay awake thinking about what we don't have done.  I know it will be a beautiful day, praying for good weather as it is outside, and God will bless this marriage.  Hopefully a week focused on something else will help me sleep better!!

I will post pictures of the trip when I return this weekend. Also another shower for Kaylyn and Jeffrey on Sunday - will put up some pictures from that too.

Camping, Shower and Baptism

I guess maybe I should have named this post Water!!  All the things I am going to talk about relate to water!

Camping:

Jim and I spent a few days in Branson, camping.  We went to White Water and had a blast.  I even went down the Free fall drop slide.  This was only by mistake.  We were going to go down the mat racing slide, but realized too late that we needed a mat, sooo.....  I said lets go and we walked up two more flights of stairs and I went straight down the free fall.  I didn't even scream, just kept my eyes closed tight until I stopped.  It wasn't too bad, but I don't think I will do it again.

We had a great time and relaxing too, though it goes by fast.

Saturday I went to a Bridal Shower for Kaylyn and Jeffrey in Harrison that Lisa, Jeffrey's mom, hosted.  It was great to meet some wonderful Harrison folks.  Here is Jeffrey and Kaylyn working on opening the gifts.  Loved the gifts they got, I think Jim and I need to have a 30th anniversary shower to get new glasses, towels, etc!

The kids and moms.  One of the few pictures you will see of me, I am usually behind the camera and hate to have my picture taken.

The last thing to do with water is Baptism, the shower didn't really have water but shower - water you get it!  Today we celebrated a baptism of a young lady in our church. It was at a friend of ours Mill Pond, old grain mill on the river.  What a blessing to celebrate this special day with her.

Before

During

 Coming up out of the Water - Baptized

All those there to share the moment with her! FUMC Youth!

What a joy to be present at this!  God is good all the time!

Memorial Day

I don't like to post without pictures, but I just had to put something here about our school district's Memorial Day celebration.  Because of all the snow and missed days in January and February, we went to school on Memorial Day this year.  It was that or go to school on Monday of next week and no one wanted to do that.  So... in order to celebrate Memorial Day and use it as a moment to teach the students about what it means, our school district had a District wide assembly on the football field.  We had the stands decorated in red, white and blue as well as the students.  Kiwanis handed out flags to everyone attending.

The celebration started off with a moment of silence and then all who had served or were serving in the armed forces were asked to stand, then those who had a relative who was or had served were asked to stand.  This was the amazing part - over 80% of the people there that day were standing.  I hadn't realized how the day impacted so many lives just in our small community.  Next was the Pledge of Allegiance. Our superintendent then explained to all why we celebrated Memorial Day, its not just a day to go to the lake.  We had our mayor, county judge, and state representative speak also.  Our High School Band played the Star Spangled Banner and other patriotic songs.

Another amazing moment was when the crowd gave a standing ovation two brothers who graduated from our school and are attending the Air Force Academy in Colorado Spring. They were there to speak to the crowd also.  What a proud moment for our school and me, I was youth leader for those boys when they were younger.  Brought a tear to many an eye as the crowd cheered for them.

The celebration was such a success, that we are looking at making it an annual event (though we don't plan on going to school on that day every year).  I am so thankful God put me where He did, in a community that praises Him and celebrates our country!

PS - I didn't take pictures because Dude Look Like a Lady and I were running the sound and had had a busy time getting it going that morning!