Mission Trip 2014

Mission Trip this year was to Petal, Mississippi.

It was fantastic as always, not too many bugs/problems/difficulties to have to sort out.  The girls came with us again, (it's getting kind of fun to explain that this was my 5 year old's 6th Annual Mission Trip).  

Gramama and Tayta both came this year, and I was so excited to have my dad along (I had been bugging him for quite awhile about how much we needed him to come).

We take everyone's picture, upon arrival, so we can attach a face with a name on each encouragement bag. This year we had 6 churches, with a total of 92 people in our living center.  It helps to have a photo.  The girls needed no prompting when it came time for their turn in the big blue velvet chair--they automatically struck their silly pose and moved on.

Our mission trip week consists of visiting all the work teams we can each day and delivering cookies, and ice pops, and frozen grapes.  And cheering up, encouraging, motivating, doing whatever we can to help out.

My dad's job was to help the worksite coordinator, and visit all the teams and supply tools & materials, help problem solve, and instruct when needed about how to do the work.  Good job for him. 

My nephew Haziel was able to come with us for the first time this year!!  That's him on the right in the gray.

This was our week.

And lots of hugs

Ricardo serves as a work team adult, which means he's out at one site all day helping the youth do the work.  We visited his site every day.  

HAZI!!!  Cousins...

Girls in one of their air mattress beds, playing with their toy phone.  One of the casualties of spending a week with the youth each summer--here they are pretending to take a "selfie"

Giant fans are amazing toys

Did I mention Haziel came with us?  He got to celebrate his 14th birthday during mission trip week too, which means his team got a surprise delivery of Snickers ice cream bars.

We play every evening too--we had a swim night

radioactive ice pops

Tayta and Jason working on the tools

Papa dressed up for our Christmas theme night.  

Next summer is Louisiana!  

Vacation Bible School

We had a really good vacation Bible school week!  I'm still not convinced that doing VBS and then Mission Trip back-to-back weeks is a perfect idea...but it is sure nice to arrive at the July heat insanity and be already done with both. 

VBS is uniquely challenging at our church because we include as many from our preschool as we can.  Which means I might be re-writing activities or stories to accommodate even our 2 year old class who came to VBS for Bible and Crafts time only this year.  We also have to use rooms that are on 3 separate floors (they are perfect rooms for what we do, we just need to manage the upstairs/downstairs transitions).  Ever try getting 9 2-year-olds up and down 2 flights of stairs?  Some of them can handle stairs decently, but others don't even come close.  It is very easy to tell who has stairs in or near their home, and who does not.  

Music/Opening/Closing/Snack all happen in the Children's Center downstairs

Craft/Bible/Tribe Time all happen in the upstairs classrooms (2 floors up from Children's Center)

Recreation happened in Scott Hall or the playground (middle floor between Children's Center and upstairs)

Xaris, demonstrating that she is her mother's daughter in the "balance-a-sponge-on-your-head relay"

I love this picture of Xaris and her friend Amaya.  And Luke's expression in the background is pretty much dead-on for his character.  

iXy and mama

The big kids during music time

This was as close to a group photo as we could manage--I know we still had a few stragglers and volunteers still around.