how do you spell pon?
Amazingly enough, today there is actually a cool breeze blowing and so I sat outside to write this out by hand and am now typing it in.
It was almost unbearably hot these past two weeks, especially since I spent a lot of my time in the kitchen with the hot stove and oven. I was proud of myself because last week I bravely lit the oven for the first time. It's a gas oven and you have to light it using a flame. So we bought one of those long-handled lighters and I lit it. I am now an old pro and had no trouble lighting it to keep the quesadillas warm that I made for lunch on Wednesday. I think my body has adjusted to the heat though, because this week I haven't noticed it as much. The humidity is really gross - I don't like breathing thick air when it gets really humid. For all you Mommy types reading this, yes I am drinking lots of water, I even caved in to the trend and bought a cheap, purple, Eddie Bauer knockoff of a Nalgene bottle at Target this week. We keep a big cooler filled with water for the kids all the time to make sure they stay hydrated.

We did a week-long pillow making project for crafts this week. The kids decorated fabric using puff paints and then made pillows by cutting a fringe and then knotting it to make seams. It worked ok for some, but others couldn't do it so we bought a cheap little sewing machine (the kind you see on tv) at Target to finish the pillows. Of course, as you would expect from a $25 device, about halfway through the afternoon it would only work by plugging and unplugging it instead of pressing the pedal, and the little hand-held sticher that came with it died as well. I still haven't decided whether or not we should take it back. I am sure all you sewing geniuses out there who are reading this wish you could help! Next week for crafts we'll be tie-dying t-shirts, which should be lots of fun and is a bit easier than pillows.

Today I am resting, which is nice. I could have gone up to Bluewater campground with Bruce, Helen and Jacob, but I decided to stay here and rest instead. I want Jacob to be able to spend time with his girlfriend Rachel (who is at that camp this week as a Graceland University Representative) without me hanging around. There isn't anyone up there right now who I know so I would just be following Bruce & Helen around. Besides, like I've said before, I'm the type of person who needs lots of processing time on my own. Jacob and I also need time apart - lately we've been bickering like brother and sister quite a bit.

Yesterday was a special treat - Troy, a good friend of both Jacob and I from Graceland, came to visit us at the church, hang out for the evening, and stay the night here at Bruce & Helen's before heading out of town today. He also taught our "Gettin' Real With Jesus" time in the afternoon at the church:

He likened the story of Jesus falling asleep in the boat to a Detroit Pistons basketball player falling asleep in the locker room, it was a good story and the kids were very engaged.
I had a good talk with Troy about my time here, he is a good person to reflect with, and it was a much more beneficial conversation than my midterm evaluation was. It was fun to remember our time in university and remember things like the fact that Troy and I are both so competitive that he actually suggested we keep score while we watched Jeopardy and I seriously considered the idea. We didn't keep score, although Helen keeps insisting that I should go on the show since I'm always calling out answers when we watch. We got hooked this summer on watching the Mormon guy, Ken, who has been the returning Jeopardy champion for pretty much the entire summer. We keep making jokes about the bishop back in Salt Lake gleefully keeping a running tally of how much the Mormon church's 10% cut of Ken's winnings is growing each night.

Yesterday the kids finished up their stuff for this week's newspaper (I am still struggling to upload last week's paper to the web, I really want you all to see it!). I have had a really good time working with them in the computer lab:

Some days I feel more like a teacher, especially when I keep getting asked things like Keiron did the other day:
"Shannon! How do you spell pon?"
"What?"
"HOW DO YOU SPELL PON?!"
"What do you mean?"
"You know, like 'once a pon a time'"
"OOhhh!"
And I try to stick with my usual rule for computer teaching: I will tell people how to do something, step by step, but I won't do it for them. It works most of the time, except for the long days when I've been asked umpteen times where the paint program is. I am so happy that they are getting the opportunity to just spend time on the computers and increase their comfort level. I even don't mind if they play games - I just don't tell them that when they play the "Mavis Beacon Typing Tutor" games, they're actually increasing their typing skills. hee hee hee.

what a day
These past two days have been exhausting. Yesterday was both emotionally and physically exhausting. We arrived Monday morning to find a huge mess had been left behind by one of the groups that uses the church on Sundays. There were dirty dishes all over the kitchen; food scraps on the sink, counter and floor; sticky, dirty floors; our craft supplies used; mess everywhere. I was so frustrated and upset that I cried. I worked so hard last week to keep that kitchen clean so I could cook good meals for our kids every day, and all that hard work had been ruined. In a way I felt personally attacked, it hurts to see hard work disregarded that way.

Bruce and Helen came to help us out, which was a wonderful blessing. I could tell that it was hard for them to see their old church in such disarray. We also have two other Michigan girls helping us out this week - we miss John C, Jordan and Linda, but they will be back next week. It was good yesterday to have lots of hands helping out. I was so upset about the messy church that I really needed to get out of the church and get some air. So when we needed to get water (I have probably neglected to mention that the tap water in that neighbourhood has often been muddy, so we only give our kids bottled water, or water that we cart over to the church from Bruce & Helen's), I volunteered to go. I had a good cry and a good pray in the car on my way to the store, and was able to calm down. It is frustrating because we are really only here to observe and help, not to question the system or petition for change. That means we're not supposed to contact the Mission Center (the next level up of church governance) to make suggestions about problems. We have to call John, who is at camp, and get him to contact the MC. For me, a person used to trying my hardest to make positive change happen, the process can be frustrating.

Once the kids arrived, though, my spirits immediately lifted. I had a couple of them help me put together the newspaper while Helen cooked lunch. It was fun to see their work come out on paper, and I am so incredibly proud of them. We had new kids come, which is always exciting, and everyone was very well behaved.

Today was a good day, though very hot and tiring. Tuesdays are pizza church and we are there longer than usual. My body is aching this evening, probably from tiredness and because I am on my feet nearly all day - cooking, cleaning, and supervising in the computer lab. We have shopping to do for tomorrow's lunch, but I have a feeling we will be doing it tomorrow morning and not tonight.

I'm off to change laundry loads.

last sunday
Today I'm not at church for various reasons. It is actually nice to have a morning by myself in an empty house, I need time like this to reflect and think. I was thinking about last Sunday and decided to copy out my journal entry from last Sunday night into here, because the story of Sunday is a good one. Some background info: Highland Park is the poorest, most dangerous area of Detroit. Holk is an independent minister who has his own church called "Word of Power", one congregation of which meets in our building. The one time I met Holk, he reminded me of a used car salesman, very sleazy. So here is the story...



July 11, 2004

Snapshot: Highland Park area, strip mall, very few stores, right in the middle of the mall is a neon sign: "Army Recruitment Center"

We went to church at Highland park, a good speaker again. We eat lunch, change clothes, and head over to the church. We're waiting in the lobby for Dave, Le-Le and Dalila when Pastor James - Holk's minister - comes out of the sanctuary and invites Jacob and I in. We say we're just waiting for our kids, but, not wanting to be rude, we go in. There are three kids who are no older than 10, one teenager, and one older fellow who we find out later is 83 and a deacon. The kids and James finish up a song they're singing, and James says "We have a minister in our midst today, and she don't know it, but she's gonna bring us the word today. So come on up here!" I don't remember protesting at all, I felt like I was being challenged, like I, John's church, and the Community of Christ were being put to the test, so I stepped up. I asked if they were looking at a particular scripture, he said no, so I went with the lectionary that day - the story of the Good Samaritan. I'd heard it preached earlier that day and John had done the story for our "Gettin' Real with Jesus" time with our kids earlier in the week, so it was fresh in my mind. I told the story instead of reading it, being sure to bring in the lawyer's question to Jesus: "Who is my neighbour?" I made the story repetitive and built up the tension - the advantage of telling and not reading. I engaged all six of the people in the congregation, I couldn't tell what James thought since he was behind me. I talked about everyone being our neighbour, and Jesus calling on us to go and do the same. I talked about how Jesus calls us to love our enemies, not just the easy people to love. And I talked about how we are called to act on our love; not just talk about loving people, but actually do things to show our love. Mr. Deacon even gave me some "Amen!"s and I distinctly remember applause when I was done, which felt weird.

Now that was a step out in faith.

James commended me for "really gettin' to the point" of the scripture. I'm just grateful God gave me the words to say, because it definitely wasn't all me up there. James kept complimenting me after the service on my ability to keep the kids engaged. (there were only three of them, it wasn't that hard) When he spoke after me in the service, he didn't even engage me, forget the fidgety kids he kept getting mad at. Afterward he wouldn't take the kids to see Spiderman 2 because one of them had misbehaved. I was not impressed with him at all. I did love talking to the 83 year old deacon though, he was great, really sweet, very funny, humble with a huge, genuine smile that lit up his face - a totally different vibe than from James. I guess this today was partially God saying "Shannon, when you pull out the seminary card," (which I did in a conversation with James on Monday) "I'm going to hold you accountable for it." Serves me right for opening my big arrogant mouth to proudly say that I'm a seminary student.


Back to July 18th

That was definitely a Sunday I will remember for a long time. I want to say thank you to all of you who are reading this who sent me notes from BC reunion, I got them in the mail yesterday and they made my day, I really appreciate your thoughtfulness. I missed you too very much and missed being at reunion. I'm really looking forward to spending a week a Samish for Kimtah when I get back.

catching up
I've been very lazy about updating this past week. With only three of us working at the church is has been very tiring. Jacob, John Corn and I had a great week though. Other than a fight on Monday that resulted in everyone being sent home, the kids were great. We really feel like they've learned to trust us and we've learned to trust them. I was lucky enough to be the one who cooked lunch every day, well, maybe not so lucky. It's always hit or misss for how many kids will show up for lunch. We always seem to have enough food to go around though, and these kids aren't too picky.


All week during craft time we split the kids into two groups and had half do a craft and the other half work on our camp newspaper in the computer lab. The kids did some awesome work, and hopefully, the next time I post to this blog, I will also post a link to an online version of the paper, so you can read it. The kids did some great work and I am very proud of them.


This week the mural has been finished. It grew in the past 2 weeks.

Here is Jacob finishing up, with Teara directing of course:

Here is a preliminary picture of the finished mural, better pictures will come soon:

The other exciting thing this week was that we took them all on a field trip yesterday to Flint to a children's farm and a water park on a lake. They had a great time.

All of the kids got to feed the animals, which was fun for them. It is interesting to think that kids who live in a dangerous neighbourhood like ours by the church, could be scared of some goats and donkeys.

There was a brand new baby donkey at the farm:

One of our girls decided it would be a good idea to braid the hair of one of the donkeys so it would have a "real pimpin' doo"

Here is the whole group. The tour guide didn't do a fabulous job of taking the picture, but it's not too bad. We certainly were not expecting 24 kids to show up for the trip (we take anyone who shows up with a permission form), but we managed just fine and they were very well behaved.

Here is a bunch of our kids posing on a tractor.

We ran out of bread for sandwiches at lunch, but the kids didn't seem to mind. Everyone had something to eat, even if it was cheese wrapped up in a few slices of ham. Thank goodness we had bought exactly 24 bottles of water.

My camera batteries died when we got to the water park and beach, so I didn't get any pictures there. That was great though, all of the kids ended up playing in the water and in the sand at the lake, the water park wasn't as exciting as the lake I guess. I had fun watching them. The concession stand had exactly 24 jumbo freezies in the freezer, so we bought them out and gave them to our kids.
It was a really great day and I am so glad we went. A lot of the kids slept the whole way home, they were so tired, and we slept well that night too.

exciting week
This week has been exciting. We have three new people helping us out who have been a great source of new energy. We have a planned-out afternoon camp that is going very well so far. Lots of progress has been made on the mural, and it looks like they will be doing a mural inside the church as well because we have lots more time for painting.

Here is Dave painting:

Here are Trina and Jacob painting:

And a picture of me! Finally! You can see that I am being good and reading my Bible.

Here are some pictures from crafts class:

Here are some of the guys showing off their fancy beadwork that they were very proud of: