A Photo Essay- Part of the Fun

Part of the fun of a new adventure is exploring the area. Today I went out with the intention of sitting by a wave pool tanning and reading school work while intermittedly going in the waves. However it was closed. The exploration began and I discovered tons of picnic groves in that park and ski/snowboard slopes. Later I headed to another park closer to myself and discovered that it will be a good nice weather place to do schoolwork.

Earlier this month I went on an intentional adventure to check out a Biblical Garden. The garden is created by a synaguoe in Pittsburgh and opens during the summer months. Plants are selected based on the summer theme, because they have Biblical names or are in the Bible. Being that it's hosted and created by a synague, the Biblical aspect is really only the Old Testament. Still that doesn't take away from the beauty or peacefulness of the place in the middle of a busy city.

Three Reasons I want to pretend I'm not home

1) Students knocking on the door to give me things they have been told to SLIP under the door
2) Student who knocks on the door asking if I have quarters for the washer or dryer. I'm not a change machine.
3) Student and her friend who knock on the door wondering if I have paint so they can paint someone's name on their stomach's to cheer them on at a sports game.

A look at life

The past couple days have been full of attending classes for the first time in a LONG time, dealing with components of assistanship part II since my boss departed town today for about 20 days and a lot of praying. I'm tired already of roommate issues, firestorms, drunk student knocking on my door after midnight and knocks on the door for unimportant things.

What is the probability?

i'm sitting here creating a birthday chart so we can recognize the resident's birthdays. Out of seventy residents and without all of them sharing their birthdate with us, we have eight sets of two people who share the same birthday. Freaky!

Fifteen Hours and 16 minutes

That's the amount of time left until my grad school classes begin and this journey is one step closer to ending. YIPPEE!!!

Stupid Event of the Day

Student who knocked on my door at 2 a.m. in the morning clearly not knowing that I am in charge of the residence they live in and without a clue who I am. I only got him to state he had two beers, but as my friend says, who slept over, "two beers my ass".

Firestorms

Firestorms are crisis' that have cropped up and need to be put out pronto. In residence life in NC they cropped up because a student needed to be taken to the hospital and that left us short handed, students chose to drink and we had to stay up until noon, etc.... Life was unpredictable and that was the normal rhythm.

Now I work in a department for part A of the assistantship which puts on regularly planned events that we know aobut far in advance. For the most part, there are no unknown crisis', not more than any other company/school would encounter, like power outages, medical emergencies, etc...

How come then we always have a firestorm to put out? Two weeks ago reservations for rooms, food and items from outside vendors were just being made for a major yearly event that spans a week that our department puts on. We don't have everything ready for the events next week and that included getting things from vendors. These are basic details of our jobs and shouldn't be crisis'. But they are and I just have to deal with them for now. I can't imagine what happens when real problems occur.

Doing it

My freshman students have just moved in and the vibe in our building is changing. There are more footsteps and people hanging outside. I'm not sure yet that I want this to be occurring, where did my summer go?

What a wonderful gift

For the first time in seven years I am living close to one of my closest friends. No words can describe the gift God has given to me by putting her in close proxemity. After those long days of writing papers or dealing with a challenging supervisor it will be nice to hang out with someone who really knows me and who has the same stories as I. No explanation is needed when I comment "I am not my father's daughter" as we are putting together a bookcase because she knows my father and also knows he was a carpenter and sees how I am not talented with a hammer. It's wonderful!

Midst of Training Time

Currently I am going through 3 days of training for my RA staff and I'm learning alot about the culture in our building. While we don't have many more rules than other apartments complexes and less rules than some residence halls it's been a challenge in the past to have people follow them. Well, this is a year of transition and things are going to change!

Finding a Church- The Final Verdict

When I began this journey some fear of the unknown gripped me as the search for a church home took seven months before. Since I began I have visited four different churches once and one church three times. Can you see where this is going?

The second time I went to The Open Door I definitely was able to connect with more people and found worship to be the same, truly a time to worship God. One of the members of the community spoke on a passage in Numbers and I think it's awesome that others can share their gifts in this way.

After the second time worshiping with this community the journey of finding a church home was over for me. It's now became time to get more connected and discovering how I can serve within the community.

However, even though my church home for at least the next two years was settled, the small number of youth that I've seen, no obvious youth ministry and my passion for youth ministry has left me feeling a bit displaced and wondering what was going on. I wasn't sure if living with college students was my "youth ministry" right now or if I would be involved with an older GS troop eventually. God has other ideas though which I learned when I went out with people after the gathering this past Sunday (the third time I was there) the conversation came around somehow to others and my past involvement with youth ministry. I was invited to join with some others to imagine what youth ministry looks like with the youth we have and what it looks like being in relationship with those who live in the neighborhood where the church is. Wow!

If this wasn't all amazing enough, the church is located close enough to where one of my closest friends is moving to. People frequently take the bus from the school she's attend and that makes this a possibility of a church home for her. I'm not counting on it because that's up to God and her, but I like that it's not totally out of the question.

Finding a Church Home- Visit Five

The week after I moved here I decided to attend Riverside Community Church's service at the movie theater.

First impressions
Walking into a movie theater without a ticket definitely made me fell as if I was doing something wrong. I walked past a couple small groups of people who were talking to others, I'm not sure if they were all the greeters or not. There was a table with snacks and then a table with information & books for sale where I stopped. At this table I was talking to the hostess about the new book the church is going through in the fall and she treated me as if I wasn't new but part of the church all the time. It made me wonder if the church is so large that people don't know everyone or know when someone is a visitor, or if it's just her. One of my questions was about things for young adults and she didn't know, even though she identified herself as belonging to that category. She did get another women to help me and I learned that the small group they had for young adults is up in the air right now. They did offer me a popcorn container welcome packet which I took and carried around.

The service
There was a band of about ten people of various ages in the space between the first row of seats and the screen. They played popular worship songs that I knew and some I didn't. There was prayer interspersed in the early portion of the service and it ended calmly with a song after the message.

The message
I don't know if this is usual or because someone couldn't make it that day, but the sermon came via video from the senior pastor preaching from their main campus. While I didn't cringe at the message and it was on spiritual gifts. During the sermon I was very distracted though as people, including the worship band, came in and out of the theatre which I could see clearly from where I was sitting.

The church
Especially considering I was carrying around a welcome packet I found that other than those two people at the table I approached no one reached out and welcomed me.

Overall
I might visit them again just to be kind and give them another chance, but I have no desire to return there.

Shopping Successes

I definitely shop more than I should, but since I'm a bargain shopper it doesn't get too bad. For instance, on Saturday, my trip to two thrift stores netted me:

1 curtain for the bedroom
2 sets of twin size sheets (for the beds in my new apartment0
1 twin size comforter
9 birthday cards
5 fuzzy sweaters
1 double boiler

All for the low price of $40. :)