2pm next week

yo,

church will be at 2pm next sunday. brad will be leading a discussion on chapter 3 of colossians remixed. if you need a copy of the chapter, i am making some paper copies today... so let me know, and ill get one to you!

and don't forget... jayme jo's "holy crap i'm graduating" party at 5pm on saturday... her house.

AND... her kids art mentorship thing on thursday night - 6-7pm at Franklin Art Works, which is on Franklin and 11th in South Mpls.

i think those are all of the announcements from last night?

have a great week!
abby

party picts

here are some various pictures from the last few bday parties we have had. enjoy and have a wonderful hump day, matt (go blog)

Remembering Latarra's Prayer

"Dear God...I pray that they wouldn't waste their breath and just talk about boring stuff...I thought this party was going to have games, laughter, and we would all be drinking smoothies. Well, maybe if it's important to them that's OK, but I was just expecting more excitement. Amen"

For those of you who weren't able to make it this past Sunday, that's a paraphrased prayer of 11 year old Latarra (and an observant little girl she is, i'll leave the sleepers in the pic unnamed). She gets "mad props" in my book, reminding us all that anything we do which could be labeled "academic" is only a means to an end. Thanks Latarra!

On the other hand, I really enjoyed our discussion of "Colossians Remixed", and appreciated how everyone humored words like "cybernetic global optimism" and "postmodern disquiet". Try to work them into a conversation this week and see what type of reaction you get...or not.

--Justin

P.S. I'll bring the ingredients for smoothies next Sunday.

Urban Adventure Race/Photo Scavenger Hunt

Hey all.

Great to see you all last night. If you discarded the evite or didn't get one, you're invited to my friend and I's urban adventure race. It is tough to explain what exactly it is, but it involves one half day/night, includes creativity, physical activity, community building, insanity, and good food. The picture depicts how you spend most of the day...laughing & smiling. It is Saturday May 12. You and your team get blindfolded and dropped off at an undisclosed location in the area and then race back earning points for varioius tasks completed.

Let me know if you need more info. I believe people grow together in various ways and shared experiences facilitate that growth.

4 o'clock this sunday...

hey all,
here's a recap of the kids party for sunday:

time: 4-5pm (we'll have regular house church at 5)

who: invite the kids you know! matt - can you talk to the kids down the street? jackie- the girls downstairs at 3129? ill talk with kids on my block. and anyone else, bring whomever- the more the merrier. christine is going to bring some more ceramic pots so kids who weren't here last time can participate in the art activity

what: we'll be having 2 activities: 1 inside, one outside
outside: relay games (think egg on a spoon, clothes relay, three-legged race)
inside: kids will be painting the pots they made last time

food: billy and i are shopping on sunday for some food for the kiddos.

i think that covers everything. if you can, bring some old clothes that the kids can use in the relay. ideally, we'd have 4 or 5 "outfits" that we could use. so bring old shoes, hats, pants, shirts, wigs, glasses, you get the idea....

peace out-
abby

Stories

alright bloggers... here is the story timeline for house church. i have assigned two people to tell stories each sunday. if you cannot share one weekend, we will have a makeup day toward the middle of may. also, you can switch with others if you would like. if your name is not on the list and you would like to share, feel free to add yourself in. if you name is on the list and you would rather not share, feel free to take yourself off... we can be fairly flexible and do not intend to make anyone feel uncomfortable. i am pretty excited about getting into this again.

April 22nd--- Justin

April 29th--- Jackie and Billy

May 6th--- Brad and Emily

May 13th--- Christine and Jayme

May 20th--- Makeup Day

May 27th--- Jon and Mikhal

June 3rd--- Darren and Julia

June 10th--- Derwin and Matt

June 17th--- The Bergets (Newly Weds) and Rachel

have a wonderful friday and see youall on sunday. Go Blog!!! love, matt

Housechurch readings "remixed" :)

Hey all!
For any of you who don't have "Colossians Remixed" in book form, here are some scanned images of Chapter 1. They didn't come out as high quality as I wanted them, but it is readable. Also, this is much like a choose your own adventure book as the files are not in the correct order. So your adventure is to first find the page that says "Placing Ourselves" at the top, the next page being pg. 16; then read through pg. 37.
I'll work on fine-tuning this process...
Justin

Aww...I miss you guys

So I just checked this site for the first time since January, and was overwhelmed by a feeling of warmth (I'm sure there's a better word, but I've lost lots of vocabulary since coming to Japan!) at the amazing activities you guys have been doing. I just wanted to let you know how encouraging it is to read and how much I love experiencing these activities vicariously through your posts and pictures. I also want you to know how rare the community that you have created is. I truly hope you cherish it and hold on to it for as long as you can...

I know this sounds really sappy, and I'm more the sarcastic/mean type :) But I want you to know that I care about you and miss you. Take care...

calendar

alright, so i tried to be all tech-whiz and created a google calendar for us to keep track of what we're doing each week, other important stuff going on, etc... im not sure if the usability will be the best or not, but you should get an invite in your email to join the google calendar and then you can create events, etc. on it. if we don't use it, thats totally fine, but i thought it may be a good thing....

love to you all on this good friday.
abby

p.s. the calendar link is on the right hand side of the website under "links"

Art Mentorship Info mation

Alright ya'll, here's the scoop on the Art Mentorship gig. This program is a part of two organizations: Project for Pride in Living and Adamantine Arts. At this point we've got two groups of kids from PPL that we do crazy fun art projects with:

Scholars: range from 2nd-4th grade
Leaders: range from 7th-10th grade

both of these groups are fantastic, if you want to join in on the fun, here is what is left of our schedule for the year:

April 18th: Photography with the Scholars
April 19th: Photography with the Leaders

April 25th: Puppetry with the Scholars (location TBD)
April 26th: Silkscreening with the Leaders (location TBD)

Let me know if you are interested in helping out! (701-340-4182)

Also... if you'd like to contribute financially to the cause, here's your chance. We are doing our 2nd annual Iddy Biddy Film Festival. It'll be a really fun night and half of the door money will go to the Art Mentorship program. If you are interested, here's the link to the Iddy Biddy ad:

http://www.iddybiddyfilms.com

Onto a totally different subject...

I know some of you were/are interested in programs that take inner-city kids into the wilderness. Well, I've got connections to one that is local to the Twin Cities. It's called Big City Mountaineers and their website is: www.bigcitymountaineers.org

As most of you know, I work at Midwest Mountaineering. This year on April 26th, just before our Spring Expo, we are doing a silent auction to help send some kids to the Boundary Waters through Big City Mountaineers. The auction will be held in the exhibitor tent and bidding will stop at 8pm. Donations are also encouraged so if you've got any extra gear or outdoorsy-type stuff (valued over $50), come drop it off at Midwest.

Sorry for such a lengthy blog post, I just get excited sometimes :)

Jayme Jo