Thursday, January 22, 2015

Gatlinburg Spring Break Trip

This will be the details for the Gatlinburg Spring Break trip. A few basics up front. Every child needs one parent to go. The child must be 5 yrs old thru 5th grade. You might question the start age but it is too hard to keep up with a toddler in a house with 20 or more older kids running around, doors being opened, flights of stairs, crazy amounts of noise and having high balconies. Even though it is someone else's child.. it is too much stress for me. I would be in worry mode the entire trip. We will have a devotion each day. You will need to bring patience with you. Things might not go as planned so be prepared to go with the flow. You might end up sleeping on an air mattress. Ok basics out of the way. Details:

Depart from WBBC Saturday morning 7am, March 28. I am going to call about renting 2 vans but depending on how many adults and kids go, we will need some adults to drive and carpool. We will eat fast food for lunch. Adults and children will need lunch money. Exception will be if we make raise tons of money then kids will be paid for and adults will pay for themselves. Arrive in gburg, go to cabins. Devotion, down time, kids can play. We will go to Dixie Stampede that night. Adults cost is $43.00. This will include our supper. Afterwards we will head back to cabins. 

Sunday morning March 29
We will get up and cook breakfast and when I say cook, I mean frozen pancakes, waffles, bacon, poptarts... things like that. We will go to the Nascar speedpark. This is an all day pass and has been extremely popular the past trips. Kids can ride unlimited on go karts and rides. The adults  price is $20 for the unlimited ticket. You do not need to include this in what you pay if you do not plan on riding. Like for me, I will not ride, ill just wonder around and watch kids so I will not pay, but I know Jami will ride so he'll pay for this. I should also warn you that the speedpark has a concession stand an any purchases there are on you. lol In  the past we have gone to a park after Nascar for lunch. I normally buy lots of lunch meat, pb, jelly and we eat sandwiches. It could be I leave Nascar a little early and run and pick up hamburgers for everyone, still eating at the park, just doing burgers and chips. We will have a devotion there. We will go back to Gburg for mini golf, mirror maze and the rollar coaster. The mini golf and mirror maze are included with the aquarium price. The roller coster will be $10 and if you don't plan on riding you would not pay for that either. We will go back to the cabins for a pizza supper. Ill order a bulk of pizzas for everyone.  

Monday morning March 30
Breakfast, pack up. Devotion. We will then go to the aquarium. The ticket price for this is $43.00. Every adult will need to pay this. We will stop for fast food lunch heading home. 

We have a lot of money to raise to cover the children's tickets. It is going to run about $90 per child and it is always my plan that the children never pay so..... we have to get busy raising funds. Anything extra raised will go towards the van rental, gas and food. We do have a children's budget at church but it takes every dime of that for the activities and events thru the year. We can dip into that but that means less things we get to do the rest of the yr. for some reason we raise enough to cover it all then I'll apply it towards parents tickets who have help fundraise. I know this is short notice but I need to know who is going by January 30. Now i am not crazy, I know things come up and people need to cancel but I have to have a very close idea so I can call these places and make reservations. 

I hope you'll consider the trip. We have had so much fun in the past. This is a great way for adults to get to know each other better and a great chance for the children to bond. Some of my favorite memories with my twins have been made at these trips. This will be Jack's first church trip so I am excited for him. If you have questions please ask me. One last thing. I'll prob need a man to volunteer to drive a van and I know we will need some air mattrresses  The adults would not pay their money until March 22. The only exception might be the $43 for Dixie Stampede. When I make reservations Ill find that out.  
Please promote and use the childcare services for Vday night. This money will go towards our trip. 

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Good morning. It has been a while since I have blogged but I wanted to let you know what will be happening soon and talk about things I have witnessed in the past. 
Lets start with the soup lunch fundraiser. Thank you to everyone who cooked, set up, served, cleaned up and especially those who donated. We were blessed with $477.00. I have not received an email back on the cabins but both are showing booked for the times I requested so it has to be for me! I'll start planning out the trip this week and begin seeing who wants to go for sure. Please don't think this will be like a luxurious vacation. You could end up on an air mattress because I will put as many people in a cabin as I can to avoid us renting one. It will be fast paced and you will probably have to help cook and do dishes. We cook breakfast and supper at the cabins. It will take all us adults working to make the trip a success. It is about the children so their needs and wants will come first. There will be no time to go shopping at the outlets! lol If you choose to go you will have a good time, the kids will have a good time and adults and children will get to know each other much, much better. This will be the 4th or 5th trip we have done to Gatlinburg as a children's group and I have so many great memories! The very first trip we did, Amy Martin's car got hit, while it was parked in front of the cabin,  and while all the kids looked on. The man just continued to drive on, even with someone trying to stop him. The police came and it was a habitual offender who was intoxicated. It was our first night there and it was CRAZY!! I didn't think the kids would ever stop talking about it. Anyway, I look forward to this group making some memories of our own!

So now that we know we are going, we need to come up with some definite plans to raise money. Even though the cabins are free, I like to offer to pay the cleaning fees. We will need to rent vans, gas, food and I like to make sure all ticket prices are paid for kids. So the next fundraiser coming up is the Parents Night Out for Saturday night, February 14, from 6-9pm. We thought this might offer couples a chance to get out for Vday without the kids. This would also be great for a single parent who just needs a little alone time.  How awesome would it be for that single parent, who more than likely is on a limited budget, to be gifted 3 free hours. Offer to pay this for someone as an act of kindness. This will be for newborns thru 5th grade. The price is $10 for one child and a max of $25 for 3 or more children. We will show them a movie, feed them pizza, and make a Vday craft. I am asking very few parents to work this with hopes that some of you with kids will use the service! How can you help? Sign your children up today!  Tell everyone you know who has children!! We will have limited space and I ask you send me a message with how many kids no later than Feb 11. 

I'll check the church calendar and if it is open for February 22 or March 1, we will do a spaghetti lunch after church.  I'll let you know by the end of the week. 

Okay so I have a lot of planning to do so I need to get off of here and get a move on. I do want to encourage you to have your child in the Kidz Zone on Wednesday nights. This month we are studying Joseph and how even though his brothers hated him, sold him, God was always with him and blessed him.  We will be having the kids Valentine party February 11 in the gym. I"ll let you know as it gets closer as to what you can send. 

Before I go I wanted to mention our youth group.. this is me coming as a  youth parent not a church employee. Over the years I have witnessed many things at WBBC. I have seen preachers go, music ministers go, almost no congregation (seriously all fit on one pew), deaths, growth, remodels, just many changes. Six months ago I watched not just our youth but the parents, myself included, be torn up, confused, and shocked by our youth minister situation. I personally felt like I had been kicked in the gut and the wind knocked out of me. I cried more about that situation than I have ever about any other church issues. I am not going to rehash any details, this is not ment to disgrace him or his family or even bring attention to what happened. I say all of this because what I saw Sunday was a youth group who showed resilience. I saw a group who had faith in Jesus. I saw kids that had been through a hard time (personally in my own home many unhappy conversations), they leaned on the church and trusted that Jesus had a better plan in store for them. What we saw Sunday was God's faithfulness. We trusted God, He placed a call on Scott's heart and Scott responded to the call and the kids continued to trust in Jesus.  I know God is still working and who knows what tomorrow holds for the youth, the kids or our church. What I do know is that we have a testimony. We can say, we had a tough time, the devil tried to tear us apart, we trusted God and we were able to see much better days come. I am thankful for the testimony and I am thankful my kids my kids learned a real life lesson. I can't wait to see God continue to work thru all the ministries, all the groups and each individual at WBBC. Have a great Tuesday!

Friday, January 2, 2015

Happy New Year!  The beginning of a new year is always exciting to me. It gives me a chance to reflect on what great works God did in the church and gives me renewed excitement as to what God might do.  This Sunday we will be back to children's church with Clif and Vickie Redden teaching music to the 4 and 5 year olds and the kids 6 yrs and up will be with me. We missed a few Wednesday nights with the holidays, so this week we will be back to regular Wednesday night lessons in the Kidz Zone. 

I wanted to go ahead and lay my plans out for the Spring Break trip to Gatlinburg. As i stated in the message  sent out, I will not know for sure about Gatlinburg until the end of January. We will go ahead with the soup lunch fundraiser on January 18 and if we do not get to go to gburg then we will use that money towards something else for the kids Spring Break week. The trip will be Sat, Sun and Mon, March 28, 29 & 30. Each child going needs to be 5 years old or going into kindergarden this year. and each child will need at least one parent to go, unless another parent chooses to watch after someone elses child. I plan on renting at least 2 vans but that will depend on the number of people we have going and the amount of money we raise. I am not taking the church van.  I am looking at us going to the Ripley's Aquarium, minigolf, The Nascar Speedpark and the rollercoaster. Except for the roller coster, we have done these activites in the past and the children seemed to enjoy them. In the past we have also done a hayride at Cades Cove but with the time of year the weather can be hit or miss and i would hate to pay for a hayride outside at 9am and it be freezing in the mountains so i think we'll skip it this time.  When we get to gburg I normally go buy groceries for the cabins so that we eat breakfast in each day, we will grill out one night for supper and have pizza the other night. We normally do a picnic for lunch and then fast food for the other lunches. Parents will have to help cook breakfast in each cabin, but we will come together to eat suppers. My goal is that the trip be absolutely free for the children and all food covered for everyone. In the past we have been successful at fundraising so the goal was met but we are getting a late start this time. We also need to remember this will be a church trip so we will have a devotion each day.  There should also be a little bit of free time if you would like to walk around Gburg.  Some of you might suggest we visit Ober as a group. Been there & organized that for last yrs Winter Extreme and Ober was very difficult to deal with for a large group. Disney was easier to deal with! 

So go ahead and start thinking on if this trip sounds like something you and your child would be interested in. As soon as I know I have the cabins reserved , Ill finalize the details. Make plans to help with the soup lunch January 18. 

I want to encourage you to start the new year off in Sunday school. If you have been slacking on SS due to the holidays, now is the time to get back to class.  Sunday school is were relationships are formed and for children this is where the basic Bible stories are taught.  I hope to have a full class Sunday!!

With the New Year brings opportunity for great growth. As many of us are trying to decrease our physical size we need to increase our spiritual size. I pray that we as individuals grow closer to God.  I am looking forward to seeing Him work in each of our lives and the lives of your children! Kristi