Whew...

What a great Lord's Day! College Avenue hosted the local Area Wide Devotional this evening. We held it at Camp Wiregrass. Eric Lyons came and spoke. We usually have around 150 teens and chaperons at these monthly meetings...but today we had a total 230 attend! Praise be to God! What an uplifting time! I was too busy to take pictures (well, besides 2). Sorry. Hope all have a WONDERFUL week!

Busy Busy

This past week was, again, busy. As much as I loved having Monday off, 4 day work weeks are so hectic; you still have to get all the same stuff done that you normally do in 5 days. However, I did like how fast Wednesday got here!
I always appreciate Wednesday evening Bible study, but I especially appreciate it when the week is so full. God knows we need to slow down and spend that time with our brothers and sisters in His word. Right now I'm doing a study with the girls using the Girl to Girl devotional book. For the first two weeks we've talked about how to strengthen our commitment to God. And lets just say, I'm am one of those teachers who learns by teaching. What a blessing it is to be apart of their lives. Soon I'll be doing a study with some ladies around my age here at home. This will be every Tuesday. I'm getting excited about that time too!
On Friday evening Brendan and I went to the Enterprise football game. It's nice to spend that time with him. We sat with the Enloe's, a great family from College Avenue. This was the first high school game Brendan and I had been to since he was on the sidelines with Coach Strunk. I did find myself really missing Kathy and Jana Beth.
Yesterday Brendan and I worked to get things ready for today's Area Wide Devotional that College Avenue is hosting. He and I will be leaving in about an hour to go out to Camp Wiregrass for this big activity. We've shopped and are preparing to feed between 150-200 people! Brendan was able to get Brother Eric Lyons to come and speak. We've gotten LOTS of help from families at College Avenue which is such a blessing. I'll do my best to take some pictures to share. As of now there is a 50% chance of rain. We're optimistic that this will decrease (it already has once!) and if it doesn't...we'll I'm sure we'll still have a great time spending time with Brothers and Sisters from around the area, worshiping God, and eating some good food.
In other news, please be in prayer for our families. As many know my grandfather, Fred Shields past away July 5th of this year. Well, my grandmother, Sibyl, will celebrated her birthday this Wednesday. She's been a bit lonely and I'm sure should would love the extra encouragement as this day approaches. I will be going to Atlanta to spend time with her and other family for this special day. Also, my other grandfather, Gerald, passed away Sept. 1st. My grandmother, Joan, has been grieving his death while battling her own health problems. Lastly, Brendan's grandmother has stopped her treatments for Leukemia. His mother has gone to be with her while we wait for her earthly departure. With all that said...please keep all of us in your prayers.
Must run now...

Geocaching

This past Friday Brendan, a few youth group teens, and myself went down to the Florida State Caverns in Marianna, Florida. We had a good time despite a few surprises! When we got to the state park we found a pavilion to eat our picnic lunch at. As we were finished up we spotted an alligator in the pond about 100 feet away! If you know me, then you know my fear of these terrifying creatures. Therefore, I was not with the boys when they went to "check it out". Turns out the creature was around 5-6' long! Thankfully we were headed away from that pond! The rest of the day I had my guard up though!

We headed into the woods following a trail while battling the mosquitoes! They were horrible! Next time we will be a bit more prepared; 4/5 of us had never been geocaching before! We didn't have to go far into the woods before we traveled just a few steps off the trail to find the geocache. It took us a little while once we made it to the location...but we eventually found it!
As we were walking out back to the road from the woods it started to rain. We weren't even a mile from the car...but we were all DRENCHED! (No pics of that though...sorry!)
We decided to do one other geocache before we headed home. It was a "Grab and Go" cache..but it took us a while! HahaLots of fun was had by all! In fact, I wouldn't mind doing it again! (Minus the mosquitoes rain!)