The Animals of Orlando

Ok, so Orlando is a big city right? I mean it's not as big as New York, LA, or Las Vegas....but it's a fairly big city. So I live in the Downtown area of Orlando. You'd expect large buildings, buses, stores, etc. Well, I have been very surprised by the amount of animals I have run into in Orlando!

Here's a turtle I found in the church parking lot! I named him Timmy. However, I did make Shan pick him up and put him in our church retention pond so he wouldn't get run over by a car.


So I'm at the Super Target near the mall of Mellnia and I'm loading some stuff in my car. As I look down, there is a giant white duck by my foot! It totally freaked me out! So I turned around and there was whole family of white ducks just walking around in the parking lot....is this normal? We're in the middle of the city people. You know you're big time when there is an IKEA down the street!


Also this surprized me the most! Peacocks! Yes they are everywhere here! I've almost hit two already with my car because they just walk out into the road. I thought you could only see peacocks at the zoo!



Last but not least, we have black swans! I thought they only came in white, it was a delightful discovery.

A Season of Change

Ok, I haven't actually written anything meaningful on here in a while! Life has been crazy over the last 8 months. I feel like I just moved to Orlando yesterday. This is just a really weird time in my life. I'm starting to feel more like a "grown-up" but yet I still act like I'm 12 :o) It's been hard leaving all the people in Jacksonville and adjusting to my new life in Orlando. But I'm loving it.

It's totally different then I thought it was going to be, I'm learning a lot about myself and a lot about ministry. I'm feeling like this is my first year of ministry ever and I'm making so many mistakes. It's weird going from a team of three elementary directors, a family ministry staff of ten, full cleaning crew, tons of volunteers, and a large staff to being the Children's Minister at a small church. Although I really feel like God has me right were He wants me.

I spoke at a retreat in October and the whole theme was "The Harvest is ready." The first night, I talked about how we gather the harvest in the fall which is the season of change and how we need change in our lives. If we never go through change then we're never growing. Change may hurt but it shapes and molds us into who we are and builds our character.

Right now, I'm in my season of change. I can feel God humbling me, molding me, and shaping me into the person He wants me to be. I feel like the last year has been trial and error. I've learned a ton of lessons over the past 12 months. I've learned not to do everything by myself. I need to depend on God more. I've learned that I love living by myself - I was so afraid. I love cities. I love meeting new people. I love watching God take my messes and use them for His glory. I've learned I need to work less and serve more. I've also learned not to live life playing defence but to now take the lead and go offensive!

I'm changing and God is shaping me and I can't wait to see what this next season holds!

Can you Believe this?

Happy Father's Day!

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I Love My Volunteers!

Hey! So we're doing a six week Wednesday Night Program called Summer Camp! It's so fun and so messy! I'll post more on that later. But some of my volunteers were having so much fun they decided to do a little dance :o)

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The joys of working at an old church!

Wow! It has been forever sense I posted! I've been really busy and having lots of fun! And being really stressed out because I started and planned to much stuff :o) But it's awesome. As I've been doing some cleaning around the church property and organizing stuff, I've found some really amazing things! Things worthy of taking pictures because no one will believe me!

One of the first rooms I decided to clean out was the Resource Room. Here are some pictures of what it looked like before:













And after I have all my new bins organized and label I'll show you my progress pictures.

But here are some of the things I've found!

This is a box of old Bible stories with record soundtracks....I don't even remember the last time I saw a record! Let alone listen to one. This is just a Sunday School classic!


Um, I didn't realize that Jesus had a tv through which He taught HIs disciples?


I also found this Bible story Album! It's great! If you look closely at the cover of the album you can see the Bible School Teacher teaching the little children about Jesus and they sit in awe!!!! I don't think I've ever seen a projector that takes old film like this. I feel like I've been digging around in some old movie theather and I've found some lost film!

Hey look you can see the pictures!


And I totally forgot about Peaches music store! Do these still exist? I loved that store!


And this tape was copyrighted the year I was Born!


If anything ever says "As Seen on TV" it's probably not a good idea....


And I'm pretty sure this is the hymnal book the disciples used!

And these are the orginal communion cups the church used when it first started!!!! They would put the grape juice in the silver pitcher thing and then I guess they would pass the cups around to the congregation? Sean like the call them the "Holy Grail."





Lol, I've had a lot of fun finding all this old stuff and really learning the history of FCCO. I may make fun of it, but I do think it's important to remember where you came from. These are the people that have built the foundation of FCCO and withouth them we'd have nothing--even if they did drink out of the holy grail! God is good!

Thank you God for projectors, old film slides, silver cups, and dust! You are so good and we know that through you all things are possible! That we don't have to have the latest and greatest technology, we just need to put you first and watch the ordinary become extraordinary!

Believe!

So this is one of the posts, I should have posted a really long time ago, but because I couldn't download pictures I never did. On March 28th and 29th I went with Christ's Church to Believe. It was kinda weird because I had already started my new job and on my first weekend, I was going with my old church to a conference as a sponsor. But it was great! It was good to have closur on a great experince and say goodbye to some people I really love.

Here's a picture of me and some of the sponsors. TO the right of me is Nicole Benscoter. I love and miss her so much! We were 10th grade small group leaders together and she is seriously the best person I have ever met! She is so real and she loves God so much.


And here's a picture of my group and another group sitting on the bulls outside of our convention center.


Also we had Civil War Reenactors at our hotel! So of course we had to take pictures with them! This is a once in a lifetime expereince!


It was really a great time! It was a great time to say goodbye and to start my new adventure. It also reminded me of the importance of pouring into someone else and doing life together. We're not meant to be on our own little islands. We're made to live in community and to CONNECT (theme of Believe) not only to each other but to God.

God is so good! Thank you GOd for Friends, Family, Community, and Civil War Reenactments!