Sandy's Sayings

Jr. High Fall Frenzy 2008

A little video montage from our Jr. High Fall Frenzy Retreat!

Things

This last year it seems I've got more things on my plate than ever.  We've got more students to care for, more youth staff to care for, more events, more small groups yada, yada, yada. As you can see: more! The last few months I've been really feeling unorganized and feeling like some things were slipping through the cracks. For me this is very unusual.  So I checked a few organizational systems and tools and found one that is really working for me.  It's called Things! It is similar to Getting Things Done, but for me it has more flexibility.  Things will be released at Mac World in January but you can download it for free from their website. Come January it will cost $39-49.  The wonderful thing about Things: it syncs with your iphone and ical! You can also download Things for the iphone at the App Store. So if you are a Mac owner and are looking for a better way to organize life, check out Things! I'm loving it!

Operation Christmas Child

As I've posted before, our Jr. High Ministry is heading up Operation Christmas Child.  We've challenged our body to bring in 1000 boxes!  Don't forget that boxes are due at CPC by Sunday November 16.  Boxes are coming in and I'm looking forward to seeing several hundred boxes this Sunday!  So go CPC!

Get Out And Vote!

I'm not a very political person.  I don't sit and argue or debate the candidates or propositions and I turn down all the different political Facebook groups I get invited to. I read up on everything and study the candidates and then I VOTE!  It's our right and a privilege.  So get out and vote and then go to Starbucks and get your free cup of coffee! Only in America.

High School Fall Escape Video

Our High School Students went on their fall retreat last weekend!  Here is a little video of the weekend.

The Boy Who Cried Wolf

I don't know what is going on at our church, but over the last six weeks our fire alarm has been pulled four or five times.  The first time it was activated was on a Sunday and everyone thought it was a false alarm. Yes, we would have been the stupid people who burned to death cause they didn't exit the building.  Then it was pulled again at WBS and again, we would be the stupid people who would have burned to death because we didn't exit the building.  Of course this got some great conversation started in our staff meetings.  Getting 1000 people out of a building in an orderly way is always interesting. Many on our staff are wondering what we might be preparing for with the alarm going off so often.  Out of the nine years I've been here, I've never heard the alarm go off.  At least we know it works! Yesterday guess what happens? You guessed it, the fire alarm went off in the middle of the second service.  After all the talk in staff, our plan to exit the building smoothly went into effect and it worked. Everyone exited the building in an orderly way except for the worried parents who ran straight to the nursery and blocked the exits to the nursery and toddler rooms so that nursery workers could not do their job and get the little ones out. It looks like we still have some ironing out to do.  Turns out, a little toddler who was fascinated by buttons hit our test alarm in the lobby and added a little excitement to the morning.  So thankfully it was another false alarm.  Kuddos to the jr. high volunteer staff who did an awesome job getting the jr. highers out and kuddos to the children's ministry staff and volunteers who had all their little ones lined up and walking out the building in orderly fashion. You all rocked! My favorite comment that someone left on my facebook status yesterday: "Next time I'm calling same seats!"   Thanks to Foster City Fire who faithfully comes and checks on us!

Pumpkin Carving Riot Nite

On Tuesday we had our annual Pumpkin Carving Riot Nite in Jr. High!  This is always a big night for us with lots of kids and their friends.  This year didn't disappoint!  I love watching the kids creativity and what they come up with to carve on their pumpkins.  This year, we had quite the political pumpkins. McCain and Obahma showed up as well as a "yes on prop 8" pumpkin as well as "nobahma."  I think this is the first year in 9 years our pumpkins have been so political.  We also had the usual happy and sad pumpkins, pumpkins throwing up their own guts and a few skater pumpkins too!  All in all a good night!

My Heart Is A Twittering

A few months ago I started "twittering."  Twitter is a micro blog that answers the question, "What are you doing?" in 140 characters or less.  Twitter has also been referred to as the "lazy man's blog."  I've been having a lot of fun with twitter and for me it has been fun to follow fellow youth workers and keep up with them.  I've gotten into Twitter so much, we have replaced our youth ministry phone "hotline" with a twitter line that is linked to youth ministry website!  We tested it out this weekend and it worked like a charm. It will be interesting to see how Twitter can be used in more ministry settings!  So if you twitter look me up!

Yes, I'm Alive

Many of you have asked where I've been and have missed reading this blog.  The last 6 weeks have been some tough ministry weeks and to be honest, I've had nothing extra to give when it came to writing.  I've been learning a lot of lessons these last few weeks and hope to write about them sometime soon.  I feel like I've been picked up and dusted off and am ready to write again.  Thanks for your concern and I hope to have some good posts for you to read!  In the mean time this is one of my favorite pics that was taken in the last 6 weeks with a very spunky little girl in our church who brings a smile on my face every time I see her!