Middle School Huddle at Rock Springs

"Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm." Ephesians 6:13

Last weekend I was excited to attend the LCMS Kansas District Middle School Huddle at Rock Springs.  I took Evelyn to the Confirmation Retreat last October and we loved it, so I knew we should go back!

Evelyn was super-excited that Kyla could come along as well -- nothing better than a girls' weekend learning about Jesus!  We started our weekend fun with some yummy dinner at the same A&W Evie and I went to last fall.

We also picked up Berkeley, another friend from church, along the way.  We made it! We stayed in the Hansen cabin this time.

These cabins were almost too fancy to be called camp!  Leather sectionals, stone fireplaces, and private bathrooms in our rooms!  It was luxurious.

With the freezing temperatures in the forecast, I was especially excited that we wouldn't have to go outside to use the restroom like last fall.

After we had our things all settled in our cabin, we headed to the auditorium for our first session on this year's theme based on Ephesians 6:10-18, The Armor of God. Pastor Nuttman from Our Redeemer, Hutchinson, was the keynote speaker for our conference.  He has a really cool background in blacksmithing and armor-smithing and brought along all of his own hand-made armor! 

During this first session, Pastor Nuttman reminded us that the battle is real and there are evil forces all around us.  The Armor of God is a gift from God to fight against the spiritual forces of evil.  At the completion of this session, we met at a huge fire circle for devotions, songs and s'mores.

Miriam works with the Kansas District Youth Ministry, so we loved getting to hang out with her while we were there.

Lights out was at 11:15 p.m., and the cabin quieted down pretty well at that time.  We were back up around 7:00 a.m. to get ready for breakfast at the dining hall.  After breakfast, we walked back to the auditorium for session 2.  A band from Concordia Nebraska led us in singing to begin each session.  These young ladies were really great!

Pastor Nuttman had a volunteer put on each piece of armor during this session as we continued studying the passage out of Ephesians.  He reminded us that God provides the armor, but we must take it up!

We were then tasked with making our own armor out of foam and foil.  I think our girls did great!

In the midst of our creating, we broke out in song to show Miriam our Armor of God VBS song we'd been practicing. It has some great dance moves and definitely gets the blood pumping.  These girls are so much fun!

Our poster turned out awesome! (We left blank spots to add pictures so we can display at church.)

Our next activity was a scavenger hunt. This hunt took place all over the grounds of Rock Springs. (I just looked it up and Rock Springs covers 735 acres, so maybe the hunt wasn't over ALL of that land, but it covered a lot anyway.)  It was quite cold that afternoon with wind chills in the low-30s, so we were running as much as walking to try to keep warm.  We found the first clue easily, at the cross up the hill.  Evelyn and Kyla ran up to retrieve it.

My girls were at a distinct disadvantage in this hunt because their adult leader is a bit directionally-challenged and the small map we were given wasn't much help.  We found half of the clues and then ran out of time (and were basically frozen at this point).  We called it a moral victory because we made it back to lunch in the warm dining hall without being late.  After lunch, we had our final session in which we learned about the importance of the Sword of the Spirit.

The afternoon was filled with camp games like gaga ball, 9-square, kick ball, basketball, and obstacle courses.  Evie and Kyla dominated the 9-square game, spending a ton of time in the King Square.

We finished up with more songs in the Auditorium and then it was time to say Good-bye.  What a wonderful weekend spent with middle schoolers from all over the state, learning about the Armor of God! 

Just like last fall, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to stop and see my favorite K-Stater on the way home from Junction City.  Kyla, Evie and I picked Calvin up to hang out with him for awhile and take him for an early dinner.  He decided the Powercat Sports Grill would be a great spot to eat.

Despite what these expressions may say, the food was delicious and we really enjoyed our evening with Calvin.  I love having an excuse to see him!

I'm thankful for our church body and those who organize events like this for our youth -- it was a great weekend spent with so many from the state of Kansas, from Immanuel, and from my own family/household.  Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

Mom's Day with Calvin

We had Mom's Day at Calvin's fraternity last weekend and the guys had a great day planned for us! 

We started with a delicious brunch at the house, followed by a silent auction.  There were a lot of really nice items and it was fun looking through them. We bid on a few things, but didn't end up winning any.  The basket I took brought $75 for the Mom's Club, so I was excited for that.

The Mom's Club buys things for the guys, either for the house, or like food for finals week. Recently, we purchased this new pool table and ping-pong table for the rec room.

Calvin took me upstairs in their library to get a bird's eye view of the auction below.  Their house is so nice.

This is the cheesy Mom's Day shirt I didn't buy.  It's true that Greek life makes a shirt for EVERYTHING.

Once the auction closed, we had a bit of time before our next activity, so we drove around campus.  I realized I didn't yet have a picture of Calvin in front of his favorite building on campus. (He actually does have class in Calvin this semester.)

Then we headed to Sinkers, a really cool indoor mini-golf place in town.  DU had the whole place rented out for us.

In addition to the black-lit room above, there were some other really original holes, like Plinko, Skee-ball, and one that started out like a pool table.  This definitely wasn't your traditional mini-golf!

We ate a late lunch at AJ's New York Pizzeria.  Our Margherita pizza was delicious.

Our final activity of the day was painting mugs at Uncorked Inspiration.

I decided it might be time to have a purple mug in my cabinet, so we both worked hard on creating some K-State masterpiece mugs.  I'll be excited to see how they turn out after they're fired.

Once our time was done at the pottery shop, we took a little drive up to the Manhattan sign.  We'd been here once before a few years ago when we did our spring break getaway to Manhattan, but if I'm remembering correctly, Violet wasn't having a great day and we didn't stay long.  It was much more relaxing this time.

The views of campus from up here were really pretty.

I sure loved having this Just Me & My Calvin Day (first time ever for that, I think!).  The DU guys had organized some really fun activities, of course, but my favorite part was just hanging out with my favorite college kid. I love him so much and I'm so thankful I get to be his mom!

Oliver at State FBLA

We just returned from State FBLA and once again, Oliver had a great conference!

The Wellsville dudes were looking pretty cool at the opening ceremony.

 

From there we went to the campaign booth area.  This was a bit different this year since we didn't have anyone from Wellsville running for state office.  Our kids didn't have any campaigning to do, so they were free to check out all of the other candidates' booths.

Something else that was different this year was no Calvin :(  It definitely felt weird without him there.  But it was fun that Ty was able to come this year with the Eudora group!

Day 1 was just taking written tests for most of the students.  Once the tests were done, we went to dinner, the kids got a few essentials from Walmart, and then we headed back to the dance.  

Oliver, Jake and Matt ended up staying at the Hotel Topeka with Mason that night after the dance and I know they had a great time.  I headed home on the bus with the rest of the kids and, as usual, got home after 11:00.  And then we were leaving the school by 7:15 the next morning for finals.  But still, I'm pretty sure I got more sleep than Oliver did. 

Oliver made finals in three events. Two of them (Business Management and International Business) were with Jake and Carter. . . 

. . . and the final one, Management Information Systems, was with Josh and Blake.

Wellsville men killing it at State!

Once all of the presentations were completed, we headed to a late lunch and made it back by 3:00 for the Awards Ceremony.  It's pretty cool that one of my boys' best friends, Mason, has served as State President (as well as a national officer!) this past year.

The Awards Ceremony is always a fun time to cheer on our Wellsville FBLA kids!  Once again, I was extremely proud of Oliver as he placed Top 3 in all of his events! The first one announced was Business Management, in which they placed 2nd.  

The next event (also with Jake and Carter, who had to leave early for his track meet) was International Business, where they also placed 2nd! I was probably most proud of this one because Oliver was coming straight from another event and didn't even have time to review the scenario before they were led into the judge's room to begin presenting.  With zero prep time, he did awesome!

Oliver's final event was MIS with Blake and Josh (who also left early).  Even though Oliver felt the least-confident here, they placed 3rd! Great work, gentlemen!

It was another great Kansas FBLA State Leadership Conference!  I love the experiences my boys have been given through FBLA and the memories they have made with their friends.  

Speaking of memories. . . Next up, Nationals in Anaheim!!