Year One Recapped

As I transitioned into my new year I needed to tell my story of last year... but where to start?? So I did what I do best.. I made a list.

This year I:

• Lived in a house with 4 other women
• Lived on $90 a month
• Learned to be family with strangers
• Was a minority for the first time
• Rode busses, walked or biked everywhere including the grocery store
• Gardened out of necessity
• Lived in a room that used to the be the Laundry Room
• Couponed a lot
• Experienced poverty, violence and crime
• Painted a mural
• Fed the hungry
• Watched 7 kids graduate high school that were told they would never live to 18
• Marched in the nations largest MLK march
• Lived and worked in two yellow houses
• Attended a Bi-lingual church
• Worked shorlty at a day care int eh projects
• Took teenagers camping
• Drove a stick shift successfully
• Picked up trash
• Made tamales from scratch
• Traved to: New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, New York, Tenessee and Mexico
• Wrote grants
• Learned to meditate
• Read more of the Bible than ever before
• Went RVing for the first time
• Found God outside of the four walls
• Slept whenever I could
• Made new friends
• Lost my grandmother
• Played music everywhere
• learned that basketball is just no my game
• Went on a delegation to Mexio that changed my life
• Fought for immigrant rights
• Became well versed inteh DREAM Act
• Built a labrynth
• Learned Mandala meditation
• Got a puppy
• Fixed showers, mowers, doors, cars, stoves and toilets... to name a few
• Spoke a whole of of Spanish
• Found out that the best food is in the creepy places
• Made friends with a cute elderly lady that come for food assisatnce
• Experienced my first earthquake
• Taught a confirmation class
• Didn't watch TV
• Got my butt pinched by lots of well meaning old ladies
• Lived in the Barrio
• Fed thanksgiving meal to over 600 people
• Tie Dyed
• Swam in public pools
• Saw drug deals
• Met gang members
• Made hundreds of power points
• Had moms tell me to quit serving PB and J
• Saw a badger for the first time
• Got my bike stolen
• Learned that there will always be more growing to do
• Found out that Sometimes the hardest people to love are the ones I can learn the most from
• Saw that Mennonites are seriously awesome
• Met other volunteers my age
• Spent hours arguing with one roommate
• Stopped holding people to my expectations
• Learned to go with the flow
• Adjusted to San Antonio time where 11 means 11:20
• Lots of arts and crafts
• Learned tha teenagers are the same everywhere, no matter what
• Chopped down a tree
• Crocheted over 20 hats
• Finally got along with my roommate
• Cooked all kinds of new foods
• Found out that I will be judged because of the color of my skin
• Found social justice to be my passion
• Worked a food bank delivery day
• Killed lots of cockroaches
• Taugh a kid to fish
• Re-learned algebra
• Learned taht you must put cumin in everyhting
• Called animal controll
• Met kids who changed my life
• Became a family with 4 women I woul dhave never even chosen to live with and will never forget because they are now my sisters
• I joined a church
• Finally heard my calling
• Picked seminaryies
• Laughed, cried, yelled was angry, sad, frustrated, enlightened, centered and every other emotion possible

But mostly this year I found myself, my God and my calling and no words can describe how greatful I am.

Plans and puppies!

Everyone I did what I said I would never do! I got a puppy. Now when I say got I mean more like was given one. My friend found little Bella at a car wash covered in mud and bugs and rescued her. She couldn't keep her and well I'm a sucker so now Bella is apart of our community!

Summer has officially started. Not just judging on weather but also on the school calendar. 7 kids are graduating from high school that go to house of teens! That means that 100% of our seniors are graduating. These kids were told they would never make it to graduation and they are proving everyone wrong! It is truly awesome to be apart of their lives and be alongside them as they all move on to continuing education of some sort! The community they grew up in is made up of 60% non high school graduates. As for summer program we are switching it up a bit! Mondays we are doing service projects Tuesday is office hours and then teen night Wednesday is afternoon at the pool Thursday is office hours and Friday afternoon I will be teaching some of the kids piano and/or guitar! Summer is all about fun time with the kids and some good time to plan for next years program.

Speaking of next year I have decided to stay and do a second volunteer year here in the same spot!! The kids need stability and I need one more year of prep for seminary! Yes I have decided on that too! I'm looking at MDiv/MSW dual degree programs. That is masters of divinity and masters of social work.

In the past month I have been heading up a massive funding campaign and last week we sent out close to 80 request letters to different central Texas foundations. They may be no goes or they may end up giving us support! Pray for the latter! Grants have become my constant project when I am at work but not with the youth. I really like writing them.

I also began reading the Bible on a 6 month plan about 15 days ago. This is the first time I have really sunk myself into the Bible and strangely enough I'm really enjoying the old testament. New testament I'm already familiar with the stories so it's sort of repetitive for me. Just another thing for seminary prep!

Hope you are all doing well! An of you are in Texas drink plenty of water and try not to fry in the coming months!

Peace,
Kelsey

Grief and New Life.

Hey guys,

I know it has been a very long time. Just after my birthday in mid Feb. my grandmother passed away. It was rather unexpected. She had been in remission from Breast cancer and doing remarkably well. From what I have heard from my uncles and aunts she had a beautiful last day. A good meal with three of her five children, a beautiful sunset and a nice evening of conversations with her family. She went to bed and an hour or so later she woke up complining of intense stomach pain. (not unusual for her and her ninny stomach) but she insisted on going to the hospital. She walked herself to the car and my uncles called the ambulance to meet them at the bottom of our 7 mile ranch road that is pretty much full hill. They ended up sending the helicopter because half way down my Mimi passed out. By the time they reached the paramedics she was gone. A massive heart attack. The upside is she did not suffer. They said that even if she had been at a hospital when it happened nothing would have stopped it. She went how she wanted to. She did not lose dignity or brain function before she passed. She died fully herself and not really needing any help to do daily things. The problem with sudden death is that it leaves the survivors in complete shock. Mimi lived with me from when I was born until I was 2 and then my mom and I lived with her from 1st-5th grade. Then she moved in across the apartment parking lot from us for 7th-11th grade. She was my rock, my guide, my idol. I had a special relationship with her, we were very much alike and she molded me into the woman I am today. My world was shattered. It still is and I don't know when if ever it will get back to "normal." I suppose God had a reason for putting me in San Antonio because I was a short drive away from home. I spent about a week with my family grieving and doing funeral stuff. She looked peaceful and beautiful and we sent her off in a proper Irish fashion.

In the midst of all of this we had a new person join our community. She brought a breath of fresh air and a nice recommitment to our covenant.

The Lenton season was rough for me it included a death a breakup and never a moment for rest or proper grieving. The Easter season has begun my healing process. The Catholic side of this community really showed itself in the Maundy Thursday service, the Via Cruces (way of the cross) and Easter Sunday. It was a nice reminder of Mimi who was a devout Roman Catholic and tried her hardest to get me to convert. On Easter Sunday 5 of my House of Teens kids were confirmed and I joined the church! During Lent I decided to stay another year here in SA and that after next year I will head on to Seminary... don't know which one, but I am just trying to follow the call. Seeing those kids join the church was a real testiment to the program and how a positive community can really rescue a child from the chaos of the Westside.

As for Easter itself it was great. We had a few moms in town so we had a week of free groceries! We had a potluck Easter meal with the Jesuit Volunteers and an easter egg hunt with them. Found out that we are all terribly competitive. We had a beautiful Stations of the Cross. The church garden was the perfect place. I played percussion for the church band on Easter and I think they are going to keep me playing with them.

We have been more busy than usual this month. We got back Sunday evening from a Women's retreat in Port A! The beach was nice, not too sea weed infested! It was a great time to get to know more of the women at the church. I also learned a new meditation practice that really helps me with my spiritual disciplines of meditation and solitude. It is Mandala work. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandala

We leave Thursday in the early hours to drive to Tucson for a Spring Retreat with the Hollywood YAVs. We are going to participate in the Borderlinks program. http://www.borderlinks.org/ It is going to be tough but very inspiring I am sure. We return late Tuesday night.

THEN the weekend of the 27th the DR staff is running a camp for the community at HEB camp.A chance for the inner city to have a country retreat as families and a chance to take the church to the streets as we like to say around here.

THEN the first weekend in May I am headed to a VEV conference in Denver. I feel like I dont have much breathing room these days!

I put more pictures up so check the link at the top of the blog and flip through to see some craziness.

For now I am keeping my head above water and taking it one day at a time just like my Mimi taught me to.

Peace
Kelsey

Ch-Ch-Changes!

A lot has changed since I last wrote. Mostly in my placement. I was working a split placement... One at Inman Center and one at House of Teens.

As everyone knows and most are feeling by now, the economy in the US is hurting. Due to this Inman Christian Center was making major cutbacks, they discontinued all of their programming except the childcare (which is where I was working). With these cutbacks they also "let go" all of the administration and any excess workers (groundskeeper, janitor... two directors... the list goes on). The person who ended up in charge after all of these changes would have been number four in charge at the beginning. Also, with all of the chaos they forgot a few very important things when it came to my presence. Background checks were not completed (nothing to find, but still) I was never sent to training or first aid classes that are required for childcare... The new person in charge finally figured all of this out and not so nicely asked why I hadn't questioned the fact that all of this wasn't done. And so began a two week period of hell! Every day 5 mins before I left the center I would be called into the office and told all of the things I did wrong that day. They were also having such financial problems that any chance we had at payment was out the window. I spoke to my site leader and we attempted to mend all of this, but in the end we all came to the same conclusion... Maybe I was best suited for a different placement. I was very sad to leave the beautiful children I had spent my months with. All they need is love. Love that they don't get at home. They just wanted someone to care and give them positive attention. Check out the pictures link to see how cute they all are!! My little favorite kiddo gave me huge hugs and was very confused as to why I was leaving... I will be checking in on them from time to time though.

The changes at Inman came at an interesting time for House of Teens. Andrew, a former Mennonite Volunteer, had been running H.o.T. for about 4 years, plus the year he volunteered there. He was offered a job closer to his wife's family out of state. They have a young son and raising him near family was important to them and it offered a great oppertunity for Drew. He took the job and his last week was the first week of December. With this there was some staffing change. Lauren moved up from assistant director to full director and H.o.T. was in need of someone to spend more time. Worked out quite nicely that Inman wasn't going well. I don't really believe in coinsidence, I choose to believe that God had His plan going the whole time! So starting in this new year, I moved full time to H.o.T.!! Now one might ask, how does someone work full time for an after school program?? The answer is simple: Grant Writing. Along with some other necessary office work and planning and such I am now writing grants. House of Teens is completly supported by donation and grants and this will be a great oppertunity for me to hone in on a skill I was taught minimally about in college. Plus working two placements was leading to a lack of presence in either place. Week one is over of the new hours and I feel so much better. I am able to give the kids more attention and engergy and be more helpful in general.

Update over.

While home on Christmas break (which was weird to begin with, YAV has changed me and not my family and friends... go figure!) I had good chance to talk with friends and family about the goings on in this country. I also received a book from a church member that has brought up some interesting points of thought for me. The book is called Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller.

 "I think Jesus feels strongly about communicating the idea of our brokenness, and I think it is worth reflection. Nothing is going to change in the Congo until you and I figure out what is wrong with the person in the mirror."- Blue Like Jazz

I find it hard to verbalize how this year has changed me so far. But it has. For the better I think. I know that other YAVs will understand this feeling, but I find it hard now to be in my "other world" away from YAV. My perspective on life has changed. I feel like the bubble I grew up in is not somewhere I want to be. I struggled with seeing people who are still in the bubble, I'm not saying they are ignorant to the world beyond, but I had a hard time even feeling comfortable in situations I would have felt at home in just 4 months ago. I missed my community, my new church, my kids, my support system. Hell I missed Mexican food and speaking Spanish. The idea that YAV is just one year and I will have to move on after was a thought that was constant. What do I do now that I know social justice is such an important thing for me?? Where do I go from here? Where is God calling me? and how does this fit in to what I already have lived? So many questions!! To let go and let God is a very terrifying and freeing experience. I know He will provide, but it is a little scary to put myself out there. The world has such beauty in it, and such distruction. How do we focus on the beauty without loosing sight of the brokenness? Living in the Westside community I am faced with brokenness all day. I struggle to see the beauty sometimes, but the strength of this culture speaks for itself. The things that I from my background see as "broken" in reflection are just things that I haven't experienced. My job here is not to change them, it is to let them change me. Seems backwards sometimes to me, but you know what? There are millions of ways to live life. Everyone struggles. Everyone succeeds. Every life story is different and beautiful. This need for "fixing" is becoming a pet peeve of mine. Who says it needs to be fixed? Is it me? There is always room for improvement, but just because something isn't going how I want it does not mean it is broken. I can't tell someone that my way is right and their way is wrong. I can learn and make a new way. A blend. I agree with Donald Miller in that I think Jesus wants us to see the brokenness and that it is worth giving thought to. I also agree that the change has to start in me. However, I think that the change has to happen IN me. It has to begin and end in me, in the "mirror" as Miller states. Those difficult to verbalize changes have begun in me and I'm sure will continue for my entire life. People aren't static. I wish to be a sponge in the world and become the most full human being I can. This is meerly the beginning.

Peace and Blessings,
Kelsey

We are reading this book as part of our community on spiritual diciplines (Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth by Richard J. Foster).

The first bit was about inward disciplines. Meditation, Prayer, Fasting and Study. I started these a few months ago. I took on the dicipline of Meditation. When I say meditation the secular world sends our minds to the OM and the Eastern culture and practice of emptying your mind to reach salvation. The meditation that I took on was of a very different style. The particular practice I took on is practiced by stilling yourself and then putting your palms down and reciting all of the things you want to pray about... could be words or situations or feelings, you push them all out. Then you put your palms up and wait... and wait... and listen. Now we all know those are not things I am particularly good at, which is why I decided to take on the discipline itself. I enjoyed the centering process. It really relaxed me and made me feel so in touch with God. This year was about listening to what God had to say to me and what His plan is and this discipline is teaching me how to listen when I didn't know how to myself. Untill now God's only way of communicating with me has been to basically smack me in the face with whatever His plan has been for me... I'm not God, but I'm sure He is very happy that I have decided to start listening.

The second part of this book is about the outward disciplines which we started this week. Simplicity, Solitude, Submission and Service. Simplicity is a practice I took on at the very begining of this year as I made the commitment to my YAV year and to simple living. So taking on that discipline was not really anything new. Service is also something I am currently doing... duh. So that left solitude and submission. Solitude is something I struggle with... and since this year is about pushing myself... well there we go! Solitude is not about being alone as the name suggests. The book compares solitude and silence and says one cannot occur without the other. I'm not good at either of those. In fact I would go as far as to say those two things are some of my worst fears. I struggle with them. The quiet moments before bed scare me to the point of needing noise to fall asleep. I don't know why and I'm sure as I explore this new discipline more will come to light. But these two things are also oppertunities to sit with God. Jesus repeatedly withdrew into silence and solitude. A place he even relied on in times of trouble. I won't list them... the book did that and if you want more info send me an email... but I feel God calling me to this. Solitude isn't about being alone, it is about being quiet and centered. And that word continues to come up. The actual practice of solitude has no guidelines... it is an awareness. There are action steps I can take towards becoming more disciplined, but those are not clear to me yet. I am contimplating taking one day a week to be silent... the reality of that may be difficult given my busy schedule, but I would like to try. One of the things I am going to be super aware of is the act of self-justification. We as humans feel the need to explain our words and our actions with more words. We think that we need to explain ourselves to the people around us. We care entirely too much about how other people view us and understand us. I care too much what people think. God should be our justification. Part of the solitude is to stop explaining myself and let the space that I would have taken up using words to let God fill me and the people around me. God is my justification for being, for breathing.I am anticipating this to be a very difficult practice for me... it hits on some of my core fears and insecurities, but I have an amazing support system here in my community and at home and in the people I love. This year is about growth right??

I had inteded this blog to be about something entirely different, but I guess I haven't journaled today so I had other things going on in my brain!

Don't forget to check out the pictures... there is a link at the top of my blog.

Also I am at 70% of my fundraising and if you are feeling the giving spirit please help me: 
http://gamc.pcusa.org/ministries/yav/support-yavs/
Peace and Blessings,
Kelsey

The Name of the Game is Frustration.

I know it has been a while since I have blogged, but taking time out to blog is not always an easy task. I have been journaling every night so that I can get the brief overview in here. This is a bit of a rant I realize, but I am loving my placement and everything about my life... just thought I'd express some of the frustrations I'm having in the spirit of full disclosure.

First let me say that if I were a 3 year old... I would nap. There are some that just pass right out when it is time for nap and then there are the ones who take an hour of patting their backs to get them to sleep. The ones who ask to go to the bathroom 20 million times, play with their blankets, don't stay on their mat and of course the one kid in the corner who talks to himself for the entire 2 hours of nap time. All I want to do is nap!! Just not fair! :)

I know I'm not supposed to play favorites, but one of my favorite little ones was moved up form the 3 yr olds to the 4 yr olds. I still get called into his new classroom, because he throws fits and refuses to behave until I get called in. I understand his frustration though. He is a new kid again. I feel that way too. Things aren't as they usually are, we cant find things, there are new people in charge and new people to be friends with. The new kids have to stick together.

House of Teens was tagged at the begenning of the month. Tagged is the lovely slang word used for graffiti. Some gang spray painted our building. Shocking for me, apparently not for the kids. The boys have also taken up a bit of an attitude here of late. Having not ever been a teenage boy I don't know if this is common or not. I'm struggeling with how to reach them. Telling them not to do something makes them want to do it more. So how do I get them to behave?? The biggest issues are with language and appropriate conversations. They have literally no respect for women. I found all of this out during a weekend trip to John Knox Rach with 12 of our teens. They got to hike and canoe and fish and swim and do a service project and a ropes course. It was awesome to watch them experience the hill country for the first time and also to build more relationships with them, but you also get to see true colors and the boys have some respect to work on. The girls are hysterical and fun loving, but we cant expect the boys to change if the girls continue to allow the boys to speak to them and treat them with disrespect.

After the lovely weekend trip I was sick as a dog!! I am not good at being sick... I'm very pitiful. Rest I have found is difficult for me. Staying in bed was very frustrating and frustration does not lend itself to healing. I am still struggeling with the idea that I need to take more time for myself to rest. I am a "yes" person and saying no is again, frustrating.

On the community front, we had a huge blow up that I thought was going to permanent damage to our group... Turns out that once everyone lays everything out there a real healing bond is formed. I know that the struggles I find within intentional community are the areas in which I am growing most. Strange how that works. I started off wishing that it would be easier to live with strangers and now I am starting to enjoy the challenge.

In my fight against frustration I realized that I needed something tangable. I needed something to show me real progress and without naming that I had already begun working in the back yard. Cleaning it up. Planting a garden. Finding a fire pit. Trimming branches. Mowing and weed eating. Geting all of my frustration out in a physical manner. I also have begun to build a labrynth. I cleared an area, leveled it the best I could, used some of the branches I cut down to make the perimeter and the off to Home Depot for sand and rocks. I didn't get enough sand the first time and so a second trip was necessary, but of course since the name of the game is frustration the first Home Depot was closed and so I had to find another one!! 15 sand bags later and I still didn't have enough!! GRRRRRRRRR!! I will try again this upcoming Friday. I want to get the back yard all nice and set up for Kathryn's (one of my housemates) birthday which is on Halloween!!

Now that my frustrated rant is over... I have started the spiritual disicipline of meditation. God tells you amazing things when you sit back and listen!

I'm still trying to find a dark room to use for some fun photography and a bit of me time.

And on a side note... I may never get tired of good home cooked Tex-Mex.

Peace and Blessings
Kelsey

Dwell Orientation and Week One of Work!

Sorry it has been awhile! As you are about to read, we have been very busy!

Matthew 18:21-35 hit me hard yesterday at a bible study so from that I got this blogs start:

GIVE ME A CHANCE

After an eventful first day in SA, we got to sleep in a little bit and then went to the church to meet a former YAV who is still going to Divine Redeemer (DR) and she gave us a tour of the church. Then she took us to a place across the street from the church that is called Time Dollar. Time Dollar is an agency that believes everyone's time is equal, you can go in and trade and hour of your work for an hour of someone elses. For example.... if a person knows how to fix ACs they can trade an hour of AC work for an hour of someone elses work. It is really a very unique and amazing agency! AND they helped us get a new AC unit for our living room! In the back of Time Dollar is a garden that is a community garden and they also offer gardening classes! Andrew runs the garden and the programming there and also runs House of Teens which is where I'm working. He gave us a tour and some seeds and some literature on gardening and is going to come to our house and help us garden!! It is a goal to grow at lease one edible vegetable this year! Whish us luck! After our tour we went out to eat with our pastor, Rob, and some other staff people from DR. They took us to this awesome hole in the wall and ordered a bunch of different foods for us to try and experience.

Thursday we had a walking scavenger hunt around the Westside. We found out some interesting local drama at our first stop. They have changed the name of a very important street! Which explains why it took us so long to find the high school!! We had to find out what the mascot of Lanier was. Next stop was a a program form Catholic Charities called the Guadalupe Cammunity Center. We spoke the supervisor and she told us all sorts of things about the Westside and their programming. As a side note Catholic Charities has huge programming in this city! Two of my housemates work them. One is at the Refugee and the other at Guadalupe Home. (http://www.ccaosa.org/services.html) Our next stop was a historical marker about some crazy battle that didn't make any since at all! Then we went to the Natatorium and the receptionist told us all aobut cool things on the Westside! As we walked to our next stop we passed some of the first public housing community buildings. Rent there is still based on 30% of the tenants' monthly-adjusted income. We went to the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center and learned about the rich history it has and all of the amazing things they do arts wise for this part of the city! Art is very important here for expression. Poverty leads to beautiful art might I add! Our next stop was Our Lady of Guadalupe Church. It was so beautiful! There was a shop next door selling holy water and rosaries and such and we went in and tried to talk to the cute little Hipanic lady, but between her no English and our hodge podge of Spanish all we managed to say was "We are missionaries and we are exploring the Westside." Next stop was a local high school hang out and local place called The Galleria... it was a tiny hole in the wall with quite possibly the best buger ever! My housemates had never even heard of a frito pie or Big Red!! So they tried them and lets just say not everyone is a fan! Then we got to go home!! After about 5 mins of enjoying AC again our site leader picked us up and we went to a local coffee shop and talked about goals/expectations for the year. That evening we met the D.O.O.R. board memebers and had dinner at La Casa which is what their office is called.  Then we quickly rushed to church for choir practice!

Friday the assistant director of DOOR took us on a city tour and we saw one of the missions and had lunch at an amazing place on the northside called Chris Madrids. That night was First Friday which is an artisan festival and we decided to ride the bus to get there. This was our first experience with the San Antonio bus! Lets just say it was interesting and leave it at that. We met a nice, but sort of creepy guy who decided to litrally take us there even though it was out of his way. We met up with my old roommate from college who lives here and we saw lots of cool art and lots of good people watching!! Fortunately Ginny (my old roomie) gave us a ride back in her car!

Saturday people from the DWELL committe at DR took us to the Riverwalk and we went on a boat tour and then had authentic German food, because at some point SA was very German. That night we had dinner with the DWELL support committe and we got to meet some very cute babies! Two sets of twins!!

Sunday was our first day of church at DR. It is a bilingual service so I was very nervous. Turns out the pastor Rob is incredible!! God flows through him in such a powerful way! The mix of Spanish and English was a really cool way to do a church service! Sunday night we went to play sand volleyball with the DR Young Adult group and the young adult group from First Pres. SA.

Monday: Labor DAY!! as in I slept a lot.

Tuesday was my frist day of work! Inman Center was full of cute kids and I got to play and learn how they do things! It is a requirement that I eat breakfast and lunch with the kids... I am not complaining about that one at all!! I was at Inman from 8 am - 2 pm then it was off to House of Teens. Tuesday turned out not to be the best day to start for me because those are they days that DR has teen night untill 9 pm! I got to H.O.T. at 3 pm and hung out with the middle and high school kiddos and we played a game to get to know me! Then we had teen night. By the end of the day I was just exhausted!

Wednesday was Inman Center and HOT again and the quote of the day from an adorable 3 year old... "Excuse me miss. What are those holes in your arms?" I was confused at first, but then she pointed and I realized she was talking about my freckles!!!! hahahahaha such cute kiddos!! I also had an eye opening experience into what kind of backgrounds these kids have. We were riding tricycles and one boy decided to play police man and "pulled me over" and the proceded to "arrest" me and take me to "jail." He put my hands behind my back and made clicking noised like handcuffs. I feel like most 3 year olds wouldn't be this detailed about that. Also when I was released from "jail" I was informed that I was now on probation. This was a hard pill to swallow for me. This little innocent boy has obviously witnessed this process.

Thursday was another day!! The teachers at Inman have decided they are going to teach me how to speak proper Tex-Mex instead of the Spanish I already speak!! In the evening we made our way to the Mennonite Church to have a potluck with all of the other Volunteer Organizations which include: Catholic Worker Corp, Jesuit Volunteers, and Mennonite Volunteer Services and us DWELL/YAV. It was awesome to meet other people our age!! And just like every gathering here... good food!

Friday was our first community day... none of us work so that we can meet with our site leader and do bible studies or trips or in this day's case our Covenant... 4 hours later with a lot of compromising we came to our final covenant and headed home! Oh... we have decided to do coffee shop tours for our comminity days, so each week we will be going to different places. After the very long and frustrating covenant meeting I needed to blow off steam so I went and chopped at a tree!! Our backyard needs some good TLC and that just so happens to be a great way for me to blow off stress! That evening one of our DWELL committe people picked us up and took us to Women's Lectio! Women's Lectio is a women's group that meets once a month and had dinner and then does a Lectio Divino. A prayer practice... you should look it up if you aren't familiar. It is a very powerful process. I'd like to take a second and just mention how amazing the women of DR are! They welcome us with such open arms and hearts. They let us into their lives and take us on like we are just one of their daughters. I now have 20 more moms!!!!

Saturday we had a household Nuts and Bolts meeting. Planned our next weeks food and budget and then headed to the store! We decided to drive this time because we were getting toilet paper and we didn't think it was possible to carry all of the groceries PLUS toilet paper. We then all had alone time to nap/read/talk to people. For dinner we went and tried Bill Millers because everyone here says they have amazing sweet tea! After that we decided to get on the bus and head to the Riverwalk. Mostly because in the Westside of SA white people like us are strange and so we get stared at and called at quite a lot. I didn't realize how much it was wearing on me until someone mentioned that we were always being watched. So we headed to the Riverwalk where all of the tourists are so that we could fit in and blend. After some authentic margaritias we went dancing and then managed to make it home on the bus again!! Successful outing!!

Today was church and Rob certainly hit the nail on the head this morning!! I swear God is speaking to me through him! We had a welcome potluck after service and had some mole and lots of different rices and dishes! Then I headed to the backyard again to continue my little project!! The neighbor saw what I was doing and offered to help! Which was good because we had a dead tree and all I had was a hand saw... he had a machete! Things went much quicker with him helping. I'm going to write him a thank you card or figure out some way to say thank you!

We decided to bake a cake tonight... and it is ready. So I am signing off!! I will try to be a little better about posting more often!!

Peace and Blessings