Update!!!!

Okay, I admit it; I am completely rubbish at blogging. I’m actually completely rubbish at keeping in contact in general. If you live in the States, you probably have no idea what I’ve been up to lately. Sorry!

There’s SO much going on right now! This past week was the Mustard Tree’s week of prayer, where we read the Prayer of Jabez and had evening sessions relating to the specific chapters.

Coming up this half-term is Rock School, which is a SWYM camp for teens to develop their skills in music and worship. I’m going as a leader, and one of my young people is going along to participate in the camp. It’s held in a school in Exeter, and the young people are put into bands at the beginning of the week and perform at the end.

February conference is the week after Rock School, and I haven’t even started my coursework for the term. The course work this unit is about equality and diversity. A lot of it isn’t currently relevant to my placement, but might be at some point. I hope.

Speaking of my placement, I realize you probably don’t even know what that means. In fact, a lot of the terms I’m using are either British or YouthWork-ese (the language of youth workers). Sorry about that, ask for a definition of anything that doesn’t make sense!

My week generally is as follows:

Monday: Cluster at Alma Church, where I meet with the other SWYM trainees in the Bristol area for teaching and fellowship. I go into Bristol center for this.

Tuesday: Coffee Tots, the mums and toddlers group at the Mustard Tree, and home group in the evenings.

Wednesday: Occasionally primary school assemblies and meetings, but mostly course work and prep day.

Thursday: Primary school assemblies in the different schools of the area. An assembly is a 20 minute(ish) lesson at the beginning (usually) of the day for the whole school. Usually there’s one main theme or moral to take out at the end. The freedom in schools in the UK is amazing. Christian workers are welcomed into almost any school. Then I go to Golden Blend, the over 50’s fellowship group at the Tree.

Friday: My day off! This past Friday I used my day off to explore with a friend, and we found a Caribbean grocery store with all sorts of interesting foods.

Saturday: Xone, the youth club for ages 9-11, and X2, the youth club for ages 12-16ish. We sometimes have game nights with snooker and table tennis, sometimes have activities, and we go on all sorts of cool trips. Last Saturday, Edu-zoo came with animals to Xone, and the youth got to hold and learn about snakes, snails, tarantulas, etc. This coming Saturday, we’re going to Laser Fusion for a laser tag night. We have ice skating and archery days coming up this term as well.

Sunday: Morning, I do Sunday School for year 9 and 10s, so 14/15/16 year olds. There aren’t very many of them, but they’re a great group. Sunday evenings I mentor one of the youth and then we have Youth Care, the year 10 and up group. It’s more of an intense youth group for those who have already made a commitment, and it’s one of my favorite things in my week.

I do prep/planning and course work during the other bits that I didn’t fill in. Some of the planning I’m doing right now is for a couple different events coming up. We have an awareness weekend for the youth, called Slum Survivor, coming up in March, and a huge community outreach event in June called Hope on the Streets that is already overwhelming with the amount of organization needed… Exciting, though!

I’ve also recently booked our group into Soul Survivor, a summer event in SW England that over 8000 people per week attend. Look it up! =] http://www.soulsurvivor.com/

That’s my life right now. It includes a lot of planning, and should include more coursework than it does currently (I procrastinate), but it also includes a lot of great relationships and great fun. =]