Busiest month of my life

So like the title says, I just came away from the busiest 4 weeks in my life. It all started with Ichthus, which I already wrote about. Ichthus was fun, loud, and hot. I got to spend some great time with the youth. the only problem is that we weren't able to have youth group for several weeks after ichthus. So, any clout I gained from Ichthus was lost. In fact, we didn't have youth group again until july 11th, and we had 3 high schoolers show up :-( I'm amazed how missing a few weeks makes everything just fall apart. I've seen it happen at every holiday. We don't meet for a week or two and several youth stop attending. But then again, I've heard multiple people say that we never used to have youth group in the summer, so I think I just need to hold on till school starts again. Either way, the youth are hearing strong teaching from me and the games we play arn't half bad.

So after ichthus, I worked at a music day camp at a large church down the road. The church isn't in our co-op, but it's the same denomination and we have lots of ties to them. The camp was fun and I taught a bunch of 4th-6th graders how to play amazing grace on the guitar. It was a challenge, since I'd never done group teaching, just one on one teaching. I think it went ok. That lasted till through the week and then we left for bible camp. It was a camp where multiple united methoidst churches joined us. We had a blast and I made some new friends in those churches. During that same week, I had to drive back home each day and help do vbs for my sciotoville church. It was a rough week, cause it's an hour long drive through some really hilly roads. So, my typical day looked like this during that week.

7:00am: Wake up and start doing camp! (This was a highschool/jr high camp by the way)
4:00pm: Drive back home
5:00p: take care of ferrets
6:00: teach vbs to rowdy elementary kids
8:30: Drive back
1:00am goto bed

So, lots of sleep deprivation, high energy activities, and loud mouth kids (some elemntary aged, some in high school! :-) I wrote up my time logs for that week and discovered that I worked 75 hours! Needless to say, I got sick after camp ended.

Then, the next week, I helped teach vbs at the new church in our co-op: Minford. They officially have joined us and this was an opportunity to get involved with their adults and youth. I taught the 6th grade class and met a bunch of em from that church. I also had to resume my normal duties that week. So planning youth group, events, etc.

Then, that brings us up to this week. I'm exuasted, not sleeping well, and eating horribly. I've been so busy in the last 4 weeks, I've gotten into the rut of eating fast food. This is not a good thing and I need to break the cycle. I've been remembering my dreams alot, which means that I am not completing my rem cycles properly. Oh yea, I also helped out in the kitchen for a girls Chrysalis flight. For those of you who don't know what that is, please google it. I'm too lazy to explain it. I had to wake up at 5:40am on saturday and monday to do this. Yuck. But, something really good came out of it. I made two new friends who are my age! I'd been praying for some for a while now, and I assume that others might have been asking God for this too. These two GUYS are in their mid 20s and both seem to be solid Christians. One is a msucian like me who volunteers in his church's youth group while the other is a techie. Go figure that my two new friends would have two huge areas in common with me. So, this is good! Also, one of em is a fan of the TV show "House", so he's gonna come over and watch with me when the season starts back up.

Oh yea, I also got HD cable. I bought a tivo and upgraded. Sorry dad, I abandoned mythtv. (http://www.mythtv.org/detail/mythtv if you have no idea what mythtv is) I also bought one of those new iphones. It's the coolest thing I've ever seen and is really useful to me. I can communicate WAY better with my youthgroup. I've not even had it a week and can't remember not having it. Wow

Also, I still have all my ferrets. I'm trying to get rid of all but two of them and might have someone who can take them. However, I'm working through an intermediary at one of my churches, so it's moving slowly. I'm still trying to figure out which ones to keep. I know I definitely want to keep george. He has the best personality, doesn't bite, doesn't do anything annoying, and ALWAYS poops in the litter box. The others aren't so easy to decide.

Garret: hits the litter box most times, but not always. He has an obbsession with pockets. He bites them and pulls stuff out of em. It's cute, but annoying. He's bitten holes in the bottoms of my pockets.

Gracie: Worst pooper of them all. I think she's either ornry or actually really stupid. She pretty much NEVER hits the litter box. She has a neat personality. Pretty mellow and she's a climber.

Sir Gregory: Best pooper of them all. I've never seen him miss. However, he is agressive. Sometimes, he starts licking me. He will usually scratch me while he licks (which I guess is a sign of affection?) and then proceeds to bite me. I've gotten to the point where I know it's coming and don't let it happen, but that's his major flaw. He also is a big fat chicken. He's scared of everything. If I move too fast, he winces. This is strange, since I am very nice to him and bought him from the pet store. I dunno

Lucy: pretty bad at pooping in the litter box, but she is still young. I like her personality alot. She lets me hold her, which none of the other ferrets do. She is cute and energetic. She often starts the whole group doing the weasel wardance (google it!) and is fun.

I definitely will keep george. But who will be the second one? I'm leaning towards lucy, but wonder if she will ever be fully potty trained. I could keep sir gregory instead, but he has that nasty lick/scratch/bite combo. I dunno.



Other than all that, I hung out with some unbeliever guys my age yesterday. They swore a good amount and talked about some pretty raunchy things. As I left, I smiled cause I could tell that God has worked powerfully in my life. I am VERY different than those guys in a good way. That was meaningful to me because I don't have one of those "bottoming out in sin" testimonies. I've just steadily grown closer to God my whole life. To see the marked difference between myself and them boosted my faith, I suppose. Anyway, I've written a whole bunch now. Enjoy!