The Rest of VBS

Perry and I have gotten lazy reporting on Micronesia Adventures.  I'm sure you have all been on the edge of your seats waiting to hear the rest of the VBS report.  We had 54 kids come to VBS (and probably 30 workers throughout the week).  I LOVE island VBS food....island soups and tuna or egg salad sandwiches every night.  And on the special nights...pancit and lumpia.  You just don't get that kind of food at VBS in OK. 

Here we are waiting on VBS to start.  We have to do multiple van runs to get all the kids there, so we have kids as much as an hour early!

Obviously, you HAVE to have Bible stories at VBS!

Everyone loves crafts!!!

And food!  (We get island donuts this night with our soup & sandwich)

The kinder class is waiting on everyone to arrive for their pictures

Perry wants you to know if you look VERY closely, he is hanging (literally) in the front row. 

Beach Sunset Picnic

Tonight was a fabulous night.  I went with my friend Kathy and her kids (and a few more we picked up on the way) for an evening of swimming, sunset, and food on the beach.

Here we are...ready to EAT.  We had a little bit of fried chicken, red rice, salad, and cookies to go with our ants.  Nothing like a little extra protein.  (Perry said he preferred eating ants.)

Perry and I decided we'd have a little photo shoot while we waited on the sunset.

Island sunsets....always different and never gets old! :)

The drive back from the beach was hilarious.  We decided to greet tourists in their native tongue.  We used all the words we could muster in Japanese, Korean, and Russian (and Spanish, though I'm not exactly sure why).

Overall, it was a fun night and will probably go down as one of the highlights of my summer.  Nothing better than spending time with friends and a platypus on the beach!

Perry Wants an Airport Adventure Too!

I wonder if I could arrange Perry to have an airport adventure?

http://www.news9.com/story/29353740/airport-employee-takes-boys-lost-stuffed-tiger-on-adventure

My beautiful islands

A picture is worth a thousand words, so I will save mine.

Naughty Platypus

I hadn't blogged in a few days because Perry has been kind of naughty.

It looks like Perry takes after me in being "part monkey."  

However, we have had lots of fun the last couple of days.  Besides VBS (which I will blog about later...and when I say later, I don't mean in the next few hours), we have been to Jeff's Pirate Cove....

....a Micronesia Festival....

....and had a photo session...

We apologize for the two previous pictures.   My photographer will be enrolling in classes soon. :)

VBS--Day 1

This year marks the tenth anniversary of directing Vacation Bible School in Guam.  Though it has come with more challenges than usual, the smiles on the kids faces is priceless.

Weird Animals: Where Jesus' Love is One-of-a-Kind is this year's theme. (Some of you may think, "No, that's last year's theme."  Since I fund most of the decorations, crafts, etc myself or with donations of others, I have found it it is much more efficient to use someone's year-old VBS and then buy crafts and decorations on clearance!  It works out in a great way, because two more churches--Guam & Saipan--have the opportunity to benefit from the VBS.  Thank you Sara Frakes for sending me your old VBS to use!  The crazy part, is this is the about the fifth year I have borrowed a VBS.  And every single year, there is one teacher's book missing: the Bible stories book.  How weird is that?)

Here's my weird animals habitat...

 And here we are hanging out before the festivities began!

Catch the Wave--Days 3 & 4

The third day of Catch the Wave involved lasagna, which just happens to be one of my favorite meals.  I’m guessing it is the teens’ favorite meal too, seeing that there were no leftovers.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, hot dogs are basically the “choice meat” of the islands (other than SPAM, of course).  After I lived here, it is stretch for me to partake in this great American food.  See the hotdog “sausage” is used here for a breakfast "sausage"….it is used for meat in spaghetti….and many, many other examples.  Earlier in the week, I was talking to my dad on the phone, and he asked where they would get the meat for the lasagna—or if they would just use hot dogs.  After eating the lasagna, I emailed my dad and informed him that it was a meatless lasagna, but we did have hotdogs as a side food. J  

We also had ice cream Sundaes as well! YUMMY.

Our theme for Day 3 was Catch the Wave of Purity.

On Day 4 of Catch the Wave, we kicked off with the teens leading the music in our Sunday Service.  These are the ones brave enough to go on the stage! :)

After the service (and while we were waiting on the pizzas), we all participated in a prayer walk.  It was an extra warm day for this, but I think we were all blessed by the time we could spend talking with God.

After pizza and chocolate cake (can you tell we like to eat?), we spent the last couple of hours playing ridiculous games.  They seemed to be a big hit too.  I also learned which games are best not played right after we eat!

Hair Style

One of the best parts of island life is having my own personal hair stylists.  Island girls are such talented braiders.  

The braid kept going round...and round....and round....

Or how about this...

Please note: I think the individual "selfie" is the dumbest things on the world wide web. However, I did not take this picture for you to see my face, but to see how the braid forms around my head. Please excuse the actual face in this picture, as I don't want to be accused of posting selfies.  Perry is still on his vacation from me, or I would have had him take the pic.

Catch the Wave--Day 2

The second day of the youth retreat was tons of fun.  Of course, any time “s’mores” is on the agenda there is no choice but to have fun!  We had traditional island fare—hotdogs.  I am pretty certain if I was to google who eats the most hotdogs in the world, the answer would be those residing in the Mariana Islands.  

The next pictures is one of the most baffling of all.  My youth group enjoy taking a bun and putting chocolate and marshmallows inside.  Or sometimes, they take the actual hotdog and melt the chocolate on it.  I thought they were the only freaks of nature, but apparently, this tradition is also in the Guam youth group. You can say "Maybe it's you, Laura."  It is not me because I have never put marshmallows or chocolate in my hotdog bun.  Gross.  

We had a guest speaker come out and speak on this evening.  He is a youth pastor here in Guam (originally from NY), and was swept out to sea when a wave crashed on a cliff where he was sitting and knocked him off.  He spent 1 1/2 hours bobbing in the ocean (with no floatation device) until the rescue helicopter found him. He had been hiking with two boys from his youth group. They had to run 45 minutes through the jungle (took longer because they got lost) until they could reach an area with cell signal to call 911.  The helicopter didn't see him on the first two passes.  On the third pass, he used the little strength left in him to wave his swim trunks and shirt in the air. (Side note: he is the first person that has been swept out to sea in that area to ever be rescued alive.)

Our theme this night was Catch the Wave of Value.  Do you think God values you enough to save you?  (Guess what? He already has! We just have to accept that salvation.)

......
Where's Perry you ask? Platynapped.  Maya took him.  First, he told me Perry was on a mission. Then...he told me Perry wanted a vacation from me.  Sigh.

Sunset While We Wait

While waiting outside at the Jamaican Grill, here was a nice island sunset.

Catch the Wave...with Perry

Perry got to go to the first night of the Guam youth retreat.  Here we are waiting in line for Jamaican Grill. 15 minutes they said.

After a while standing, Perry decided to take a seat with Dulong.  (Rico, the guy sitting next to Dulong, declined the invitation to let Perry sit with him.)

After and hour or waiting, I went in to inquire about this so called 15 minute wait.  (It was a graduation day in Guam, and the restaurant was unusually crowded.  The people had been finished eating, but then they started bringing in cakes which made our wait longer.)  Since, there seemed to be no end in sight, we decided to order a few family platters to go.  Here's Perry after eating.  He's so happy. We were all so happy!

We had a great first night with 22 attending. We are hoping for a great second night as well!