Book: Cherry Pies and Lullabies

I used this book for All Saints.

The text repeats a simple appealing pattern reflecting that things are passed on generation to generation and as they are, they both change and remain the same.

It's fun to observe details of the pictures...for the benefit of any who may get the book I won't tell you why.

Other titles with a related theme that I put on the Kids' Table at church for All Saints:

• Plowie: A Story From the Prairie
• The Keeping Quilt
• Matthew Wheelock's Wall
• The Always Prayer Shawl

All available through the Minneapolis Public Library.

Making Ribbon Sticks - and Doing Things Differently

My experiment in doing things differently is off to an encouraging start.

Today we made blue ribbon sticks for Advent after the 10:00 service.
There was also a Bishop's Committee report forum, led by Lou, which I believe included report of my attendance at the last Bishop's Committee meeting in which, among other things, I identified the need not to do so much of what I do at church in children's & family ministry alone.

Out of today's events comes the following.

Thank you to:

• Everyone who brought blue ribbon
• Anthony(??) whose name have to ask his name again...for helping move the table
• Madge for volunteering to help a couple weeks ago, being right there today & making a point of inviting kids to participate
• Deacon Sandy for going around "ordering" adults to participate
• All the adults & children who participated. (I hope you enjoyed yourselves.)
• Patti for getting a napkin to clean up my daughter's spilled juice*
• Aron for putting the activity in the space it was in & for announcing it
• George for agreeing to staple the ribbons onto the sticks on Wednesday
• Ethel & Madge for their offers of help in the future
• People who I imagine were involved in ways I didn't notice or don't recall.

I feel like we did something together today. That seems good. That will make using the ribbon sticks all the better too.

I've had more than my usual amount of conversations with other people at church in the last couple weeks too. Being where more people are makes that possible. They haven't all been big conversations. But I feel like they're important.

* I only found out about this spilled juice episode later as my kids & I talked about the difficulties they had when I was so taken up with the other interactions of the activity that I wasn't responding to them very well....Mommy my juice spilled and I was trying to tell you but you didn't hear me and then that other lady got a napkin to wipe it up.... Note to Aron & Bishop's Committee: isn't this story an interesting juxtaposition with my story of the juice spill of a couple weeks ago?

The Bishop's Committee

I attended part of the Bishop's Committee meeting at church last night to talk with them about my work in ministry to children and families.

Thank you to them for having me, for their interaction with me and their support.

As the people on the Bishop's Committee know from what I presented to them, some important things have happened since I last blogged (which has been way too long ago.) As a result I'm thinking, talking, planning about ways to invest my time and energy differently in ministry to children and families.

I think one of the big things is that I need to free up time for relationship building. I also have lots of other ideas, but I need to work out which of those things I'll pursue and how I'll pursue them. I think dealing with those questions within the context of stronger and more extensive relationships with people at church will be important.

I've heard that insanity is doing the same things over and over while expecting different results. I'm looking for different ways to do things in the hope of improved results.