one of my biggest flaws

Why am I so incapable of keeping things clean?? Really...I don't understand.
This is Heather and I's bedroom/Kid's club supply room/team meeting room/office.I hate it. It is a disaster and there are no windows and no ventilation.

Coming Home

I am leaving to come home in 12 days. That is crazy! I can't believe how fast this summer has gone and I know this last week will fly by as well. I've starting to think about coming home. Not about leaving here...that is too hard to think about just yet...but I have been excited about returning home!

Here are some things I've been contemplating:

What I will do when I get home:
1. Sleep in a bed
2. eat healthy food
3. get margaritas with Emily
4. go to starbucks with sara
5. watch a movie
6. sleep in....past 8am
7. have windows in my room
8. have a closet
9. sit on the patio with a cup of tea and a pointlessly entertaining novel
10. talk on my cell phone
11. go to target
12. hang out with the fam
13. check facebook
14. go to church...it's been 7 weeks!
15. walk around barefoot

What I will not do when I get home:
1. have meetings
2. go to sam's club
3. use a calling card
4. go to bed at midnight or later
5. get up at 6:30 or earlier
6. sing in front of people
7. get people's attention by screaming "holla back"
8. wear the same t-shirt every day
9. keep reciepts
10. constanly remind people to wear seatbelts, lock doors, pick up after themselves, and go to bed
11. paint...anything
12. give piggyback rides
13. fight with a scanner
14. do paperwork
15. check my voicemail every 4 hours

some random thoughts

1.
One of our adult leaders is calling me "Molly Mom" this week. I feel like this is kind of fits. I think I wrote about this a little bit at the beginning of the summer...but it continues to make me laugh. Especially in light of the fact that a few years ago I wasn't even sure I wanted to have kids....to set the record straight : I do. But I guess I'm more of the "mom".."take care of people" type than I ever realized before.
*this is a picture of me and the boys and the yummy cake I made for our team*

2. When did I become such a klutz? I fell down at glacier. When I fell: I broke my camera, and severly bruised my shin and my ankle. They are both turning purple now and still hurt quite a bit. I also stabbed myself with a plastic fork yesterday...who does that?

3. I'm ready to go home. I love it here...a lot! But I'm worn out and I need some time off to hang out with friends and family, sleep in my bed, and not be on the job 24/7.

4. I really don't like paperwork. and there is a lot of it to do right now. too much.
5. I really need to go do my paperwork now.

More pictures from our trip to West Glacier and Going to the Sun Road

Weekend Retreat!

This is a picture of our staff team + Area Director Ashley!

It was a wonderful weekend full of adventure and relaxation!

More pictures and stories to come.

So Tired

I'm so tired.

More than not getting enough sleep...the wear and tear of working 18 hour days with 1 day a week off for 8 weeks is catching up to me. I want to sleep and sleep and sleep.

I could barely get out of bed this morning...and I'm not the only one. We had to send Dillon to wake Ranger up, and if you had given me a few more minutes, someone would have had to come get me too. I knew what time it was and I knew I needed to get up but I could not physically pull myself out of bed.

This weekend we are going to West Glaceier National Park to stay in a cabin, go whitewater rafting, and drive "going to the sun" road. It is going to be a glorious weekend...and one of the best parts is that tonight I get to sleep in a real bed.

A real bed with real sheets, a mattress, and glory!!!!!

Be excited to see pictures when we get back!

yum

Praising God for veggie and hummus wraps instead of taco tuesday dinner!

that's all.

Moving on...

I remember very clearly sitting on a hill at our training week in Denver thinking "what have I gotten myself into?" I'd been listening to people talk for days about what my summer was going to look like and all the daunting tasks we had to do. They were giving us piles and piles of paperwork and binders of information and saying "don't forget this" and "don't forget that". "

What did I sign up for?"
"What have I gotten myself into?"

I have been here for 8 weeks. I have 2 left. I know that when we leave here and I go back to Denver for our debrief I will be asking myself "What just happned?" "What was that?"

Everything here happens so fast. One minute you are in crisis mode. Taking kids to the hospital to get stitches and then dealing with conflict and then making dinner...battling high school students over lights out and then you crash into bed and wake up the next day to go full force again....forgetting that yesterday I was kneeling next to a 10 year old girl busting out my first aid skills and then taking her to the hospital.

When did that become an everyday kind of thing? When I joined Youthworks...that's when.

Bottom line: things break...like cars, fridges, dishwasher disposals, toilets.
adult leaders get angry.
staff get into conflict.
kids get hurt.
community members yell at you.
the school board spends a good chunk of their meeting discussing how clean you keep the school.
mice eat your food.
you don't sleep.

In any given day, 3-5 of these things could happen one after the other. And they are not little things. When Adult leaders get upset...it is a big deal. When staff are in conflict...you have to resolve it...when the school board is upset...you have to spend 2 hours cleaning.

Here is the point of this post: Stuff happens. you have to face it head-on...deal with it...let it go...and move on to the next thing. I don't have the luxury of time to process through every situation and how it impacted me and what I learned. I know I'm learning, I know I'm growing, but sometimes you take the kid to get stitches and then you go home to make a snack for 72 people and calm down the anger of an adult leader...and no one even knows that you spent an hour at the hospital comforting the kid and answering to the parents whose kid got hurt while in your program.

Never thought I'd say it...but it's all in a day's work. A very long 18 hour day's work. I love it. and right now...I'm really tired.

new addictions

I have become addicted to Cinnamon Toast Crunch..or as the off-brand calls them: Cinnamon Toasters.

I used to be a cereal snob...but off-brand cereal that comes in a bag is so much cheaper and it tastes the same.

Why are these toasters so good?? I'm sure they are not good for me!

Is this real life?

Today I was struck by some of the completely ridiculous and amazing things that I do on a daily basis that I never in my life would have expected to do. Here are a few.

1. I drive around in either a beat up 15 passenger van with no air conditioning or a dented green chevy pick-up truck.
2. I buy lattes at a coffee shop that's literally a white cement tipi.
3. I hang out at a beautiful crystal clear lake with views of the mountains all around.
4. I load up 5 flatbeds at Sam's club every week and pay $1200 for groceries
5. I live in a classroom of a school and sleep on an air mattress...and I think it is completely adequate
6. I use packing boxes as my clothing dresser
7. I lead worship
8. I have a 22 digit phone card number memorized
9. I go to glacier national park multiple times a week
10. I teach native dances to high school students
11. I teach people how to paint....(I don't know anything about painting)
12. I warn people about the hazards of grizzly bears, mountain lions, and stepping in cow manure
13. I make high school students clean toilets
14. I have three people in their 20's who call me "mom" on a daily basis

Unexpected Friends

Making friends is something that has always come pretty easily to me. And I've always been okay with the concept that I can't be friends with everyone so sometimes it's okay if I just don't hit it off with someone I meet.

This whole lifestyle is a little bit different. I've made some amazing friends in the community....but it has taken a lot of work. It's required a lot of initiative and intentionality on my part to get the friendships started and to keep them moving forward. There are so many little cultural things that impact relationships here. I'm just not used to it. A lot of times I feel like I'm not wanted or that my attempt at friendship is annoying and I'm just that pesky white girl with that crazy youth organization. That's the lie I've been believing, but the truth is: my friendship is wanted and appreciated...but that appreciation and mutuality in relationships just looks a little bit different here.

Over the last few weeks...I've stepped my game up with being intentional and seeking out time (what very little time we have) to spend with friends and to be present in the community. Now I can honestly say that people who started out the summer as "community contacts" have become friends. The friendships are new and they need work...but they have so much beautiful potential.

The awful....horrible...makes me want to cry part is that I'm leaving in three weeks. I seriously feel like I just got here. Like I showed up a week ago...but I know that these relationships could not have possilby been built in a week. It has taken 6 weeks to build up to this beginning stage of friendship and in 3 weeks...I have to walk away.

They're used to it. This happens every summer and so they have a great attitude that we are friends for the summer and they get to help us become aquainted with the community and hang out....but for me: it hurts a lot. After we spent time with them last night, it really hit me that I'm leaving and I don't want to leave these people who have drastically impacted my time here. I can't even imagine showing up in this community...that is not an easy place to enter...and not having them here. They have made all the difference and when I think of Heart Butte and the Blackfeet Reservation it is them that I will think of.

** The picture is of me and my friend McKenna. She is 5 and was crowned the Blackfeet Tiny Tot Princess this weekend!**

Canoe Trip!

We went on an amazingly relaxing and restful canoe trip this weekend! We did a few hours in the canoe broken up by a wonderful picnic lunch!!

It was a fantastic day of rest that was much needed by all our staff! Praise the Lord for peaceful surroundings and fun times on the water!

Pow-Wow

This weekend I experienced my first Pow-Wow. I'm not exactly sure how to describe it. It was kind of like a cultural fair. There was drumming competitions, dancing competitions, fair rides, fair food (yummy fry bread), and vendors. It was amazing!! I loved the dancing and the costumes and all the great explanations that our native friends provided!! I posted a video of some dancing!! Check it out!

These are Fancy Dancers...it is my favorite!

It lives and moves and breathes

The Native people call God "Creator". They worship him for the beauty of the earth and all that He has given them through it. They recognize that the earth is alive. It lives and breathes and moves. One of our great community friends has shared with us some wisdom about the earth which I would love to pass on to you.

The Creator has given us everything we need through the earth. You can heal so many things and find medicines in plants and flowers. Brewing sage for arthritis and using dandelions and a number of other things to make you feel better!!

Everything is alive. When you cut down a tree for Christmas or flowers for your home, you are taking something that is alive. You should carefully consider when it is appropriate to take from the earth and when it isn't necessary. When Natives take from the earth, they give back. They offer tobacco (which is very sacred to their culture) back to the earth in exchange for what they have taken, realizing that they have taken life for their own purposes and this is not something to take flippantly.

God is in everything. He is in the animals. Watch the animals, they will tell you things. When horses are jumpy and running....a storm is coming. Watch the beaver....see where he makes his house. If he makes it close to the shore or far away...this will tell you what kind of winter you will have that year. If a bird flies in front of you...especially while driving, be aware. The bird is warning you that something is coming ahead and you should slow down.

You can choose to believe what you want to believe, but God is in everything. He is everywhere. So why don't we pay attention to the animals, to the plants and the trees and the earth??

Being in this beautiful place with places that have been untainted by human progress has touched me. The mountains are massive and overwhelmingly speak of strength, but then on the side of this same solid mountain are streams and waterfalls and bunches of yellow wild flowers. The lakes are crystal clear and unpolluted. I have never seen such beautiful sunsets and sunrises.

The earth is the LORD's, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it.
Psalm 24:1

some pics

Don't pet the rez dogs

Youthworks has a policy: Do not pet dogs on your site.

This rule exists for many reasons:
1. fleas, ticks, germs, and general dirtiness of dogs that live in places like reservations and in mexico
2. you never know which dogs are mean and which dogs are nice

I guess that is only two reasons. They are good reasons, but as you can see from the photo....they didn't really work out so well. We tried, we really did. There are four dogs that live near the school that we have become bff with.

Cry Baby...the black one in front is Dillon's shed buddy. She comes and helps him mix paint and eat granola bars.
Trouble: it's all in the name. He is the little guy that Heather is holding. He likes to bite ankles and cry outside the door of the school while we have club. This week Ranger found him curled up in our skit costume pile behind our club stage...this was adorable, but also bed because dogs are sooo not allowed in the school
Mary Jane: She isn't pictured in the photos, but she is a big white puppy that has tripled in size since we arrived. She has huge ears, loves popsicles, and is currently sporting a big gray paint spot on her back from sitting in a paint bucket over the weekend.
Rocket: Rocket is my favorite. She is a german shepherd puppy about 6 months old. She is speedy quick, super sweet, and completely loyal. She sleeps outside the door of the school, follows us around, sits on our laps, and has generally adopted our team as her family. She also loves Gorp (our home made trail mix) In the photo...Ranger is holding her!

So at the Blackfeet Reservation the rule is:
Don't pet the rez dogs....except Cry Baby, Trouble, Mary Jane, and Rocket.

What can we do right?? You try telling 75 high school students not to pet or play with the four puppies that hang out at the school and try to sit on their laps. Ya....it doesn't work.

The Pictures are Back!

Thanks for the new connector cord mom!! I'm back with picture uploading capabilities so here is a beautiful picture of our staff team!!

more photos to come!

Balancing Act

The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to him.
Psalm 28:7

I'm responsible for a lot of relationships here. Relationships between our staff team, relationships in the community, relationships with our adult leaders, and relationships with our student participants. It's a lot to balance and a lot to juggle. Sometime one relationship seems really important and the next minute is a completely different relationship that demands my focus.

Last week my relationships with adult leaders took a lot of finessing. They were a difficult group and I spent a good portion of my time devoted to working with them. This week I had a conflict with a community member. The challenges of intercultural communication and living in a completely different world really caught up with me and I'm still working to heal that relationship. This morning I had to send some students home for seriuosly breaking youthworks guidelines.

I've spent time in the last two weeks crying over all these relationships. Working my hardest to do the best for people when they often have conflicting interests. I think I've learned something about people though. Regardless of which category the relationship falls under, if it is a conflict, or a drama:

.... people do not feel like they are loved.

Whatever issue that is at hand, if you listen hard enough to the heart behind the problem, you will see that most people are not loved enough. They are lonely. They want someone to listen and they want someone to care.

I'm emotionally drained from caring for people. Listening and sympathizing is not hard. Loving someone to the point that your heart aches for the pain and the problems they face in their lives is physically, emotionally, and spiritually exhausting. But at the same time, I feel like my heart is full. God continues to fill my heart with love and compassion so that I can pour it out into the people he puts in my life.

I know if I tried to truly care about people with only my own strength, I would fail, and I would quit. But I can't quit, and I don't want to. So I lean on the Lord and He gives me strength.