Okay, its 2AM and I am updating. This could be a very bad idea, but I don't like being so out of touch with the world. And in some ways I do. But I really don't.
So, lets see.
I left off hacking my lungs out after getting the summer project plague due to running 25 hours a day and draining my sleep tank.
Things have been an insane roller coaster ride since then. I shall summarize with a list, beginning with the most important/pertinent thing.
~My dad had another cancer scan, which came back negative except for a miniscule spot on his lung. This is really good/ maybe not so good news. The fantastic news is that there is no sign of any cancer left where his kidney used to be. And the spot on his lung may be nothing. So lots of prayers will be said over the next few months. His next scan will be in three months.
~We brought our friend Ray from China to church with us last Sunday. He had never been before and it was really cool to hear him talk about his experience.
~Leadership is hard, but I knew that full well going in. I was not expecting it to be easy and I was right. Good news is that our directors team works really well together. Pat (see previous entry for a visual aid lol) is the female project director and she is basically opposite of me in the best way possible. Obviously if you are reading this you know how very right-brained I am. Big picture, go in guns blazing, jump in headfirst- these are me in a nutshell. I hate details. Pat is fantastic about details and things I forget about and awesome at calming me down when I spill out these extravagant, not thought out plans. I love her. We are quite the dynamic duo if I do say so myself.
~This past Tuesday we went to UCF for campus outreach. Last Tuesday also happened to by my best friend on the planet Jessica Nicole Leeds' 21st birthday. And she happens to go to UCF. Perfect. Except its really hard sometimes when my two worlds collide. I feel like not only do I struggle to keep my heart fully here and not torn between Orlando and home, but I have to figure out how to balance my heart over the whole town of Orlando. It is a struggle that nobody else here faces and not one that I anticipated. I want to be fully and utterly devoted to this summer project but I love my friends and I recognize how important it is to be spending time with them as well. I really think its an amazing blessing that I have this opportunity, whereas the last few months it has seemed like a curse that I had to choose. It is yet another clear beacon that this is exactly where God wanted me for the summer. So, after spending the day with everyone on project on campus, I surprised Jess by joining her and our other friends for birthday dinner. It was so good. I miss everyone so bad.
~It is a really big deal for our store to make budget for the week. It helps determine a lot of stuff, from payroll to how many people they can hire to what hours the store is open. It is also really rare that we make budget. Last night, we were part of the closing crew, meaning we worked until 2:15. At 12:30 or so, just as the store had closed and we had begun our closing assignments, TJ ( one of the managers) came out saying "TIME TO SHOP!!!." Apparently this has happened before, but our budget was 1.5 million dollars for the week and we had made $1,499,582. Which meant that we were about $4o0 away from the golden number. At this point, my coworkers and I each grabbed a basket and began literally shopping. All the things that we have had our eye on were ours for the taking. Well, to buy, not take, but you know what I mean. But it was so ridiculously fun. We raided the candy section with enough sweets to satisfy us for the night and picked up all the little things we had been wanting for weeks. I grabbed this really cute stuffed Eeyore, a car decal, a pen, some candy, etc. It was about $40 worth of stuff I would have bought anyways, but due to all of us shopping, the store made budget for the week and we all got cookies as a reward. It was hilarious, we were all ringing each other up at our registers and joking around pretending to be annoying guests. I think it was my favorite night to date.
I just really love my co-workers, and not just my fellow project-ers from Team Emporium (although I want to brag on us, we are really close and probably the most awesome team that ever existed except perhaps the Justice League). I work with some really really amazing people. One unique thing about working at Disney is that there is pretty much nobody who works there for the money or just because they need a job. I work with people who are willing to work minimum wage night shifts stocking fifty dollar mickey mouse dolls just because they believe that happiness is real and dreams do come true. Sure, we complain and grumble and moan, but at the end of the day, it is evident that there is something unique about each and every cast member. Every night a collective prayer goes up amongst Magic Kingdom cast members that their break ticket comes somewhere between 945 and 10, because no matter how many times you have seen the Summer Night-tastic fireworks, it never gets old. I was one of the lucky ones twice this past week. The first night I got my slip at 10:08 and sprinted backstage to watch the last 5 or so minutes of the show, joining a pod of my coworkers behind the shop. You have a semi-clear view of the castle, and personally I have found few spots better to watch the fireworks than behind the Emporium. Two nights later, I was told to go on break at 9:52. I almost cried from joy. As I stood outside slurping microwave chicken soup with a spork, I looked around and realized how blessed I was. I was standing amongst a group of adults, whether college age or far into their seventies, who were instantly transformed into children the moment the sky began to light up.
No matter how insane the store was that night, no matter how many angry guests you had to deal with that day, all is right with the world when Tinkerbell flies through the sky, forcing the evil pirates to leave (there is this utterly fantastic scene in the Nighttastic fireworks where Captain Hook and his band of hooligans "take over" Cinderellas castle and begin to "blow it up" (fireworks shoot off of the castle to make it look like it is exploding. It is both the most disturbing and the freaking coolest thing ever) all to the tune of Pirates of the Caribbean music). I watched the faces of my co-workers the other night and caught a glimmer of the very thing that lies in each of our hearts: hope. No matter what, we still have hope.
Today I went to church, went swimming with people from all over the world who I consider my dear friends who I didn't even know two months ago, had a ten minute conversation in broken Spanish with a woman from Venezuela who thanked me profusely for even attempting to communicate with her, played football with a boy dressed up as Buzz Lightyear in the middle of a busy store had a spiritual conversation with another Christian girl and two Mormon girls over dinner in the Main Street Break Room, and made a 5 year old girl with Down's Syndrome stop crying and start laughing by giving her a sticker and sprinkling her with Pixie Dust. I am so blessed. This still all feels like a dream.
It is bedtime. But remember, no matter what, God is still good. Good will always win. No matter what circumstances surround you right now, God is greater and more powerful than all of them, and he is also more good and just than all others. So have a little hope. Tinkerbell brings hope to thousands every night. But God brings hope to billions.
I love you all.
Kel
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Photos? Maybe?
Okay, these are all out of order, but here is a summary of the last 6-ish weeks of my life
(I cannot believe its almost 2/3 over. Seriously.)
Tim, Jamie, Erica & I (collectively known as Team Emporium) outside our place of employment
A bunch of students and staff celebrating Katie's birthday (see here)
Trip to EPCOT after Traditions- our first time using our Cast Member ID to get into a park!!!
The boss himself in the Celebrate a Dream Come True Parade
Me, Alexis, Pat, and Jess. These are probably my three closest friends on project :)
The finale of the castle show- Dream Along with Mickey
This is Liz. She is the reason I am sane right now. I miss her terribly already.
This is my LTG- They weren't kidding when they named it that. Liz, me, Laura, Savannah, Sarah, Alicia, and Kelly V. My "moms" were wonderful leaders and now Laura has taken over as the leader!
Team Emporium in costume
Catching a wave at Cocoa
Being taught how to surf
This is where I live!
The parade that passes by my store twice a night
A bunch of people crammed in my living room to watch Princess and the Frog
Campus Crusade International Headquarters and Lake Hart
Movie night with some of the girls
(I cannot believe its almost 2/3 over. Seriously.)
Tim, Jamie, Erica & I (collectively known as Team Emporium) outside our place of employment
A bunch of students and staff celebrating Katie's birthday (see here)
Trip to EPCOT after Traditions- our first time using our Cast Member ID to get into a park!!!
The boss himself in the Celebrate a Dream Come True Parade
Me, Alexis, Pat, and Jess. These are probably my three closest friends on project :)
The finale of the castle show- Dream Along with Mickey
This is Liz. She is the reason I am sane right now. I miss her terribly already.
This is my LTG- They weren't kidding when they named it that. Liz, me, Laura, Savannah, Sarah, Alicia, and Kelly V. My "moms" were wonderful leaders and now Laura has taken over as the leader!
Team Emporium in costume
Catching a wave at Cocoa
Being taught how to surf
This is where I live!
The parade that passes by my store twice a night
A bunch of people crammed in my living room to watch Princess and the Frog
Campus Crusade International Headquarters and Lake Hart
Movie night with some of the girls
Thursday, July 8, 2010
This will be long.
Okay, I am back.
I know it has been like ten days since I said I would be back.
Since it is now impossible to give you a blow-by-blow considering I can barely remember what I ate for breakfast, I will hit on the high points.
Two Tuesdays ago we went on an "international journey." We met early in the morning at EPCOT and were divided into teams that represented several of the countries present in World Showcase- Italy, China, Japan, Morrocco, the US, and Mexico. I was in the Mexico group, and we spent the whole morning at the Mexico pavilion learning about Mexican culture and attempting to "assimilate." We talked about how much family was a huge part of Mexican culture and we each were assigned a role. I was given the role of mother. Go figure. All my roommates already call me mom. But we also had a father, a grandmother, and four kids. We had to pray the Hail Mary prayer several dozen times throughout the day. We couldn't do anything unless "Abuela" or Papa said it was okay. At one point, one of my "ninos" was kidnapped by a Mexican drug lord. We talked a lot about Mexican Catholicism and the impact is has on the culture and then related it to our lunch, or at least what we thought would be our lunch. After promising us a grand traditional Mexican lunch all day, we were served two corn tortillas and a spoonful of salsa each, and we shared a one liter bottle of apple soda between the nine of us. This is related to the gospel in mexico because the knowledge of God is easily accessible but very boring, and most are satisfied with just that. After a long deep discussion about this, we were surprised with a lunch reservation in the San Angel Inn restaurant inside the Mexico pavilion, which was the most delicious meal I have had on project to date. It was fabulous authentic Mexican food, but I think it was even more satisfying because I had just spent an hour convincing myself that I was full after a lunch that was probably 150 calories of food. It really hit home for me because before I was a Christian I truly believed that my life was great, but I had no idea what I was missing.
After lunch, we met up with the other groups and shared our experiences. Some other groups had it much worse off than we did, and the American group had been forced to walk around all day and act like ignorant tourists, which was funny, but really representative of how other cultures see us. They had all these luxaries that we pined for when we saw them. They had so much food that they tried to give it away to us when they visited Mexico just because they didn't want to carry it anymore. I really admire our staff, the whole day was so incredibly well thought out. Every action and plan represented something else.
We spent the afternoon walking around and talking to the international students who are there on the college program. We asked them all about their culture and what religion was like there. I got a HUGE rush from this because I am such a history/culture nerd. I loved learning about how my life compares to the life of a 21 year old living in a country like Norway or Mexico. I was shocked at how easy it was to talk to everyone we stumbled upon. After we got done talking to everyone, it was time to watch Illuminations, the firework show at EPCOT. It is all about global culture connecting and how we are all one, which means SOOO much more after spending an entire day talking about it. It was so moving. I think this was my favorite day of project thus far.
We took another one of our days off and spent it at Hollywood studios. It was a lot of fun, we got to see the fireworks there, Fantasmic, which is one of my favorite shows. It was really awesome :)
The next Tuesday was Woman's Day. We all had the day off (we have every Tuesday off for "project day") and we spent the whole day together. One of our staff women, Betsy, just so happens to be a jazzercise instructor, so we started off the morning with Jazzercise, which was a blast. After that we had some much needed "scheduled rest and relaxation" time. We all had the afternoon and had to spend some time doing personal bible study/ quiet time (quiet time is just a fancy way of describing time spent in conversation with God, whether that is prayer, studying the bible, reading a Christian book, listening to worship music, etc). This was so refreshing I can't even describe it. I read through Hebrews 10, 11, and 12. There is a lot of good stuff in there, including my favorite verse- "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."- Hebrews 12:1
We were also "forced" to do one of the following activities: Shop, relax by the pool, watch a chick flik, sleep, or play volleyball. Needless to say, they didn't have to force us very much.
That night, we went out to Macaroni Grill for dinner as a group (there are some pictures on facebook and I have to add mine as well). When we got done with that, the staff women surprised us by taking us mini golfing in our dresses lol. That was a lot of fun, and when we got back we were put in a circle, and one by one our disciplers presented us with a necklace with a single pearl on it to represent the "Pearls of Women" we had been learning about all summer in our weekly woman's time. It was really really wonderful.
The woman who disciples me (discipler=biblical mentor. Jesus had 12 disciples who were his closest friends and associates and who carried on his teachings when he went to heaven) is really amazing. Her name is Liz and I can't remember if I have written about her before and am feeling too lazy to go back and look. We get one on one time every week and she has been so patient and loving and understanding. I really admire her a lot, she is balancing being a staff woman with being a mom (her husband is one of our directors and they have two adorable daughters I have considered kidnapping because they are amazing). I am just so blessed by the people I have encountered here. I feel like with everything that was going on with my dad I came here a hot mess with a broken heart and little faith. But every single person here has, in some way, helped me get back on my feet and helped me continue to remain faithful to God. I know that no matter what, God is still good and He loves me. I am thankful that people here help remind me of that.
Fourth of July weekend was really hard for a lot of us. I was really homesick and worked like 27 hours between friday, saturday, and sunday. Saturday and Sunday Magic Kingdom had their Fourth of July fireworks show, which was apparently the most epic thing in the history of ever. I say apparently because I worked both nights and wasn't allowed to watch it. Everyone else on project besides my work group was able to watch it at least one of the nights. I was just in a horrible mood all weekend and am mad at myself now for acting like a two year old for half of it. But I am over it now, it was just hard. I missed family bbq, swimming all day and almost killing myself with fireworks.
So all summer projects that are in the United States (or "stateside" as we call them) are only led by Campus Crusade staff for the first half of the project. At the midway point, student leaders are appointed to the following positions: Director (one male and one female), Associate director (one male and one female) Woman's time leader, Mens time leader, ministry team leaders (one to two per team, and there are four teams. see previous entries) and one leader per small group, which also leads the group bible studies. I was aware of the leaders being appointed soon, but was totally not thinking about it last week. I had a lot of other stuff on my mind, such as having the closing shift six nights in a row. Jenni, one of the project directors, had a meeting with me one day which I assumed was just gonna be to catch up on life (she had really been helping me through a lot of the stress associated with my dad and family all project long) but when we met she told me that the staff was offering me the role of Associate Project Director and that I had a day to pray about it and then get back to her. I was in total shock because I felt like I had been a mess the whole time I was here, but she told me that the whole staff really admired how hard I had worked to get here and how evident it was that the project was extremely important to me. I prayed about it a lot and decided to take on the new role.
The mid-project dinner was this Tuesday, and it was also the day the staff left. It was really hard to see them go, but we had a good day. We went back to Cocoa beach for more surfing, but the waves were a lot rougher this time, and it was a little discouraging. We all got pretty beat up, but it was still good. We had a banquet at Buca di Beppo that night, and it was delicious and fun but really emotional because each group presented their small group leaders with cards and presents. When the banquet was over we had a dance party, which again was fun, but it was where we said a lot of our final goodbyes. I didn't think I would get that close to the staff in just five weeks, but it was really really emotional to watch them leave Wednesday morning. I am going to miss everyone so much, especially Liz, but I know that everything will be okay.
Work is going well, I have really started to build some great friendships with my co-workers. The hardest part is the hours that I work. I have gotten off at 4 am several times, and most nights it is around two when we finish. It takes a lot of prayer and willpower to drag myself out of bed only a few hours after getting home to go to project time, but it is always worth it. I have been getting home, sleeping 3-5 hours, getting up for project time, then going back to bed after lunch for a few hours before heading right back to work. Sometimes I sleep more during the day than at night. This exhausting schedule has finally caught up with me. I woke up sick this morning and had to call into work. Which is how I had the time to write this haha.
I am sorry I have been slacking on keeping up. I am going to try and be better but I am not making any promises. I will for sure update this weekend, since I have sat. and sun. off, and I will probably talk more then about how the leadership part is going. So far so good though :)
I love you all and never forget you are in my prayers!
Kel
I know it has been like ten days since I said I would be back.
Since it is now impossible to give you a blow-by-blow considering I can barely remember what I ate for breakfast, I will hit on the high points.
Two Tuesdays ago we went on an "international journey." We met early in the morning at EPCOT and were divided into teams that represented several of the countries present in World Showcase- Italy, China, Japan, Morrocco, the US, and Mexico. I was in the Mexico group, and we spent the whole morning at the Mexico pavilion learning about Mexican culture and attempting to "assimilate." We talked about how much family was a huge part of Mexican culture and we each were assigned a role. I was given the role of mother. Go figure. All my roommates already call me mom. But we also had a father, a grandmother, and four kids. We had to pray the Hail Mary prayer several dozen times throughout the day. We couldn't do anything unless "Abuela" or Papa said it was okay. At one point, one of my "ninos" was kidnapped by a Mexican drug lord. We talked a lot about Mexican Catholicism and the impact is has on the culture and then related it to our lunch, or at least what we thought would be our lunch. After promising us a grand traditional Mexican lunch all day, we were served two corn tortillas and a spoonful of salsa each, and we shared a one liter bottle of apple soda between the nine of us. This is related to the gospel in mexico because the knowledge of God is easily accessible but very boring, and most are satisfied with just that. After a long deep discussion about this, we were surprised with a lunch reservation in the San Angel Inn restaurant inside the Mexico pavilion, which was the most delicious meal I have had on project to date. It was fabulous authentic Mexican food, but I think it was even more satisfying because I had just spent an hour convincing myself that I was full after a lunch that was probably 150 calories of food. It really hit home for me because before I was a Christian I truly believed that my life was great, but I had no idea what I was missing.
After lunch, we met up with the other groups and shared our experiences. Some other groups had it much worse off than we did, and the American group had been forced to walk around all day and act like ignorant tourists, which was funny, but really representative of how other cultures see us. They had all these luxaries that we pined for when we saw them. They had so much food that they tried to give it away to us when they visited Mexico just because they didn't want to carry it anymore. I really admire our staff, the whole day was so incredibly well thought out. Every action and plan represented something else.
We spent the afternoon walking around and talking to the international students who are there on the college program. We asked them all about their culture and what religion was like there. I got a HUGE rush from this because I am such a history/culture nerd. I loved learning about how my life compares to the life of a 21 year old living in a country like Norway or Mexico. I was shocked at how easy it was to talk to everyone we stumbled upon. After we got done talking to everyone, it was time to watch Illuminations, the firework show at EPCOT. It is all about global culture connecting and how we are all one, which means SOOO much more after spending an entire day talking about it. It was so moving. I think this was my favorite day of project thus far.
We took another one of our days off and spent it at Hollywood studios. It was a lot of fun, we got to see the fireworks there, Fantasmic, which is one of my favorite shows. It was really awesome :)
The next Tuesday was Woman's Day. We all had the day off (we have every Tuesday off for "project day") and we spent the whole day together. One of our staff women, Betsy, just so happens to be a jazzercise instructor, so we started off the morning with Jazzercise, which was a blast. After that we had some much needed "scheduled rest and relaxation" time. We all had the afternoon and had to spend some time doing personal bible study/ quiet time (quiet time is just a fancy way of describing time spent in conversation with God, whether that is prayer, studying the bible, reading a Christian book, listening to worship music, etc). This was so refreshing I can't even describe it. I read through Hebrews 10, 11, and 12. There is a lot of good stuff in there, including my favorite verse- "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."- Hebrews 12:1
We were also "forced" to do one of the following activities: Shop, relax by the pool, watch a chick flik, sleep, or play volleyball. Needless to say, they didn't have to force us very much.
That night, we went out to Macaroni Grill for dinner as a group (there are some pictures on facebook and I have to add mine as well). When we got done with that, the staff women surprised us by taking us mini golfing in our dresses lol. That was a lot of fun, and when we got back we were put in a circle, and one by one our disciplers presented us with a necklace with a single pearl on it to represent the "Pearls of Women" we had been learning about all summer in our weekly woman's time. It was really really wonderful.
The woman who disciples me (discipler=biblical mentor. Jesus had 12 disciples who were his closest friends and associates and who carried on his teachings when he went to heaven) is really amazing. Her name is Liz and I can't remember if I have written about her before and am feeling too lazy to go back and look. We get one on one time every week and she has been so patient and loving and understanding. I really admire her a lot, she is balancing being a staff woman with being a mom (her husband is one of our directors and they have two adorable daughters I have considered kidnapping because they are amazing). I am just so blessed by the people I have encountered here. I feel like with everything that was going on with my dad I came here a hot mess with a broken heart and little faith. But every single person here has, in some way, helped me get back on my feet and helped me continue to remain faithful to God. I know that no matter what, God is still good and He loves me. I am thankful that people here help remind me of that.
Fourth of July weekend was really hard for a lot of us. I was really homesick and worked like 27 hours between friday, saturday, and sunday. Saturday and Sunday Magic Kingdom had their Fourth of July fireworks show, which was apparently the most epic thing in the history of ever. I say apparently because I worked both nights and wasn't allowed to watch it. Everyone else on project besides my work group was able to watch it at least one of the nights. I was just in a horrible mood all weekend and am mad at myself now for acting like a two year old for half of it. But I am over it now, it was just hard. I missed family bbq, swimming all day and almost killing myself with fireworks.
So all summer projects that are in the United States (or "stateside" as we call them) are only led by Campus Crusade staff for the first half of the project. At the midway point, student leaders are appointed to the following positions: Director (one male and one female), Associate director (one male and one female) Woman's time leader, Mens time leader, ministry team leaders (one to two per team, and there are four teams. see previous entries) and one leader per small group, which also leads the group bible studies. I was aware of the leaders being appointed soon, but was totally not thinking about it last week. I had a lot of other stuff on my mind, such as having the closing shift six nights in a row. Jenni, one of the project directors, had a meeting with me one day which I assumed was just gonna be to catch up on life (she had really been helping me through a lot of the stress associated with my dad and family all project long) but when we met she told me that the staff was offering me the role of Associate Project Director and that I had a day to pray about it and then get back to her. I was in total shock because I felt like I had been a mess the whole time I was here, but she told me that the whole staff really admired how hard I had worked to get here and how evident it was that the project was extremely important to me. I prayed about it a lot and decided to take on the new role.
The mid-project dinner was this Tuesday, and it was also the day the staff left. It was really hard to see them go, but we had a good day. We went back to Cocoa beach for more surfing, but the waves were a lot rougher this time, and it was a little discouraging. We all got pretty beat up, but it was still good. We had a banquet at Buca di Beppo that night, and it was delicious and fun but really emotional because each group presented their small group leaders with cards and presents. When the banquet was over we had a dance party, which again was fun, but it was where we said a lot of our final goodbyes. I didn't think I would get that close to the staff in just five weeks, but it was really really emotional to watch them leave Wednesday morning. I am going to miss everyone so much, especially Liz, but I know that everything will be okay.
Work is going well, I have really started to build some great friendships with my co-workers. The hardest part is the hours that I work. I have gotten off at 4 am several times, and most nights it is around two when we finish. It takes a lot of prayer and willpower to drag myself out of bed only a few hours after getting home to go to project time, but it is always worth it. I have been getting home, sleeping 3-5 hours, getting up for project time, then going back to bed after lunch for a few hours before heading right back to work. Sometimes I sleep more during the day than at night. This exhausting schedule has finally caught up with me. I woke up sick this morning and had to call into work. Which is how I had the time to write this haha.
I am sorry I have been slacking on keeping up. I am going to try and be better but I am not making any promises. I will for sure update this weekend, since I have sat. and sun. off, and I will probably talk more then about how the leadership part is going. So far so good though :)
I love you all and never forget you are in my prayers!
Kel
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