day 4 and 5. the dance party.

hi guys, so its now 2:45 and we are playing our usual "nap time" game of killer, which is a great way to laugh out our exhaustion from a full morning of playing with kids and pouring into them what little we can.. I am one of us who go to the Emmanuel site where we hold a vbs for kids ages 3 to about 16. And oh holy cow they are precious, and smart and funny, and are all convinced kimberly and I are twins as well as taylor and christine... but as far as the vbs part of everything, I teach the memory verse of the day, which have consequently coincided with what we ourselves are going through! Wow God! The children grasp what these verses mean so fully and its soo sweet to hear them repeat after me jeremiah 29:11, proverbs 3:5, psalm 51:10, and joshua 1:9. I ask them what they think the individual words mean and what it means to them and I think, i bet its this stuff that makes god smile big :D
I'll have the pee wees repeat it in whisper, and in yelling it, and in their best robot voice. I love it. There is one little boy named Terumayne who at the end of the verses usually will sing i love you jesus soooo much jesus you're the bestttt... in his high little vocie!
One random fact i'd like to throw in: i'd like to brag on these childrens parents, whoever they are, because these kids have the best manners and are always so sweet to each other and polite to the adults!!!!!
In the evenings though its another story. the choctaw reservation kids are all little banchies, we are throughly wiped after running around like crazy people playing with them, doing nails and coloring!!! But it is great, I don't think we'd have it any other way, and last night some of the choctaw woman suprised us by making some choctaw bread, which is flour and milk mixed fried. um yum!
But one of the best things so far for us personally at our base was worship last night, it was greatly needed and much apreciated, thanks jesus :) We also have gotten close as a group and have become better friends:] as well as gotten to know the family who's with us the Smiths, Keeley, Lori, and Mrs. Robin and the guys here Keon, and Andrew. they are all fantastic people!
sincerly,
nat<3

So along with becoming closer friends, we've developed nicknames for each other and we've all unleashed our crazy sides. Rebekah is pretzel, because she spilled 75% of a NEW bag of pretzels on the floor of the bedroom. Christine is booboo because she broke her bed and hit her foot on the metal frame when it broke. Taylor is ice cube because she put wayy too many ice cubes in her drink. Natalie is popsicle because she somehow spilled her popsicle all over me. I am sweeties because someone brought pretzel m&m's and I wanted to say "oooh sweet and salty!!" but instead I yelled "sweeties!!!!!" So I expect everyone to keep up these nicknames after Natalie and I move in the fall!!! ;)
love,
ashley

Day 3

How do I start to describe what a fantastic week we have had so far? To start off Mississippi is VERY hot! It is so extremely different from Georgia... but in a good way. The spiders play peek-a-boo here... weird. We have made so many new friends. Today the Emmanuel team headed off to enjoy our second day of teaching VBS with the children. We are having so much fun getting to know these fantastic kids. After we snacked, we made a trip to the nursing home where we played bingo... then Natalie fell... but shes ok! After we danced, we decided to sing our own FANTASTIC version of "Amazing Grace". Afterwords, it was requested that we sing songs from The Sound of Music. Natalie also made it an unforgetable performance by forgetting the words and making up her own. What would we do without our Natalie?!?! It has been such a fun week so far and I am excited to see how the rest of it goes!
- Taylor Gilliam


Hey guys! Things have been interesting here. Today some of us from the bace team had bubble blowing contest. We have played so many games during our free time. If killer was real we all would be dead or disqualified. Ha. We played it for two hours yesterday during our break.
Christine was jumping on her bed and she ever so softly broke her bed... who am I kidding she sat down and it went KURPLUNK! Overall each day is much more interesting and better than the last. :)
-Dominique (excuse my spelling)

Day 2

oh my lordy!!! What a day! This is Ashlee Bagnell (one of the Act 1 kids) today has been awesome! im listening to the off pitch sound of the girls singing in the kitchen...singing a song from Hiarspray...a beautiful sound! The girls, Carter, and I worked with somewhere around 90 kids today for the day camps. Keeley (one of the girls from Florida) and I ran the bible stories at each of the different camps we talked about creation and I know I personally had a interesting expirience with the different age groups. With the older kids I gave up on the kiddie version and read it straight from the Bible They were bored but I think I got there attention when my sis, kim and I did one of our skits the SINBOX skit. I think the kids could relate to that because it depicted some of the things that they struggle with. I also got the chance to share my testimony and let me tell you... that scared me! But I really think that may have broken the walls a bit. Which was really awesome btw. then we performed back at base and thats what happened this afterenoon before we took a break and played killer...ate cookies and..and braided hair...NOW im going to eat my oreo cup!!!!OoO SOOO EXCITED!!! night!!

Ashe:)

Man this was a exciting day!! Hi I am Carter Reeves (tech guy and son of Julie Reeves) I wanted to tell you all that I have to take care of baby chicks and this night was some thing big for me as the Chicken Man. Its almost pitch black and i have to round up about 40 chicks into a cage and alone. I ended up catching them all but they are not the easiest to catch and the weird part (maybe God helped me out) when ever i said "go home guys" they would head toward the cage and when Larry helped me last night we said the same some thing but nothing happend. Well cant wait till tommorow (well still want sleep).

Chicken Man,
Carter Reeves

Hello Everyone!!!

Today was our first day of teaching VBS and it was so great to meet all the kids we will be working with this week =) We split them up into seperate groups which was nice because we were able to really hear their hearts! Most of them know God's word really well but had some questions on some things. Something we found out today was that they really like to sing and boy is it beautiful. I was almost brought to tears many times hearing the passion in their voices and the presence of God was so evident.
The girls were able to dance at two locations today and its always so amazing how peaceful the environment becomes when they step out to worship!
I believe the Lord has some pretty cool stuff planned for this week and I look forward to Him continuing to show us all that He wants to accomplish in the children (and our) lives throughout each day. Please pray for us to have a renewed strength each morning and an alert mind to whats going on in the spiritual realm for every event we are serve at.

Blessings to you all!!!
Mary

Julie's add on....(Sunday)

Oh, the girls DID minister this morning at the church (small detail out of the day I know). They danced two songs and acted out the "Sin Box" skit. They did a wonderful job in a very small area!!!! Then they went to the fellowship hall with the kids and acted out Jonah and the Whale!!! Quite good I must say! And then the children colored pages we had brought!Great ministry ladies! Tomorrow we have a busy day, so night!!

We are here!!! Sunday

OH WOW Where to begin!!!! This morning,after a breakfast of pancakes with some amazing hamburger gravy, we attended the Native Mennonite Church, which proved to be quite an experience. We all learned a little Choctaw and had a wonderful time learing about Jonah with the children... Dominique and I were the best whale EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!! We all really enjoyed getting to know the children and their families and can't wait to spend more time with them during our evenings on the Reservation. After the service, all enjoyed delicious cupcakes and Kool-Aid while fellowshipping with our new found friends.
After church, we returned to Base (the dormitory) for a refreshing lunch and nap time!!!!! Then, we took our newly-refreshed selves out to visit with some local elderly folks. One group met with Mrs. Bonnie Lee, who lives with her son. She loved how our group laid hands on her and prayed for her and her family. The other group visited with Mrs. Dorothy and her son, Mr. Dee. Mr. Dee was paralyzed after a car accedent that was a result of drunk-driving. We were able to minister to him and be ministered to by him and his mother.
When we got back from visitting, Mrs. Maxine had a lovely meal of beef stew and salad for dinner. Then Mr. Larry took us on a HAYRIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Our whole group, along with some local kids, traveled down a dirt road to a creek where we all enjoyed the cool, refreshing water and the rope swings... YES some of us did get VERY VERY wet! We loved getting to see Mashulaville from the mountain top. It was a beautiful and refreshing way to relax before the crazy week started. We can't wait to see how God uses this week. We know He has HUGE plans for us all. Thank you for your prayers, and please continue to pray for the children that we are going to come into contact with in the next 5 days!!!!!!
Love you all!
Kimberly Elizabeth Bagnell

Welcome to the blog!

Thanks to Kimberly Bagnell who helped set this up for us!!! A team of dancers, thespians and family are on our way TOMORROW to Mashulaville Mississippi to minister to the locals there as well as on the Choctaw Indian reservation. Please be in prayer for us as we travel and begin our journey, tomorrow, June 4!

Team members:
Ashley Crocker
Natalie Castro
Mary Binkley
Lynne Newman
Dominique Newman
Taylor Gilliam
Christine Fortin
Rebekah Buran
Julie Reeves
Carter Reeves
Ashlee Bagnell
Kimberly Bagnell