First Article for Urban Arts

I had my first interview for Urban Arts last week. The content was put on the website for City Mission. Here's a look at the content!

A Glimpse of Reality

Ralph, Rayshaun, Larry, A.J., Destiny, and Takyea didn't show up to camp today. The day before our performance. The last full day of camp. I was so disappointed. I started asking the kids where they were and the responses varied. Everything from a doctor's appointment (they thought) to one of the families driving out of town. I decided to speak with Ms. Kat who is my City Mission contact for this week. She offered to give a phone call to each of the kid's parent, grandparent or guardian. As we went down the list, most of the kids had a legitimate excuse for not being there. We found out that some were even coming later in the day. That made me feel a little better.

But one phone call broke my heart. One of the boys who wasn't able to come answered the phone when Ms. Kat called. He said he wasn't able to come because he was babysitting his brothers and sisters. Ms. Kat asked to speak to his mama. As the mama was coming to the phone Ms. Kat heard her cussing this boy out. Once she got on the phone she was a sweet as she could be, but drunk. Ms. Kat invited her to the dinner and performance and then proceeded to explain that this lady's son had a solo part in the performance and we really missed his leadership at the camp. She said he wouldn't be there and he probably won't be at the performance. My heart broke when Ms. Kat told me. This young man was exemplary in his action, leadership, words and attitude. But I was told that this is typical for their community. Today I saw a glimpse of reality in the neighborhood. I pray that the work we did the last two weeks would stay with the kids the rest of their life to give them Jesus first and something worth holding onto.

Smile:)

Today was a good day. I kept trying to figure out why things felt so different. Smiles. I saw so many more smiles on faces of the kids today. What a difference that makes! I felt the joy of the Lord filling the day.

I honestly can't believe i'm headed toward the end of my second week of Urban Arts. I wish I could do this every week of the summer. (maybe next year:) Please continue to pray for the 21 kids we had today. Asking something as simple as for them to arrive at camp safely. Most of them walk from their house. I never really thought about it until I drove around the neighborhood this afternoon. That short, simple prayer is a serious, relevant prayer.

Tomorrow is our last full day of camp. Please pray that the kids focus and learn everything they need for the performance on Friday. We are fired up!:) Anyone who would like to attend the dinner and performance is more than welcome to come. Dinner is at 5pm and the performance follows at 6pm. Location is at Leland Baptist Church on 22420 Fenkell in Detroit.

Step It Up

Day 2 of middle/high school Urban Arts camp completed. I think the phrase I heard most throughout the day from the teachers and counselors was, "step it up". The girls took it seriously. They focused in each rotation today and I saw huge steps of improvement that will paid off during the performance on Friday. The guys....well, their focus was somewhere else today..the girls, themselves, who knows! (for most of them anyway). I think they are getting more comfortable with us and feeling like they can get away with more. WRONG:) I was laughing so hard when the guys were in their dance rotation, because Vicky, the dance teacher, was making them do push ups, crunches and all sorts of other things that they didn't think they needed to do. Their was some pain happening there!

Another change that I decided to implement last night was to introduce poetry to the girls and guys classes. It's a challenge for me to get them to the level of understanding and performance in the next 2 days, but i'm going to try and pray that it comes across well. The kids need this exposure on stage. Performing is more than singing and dancing so i'm "stepping it up" as we say:)

I did have some disappointing news: we don't get to use the public middle school this Friday. I guess they are on vacation and don't have anyone who can be there for us. So, we have found a church that i'm going to take a look at tomorrow. I'm a little skeptical because they are going to put us in the "lower level"...my interpretation of that is the basement. We'll see....

More tomorrow on our progress if time allows:)

Pleasantly Peaceful Middle Schoolers

Camp starts at 10am. We had 2 registered middle schoolers for this week of camp as of last Friday. At 9:50am this morning 4 kids had already shown up. Not too long after 10am we had 16 kids! By lunch time we had 19 middle and high school campers. Our team was ecstatic! The ratio of boys to girls was about equal. We decided to split them into two groups (guys & girls)and have them rotate similar to the style we laid out last week. The whole day felt very peaceful. Several of the teachers and volunteers and I were a little apprehensive about this group of kids. Everyone gave us the impression that they would be rough, rude and rebellious. They were pretty much the opposite. Of course, there were a few kids who liked to be the center of attention, but overall everyone was very well behaved. We have added one new thing to the camp since the kids are older. They will be designing and making their own t-shirts for the performance this week. Tomorrow we will see how everything goes!

Recap of Urban Arts Camp Week 1

I made it through the first week of Urban Arts camp!:) There are so many things that happened throughout the week that are so amazing, I can't even begin to imagine where I should start. So, i'll be typical and start from the beginning (since most of us follow well in chronological order).

As you may have read from my previous entry, there were some major storms coming across Michigan which stole our power from Sunday through Wed. of the last week. (yes, the first week of camp). The neat thing was that we had power at City Mission in Detroit, where the camp was being held.

Early Monday morning, Renee, Vicky, Kathryn, Wally, Linda and I, piled in two cars with all of our supplies and drove the 48 minutes down to City Mission. We held most of our camp in the City Mission Academy building, but art was special and it got it's own house:)

We had about an hour to set everything up before the kids began showing up. The first day of camp, we had 27 kids. I had set the day up to run on rotations. We all started out together and my parents did the object lesson and devotional. Then the kids were divided into 3 groups based on ages and they rotated to music, drama, art and dance. Lunch was in the middle of the day and we came back together for our "closer" of prayer, a song and announcements. All in all it went pretty smoothly. The youngest class was a handful and we had to adjust and add more volunteers to them.


On Tuesday, we had 30 kids show up for camp! That was the expected number so we were excited that all of them came. Each teacher continued to work on projects and look for those "kids who stood out" to give solos or pair up for routines for the performance. After camp that day, I went over with a City Mission lady, Kathy, to take a look at our Friday performance location. A Detroit middle school was allowing us to use their cafeteria/stage room at no cost. It was my first experience in a Detroit public school. To be honest, I was very sad. There was no air, it was old, and there were airport security stations to walk through...in a middle school. I was aware of the conditions via tv and the news, but to actually walk in a USA school and see the conditions first hand, made me hurt. We found the principal and he was a very kind man. He showed us the area we would be able to use. It really was perfect for the size, stage and area to hold the dinner. There were only a few glitches....no sound equipment, no kitchen, no air. I had some scrambling to do to make this work. It was only the Lord that brought everything together so quickly! A friend took off work on Friday, agreed to drive down from Lansing and provide all of his sound equipment and run it for the performance. We used large fans to give us some circulation and Betty, who volunteered to cater the dinner, adapted the meal so it was "mobile" and didn't need a kitchen. All of that was only God!

Wednesday was a tired day for everyone. You could feel it in the kids when they walked in, I felt it, and other teachers were walking around with coffee cups glued to their fingers:) Everything was still running smoothly though. The dances and songs were coming together well and I was beginning to see some attitude changes for the better. Oh yeah, we had 32 kids that day!

Thursday was crunch day. It was our last day to get everything worked out before the performance. For our closer, we had the kids perform for one another and they loved it! The staff from City Mission even came out from their desks and watched.

Friday was laid out totally differently from the entire week. The kids didn't come to City Mission until 12:30. We transported them a few miles away to the middle school for our dress rehearsal. When we arrived at the school, the kids ate lunch and then we did a blocking run through of the performance. It went pretty well. The kids were pretty hot and tired, but troupers. After our run through we set up stations for them to go to before dinner. A friend brought his electric guitar and pedals and took groups to play around on that and show them stuff. We also had an art station set up to do sand art and a "thank you" card section for the kids to write thank you's to their sponsors. It worked pretty well. After that all happened, I took the entire group out into the hallway and showed them my violin and played a little for them, then let some of them play. It's amazing how quite a group of loud kids can get when they are interested in something. I found that when I was showing them my violin. Dinner was at 5pm..it was a smashing hit of tacos and chips and dip. We were worried that the parents wouldn't come. I think someone from every family showed up to support. That was another answer to prayer. When the kids were done with their meal, we took them out into the hallway and passed out their performance t-shirts. A church had donated them last summer. They were very cute--white t's with stars and glitter on them. The performance started about 6pm. They got a standing ovation! My heart was bursting with pride:) Our team did an amazing job!

And that, my friends was our week in the abridged version. I now begin a whole new week with all new kids tomorrow.

10 Minutes of Power

I have less than 10 minutes of internet usage left before Panera closes, but I have so much to share after the second day of Urban Arts! I'm at Panera becuase on Sunday afternoon most of the county and surrounding counties lost power. It's now Tuesday night and we still have no power. What a way to start the first day of camp! Things have been going really well. We have been handed some challenges, but have sought the Lord and are seeing Him answering. As soon as I am able to take a longer breath and get some power at home, I will be sharing my heart out about the kids at Urban Arts! So for now, i'll keep you wondering and waiting:) Please keep praying for the City Mission kids, teachers and volunteers!!

Pick Up Sticks

I spent the weekend in Lansing, on a friend's family farm. She and a couple other friends were helping prep stuff for the Urban Arts camps. One of the projects required 100 tree sticks that needed to be a certain length and width. What better place than the woods! Our timing was a little off though when we decided to start. So, to document this adventure better than a suburban girl could tell it:), I thought I'd show some video. Be sure to watch it in order from top to bottom!
It begins at the Brook Farm on Saturday. We are just setting out on the John Deer Gator to get around.





Before you view the next video in the series, let me explain what happened right before we turned the camera on. Melissa and I stepped out of the Gator, toward the pile of sticks and as we did, there was a huge rustle of leaves and the sounds of scurrying animals. It was quite freaky!



The next day after church we were counting the number of sticks we had gathered. Not enough:( That night we went over to a bonfire with some people and decided to pick up sticks on their farm. It was quite late, we were pretty tired, and we couldn't see anything once we got out of the workshop. If you are wondering what my one friend, Brie, is doing, she is singing to the music on the radio that is playing in the shop. It's funny though cause you can't really hear the music and she just looks goofy:)


I thought I'd throw these next couple of short videos in even though you can't see too much, it's part of the adventure you don't want to miss!




When we finally got the trailer full of branches and sticks, Derrick was kind enough to turn on the band saw and cut the sticks to size and cut off all the little knobs.


And that is the story of my weekend. When we get pictures of the actual art project I will be sure to post them so you can see what all of this craziness was for:)