Our church's Epic Australian Adventure vacation Bible school was a big success! We are a rural church in the middle of several small towns, with children coming from miles around. We were excited to welcome 40 children, most not from our congregation.
We decorated the fellowship hall the Sunday afternoon before VBS started the next Monday evening. We got our ideas mostly from the Internet. The decorating crew was members of our congregation, including some of the kids. They were so excited to help, and for us to use their ideas.
This was the main wall. The kids chose where the silhouettes were placed.
This was the tree in the other corner. The 'stumps' were five-gallon buckets with paper on them, borrowed from another local church. These were the seats for the kids. We did get a few comments that they weren't that comfortable.
I dressed as their adventure guide.
This corner of the room represented the Great Barrier Reef.
The sign-in table was decorated with bamboo. They have bamboo in Australian, right?
My granddaughter made pipe cleaner chameleons for me. I moved them around every day.
One of the local libraries had this cute cardboard camper they let us borrow. Everyone liked how this corner came out. The kids loved having their pictures taken driving the jeep.
The first lesson of the week was how God called Moses with the burning bush. The kids loved our burning bush - an electric 'fire'. A tabletop device with red and orange cloth 'fire' which was lighted, with a fan inside to make the cloth stand up and wave. We put fake leaf garlands around it. It looked amazing!
We had a great week. The kids were enthusiastic and enjoyed the activities and the singing. From listening to them talk to their parents on the final night they got a lot out of their time spent with us. They went home excited about what they had learned and singing the songs that went along with the lessons. Some were already asking if we were going to do it again.
I'm not sure how much like Australia we made it look, but it definitely was different than normal! We even left the decorations up for the next Sunday so the rest of the congregation could see them, too.
Putting on the VBS was a lot of work, but well worth it. I'm just glad I won't be in charge next year!
I didn't tat much at all that week because I was so busy. I didn't even get to the earrings I wanted to make. Instead of having the kangaroo charms with tatting, I wore just the charms. Unfortunately, what I did tat was for sympathy cards. I made a second cross due to another death in our congregation.
I am back to having time to tat and have started several projects. Nothing to show yet, but I'm excited about them.
I just saw yesterday that the Lacemakers Guild of Oklahoma posted about their annual Lace Embrace in Dewey, Oklahoma on October 4th. My sister and I are planning to go. It sounds like fun!
"Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it." Proverbs 22:6 ESV Bible
