being real

I think I got enough sleep last night even though I went to bed at 1am. (3am MN time). We are not doing any critical concern courses some we got to sleep in this morning. I am looking forward to a great day.
I ran into some old friends from Minnesota that I haven’t seen in four years. I was pleasantly surprised that they are doing youth ministry. I will be having lunch with them today. Maybe I will have more PF Changs. (yes)
I lost Killer Bunnies last night on the final draw the carrot cards. (I know it sounds, nerdy but it is lots of fun)
Whelp! I guess I am going to venture out and get some doughnuts now.

The NYWC is so great, it is like Super Bowl for youthworkers.

I thought it would be cool to post a list of people blogging from the convention. Here are the people I have found so far. I will add them as I find them.

ysmarko
beingreal guy
Andrew Seely
ythdudette
revkasedoggy
lilly
chris not blogging yet but he is at the conference
jlyn76
ayouthpastor
midwesternyouthpastor

Hey everybody! I know that not very many people read this blog at this point. However, I am at the National Youth Workers convention in Sacramento this weekend and I thought it would be good for me to blog all that is happening. I am always pumped about this convention. This is the 8th time I have been to this convention.

So far all that has happened is we checked in to a nasty hotel room in the Quality Inn here in Sacramento. We checked in early and the lady at the desk said, “Go up there and if the room is not clean give us a call.” Ok…this was a bad idea to even go check. We go up to the room and it is really, really nasty. So we call and 10 minutes later they send the maids. They clean the room while we are standing outside. Then when they are almost done with the room the lady comes out and says the shower is busted. We are thinking “Yes” we don’t have to stay in the nasty room. I could describe how nasty I was but I is too gross to blog.

Then we head to lunch at PF Chang’s. YES! YES! Can you say yum? Their lettuce wraps are awesome! Then we went to the Convention Center to check in. One of the great things about YS is all the free stuff. It starts with getting the new YS tote bag. The bad this year is interesting. I really liked last year’s backpack. I wonder how much I will use this new one?

We then checked out the YS store and ten headed to back to the Hotel for a little round of Killer Bunnies. I won. Thank you Abu! Next we are heading back to the convention center to sign up for prizes. Oh..man I feel it…this is the year I will win an I pod.

I am still trying to get a free I Pod. I need 3 more referals to make it happen. If you want to help a guy out sign up following this link. If you don’t follow this link I will not get credit.

Thanks for you help. Again, here is the link.

Click here for the link.

After about an 8 year hiatus from doing musicals I thought I would throw my hat back into the ring. I was cast as a lead part in a local community theatre. I was cast as “Prince Dauntless” in “Once Upon a Mattress”. “Once upon a Mattress is a cleaver retelling of the story the princess and the pea.
I was in a musical 2 years ago, where I filled in, a week before the show opened. I didn’t audition or anything, they just cast me. This time I actually auditioned which was a lot of fun.
The read through starts Monday, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous about taking the stage in a musical again.

Today I took my wife and daughter to Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” at the dinner theatre. It was fantastic! My daughter was a little overwhelmed at first because she thought it was “too fancy.” I’m not really sure what that means. However, we all really enjoyed the experience.

So I thought I would take a little time to catch up on my life as I have not blogged much in the past 4 months.

It really has been a good summer. It has been busy, but good. As far as youth ministry goes our summer is very trip intensive. I like it like that, except it is a little frustrating that there is a whole section of students I feel disconnected from for two reasons. Some move on to high school and others just don’t so up for the events.

June’s main thing was our annual Junior High Mission Trip. We again went with an organization called TEENSERVE. We served the good people of Merrill, WI helping them repair their homes. I got to know a group of pretty cool kids from all over. One of the people in my crew I had in my crew 3 years ago. Then she was a sophomore and this year she just graduated from high school. It was an amazing coincidence that was on my crew again. Going on mission trip really feeds the soul. God meets students their and he meets me their. We served a nice lady named Ruth that made us strawberry pie from fresh strawberries she picked that morning. I think our company was truly the mission as she lives out in the country all by herself. We had one kid ask Jesus into his life for the first time at mission trip which was cool. I was a little confused at first because I thought he asked Christ into his life at a different event. However, at mission trip his “girlfriend” broke up with him and it sort of put him in “crisis” mode. God used that pain to draw the kid to himself.

July involved 3 major things. First off I got a new boss. After 2 years of not having a senor pastor we now have a new one. It is weird, I sort of got use to not having a senior pastor. Actually, I was quite comfortable without it. He is a very nice man, and I think is a great addition to our church. However, it is strange having the longest tenure and still being the junior high pastor. It something feels like my existence in my church is a little bit of an oxymoron.

I July I also spoke at a 4-6th bible camp. This is always a lot of fun for me. However this year I was at a camp I have never been to before and I was speaking to a younger age than I am use to. I all worked out. I even brought out my annual Elvis Impersonation to keep the kids attention. My wife and kids absolutely adore being at camp.

The we after speaking at camp me and a few other JHer leader took so students into a wilderness camping experience. This was a pretty amazing experience. We caught a lot of big fish. We sat around the fire and talked about life, did a little improve acting in front of the camp fire, gave each other secret names like Bearbait, Dewit (that was me), and the Guardian of Whatnot. Speaking of bears a couple of other JH leaders thought it would be cool to scare the crud of of me at 3:00 am pretending to be a bear! I have never been so scared in my life. I may not ever go camping up there again. I am scared.

August brought other local events with water parks, amusement parks, professional baseball games, tubing, and lots of other relational building events. At the amusement park we went to I went on a ride that you had to pay extra for to try . It was called The Skyscraper.” It pretty much rocked. And it was fun to scare one of the guys that pretended to be a bear. Payback is sweet.

3 weeks ago I got completely few up with gas prices and I bought a scooter. It rocks and get about 80-100 MPG. Nice, huh?

That bring us to the approaching fall. I am getting weepy because my first born will be heading off to Kindergarten next week. It is the beginning of the end. Pretty soon I will be walking her down the aisle.

We got lots of good stuff lined up for the fall. I have a renewed commitment to reach more lost JHers for Jesus this fall.

My wife wants me to try-out for the local community theatre. We will see…I think I will and then go crazy because I will be so busy. I do get an itch quite often to be on stage doing some musical theatre. Ok…enough said. Thanks for reading.

I got this idea from Rick’s Blog. These are the top songs from 1996. I highlighted the ones I liked. Man.. looking through the list I thought it was a pretty bad yesr for music.

1. Macarena (Bayside Boys Mix), Los Del Rio
2. One Sweet Day, Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men
3. Because You Loved Me, Celine Dion
4. Nobody Knows, Tony Rich Project
5. Always Be My Baby, Mariah Carey
6. Give Me One Reason, Tracy Chapman
7. Tha Crossroads, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
8. I Love You Always Forever, Donna Lewis
9. You’re Makin’ Me High / Let It Flow, Toni Braxton
10. Twisted, Keith Sweat
11. C’mon N’ Ride It (The Train), Quad City Dj’s
12. Missing, Everything But The Girl
13. Ironic, Alanis Morissette
14. Exhale (Shoop Shoop), Whitney Houston
15. Follow You Down / Til I Hear It From You, Gin Blossoms
16. Sittin’ Up In My Room, Brandy
17. How Do U Want It / California Love, 2Pac
18. It’s All Coming Back To Me Now, Celine Dion
19. Change The World, Eric Clapton
20. Hey Lover, LL Cool J
21. Loungin, LL Cool J
22. Insensitive, Jann Arden
23. Be My Lover, La Bouche
24. Name, Goo Goo Dolls
25. Who Will Save Your Soul, Jewel
26. Where Do You Go, No Mercy
27. I Can’t Sleep Baby (If I), R. Kelly
28. Counting Blue Cars, Dishwalla
29. You Learn / You Oughta Know, Alanis Morissette
30. One Of Us, Joan Osborne
31. Wonder, Natalie Merchant
32. Not Gon’ Cry, Mary J. Blige
33. Gangsta’s Paradise, Coolio
34. Only You, 112 Featuring The Notorious B.I.G.
35. Down Low (Nobody Has To Know), R. Kelly
36. You’re The One, SWV
37. Sweet Dreams, La Bouche
38. Before You Walk Out Of My Life / Like This And Like That, Monica
39. Breakfast At Tiffany’s, Deep Blue Something
40. 1, 2, 3, 4 (Sumpin’ New), Coolio
41. The World I Know, Collective Soul
42. No Diggity, BLACKstreet (Featuring Dr. Dre)
43. Anything, 3t
44. 1979, The Smashing Pumpkins
45. Diggin’ On You, TLC
46. Why I Love You So Much / Ain’t Nobody, Monica
47. Kissin’ You, Total
48. Count On Me, Whitney Houston and Cece Winans
49. Fantasy, Mariah Carey
50. Time, Hootie and The Blowfish
51. You’ll See, Madonna
52. Last Night, Az Yet
53. Mouth, Merril Bainbridge
54. The Earth, The Sun, The Rain, Color Me Badd
55. All The Things (Your Man Won’t Do), Joe
56. Wonderwall, Oasis
57. Woo-hah!! Got You All In Check / Everything Remains Raw, Busta Rhymes
58. Tell Me, Groove Theory
59. Elevators (Me and You), Outkast
60. Hook, Blues Traveler
61. Doin It, LL Cool J
62. Fastlove, George Michael
63. Touch Me Tease Me, Case Featuring Foxxy Brown
64. Tonite’s Tha Night, Kris Kross
65. Children, Robert Miles
66. Theme From Mission: Impossible, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen
67. Closer To Free, Bodeans
68. Just A Girl, No Doubt
69. If Your Girl Only Knew, Aaliyah
70. Lady, D’angelo
71. Key West Intermezzo (I Saw You First), John Mellencamp
72. Pony, Ginuwine
73. Nobody, Keith Sweat
74. Old Man and Me (When I Get To Heaven), Hootie and The Blowfish
75. If It Makes You Happy, Sheryl Crow
76. As I Lay Me Down, Sophie B. Hawkins
77. Keep On, Keepin’ On, Mc Lyte
78. Jealousy, Natalie Merchant
79. I Want To Come Over, Melissa Etheridge
80. Who Do U Love, Deborah Cox
81. Un-Break My Heart, Toni Braxton
82. This Is Your Night, Amber
83. You Remind Me Of Something, R. Kelly
84. Runaway, Janet Jackson
85. Set U Free, Planet Soul
86. Hit Me Off, New Edition
87. No One Else, Total
88. My Boo, Ghost Town Dj’s
89. Get Money, Junior M.A.F.I.A.
90. That Girl, Maxi Priest Featuring Shaggy
91. Po Pimp, Do Or Die
92. Until It Sleeps, Metallica
93. Hay, Crucial Conflict
94. Beautiful Life, Ace Of Base
95. Back For Good, Take That
96. I Got Id / Long Road, Pearl Jam
97. Soon As I Get Home, Faith Evans
98. Macarena, Los Del Rio
99. Only Wanna Be With You, Hootie and The Blowfish
100. Don’t Cry, Seal

I feel a little bad at abandoning this blog. I found that it is much easier to abandon a blog that you don’t pay for. It is funny how slowly the visitors just go away completly. The fall is starting up again and maybe it is time to start blogging again. I have had a really busy summer with lots of good stuff. I should fill you in on all that happened. Right now I have no time as I am going to a picnic celebration for my daughter’s new school. She starts kindergarden next week! I can’t believe it! She is really growing up.