Week 5, 6 and 7.

Oh man it has been a whirlwind the last three weeks! 

Things have been crazy around here, 

but in the best way! 

Let's see....where do I even begin?!

So the second week of July, 

was basically all prep for our kids camp the following week. 

We spent most of our time up at church transforming the building into the most epic fire house ever! 

It was awesome there was a giant firetruck, 

and a cat stuck in a tree and a helicopter! 

But the best was the science room that we decorated with molecules and the periodic table on the ceiling tiles! 

It's not the best picture, but you get the idea! 

I was pretty proud of those bad boys! 

This was my crowning glory...can anyone guess what it is??

That week we did still have Wednesdays off so Jill and I went with some Irishmen on the team to Saint Honorat, an island off the coast of Cannes. 

The island was beautiful and so calm and peaceful! 

St. Honorat has been home to a monastery for over 1600 years! 

St. Patrick even studied there! 

                                                                 

Regrettably my birthday happened to fall on a fairly inconvenient day...

it was on a Sunday which is always a busy day for us; 

it was the day before kids camp started, 

and it was the world cup finals.

So not the most convenient, 

but still a really fun day! 

I was greeted in the morning to decorations and balloons everywhere! 

One of the ladies from church remembered me mentioning that I like Angel Food cake, 

so she made me a cake! 

It was delicious! 

And we went out to lunch for some celebratory birthday crepes! 

They were delicious! 

It really was a fun day!

Thank you to everyone who made it special from near or afar! 

The next week was our kids camp.

It was an exhausting and exciting week! 

I worked at the story translator, 

so I mostly would tell kids to stop moving and pay attention, 

and translate into English is there were kids who needed it. 

It was really cool because at one point I had to translate the story from French to English, 

so that it could be translated from English into Serbian! 

Now if that's not the gift of tongues, I don't know what is! 

I really enjoyed working with the story because it allowed me to get to know all the kids, 

and it gave me flexibility to work or visit different groups or activities! 

Overall it was a great and exhausting week! 

This past week was outreach week! 

So we had basketball camp in the mornings with a team from News Release. 

Basketball camp was interesting...it became more enjoyable as the week progressed! 

It was quite an adjustment moving from kids camp, which was highly structured and scheduled, 

to basketball camp which was much more free flowing. 

Also, the first day I was called upon as lead translator....

and that was.....painful. 

It's one thing to translate the instructions to a game into French, 

but it's another thing entirely to translate someone's testimony. 

So that put a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, 

but I think most of that came from my own perfectionist attitudes,

and not the actual translation. 

But after basketball camp we had several different outreach activities. 

We passed out tracts, or did the soularium project (which is a survey that uses pictures...it's pretty cool), several people passed out sandwiches or played music on the street. 

There was a lot going on and it was neat to find the avenue that worked best for you! 

So it's been a busy few weeks! 

But the summer isn't over yet! 

Tonight starts our Exchange Conference at the St. Paul church. 

The interns have been in charge of the children's program, 

so all that BSF training is coming in handy! 

I'm excited for the weeks ahead!

It's crazy to think that I've only got two more weeks in Nice! 

Pray that I would stay focused on my purpose here, 

and not get distracted by things to come later. 

Pray that we would all be filled with energy and endurance to keep going this week!

Pray that the Lord would be known in Nice!