Snowed in and catching up on the past few months!

Well it's been way too long since my last post so I will update you on the events that I've been busy with in Dec, Jan, and now Feb. This is the perfect time to catch up on blogging because we are snowed in. Since Friday, we have gotton over 4 feet of snow! This past weekend we had to postpone the winter meltdown retreat because of the pending snow storms! So, we took advantage of the snow and time off and had a great weekend hanging out, playing basketball, sledding, eating together, watching movies, and playing games! So, needless to say, this week I am snowed in, cleaning, catching up on blog updates, and just life in general. I'll try to give ya the run down on what I've been up to.....



All through the month of Dec. we had plenty of Christmas parties to attend... I believe it was over 6 to be exact. One of those was hosted by 95.1 Shine FM the radio station in Baltimore, MD that is affiliated with RVR. Also, here at the ranch we invited our neighbors over for an evening of food, fun, and fellowship to celebrate the Christmas season. There were 4 other Christmas celebrations including: dinner at the Mersons, the full time single girls Christmas party, RVR staff gift exchange and breakfast, and finally all of us interns had a gift exchange of our own!



We were kept busy in Dec. trying to get the Winter Meltdown program details in order. We will have aprox. (over 5 weekends) 1,000 teens participate in our winter meltdown retreats. The theme this year is "Snapshot". The teens will be challenged to take a look at their lives and evaluate what other people may see if they were to just take a quick snapshot of their life. Each teen attending will have the chance to listen to inspirational speakers, watch powerful dramas, experience dramatic audio visual presentations, do great activities such as; paintball, horseback rides, zip line, dodge ball, and rock out to a concert by "Ashes Remain" , and so much more. Things we have been working on in order for Winter Meltdown to happen have included; painting a black canvas to look like an old polaroid photo (the kids are going to answer a question on a piece of paper at the end of each service about how they are living their lives. Then we are will tape the various colors of paper to the canvas in order to make a mosaic picture that resembles a cross, the sky, and a hill.), Beth has been diligently memorizing 4 poems to recite as slam poetry, Sarah's job was to write her own version of a reverse poem, Ryan and Bill are spray painting signs to go along with their presentation of John 3:16, and Taco and I have been working on writing "the weight I carry" from a teens perspective to present during the services, everyone of us have been working on and learning a drama that portrays the struggles and temptations that 2 teens have to deal with through life (I am the lead role as the girl that experiences and experiments with; her parents divorce, boys, self image, bulimia, boys, and alcohol, then I choose to follow Christ at the end of the presentation, and the last project to prepare for W.M. was a huge project.... it was to get the Old Town Meeting building winterized in time (a.k.a. striping out the old installation, sweeping sweeping and more sweeping, and installing heat.)



We have successfully completed with lots of prayer and preparation 2 out of the 5 weekends of Winter Meltdown so far!!! It has been an amazing experience to be part of what God is doing in the lives of hundreds of teens. I love that we get the chance to spend all weekend ministering to them through facilitating activities, participating in the services, hosting the meals, and by just hanging out with them. My favorite part, by far, is before every service Beth and I always prepare ourselves to be used by the Lord by gathering together and offering up ourselves to Him in order for us to be humbled and Him to be glorified! I love that feeling of when 2 or 3 are gathered together that Christ's presence is all the greater! It is an indescribable and amazing feeling that I can't describe! I feel the love of Christ explode and know that the Lords being honored through out the entire weekend! It's a privilege to be blessed to be able to do the Lords work here at RVR! It's great=)



In January we started a new class called "Old/New Testament Survey". We have been learning, writing papers and doing presentations about the various types of Christ, the 7 feasts, the torah, classifying the Psalms, and piecing together Matt, Mark, and Luke's stories together to see the big picture. It is great to learn new and exciting biblical truths from the Bible!



We started our recruiting trips by going to what I love to call the PA Farm Show!!! It was sweet to be able to recruit at a place I have grown up going to every year. Each one of us interns took our turns going for the day with full time staff in order to recruit campers for the summer. I was the first to go on my college recruiting trip. I had the privilege to represent and recruit for RVR at Lancaster Bible College. It was awesome to go to my hometown and college for the day. I am looking forward to doing some more recruiting if given the chance=)



On every first Thursday of the month Matt and Michelle Merson (the intern directors) have all of the interns over for "Merson Madness". That means we pretty much go hang out and have a fun time together playing games and such. In Jan. we had an extra special "Merson Madness" night because Matt and his friend Ryan taught us how to make Sushi! It was so fun and very delicious=)

All of us interns got to go home, relax, and visit with our families for Christmas. Then we came back to the ranch ready for a busy and yet very fun and eventful week! The day after we got back from break we had a mid-week retreat group in. As soon as they left we were detailing all of camp in order to prepare for our RVR summer staff retreat. That night was New Years eve, so everyone (about 40 of RVR's summer staff, full-time staff, and interns) headed down to Baltimore, to explore the city, dance the night away, and watch the amazing fireworks display! It was one of the best new years eve's of my life! I had a blast=) Then for New years day we all slept in and enjoyed a late brunch. I played my first game of flag football! I had way too much fun playing defence and riping the flags off the opposing team! The funniest part though was when I scored a touch down by (in slow motion) running into and falling over the parking sign.... lets just say I had a blast playing flag football in the muddy field with everyone!!! Later that night we had a dodge ball tournament that the interns (boomstang was our group name) took a close 2nd. Then the evening took a calmer turn at the coffee house were Sarah, Beth and I sang "girls just want to have fun". All in all, spending time with RVR staff was a great way to start off 2010!

All the interns, Matt, and Zig all went to the CCCA (Christian Camping Conference Association)
sectionals conference in northern pa at Tuscarora inn. The camps that were in the region all came together to meet, talk, fellowship, worship, learn in workshops, learn from speakers, and to connect with each other. I met and formed some great friendships with some great men and women of God while I was there. Joe was one of those people. He is an older guy who myself and Erin (an awesome girl that I formed a friendship with) had the privilege of sharing lunch with. We were enjoying lunch and talking about each of the camps were we work. I mentioned about the dramas, slam poetry, and presentations that we were going to present during winter meltdown. He was very interested in watching us perform them, so I invited him to watch us practice in the lounge that afternoon. It was a blessing to let God use my mouth to speak to Joe and invite him to be a part of our practice. God used Beth's poems to touch his heart and lead him to share his testimony with us. He has been through a lot, but by Gods grace and mercy he
is following the Lord now! It was amazing to see God's work being magnified through our conversations and interactions with Joe. Joe was a blessing to us because we were a blessing to Him. God just keeps the blessings flow when you do His work! Thank you God for such a great life in You!

I will update you later on the position I will be blessed with this summer and the programing part I will be a part of while planning this summer!

~LaDessa