Hat Day...CRAZY!

Another great day...I am a day late blogging but too tired to get caught up. I will update the carnival pics tomorrow...huge success. Over 400 kids... These are pics from yesterday Look at these faces...which one of these kids is different than the other? :)

This little girl has become my favorite...she was very shy at first but I was very persistent with her and now she is attached at my hip! She might be coming home with us :) She made this quilt square today which almost made me cry. It says "Xandria and Jenn...friends forever".

This little girl walks to the youth center everyday with NO shoes. I walked her home today and there was broken glass everywhere. So sad!

Hat making begins...

Yesterday was the most exhausting day by far. I had the crazy idea to have the kids decorate hats. We brought 100 white baseball hats and the kids were going to decorate them with paint, fabric markers, stamps, etc. Well, we quickly decided that would be absolute chaos so I was to help the kids design their hats and I would do the stamping. Much better idea but a ton of work for me especially since I stood in a HOT kitchen (well over 90 degrees) for HOURS! The good news is that they turned out adorable and the kids LOVED them. Well worth the work!

Every night when I get into bed (well, actually my deflating air mattress) I am overcome with thankfulness. I am thankful that I am here and having this experience, I am thankful for the hard work and the poor conditions we are in, I am thankful for the people I am with and for their amazing hearts, I am thankful that my family is able to serve together, I am thankful for these beautiful children that we are able to bond with, I am thankful for my life and quite sickened by how good we have it, I am thankful for my relationship with Christ and that He chose me to do work for Him but most importantly I am thankful that our family listened. He is sooooo good!

First day with the kids...WOW!

The girls and their new buddies

White men can't jump!

Emma and her new friend that stuck to her like glue!

Emma and Xandria

These girls loved when Rachel and Madi put their faces together...they kept saying "again, again"

Rachel and her new friend playing dress up.

Madison with some fancy glasses

Jordan with her new friend "Precious"

Aaron on dish duty

We had an amazing first day with the kids. Exciting but very exhausting! We endured a pretty intense storm with lots of thunder and lightening. Olivia was very concerned that there was no basement. :) We are staying at the Cheyenne River Youth Project where children ages 4 thru teenage can come and hang out. The program originally was developed only for the younger kids ages 4 thru 12 but one summer 17 teenagers committed suicide so they decided that the older kids needed somewhere safe and fun to come as well. The younger children come to the youth center from 1pm until 7pm. They start in the library, we do a craft, and then we feed them dinner. It dawned on me last night that none of these children ever eat dinner with their families. Definitely a cultural difference than we are used to. The children were noticeably hungry and ate quite a bit. At one point I ran over to the other building because we ran out of fruit and on the way back was "mobbed" by a cluster of little girls who quickly grabbed the fruit off of my platter.

We had an unfortunate incident yesterday that was very eye opening. Madison had a mom come in and accuse her of making her daughter cry. Madison had been playing with several of this women's children throughout the day with no problems so this came to her as a complete shock. The mom was very aggressive and mean to say the least. We aren't sure why the little girl lied to her mom but it is very clear that ALL of these kids are starving for attention. Madison was very upset and had a ton of tears but everyone on the team really rallied behind her which made her feel very loved. We are praying for a better day tomorrow.

Another highlight of the day was our guys playing the kids on the reservation in a rousing game of basketball. Needless to say the boys manhandled our men which was quite humorous at times. They all had a blast and it was a great way to interact with the teens.

All of the kids are very reserved at first but then when they feel comfortable they latch on to you...literally! At one point I looked over and Rachel had about 5 kids on her. They kids here are fascinated by Rachel and Madison being twins. I talked with the director here and she doesn't remember ever having identical twins on the reservation. So they have caused quite a spectacle :)

We are all doing well. The team is great. The girls all have friends to play with. We feel like we are making a difference...if only for a week. Life is good.

We have arrived!

WE ARE HERE!!!

Our welcome sign.

Rachel unloading the truck. Busy bees... I took this picture driving 75 miles an hour...how about that? Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam.... This is how a caravan of cars gets gas at the same time

This is our cozy sleeping quarters.

The World Famous Corn Palace...it is corntastic!

How corny

Our team leaving St. Louis...bright and early!

Long story on the hats...Aaron and Chuck are on my craft team (by default!) and they came up with these gorgeous hats to wear...should be an interesting week!

We have made it to South Dakota....whew! 66 people, 15 vehicles, and 1000 miles and we all made it with no problems and only one trip to the ER so far (not a Crowell)....what a relief. Last night we stopped in Mitchell, SD and slept in the basement of a church...comfy. Kidding of course!

We were so lucky to be able to visit the world famous Corn Palace last night. We even got a tour as well as a spectacular video of the making of the Corn Palace...another joke. The twins wanted to go back this morning because they loved it so much. :)

The drive was absolutely beautiful with the craziest looking hills I have ever seen. I think they are called "lousses"...they formed when glaciers were covered with soil or something like that. Or maybe Aaron was just trying to act smart when he told me that :)

We are sleeping in very tight quarters...we can bounce from air mattress to air mattress. We have a women's room, men's room, and tween/teenage girl room and the snorring room. The teenage boys are sleeping in the hall.

We unpacked the truck with a major team effort...every person was carrying a box, even the twins. :) Miracles are happening already. One small issue is that the hot water heater is NOT working in the youth center where we are staying. The good news is that our showers are supposed to be under 5 minutes long which hasn't been a problem since the water is freezing!

We are off to bed and ready for the real adventure to begin tomorrow...stay tuned! :)

Off on an adventure...

Tomorrow morning at 5am the Crowell family along with about 60 others are heading about 1000 miles to South Dakota to the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation. We will be working with the Lakota Indians who are a part of the Sioux Indian Tribe. We have been preparing for this trip for several months and I can't believe it is finally here. We will basically be having an indoor camping trip with 17 other families while we work at a youth center for the week. We have lots of fun events planned including a carnival with a bounce house, cotton candy machine, dunking booth etc. We also have a band coming to do a concert on Thursday night. Some of the guys are heading a couple hours north for the week to rehab a church that is in desperate need of repairs. I am in charge of crafts for 4 days which has put me on a first name basis with the manager at Hobby Lobby (who am I kidding...we were already friends but now we are best buds!).

Yesterday we packed a 16 foot truck with all of our supplies. Someone had a great idea to pack our things in banana boxes since everything was uniform and they worked perfectly! We have just about every square inch of that truck loaded down from food for the entire week (no grocery stores for hours!), construction supplies, carnival supplies and then even more food. Did I mention that we have 700 hotdogs for the carnival? How crazy is that?

And so with excitement and some apprehension we head out for quite the adventure. Please keep us in your prayers that we will travel safely and that our time there will bring happiness to those in need. I will try to update the blog since I know I will not have cell phone service. Our group also has a blog that will definitely be updated daily if you want to keep tabs on us. The blog is http://www.sdteam2009.blogspot.com/

See you soon!

Baby Blessings

About 6 months ago, after a pretty crazy chain of events, I stumbled into a women's shelter called Our Lady's Inn. This is a home for pregnant women and their children that offers a ton of hope to these struggling women. A vast majority of the women come from very abusive pasts, some from early in childhood all the way until now. I asked them if they needed any help and to my surpise they told me that they lost the grant for their nurse earlier in the year and have been praying for someone to step in without pay. I told them that I would love to help and the rest is history.

I began teaching childbirth classes to them on Tuesday nights. After my very first class a sweet girl named Brandi approached me and told me she had a question for me. After some prompting she finally had the courage to ask me if I would be in the delivery room with her when she had her baby in the summer. She had no one else. I of course told her that I would love to be with her and from that point forward a relationship developed. I would often hang out with Brandi and her other two children after class. The kids are absolutely darling and very funny!

And so the last several weeks we have been counting down until the big day. I have slept for quite some time with the phone by my bed just in case she went into labor during the night. I often worried since in was summer that I would have a hard time finding a place for the girls to go but I just prayed that God would make it all possible. And that He did. Rachel and Madi were away on their mission trip and Jordan and Livi were at the Lake with Grammy and Papa. I was getting a little nervous since I was in bed for days with the flu but just as I was feeling better the phone rang and Brandi was in labor.

I took some time getting there as I packed my bag of goodies. Lotions, things to occupy my time, snacks etc. Brandi was only at 2cm when she called and the baby was very high still. At the hospital Brandi wanted to get into the shower to ease her back pain but after a few minutes said that she felt some pressure. If anyone has worked in ob they know that the word "pressure" causes some alarm. But since not even 30 minutes before she was at 2cm made me think she still had a ways to go but she did have a funny, sort of paniced look on her face. She got back into bed and to everyone's surprise the baby was crowning! After a quick yell down the hall a nurse came running in and literally caught the baby! Crazy!

The baby was perfect and screaming away. She weighed 7lbs7oz and was 20" long. My labor bag never got opened once. :) I am so thankful that I was able to share in this amazing women's birth...she is such an inspiration. I wish her many blessings as she starts rebuilding her life. I know in my heart that Brandi is going to be a success story. She is a great mother, hard worker and very firm in her faith. I hope that they are all a part of our lives for a long time!

Rachel and Madi's Mission Trip to Nashville

Rachel and Madi went on a Mission Trip last week to Nashville with their youth group. They experienced a ton of new things as they helped those much less fortunate than themselves. They helped in a HIV clinic, worked in a soup kitchen, helped a man with AIDS clean his overgrown yard (which left Madison with a severe case of poison oak...she is now on some serious steroids!), walked the streets handing out granola bars and water bottles to the homeless, assisted in a store organizing shelves and so many other eye-opening things. One day their assignment was to find a homeless person and buy them breakfast. They found a man and asked him to come into McDonalds and they would buy him breakfast. The manager at McDonalds wouldn't let him in because they said he was a beggar! This was shocking to everyone. They were able to meet several homeless people and hear their stories which really touched the girls. They were amazed at how appreciative and loving these people were. Here are a few pics of the trip...

Telling the girls "bye"...always a production in our home!

Rachel and Madi's identical twin buddies Mallory and Cassandra. Mallory used to babysit the girls and now she is like a "big sister" (although she is shorter!) The whole reason Rachel and Madi decided to go on this trip is because of Mallory.

Getting ready to go!

The girls also experienced lots of different types of food. They had Thai food, Turkish food, Indian food and Soul food. :) My girls, thank God, are not picky eaters and love trying new things so they really enjoyed this part of the trip.

They did a lot of work at FAM (Family Affair Ministries) where they took care of children ages 6 months to 12 years. This was their favorite part of the trip. They developed some close bonds with the children and definitely came home with some favorites! They said when they left the last day they couldn't turn around because they were crying.

This is Jordan, the girls' favorite little boy!

All in all this trip was a huge success on so many levels. The girls were able to see people that were much less fortunate than themselves and they started to develop a heart that loves to serve. They didn't want to leave! Rachel kept a journal for the week and asked me to read it when she got home. On the very last page she said "I really missed my mom this week. I realized how much I love and need her. I love you mom!" SUCCESS!

PS I also wanted to thank my in-laws and my husband for taking such good care of me when I was sick in bed with the flu for 3 days! They had a mission trip right at home! :)