Kaleo Ministry #7

<--me and erin and my new pet Aslyn :)

I was sitting outside today and she came and sat up on my lap and cuddled with me :)
SO WOW!

I can't believe time is flying by so fast!

I've been doing so much homework lately that has been so overwhelming!

The past two weeks have been somewhat busy. Basically we have had lots of assignments and papers to do before our pre course that started today! THe course this week is called Hermeneutics. We are studying the Bible and how to read it. Our profs name is Merril Dyck and he is from Briercrest college in saskatchewan. Our first class was pretty good today. We had a lot of pre-course work that was heavy but i managed to finish it just in time to hand it in :) 

Other than pre-course work we have been helping out around the camp here and also we went down to Victoria last week to help clean out the Salts ships that were coming in for winter. The Salts ships are one of the sail ships we sailed on in September for 5 days which was amazing! We helped sand down all the small boats that are called "doreys" and we helped sand down the poles the sails go up on. I'm a professional sander now after sanding for 6 hours lol!

My church ministry is going well! I'm having a really good time at my church. I just love the kids! I love hanging out and being crazy. My crazyness always shows when i'm around these kids. For instance we had dodgeball outside in the skatepark after junior high on wednesday and i ran around stealing the dodge balls from the boys and they were going crazy chasing after me, but offcourse i'm faster and i'm a professional so i out ran them! haha (side note: just kidding well i did out run them but I have this joke that i always say i'm a professional at kaleo and everything i do i say it..it's my new phrase :) I just love hanging out with them and i feel so free when were hanging out like i can be so crazy by running around and I don't care what people think. There is one girl that i really am trying to get to know. I've talked about her in previous weeks. She intrigues me and i really enjoy hanging out with her. I want her to know i care! This week at junior high we had this awesome talk at the end of the night. She was walking away and i called her name and i asked her if everything was alright. I knew something was up. She was hesitant but shared with me what was on her mind. It was about a boy that was her boyfriend and she didn't know if he really liked her and she didn't know if she could trust him because another boy that liked her told her that her boyfriend didn't like her. (basically a lot of drama  in junior high lol I told her no matter what happens that she is so valuable and a very special girl. She deserves a boy that will like her for who she is and she can trust fully that will treat her like a princess :). I really hope that she see's how much worth she has and that she doesn't look for it in guys always. I really feel my heart is to get to know this girl more and be there just to hang out. So all in all i love my church and the kids are sweet! I'm excited for Halloween this friday to dress up..im thinking either a gangster or a cowgirl :) but it might change...maybe i'll be tin foil warrior haha...we have an outreach at the town community center and were handing out candy! I'll be there with my beauty and the beast pillow case just in case we get to go tricker treating! Eh your never too old ;)

Soo that is all for now! I have a course this week than i have some free time for more homework and hanging out with the awesome people here!

Prayer Requests: 

-knowing what the right descision is

-getting my homework done

-being stretched 

-for me to be able to speak for into the Junior Highs on wednesday nights!

-We have to make decisions this week on which mission trip we would like to go on in march. There are 4 choices and i'm not 100% sure where i want to go. If you could pray for guidance and for me to be able to make a confident choice by friday the dead line day.

The 4 choices are 

-Columbia

-Vancouver & surrounding area

-India

-New York City

In general pray that I continue to learn and grow while i'm here. 

The picture below isn't the best quality but it was a sunset a few weeks ago and i thought it was really sweet coming over the mountain :)

Love Alivia :)

Kaleo Ministry #6

Me and my goofiness :)

hey everyone :)

So here i am about 6 weeks or more into Kaleo and I'm having the time of my life. I can't believe it's been that long since i've been here! Time is flying by so so so fast its crah-azy! So the past week or so i have been work work working! I have had lots of homework to do before the month is over so its been a bit stressful for myself! It's defiantly hard when there are so many awesome people around to hang out with or play some volleyball with and you sometimes have to say no because you need to get work done. I'm doing a pretty decent job on managing my time and getting my work done for the most part :D. 

THANKSGIVING!

 It was a sweet time!

I went and visited the 

Rogers in Victoria! I had an awesome time at thier house! The picture is of all of us having Thanksgiving dinner together!

They were so welcoming towards me and it was an amazing dinner cooked! Even though the power went out in the middle of the turkey 

cooking everyone helped with getting the barbeque out and camping stoves to cook our delicious dinner :D!

 I came back on monday and we had a dinner here with everyone and the staff of Qwanoes which was fun!

After the fun weekend i had to buckle down to do some homework! During the week we had a girls/boys night last week which was really fun! The girls went off to parksville! We ate some indian food at a restraraunt off the Ocean and than we went to dairy queen :) We stayed at this GORGEOUS house off the Ocean and had an awesome time bonding and talking with one another. We had an awesome breakfast that Jen and Kristie made for us and also Kylie helped cook some oh-sum eggs! We had banana pancakes which were my favorite! I put peanut butter and syrup on them oooh it was soo good! We than went for a walk on the Ocean and i found this really cool rock! I named it rupert! Look at the picture below :)

  It's really sweet it has two eyes and a mouth haha i was walking along the beach and looked down and it was there this sweet rock! Soo after our walk on the beach we went shopping in Nanaimo at a mall! (come on its girls time you gotta have some shopping in there eh? lol). I bought these really sweet green lime jeans....on SALE. Yes on sale lol everyone makes fun of me here cause i always look for the cheapest stuff...but hey im a student I can't buy too expensive stuff! :P Girls hangout time was really awesome! We came back here and the past few days have been homework and hanging out and going to church!

Church 

My church is going really well! I'm liking it more and more each week I attend! We had jr.high youth group on wednesday like usually and i hadn't been in 2 weeks cause i had missed one wednesday because we were in Tofino! So it was a sweet night! Stevie the leader (really cool guy) talked about the gospel to the kids and i think this was the first week it seemed that they were somewhat paying attention to what he had to say! Some of them were being crazy and fooling around but most of them sat there and listened to him draw on the white board and draw stick people to catch their attention haha. The night went over all pretty well! My girls are all unique in their own individual way. They all have their own things they are dealing with and they are all wanting to be loved. There is one girl in particular that i would love to reach out to and just sit and talk with. She has something to her that makes me want to know more about her story. Sunday services are good too. This sunday they had a couple come up and talk about their adoption process of adopting a little girl from Ethiopia. It is still in progress the adoption it takes just over a year and a half or more. The amount of money to adopt is between  25,000-30,000

Prayer Requests etc.

Im really trying to work on putting others before myself. I'm trying to seek God not just to know about him but actually know him on a personal level. I'm getting challenged alot here which is awesome because i want it! So if you could pray for me to keep on getting challenged and pray for my weaknesses to become strengths and for me to be on top of my homework that would be awesome :)

Love Alivia

Kaleo ministry #5

hello there!

surfs up!

I just got back a few days ago from SURFING!!! Which was so much fun! I went to Tofino on the island and it was INCREDIBLE! We camped right off the Ocean the view was gorgeous. My tent was facing the Ocean when you woke up in the morning and it was so beautiful! When we got here we set up tents and than went and played soccer on the beach!

I went and dipped my feet in the cold Ocean and collected some sweet rocks and i found a half of a sand dollar of which broke in my bag unfortunately :( 

I loved how we were sounded by God's beauty and creation which was so amazing! So that night we had dinner and than all went for a walk on the beach. We played a game where you spin round and round looking up and picking a star in the sky. Than someone says stop and puts a flashlight on in the distance and you run towards it and try not to fall. You get so dizzy from spinning that it is so funny try to walk straight to the flashlight. We than had a camp fire and made smores and went to bed! The next morning we woke up and had a little lesson on surfing. Than we headed off to surf! We got there and put on these full body wet suits! We had boots and gloves and hoods if we wanted to put over our heads to be real hard core :)

 <---This picture right here is of me and my roommates!

We look styling eh?!  From left to right is

Amelia, Erin, Kylie and me! We all had our own surf boards and the way we knew it was ours by names we had given to us. My surf board name was "Prairie Fire"! It was really sweet! It was a 9 ft board! The water at first was really cold! I got in pretty quick though because i was so excited to hop on my board and go surfing! I didn't catch many waves at first but i got Jim our leader to show me how to surf. I was on my board to far back. I did it the right and way and got up on it and was so HAPPY! It was so much fun! It felt so awesome to get up on a wave and ride it! I had the best time of my life surfing! I always wanted to try surfing and i loved it so much! We are going back in march i think so that should be cold but amazing! The good was so good! One of my favorite things on this trip was banana dessert. One night we cut down the middle of the banana and put in chocolate chips and marshmallows and wrapped the banana in tin foil and stuck it in the fire and let it sit for about 5 minutes. Than you take it out and it is a bit mushy and cooked and all the chocolate is melted in and marshmallows and it's the best dessert ever!!! So yea surfing was STELLAR!

My church is going awesome! I missed youth this week due to being in Tofino surfing! As well this sunday i'm missing Church because i am visiting The Rogers in Victoria for the weekend! It's sweet to have some home cooked meals and baked goodies! Their kids are awesome to hangout with! So i will be at my church again on wednesday for junior high. Which shall be another awesome night of crazy kids and having tons of fun hanging out! I can't hardly wait to see them again!

Some things that would be awesome for prayer would be:

-Making sure i am on top of my work for the next few weeks because i have so much stuff due!

-being disciplined to get enough rest and not be so tired

-for junior high at my church on Wednesday that it will go well!

That is all for now :)

thank you for reading and being interested in my adventure this year!

Love Alivia

kaleo ministry # 4

This picture is of everyone on the sail ship!

Hey everyone!!

I hope that you are all doing awesome!

So my week....i had my first course this week! It was spiritual formation with Marv Penner from briercrest. He was an amazing teacher to start of the school year with the course was very beneficial! The week consisted of classes being roughly from 9am till 3 or 4pm. After class we would have group discussions or be organizing the chapel we were going to do for the group. Each of us were in 3 groups of 9 people. We had to pick a topic and do a chapel based around it. My group picked grace and the chapel went very well. It was a time to reflect on what Grace really is in our lives and we had 2 people share and we sang some worship songs as well. At the beginning of the week we went out and picked a place where we could go to write in our journals we were keeping that week. Throughout the week Marv would send us out and either we would free style write or he would give us an exercise to do. For instance he asked us one day to pick out things we struggled with in our lives out of a list of different sins. We picked 2 of those sins and turned to the Bible to see some bible verses about them and overcoming them.  It was a really solid week of learning new things!

My church is awesome! I'm really loving it lots! I have been helping out with sunday school the past 2 weeks and i love the kids! They are so much fun and i love spending time with them! This past sunday the lesson was about God being humble and what is the word humble mean. Also on Saturday i went to a thing called "road tour" with my church youth. Going into it i wasn't sure what to expect. Road tour is when the camp that i live on goes into vancouver and into victoria and goes into a church and play camp songs and worship songs and have camp games and hangouts with old friends. So its a remake of what the summer is like. So i went along with my church youth group and all of the kids loved it! They danced and sang and had fun with the games for the most part! THere was one game where there was atleast 150-200 finger rockets. THey are like plastic noodle foam rockets. you put your finger into the elastic and shoot them at people. They are really fun to throw back and forth at people. So they gave us tons of these and all the kids had a blast throwing them around going crazy! I defanatley had lots of fun doing this i was laughing so hard because i ended up hiding underneath a tupperwear container because i had so many rockets coming my way lol! So everything else with church is awesome! I really am enjoying myself there and the people are awesome!

Tomorrow i go surfing which i am so excited for! Im going to Tofino! I can't hardly wait! I hope it is decent weather to surf in! Aaaah i've never been surfing! We are wearing full body suits because the ocean can get really cold!

so i'm going to end this blog for now and leave some prayer requests....

-That i don't procrastinate on homework and get my work done

-That I keep focused and not get distracted too easily

-that surfing goes incredibly amazing

-that everyone continues to grow as a community and have lots of fun and be safe! :)

-that the group of grade 7 girls i lead on wednesdays at Jr.high goes well and that i will be able to speak into their lives and show them love

thank you everyone!

Love, Alivia :)

Here are some pictures I took from the sail ship!

<--This is Kylie and Tom!

I climbed the whiskers on the boat! I took this near the top!

The dories that everyone went on to hike yet another mountain, this time it was a lil smaller!