This summer we're trying something a little different.
The CFM team has really looked hard at VBS these past few months and at what we wanted to get out of it. What we found is that while we’ve got great goals in mind for VBS, our current program is not achieving them. From the outside, VBS is polished and pretty, but the reality is that we’re exhausting our resources. It takes 3 people other than the DCFM to spearhead VBS, and all 3 of those people resigned last year due to burnout. Additionally, every time CFM committee members approach people to volunteer for Sunday mornings or for events, we hear the same excuse repeatedly: “I did my time at VBS.” It’s a one stop shot for people, and that’s not what VBS is meant to be.
One of the things we looked at in our meetings was that VBS should be an outreach, but in reality, we haven’t gotten ANY new people from VBS. We cap our numbers at 200, and most of those kids are already CLPC members or have churches of their own. Every January, the Clear Lake DCFMs call each other to schedule out the summer, so that our VBS weeks don’t coincide. What happens, then, is that kids travel from VBS to VBS, and sadly, we become babysitting services.
So what are our goals, then, and how are we meeting them this summer?
· We want to reach out to friends and neighbors (Hangin’ Out will reach out to all ages, not just kids, and Super Sloppy Summers brings in new kids who DO return in the fall).
· We want to have multi-generational events (Hangin’ Out will focus on babies through older adults).
· We want more family involvement (Many dads and working parents who have heard about Hangin’ Out have approached me about how excited they are for the family time it will provide).
· We want our kids to be spiritually nurtured (all of our programs are Biblically strong).
· We want our kids to have a smoother transition into youth group (Summer Safari)
· We want more mission activities for kids (Summer Safari and CLPC zoo).
· We want our kids to have good music (Passport to Adventure and Summer Safari will have great music, and we hope to have CDs for kids to take home).
· We want Tshirts (almost all the programs will have tshirts, I promise)
· We want to give our burned out volunteers a chance to recharge (simplify) and other volunteers a chance to do something new for a summer, so that we can enter Fall with a full team.
· We want to bring different program areas together to function as a church body and not in silos (Summer Safari and Hangin’ Out both meet this goal)
There’s our plan, and we will re-evaluate at the end of the summer to see if we meet our goals. I’m excited about collaborating with other ministry areas and about the needs that will be met within and without. More posts to come about what all the hype is about!
Showing posts with label vbs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vbs. Show all posts
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Yeah, I'm a slacker
...blogwise, anyway.
Thanks to Emerging Kids for still reading. You've prompted me to write a post today. :-)
Well, lots is going on here at CLPC. Sunday mornings are trucking along as always. We added a new prayer tent to our children's worship room. The kids are psyched about it, and it's been well received by adults who use the room for prayer, as well. Basically, it's just fabric clipped to the ceiling with binder clips, but inside the tent is a pillow, a long scarflike piece of material and 2 Glade flickering un-candles. I actually don't know the name of them, but they are an air freshener designed to look like a candle. I just took out the air freshener, and voila, we've got candles that won't break fire codes.
For Palm Sunday, we rolled out the red carpet for Jesus (literally a long piece of red butcher paper) and the kids wrote out what they would give Jesus if he came walking/riding into CLPC. My favorite response was a map of Houston, but other touching responses were a place to stay, clean clothes, and fireworks.
KidsInC has been really hitting the books hard this year, so we took March off to just have fun. We had a rodeo party (a big thing in Texas), an ice cream seder, and are prepping for a Spring Fling which translates to a pool party next week. KidsInCers are also planning a party for the preschoolers on March 30. They'll wear their pjs to church and play games, etc. The tweeners are having so much fun planning it, and the preschool SS classes can't wait to wear their pjs to church! Actually, I think the teachers are the most excited about wearing their pjs, surprisingly.
The other buzz around here is that we've decided to do some things in place of a weeklong VBS this year. You all remember my previous posts about VBS, I'm sure, but I actually sat down with my team, and we all decided that this new format would meet our goals much better. I'll post about it as soon as I get the word out to the congregation. It's pretty hush hush right now (aside from the circulating rumors). We're meeting next week to finalize things, and I'm very excited.
More soon.
Thanks to Emerging Kids for still reading. You've prompted me to write a post today. :-)
Well, lots is going on here at CLPC. Sunday mornings are trucking along as always. We added a new prayer tent to our children's worship room. The kids are psyched about it, and it's been well received by adults who use the room for prayer, as well. Basically, it's just fabric clipped to the ceiling with binder clips, but inside the tent is a pillow, a long scarflike piece of material and 2 Glade flickering un-candles. I actually don't know the name of them, but they are an air freshener designed to look like a candle. I just took out the air freshener, and voila, we've got candles that won't break fire codes.
For Palm Sunday, we rolled out the red carpet for Jesus (literally a long piece of red butcher paper) and the kids wrote out what they would give Jesus if he came walking/riding into CLPC. My favorite response was a map of Houston, but other touching responses were a place to stay, clean clothes, and fireworks.
KidsInC has been really hitting the books hard this year, so we took March off to just have fun. We had a rodeo party (a big thing in Texas), an ice cream seder, and are prepping for a Spring Fling which translates to a pool party next week. KidsInCers are also planning a party for the preschoolers on March 30. They'll wear their pjs to church and play games, etc. The tweeners are having so much fun planning it, and the preschool SS classes can't wait to wear their pjs to church! Actually, I think the teachers are the most excited about wearing their pjs, surprisingly.
The other buzz around here is that we've decided to do some things in place of a weeklong VBS this year. You all remember my previous posts about VBS, I'm sure, but I actually sat down with my team, and we all decided that this new format would meet our goals much better. I'll post about it as soon as I get the word out to the congregation. It's pretty hush hush right now (aside from the circulating rumors). We're meeting next week to finalize things, and I'm very excited.
More soon.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
VBS and burgers
Ok, let me clarify why I hate VBS, but first I need to talk about my favorite burger place.
I don't eat many burgers, especially now that I'm training for a marathon, but when I do, I don't go for McDonalds or the higher class, Fuddruckers. I go to Lucky Burger. The building is shaped like a sombrero and serves up a nice 1/4 lb burger with a side of some of the best fried rice in town. When I go out of town, I search for these sort of places because I like the indigenous, the eclectic, the heterogeneous. I'm just not a happy meal kind of gal.
Now onto VBS. Many years ago, VBS was a different animal. It kind of had the feel of a backyard Bible camp, the closeness of small groups, a distinct personality, and just overall simplistic fun. Perhaps it is just my "neck of the woods," suburban, affluent Houston, TX, but things just aren't the same. Now, VBS is prepackaged, overpriced, and homogeneous to the point that aside from the theme, you can't tell the difference between publishers. One has a chipmunk and a buffalo telling about Jesus, and another has a mouse. It's all the same.
Now don't get me wrong--it runs like a well-oiled machine. When I started this job a year ago, I was told that I didn't have to do anything but walk around and smile, and they were right. Here it is, a year later, and aside from adding a rather large missions component to it, I'm the smiling poster queen, but I hate that. Why don't I do anything about it? It's because at this point, it runs smoothly, it's not broken, per se, and since I am a one staff member team, I've got to pick my battles.
Now to answer Trisha's question-- yes, I am ministering. If you read the rest of my blog, you can see the many, many areas in which we are ministering. I'm busy because I am constantly in prayer, constantly in motion, thinking of ways to minister inside and outside our community and doing all of them. The problem is that VBS is not a ministry to me, at least not in this area. The churches around here call each other in January to find out which publisher each church is using so that they don't duplicate. They also pull out their calendars and fight over weeks because down here, parents want cheap (yes, we charge for VBS down here because the curriculum is so expensive and so are the tshirts and all the little dodads that go with it) babysitting all summer--every week should be filled with a VBS from somewhere, and it is. June is the Baptists, us, the Church of Christ and the Methodists. July is taken by independence day, the Bible church, the other Baptist church, the nondenominational mega church, etc. It is sickening.
And because it is a well oiled machine, it is the most efficient choice to put a cap on the amount of kids who come--200. It means better security, better organization, better planning. It also means that once Suzie and her little friend Betsy and all their little goldilocks friends pay their tuition with checks clipped together to ensure that they are in groups together, the chairperson/s begins having to turn away neighborhood kids, last minute move ins, kids who are outside the flock and sometimes worse turn away reasons--I've seen it all from churches around here, not just ours. That's not ministry to me, but it's the obvious choice when you're doing one of these kits.
I have a volunteer crew of brilliant, creative women and men, and yes, they run the ship so well that it is flawless year after year, but to me, their brilliance and love of the Lord is lost in the midst of (forgive me using the phrase again) Chuck E Church, and the kids get lost in it, too. But my team is only so big, and we are planning unbelievable ministry opportunities all the time, so I can understand why doing something as simple as Group VBS sounds easy and wonderful.
Two years ago, I worked for a church in Bolingbrook, Il that didn't have the funds for one of these VBS to go boxes. We put our heads together and created our own VBS. It was called Bible stories come to life, and the kids became a part of the Bible stories. They crawled into an ark that we made of crates and pallets and heard the story while a friend of mine and I ran around outside holding up rainbows and blue streamers and spraying the window with water and making fake birds fly. Yeah, it was low budget, but the kids loved it, and every one of them could tell you the story afterward. "Yeah, but it's Noah, you say. " Ok, well we also made a life sized ark of the covenant, created a river in the church hallway with rocks and reeds on the side, had the kids carry the ark down the river and into the temple, etc. We had the kids blow trumpets to crumble the wall of Jericho and on another day, had them sit inside the dark well/pit while looking up at the tiny light in the ceiling and hearing the story of Joseph. This was ministry--this was VBS to me, and I even adapted the idea to create the Fear Not Festival last year, which was astounding because of my volunteers' brilliance and artistry. That is my idea of VBS.
Well, I've rambled on enough, and you hopefully understand my point of view now, and if you don't, well, I can't ramble on anymore. It's not that VBS is bad, it's just another happy meal, and next year, maybe we'll do something more.
I don't eat many burgers, especially now that I'm training for a marathon, but when I do, I don't go for McDonalds or the higher class, Fuddruckers. I go to Lucky Burger. The building is shaped like a sombrero and serves up a nice 1/4 lb burger with a side of some of the best fried rice in town. When I go out of town, I search for these sort of places because I like the indigenous, the eclectic, the heterogeneous. I'm just not a happy meal kind of gal.
Now onto VBS. Many years ago, VBS was a different animal. It kind of had the feel of a backyard Bible camp, the closeness of small groups, a distinct personality, and just overall simplistic fun. Perhaps it is just my "neck of the woods," suburban, affluent Houston, TX, but things just aren't the same. Now, VBS is prepackaged, overpriced, and homogeneous to the point that aside from the theme, you can't tell the difference between publishers. One has a chipmunk and a buffalo telling about Jesus, and another has a mouse. It's all the same.
Now don't get me wrong--it runs like a well-oiled machine. When I started this job a year ago, I was told that I didn't have to do anything but walk around and smile, and they were right. Here it is, a year later, and aside from adding a rather large missions component to it, I'm the smiling poster queen, but I hate that. Why don't I do anything about it? It's because at this point, it runs smoothly, it's not broken, per se, and since I am a one staff member team, I've got to pick my battles.
Now to answer Trisha's question-- yes, I am ministering. If you read the rest of my blog, you can see the many, many areas in which we are ministering. I'm busy because I am constantly in prayer, constantly in motion, thinking of ways to minister inside and outside our community and doing all of them. The problem is that VBS is not a ministry to me, at least not in this area. The churches around here call each other in January to find out which publisher each church is using so that they don't duplicate. They also pull out their calendars and fight over weeks because down here, parents want cheap (yes, we charge for VBS down here because the curriculum is so expensive and so are the tshirts and all the little dodads that go with it) babysitting all summer--every week should be filled with a VBS from somewhere, and it is. June is the Baptists, us, the Church of Christ and the Methodists. July is taken by independence day, the Bible church, the other Baptist church, the nondenominational mega church, etc. It is sickening.
And because it is a well oiled machine, it is the most efficient choice to put a cap on the amount of kids who come--200. It means better security, better organization, better planning. It also means that once Suzie and her little friend Betsy and all their little goldilocks friends pay their tuition with checks clipped together to ensure that they are in groups together, the chairperson/s begins having to turn away neighborhood kids, last minute move ins, kids who are outside the flock and sometimes worse turn away reasons--I've seen it all from churches around here, not just ours. That's not ministry to me, but it's the obvious choice when you're doing one of these kits.
I have a volunteer crew of brilliant, creative women and men, and yes, they run the ship so well that it is flawless year after year, but to me, their brilliance and love of the Lord is lost in the midst of (forgive me using the phrase again) Chuck E Church, and the kids get lost in it, too. But my team is only so big, and we are planning unbelievable ministry opportunities all the time, so I can understand why doing something as simple as Group VBS sounds easy and wonderful.
Two years ago, I worked for a church in Bolingbrook, Il that didn't have the funds for one of these VBS to go boxes. We put our heads together and created our own VBS. It was called Bible stories come to life, and the kids became a part of the Bible stories. They crawled into an ark that we made of crates and pallets and heard the story while a friend of mine and I ran around outside holding up rainbows and blue streamers and spraying the window with water and making fake birds fly. Yeah, it was low budget, but the kids loved it, and every one of them could tell you the story afterward. "Yeah, but it's Noah, you say. " Ok, well we also made a life sized ark of the covenant, created a river in the church hallway with rocks and reeds on the side, had the kids carry the ark down the river and into the temple, etc. We had the kids blow trumpets to crumble the wall of Jericho and on another day, had them sit inside the dark well/pit while looking up at the tiny light in the ceiling and hearing the story of Joseph. This was ministry--this was VBS to me, and I even adapted the idea to create the Fear Not Festival last year, which was astounding because of my volunteers' brilliance and artistry. That is my idea of VBS.
Well, I've rambled on enough, and you hopefully understand my point of view now, and if you don't, well, I can't ramble on anymore. It's not that VBS is bad, it's just another happy meal, and next year, maybe we'll do something more.
Friday, May 25, 2007
forever busy
Ok, sorry I've been gone for forever, but I just haven't had time to blog. I'm training for a marathon, and I'm busy planning summer programs and such.
Just finished the last KidsInC for the year and am planning Super Sloppy Summers. The tshirts came in last week, and they are awesome.
Today we decorated for CLPC zoo, and the tshirts came in for them, as well. I'm really excited about this program, and I think the kids will be, too. Also, I'm piloting a new curriculum for the preschoolers.
We've also got VBS underway (secretly, I hate VBS. I'd put it on a post secret postcard, but the public wouldn't care, I don't think, so I'll just say it here--I HATE VBS or at least what it has become), and so that's a time consumer, and then this weekend, we've got this ubercrazy Pentecost celebration going on, which is cool and multigenerational, but man, it is a lot of work.
And then we're constructing an underwater classroom for children's worship, which is a blast. My deco team is outstanding. I couldn't do my job without them.
Add to that some computer problems, and you see why I haven't blogged.
So can you tell I need a vacation? Yeah, I scheduled a little minibreak for New Orleans, but I'm hoping to get out to DC or to CA for at least a week in July. My year anniversary is June 1, and I haven't had a day off yet, other than my Mondays and an occasional holiday.
Anyway, I hope to be a more faithful blogger. Sorry about that.
Just finished the last KidsInC for the year and am planning Super Sloppy Summers. The tshirts came in last week, and they are awesome.
Today we decorated for CLPC zoo, and the tshirts came in for them, as well. I'm really excited about this program, and I think the kids will be, too. Also, I'm piloting a new curriculum for the preschoolers.
We've also got VBS underway (secretly, I hate VBS. I'd put it on a post secret postcard, but the public wouldn't care, I don't think, so I'll just say it here--I HATE VBS or at least what it has become), and so that's a time consumer, and then this weekend, we've got this ubercrazy Pentecost celebration going on, which is cool and multigenerational, but man, it is a lot of work.
And then we're constructing an underwater classroom for children's worship, which is a blast. My deco team is outstanding. I couldn't do my job without them.
Add to that some computer problems, and you see why I haven't blogged.
So can you tell I need a vacation? Yeah, I scheduled a little minibreak for New Orleans, but I'm hoping to get out to DC or to CA for at least a week in July. My year anniversary is June 1, and I haven't had a day off yet, other than my Mondays and an occasional holiday.
Anyway, I hope to be a more faithful blogger. Sorry about that.
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