There are a ton of pictures in good old 05-19-07. Probably should’ve broken this up into different posts, but that is quitter talk!
Next Saturday’s post will be much shorter, I’m sure.
I thought I was going to write a really long breakdown of my trip to Milwaukee with my church’s youth group for Mission Work.
Instead, I think I’ll settle for a description with each photo. Maybe I’ll be more ambitious with Volume 2.
Across the street from the Lutheran Church we were staying at was a Greek restaurant that sold frozen custard. Not fooling this cone cost me close to $5. They didn’t always give change either.
Found this sidewalk art at our first stop Monday morning at Adullam Outreach. This was an outreach program named after the cave where David spent his exile.
One of the good and bad things about Youth Works is that break your group up into groups with other churches. My group consisted of 3 kids from Boone and 1 adult and 2 kids from Louisville, Kentucky. Our group worked all 4 days at a low income nursing home. They owned property across the street from their main facility. They had us mow that property. Going by the height of the weeds and the amount of garbage, this seemed like the first time they had been mowed all year. Wyatt is pictured mowing.
On Monday the low income nursing home (named The Family House) had a free food giveaway on their lawn. They have food donated to them by Aldi and Wal-Mart. Pictured is Cordelia Wallace, the founder of Family House. 80 years old and a house of fire. She is telling her story to Megan (who’s spirit animal is Shakira), Wyatt, and Elizabeth. Elizabeth is from Louisville. One of the things we did was go door to door in this neighborhood knocking on doors to tell people about the food giveaway. It might go without saying, this was not a nice neighborhood. Nobody answered their door. Although we did tell some random people on the street about it.
David organizing their pantry.
Our facilitators at The Family House were Cornelius and Latoya. Can you pick them out of the picture? Latoya showed no team loyalty by wearing just about a different team jersey every day. Cornelius is a bad Prom date. More on that later. The guy in blue is Scott. He was the other adult chaperone from Louisville. He was a good dude. A little daffy, but a good dude. He is also in the FBI. The male kid that isn’t Wyatt or David is Jay. Real name James. But he goes by Jay. In the unabridged version, I’d have a lot to say about the dynamics of this group. The important thing to know is that when I job needed done, they banded together and got stuff done.
After we were done with work for the day and had showered, we went to the overpriced frozen custard place. Anna is the youth that hasn’t been identified up until this point.
Monday night was a free night. We started our free night at the park across the street from our home for the week.
Alex, Anna, MacKenzie, and Megan
After the park we went to Dairy Queen. Alex showing off his ice cream eating form.
After Dairy Queen, we went to a park on Lake Michigan and watched the sun set on the Milwaukee skyline.
Posing with Youth Pastor Alisa
Tuesday. Back to work. David. Mowing property #2.
The Family House. The Family House was actually a nursing home that Cordelia Wallace started out of her own house where she raised 8 children. Most of the other houses in the neighborhood were drug houses. So she slowly acquired them and added them to her facility.
Street view. Cordelia worked at a nursing home. She had “ideas” on how to improve the life of the residents and took her suggestions to her bosses. They smiled politely (maybe) and then told her that they get paid to do the thinking. She gets paid to do what they tell her to do. She cried all of the way home. Then complained to her husband. After listening to her, he stopped her and said, “Listen, you can complain about it or you can do something about it. But if you don’t do anything about it, I’m done listening to you complain about it.” She did something about it.
I often find that areas our Youth Group go to do mission work aren’t ready for Iowans. Iowans work. On the start of Monday they took us up to a room and told us to organize it. They were planning on turning it into a kids center. We organized it in 45 minutes. Their jaws dropped open. They told us that they were expecting that to take us all day. The previous week they had had 2 youth groups there working. We had accomplished more in 45 minutes than those 2 youth groups did in a week. So they had us start painting the floor. Pictured is Elizabeth and Megan putting a second coat on the floor.
More on this trip soon. Even though I can never tire of talking about it. Mission Trips are hard to talk about to people back home because there is no way to put into words to describe the transformation that happens.
They mostly look at you and say, “Oh. You painted some stuff and served food at a soup kitchen. That is nice.” It is so much more. That is why I would argue that anybody that is a believer should commit themselves to at least one act of service a year. Whatever, that might be. Putting up drywall for Habitat for Humanity. Serving dinner at the local homeless shelter. Anything you can do to help somebody else. I’m telling you, do it!
I should stop rambling, because there are quite a few blog subscriber birthdays today. I’ll go youngest to oldest:
I hope all of you have amazing birthdays!
I’ve thanked all these people in person, but I’d like to publicly thank everybody that helped out in some either small or big way with my birthday party on Saturday.
Big shout out to Scott for making tons of delicious mouth watering chicken and jalapeno cream corn. I only wish I would have had time to help do more than just brine the chicken. If I am so inclined to do this again next year and you are so inclined to help with the food next year, I will have to schedule this so I can be more hands on with the process. I may have been The Master, but Scott was undeniably the Smoker Master. I just can’t overstate how amazing the chicken was people.
Much love to Scott’s (better-other-less high maintenance) half for making the Pick and Pluck. If I would’ve thought of it, I would’ve bought several gallons of ice cold chocolate milk to knock down while setting up shop on that thing.
Thanks to Logan and Corinna for holding down the grill and making an assortment of hot dogs and sausages to compliment the mouth watering chicken. I don’t really have any photos of the event, perhaps next year I can talk him/them into doing some candid photography for the party.
I’m always able to count on Dae Hee when I need some assistance. He came over and helped put up the canopies for the outdoor dining area, the tent for an additional child area, moved all the chairs from the basement to the outdoors, and watched 2 hours of GAME OF THRONES. A pretty solid effort!
Thanks to Jason for loaning me his Cornhole set.
Thanks to Shannon for loaning me her canopies, although I’m still unclear where one gets tailgating tents that don’t have Iowa State colors. Or why a person would even want such a thing.
Thanks to Jesse for laminating the beverage identification signs.
Thanks to Teresa for helping out in various tasks before the party started.
Thanks to my Mom for making a copious amount of side dishes and desserts. Nobody went home hungry. That is for sure.
Finally, thanks to everybody that took time out of their lives to come visit me:
A special thanks to Dae Hee, Bethany, and Nora who came from Minnesota. Aunt Linda who came from Kansas. Stephanie who came all the way from Brooklyn. I guess I’m morally obligated to visit her in October now. Right?
Since I think that this party was a success on some level, I am tentatively planning on doing it again next year. Tentatively thinking about some time on Memorial Day Weekend next year. We’ll see how the cookie crumbles.
Now to the less than stellar news…
The Photo Booth was a success, but far from perfect. It turns out that the photo booth program I used has a painful little quirk. If the “Finish” button wasn’t pushed at the conclusion of the photo session, the program timed out and didn’t save the photo strip! The good news is that it did save the original images. The bad news is that there will be a night in my future where I’ll be piecing together photo strips from saved images. Yeah me!
For that reason, I did load up all the images into the party gallery. Not just the “finished” photo strips.
To see those images, click on the link below… (You can also download them by clicking on the down arrow icon.)
However, thought I would share a few of them here as well:
But the good news is that I now have a thousand different ways to improve the photo booth for next year. Tentatively.
This week being more of a challenging theme, it was expected that participation might take a dip. However, on the positive side, my nephew Logan became a first time contributor. I’m expecting big things from that guy in the future.
The submissions for SILHOUETTE:
But what is this week’s theme?!?!?
Look below this text…
A quick shout out to the Baier clan for providing the blocks for the Theme Release Image.
So what does that SHAPES mean? You could almost take a picture of anything and submit it and say “that has a shape”, however what you really want to look for is a subject or scene where a shape or shapes are heavy in the composition. A tile floor. A pile of pipes. A brick wall. A bunch of street signs. You get the idea.
However, define the theme any way that you want.
We haven’t went over the rules lately, so here is a quick refresher.
RULES
1. The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week.
2. Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by noon on the Monday of the challenge. It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.
That is it, them’s the rules.
Once again, no HOUSEKEEPING this week. I’ll try to do better next Monday.
All the Bennetts were actually here for Thanksgiving this year, so we had to get a picture!
It might be the last chance to get a picture like this for a bit. With Alexis leaving for the Navy. Elainie already in the Navy. Logan getting ready to graduate from Iowa State University. But hopefully it isn’t!
While I prefer the kind of party where a bunch of people show up at my house and do a bunch of work to my house, other people prefer parties where cake is served and people have polite conversation. Back in August we had such a party for my Grandma’s 90th birthday.
Here is a photo from that event:
Pictured are all of my Mom’s kids that could make it. Me, Logan, Teresa, Alexis, Carla, and Jason.
I wish I could remember who took this picture so they could get credit, but I can’t…
PARTICULARS
CAMERA: SONY SLT-A65V
FOCAL LENGTH: 20mm (30mm – 35mm equivalency)
ISO: 250
APERTURE: f/5.6
EXPOSURE: 1/60
DATE: 08/23/15 – 17:31
NO GPS DATA
Although I haven’t touched the real camera lately, I have sorta documented some stuff with my cruddy camera on my phone. Thought I would post some of those from the last few months. Remember, these are taken with a cruddy camera phone.
If you follow me on Instagram, you’ve already seen many of these. Feel free to carry on.
Our waiter at Pig Ate My Pizza. Carrying Naima’s favorite toy.
This was apropos of that weekend. I love John Cusack.
Naima had Willy protect her while we watched the ISU-Oklahoma game.
I still don’t think they’ve done anything about this building.
Dre’s Birthday. Watching a little March Madness.
Network Engineering Night at Welch Ave.
First birthday party I’ve been to that was on the grounds of a federal prison.
ISU Spring Game.
Confirmation Sunday with my Confirmation Mentee Mitchell.
Derek. Winner of this year’s Roundball Oracles.
Logan really enjoyed his first Adobe experience.
Jim. The last night of bowling. Ever.
Dinner with a member of the Illuminati.
Bulletin from Pastor Sarah’s amazing Superhero Sermon Series.
More soonish…
March Madness is once again upon us. That can mean only 1 thing! It is time for the Roundball Oracles to gather once again and make predictions about the outcome of the NCAA tournament.
I would actually like to start this by quoting the predictions I made about this year’s basketball season at the end of last year’s tournament:
I’m already excited for next years tournament. It is no secret that Iowa State is the rooting team of the grand majority of Oracles, with a few Hawkeye and Kansas fans sprinkled in to mix things up. Plus a few statistical anomalies, (like a UCLA fan) on top for garnish. I anticipate Iowa will actually join the tourney field again next year. Iowa State should have at least a fighting chance to get back to the dance as well. We lose a bunch, but some of the recruits coming in are heralded and I wouldn’t bet against Hoiberg going up against a Big 12 that I expect to be down next year. Plus don’t forget that Michigan will be getting a taste of Hilton Magic next year. 2013-14 should be another great season! Remember the name Monte Morris. I’m guessing you will know it very well next year.
Plus, Steve Alford will be choking at an entirely new school next year! What was UCLA thinking?
I will point out that at the time I wrote that, DeAndre Kane was not yet in the fold.
As always, basketball knowledge is not a prerequisite to participating. Every year when I look at the standings, I think basketball knowledge is actually a hindrance in this competition.
A few things to know that if you want to sign up this year and take a shot at putting your name on the list of the immortals:
1. You do not have to wager any money. The only thing you have to put on the line is pride. And as C.S. Lewis would tell you, pride is the greatest sin.
2. This competition is open to all ages (as long as they can make their own decisions), genders, and fan bases. Unfortunately more than a few of these titles have went home with Hawk fans.
3. There is a trophy for the winner. In fact, this year there might even be a traveling trophy that will go home with the winner for a calendar year. If said traveling trophy does come into existence, it will not be a bust of Kobe Bryant. The Roundball Oracles does not endorse ball-hoggery and low basketball IQs or mediocrity.
Here is a look at last year’s final standings:
Place | Competitor | Score | Correct | Champion | Last Year |
1. | William McAlpine | 266 | 39 | Louisville | 6th |
2. | Jason Stensland | 253 | 39 | Louisville | 8th |
3. | Jesse Howard | 251 | 40 | Louisville | 10th |
4. | Shawn Lockner | 247 | 39 | Michigan | 21st |
5. | Jon DeWaard | 242 | 38 | Louisville | 11th |
6. | Angie DeWaard | 236 | 36 | Louisville | 4th |
7. | Corey Faust | 234 | 38 | Indiana | 2nd |
8. | Mark Wolfram | 231 | 36 | Indiana | 7th |
9. | Jordan Toot | 218 | 36 | Louisville | 28th |
10. | Robert Henning | 208 | 36 | Indiana | 5th |
11. | Frank Meiners | 206 | 37 | Gonzaga | DNP |
11. | Logan Kahler | 206 | 38 | Kansas | DNP |
13. | Sean Clubine | 201 | 37 | Miami | DNP |
14. | Derrick Gorshe | 200 | 32 | Louisville | 12th |
15. | William Wentworth | 199 | 36 | Kansas | 15th |
16. | Jackson Faust | 197 | 35 | Gonzaga | 14th |
17. | Toby Sebring | 193 | 34 | Kansas | 26th |
18. | Brandon Kahler | 189 | 34 | Syracuse | 27th |
19. | Carrie Baier | 188 | 34 | Michigan State | 20th |
20. | Jen Ensley-Gorshe | 178 | 34 | Indiana | 18th |
21. | Elizabeth Nordeen | 176 | 32 | Iowa State | DNP |
22. | Tim Peterson | 174 | 33 | Miami | 16th |
23. | Dawn Krause | 173 | 33 | Duke | 9th |
24. | Jason Baier | 171 | 33 | Miami | 3rd |
24. | Russell Kennerly | 171 | 33 | Indiana | 22nd |
26. | Michelle Haupt | 170 | 32 | Ohio State | DNP |
27. | Becky Perkovich | 166 | 32 | Ohio State | 29th |
28. | Andree Jauhari | 165 | 32 | Kansas | DNP |
29. | JJ Baier | 163 | 30 | Ohio State | DNP |
29. | Nader Parsaei | 163 | 32 | UCLA | 13th |
31. | Michael Augustin | 157 | 32 | Indiana | 19th |
32. | Ben Baier | 156 | 26 | Butler | DNP |
33. | Your Humble Narrator | 139 | 28 | Miami | 25th |
34. | Will Baier | 121 | 14 | La Salle | DNP |
Roundball Oracles Champions
Sold yet?
You are? Just write me and let me know that you want in (I’m a fairly easy person to contact) and I’ll send you out all the information that you will need to participate with all due haste!
The deadline for entering your bracket is the tip-off of the first game on Thursday morning. So if you suffer from being a Hawkeye fan, you’ll will know whether or not your team made the real tournament by then. Not sure why you would care, but to each their own.
Good luck to all the oracles and GO STATE!!!
Almost halfway done!
Day 179: Where You Slept – Or where I wish I could…
The next 7 themes:
Day 183: You
Day 184: Celebrate
Day 185: Lunch
Day 186: Begins with G
Day 187: My Town
Day 188: Words to Live By
Day 189: Found
The themes for January:
1. Lunch
2. Begins with G
3. My Town
4. Words to Live By
5. Found
6. Happens Everyday
7. Upside Down
8. Lucky Number
9. Natural
10. Manmade
11. Looking Down
12. Colorful
13. Makes Me Smile
14. 3 Things
15. Black & White
16. Sun
17. Tiny
18. Happy Place
19. Breakfast
20. To Do List
21. Blue
22. Nice!
23. Bedtime
24. Your Space
25. A Taste of Winter
26. Fun Stuff!
27. Something I Brought
28. Dinner
29. Window
30. Best Invention Ever
31. Polka Dot