Placerville, California

 This is the neighborhood we pulled into on Wednesday

evening... we wondered what our house would look like!

 Beautiful fall colors!

 Home Sweet Home! :-)

 View from the balcony upstairs

 Hi, Pastor Labins & Thomas! :-)

 I get "the blue room" this week :-)

 Verse above my bed

 Crystal's room... she got the "pink room"... so fitting! ;-)

 The verse above her bed

 They even have an intercom system throughout the

house.  We both had one in our rooms :-)

 Pretty awesome staircase!

 The view going to church everyday!

 This building that the church now meets in used

to be a grill & bar!  Much better use now :-)

 We went to the pastor's house on Thursday afternoon

for lunch.  Can you see the deer in the neighbors' yard?

 For you, Amanda! :-)

We enjoyed a hotdog cookout! :-)

Crystal looking a bit smug.. nothing too new! ;-)

Matt found a lizard outside pastor's house...

here it is for you, Dave! :-)

 Pastor Labins & his family...

L to R:  Mark, Katie, Pastor & Mrs. Labins, and Matt

 We went to Mrs. Brownings' house on Thursday night

for supper.  This church goes all out to treat us well!

 L to R:  Mrs. Labins, Mrs. Johnson (who we're staying

with this week), Matt, Elly (daughter of Mrs. Johnson),

and Katie, the pastor's daughter.

 Dr. Jim & Mrs. Van with our hostesses

 L to R:  Pastor Labins, Mr. Sears,

Dillian (Mr. Sears' son), and Matt

 The guys were asked to serenade us :-)

They really sound great together!

 Our hostess was also born at St. Joseph's Hospital

right by Ann Arbor and lived in Ann Arbor growing up!

 Back at pastor's house for a "breakfast lunch" on Friday.

Grammie and Matt enjoyed talking on the veranda :-)

 Net Caster's with Miss Crystal...

doesn't this look red neckish?!

 Janna studying for her test outside.

 Saturday night of the War

It was so awesome what the Lord did this week

in our recruiting efforts!  I think by the end of

our recruiting time we had a total of 365 numbers!

DJ and Matt both reached their goal of 100, and

even exceeded it!  It was a huge victory for us!

It was awesome how the Lord opened up the

door for us to recruit on Friday night at some

nearby football games.  DJ, Mark (the pastor's son),

Thomas, and I went to Ponderosa, a nearby high

school, to recruit their football game.  We were

nervous going into it, but it was so awesome

to see how the Lord delivered!  In the line on

the way in, I started a conversation with a couple

of teens that were behind me in line.  I was talking

about how I was from Michigan, and they asked why

I was there.  Perfect opening opportunity! :-)  It was

great!  I ended up talking to them and the group

that they were with most of the night.

While I was in the stadium I was talking to a couple

girls and a security guard walked up.  I thought for

sure he'd probably kick me out, but instead, he said

to the girl that I was talking to, "You need to go

to that!"  I don't even know that he knew for sure

what it was!  It was awesome, though!

I ended up recruiting about 16 from the football

game and DJ got about 50!  It was so encouraging

to us how the Lord worked and the liberty He gave!

 Saturday night we had about 30 teens... 

not too bad, but it could be better :-)

Quite a few were from other churches too...

"Short-Range Bombardment" in the alley :-)

 

 Sunday school classes...

Matt took the teen guys and Crystal and I took the teen

girls.  Do you think Matt likes to preach?? ;-)

 Mrs. Johnson missed the girls playing on Sunday

morning because she was in the nursery, so she

asked for them to play again.  They did and then

Thomas joined in to play the Bach Double with them! :-)

 Mexican restaurant for lunch! :-)

Janna eating lemons.. Thomas probably tried it too! ;-)

 Pastor Labins talking with the girls

 Social Butterflies... :-)

Actually, they were texting recruits, I think, so we'll forgive them!

 It was her birthday, so we celebrated it with

an apple pie from McDonald's! :-)

 Sunday night War

It was awesome!  I think we had over 40.. almost 50 teens!

We had a lot of recruits come in!  I think over 20 were recruits!

Serena came, one of the girl's I'd recruited from the football game!

And Cody, a kid I'd recruited at the skate park,
came with three of his friends!  It's so exciting
and encouraging to see my recruits show up!

 Mr. Sears holding down the ropes :-)

 DJ, Mr. Sears' son, got injured during the Big
Ball Basketball on Sunday night and had to go
to the emergency room.

 He came back, though, and was ready
to go at it again.. maybe the medication? ;-)
They had to cut his Rangers' shirt off of
him, but he still tried wearing it... what
a loyal team member! :-)

 All-Star Baseball in the alley

 

Miss Crystal with the girls :-)

 Katie helping out with the food!

This church was a great team that worked together!

 

 I did the "Dinner Decisions" skit, and

I got pretty soaked by DJ!

 On Sunday night, as we were meeting with

the Vans after that night's War, I looked

over to see this... Thomas eating lemon cake

with a key!  Oh my starz!  Now, that's redneck! ;-)

 You could find these cute little frogs all around the church! :-)

Monday night War, the final night

They did the War in a nearby park because

they needed grass for Spoke Tackle and Tube Tug and 

then they came back to the church for pizza and the service.

Enjoying pizza outside

 

It was so awesome to see final total of 6 of my

recruits show up this week... Serena, Cody, Joey,

Rachel, Lexi, and Sara!  And they brought friends

with them too!  As far as I know Joey, Rachel,

Lexi (their friend, Hannah), and Cody (and his three

friends) all made salvation decisions this week!

Praise the Lord for the great things that HE has done!