Hey all =)

So I have slightly been falling behind on blogging because I’ve been quite busy this last week with my Progress of Redemption project, having to finish my bible study assignment and doing ministry, but I am blogging now so it’s all good. Right now I am sitting in a café with Cameron; she and I decided to go back into Geraldine after church, while most everyone else went to hang out at Waihi Gorge.
So this is what been going on in the last week here in New Zealand:

Mud Masks
Kelsey’s mom sent her these chocolate mud masks for your face in the mail and all the girls decided that we would use them one night. After we put it on we pretty much looked like we were black because the mask was so thick. We went downstairs to see how the guys would react and they thought it was hilarious just because they didn’t expect it at all haha

Waihi Gorge
That same night Kelsey, Amber, Sheryl, Adam and I went up to the gorge around 10 PM. It was really dark and we could barely tell where we were going. We eventually found the stream and we were walking across it using rocks as stepping stones. The water was absolutely freezing and I got stuck out in the middle of the water. Adam was walking by through the water and I asked him to give me a piggyback ride to the other side so I wouldn’t have to freeze my feet off again. As he was walking back with me he stepped on a loose rock and we both fell completely into the water. We were soaking wet, but at least when your whole body is wet the water isn’t quite as freezing.

Farmer’s Market, Holland & Accordions
The next day (on Saturday morning) we biked to the local farmers market and they had so much good, fresh food. Cameron and I bought some fresh strawberries and raspberries to take home. While we were there Louise from Church (who had invited us to her house for lunch after church last weekend) invited 7 of us from The Crossing to come on a picnic to Peel Forest after church tomorrow. Then Cam and I were walking around this free museum and we were talking to the owner for about half an hour, he was a nice older guy from Holland with some interesting stories. Throughout the last week we also had this guy named Ira staying at The Crossing, he was a student here last semester and he was working at the Te Mapua camp when we volunteered there in October. As Cam and I were walking through town Ira was sitting on the street corner playing his accordion for some money, he’s a very quirky guy haha, but he’s a lot of fun.

Peel Forest
After church last Sunday Louise took Cameron, Michael, Jordan, Jonas, Adam, Angela and I to Peel Forest. It was about a ½ hour drive, it was this really scenic forest right near the base of some mountains. We went on a short nature hike up to this big tree, hung out with the family and then had a picnic. Then we went and drove another 5 minutes to get to this gorgeous little church. It wasn’t the right time of year, but normally the church is surrounded by lilies everywhere you look. The church was from 1836 and it has these beautiful stained glassed windows inside. It was quite lovely to say the least.

October 31
We didn’t really celebrate Halloween here because it has a more negative connotation. But we still had some fun activities. A bunch of people from The Crossing went to volunteer at “The Light Party”, an alternative for kids to celebrate something on Halloween. After that we had a pumpkin carving contest while Cameron, Joseph, Sheryl and I made caramel popcorn balls in the kitchen. They were delicious. Then a bunch of people started playing this ridiculous hide and seek tag game, they almost took people out when they were running through the house.

Family Night
We had family night again, as we do every second Tuesday (where the students are split up into two groups and go to different places). It was really good, our group stayed at the crossing played some volleyball, played Balderdash and then had a campfire. While we were playing Balderdash Sheryl (the cook) made us this really interesting dessert by combining some leftovers. She took some pancakes drizzled them in caramel and then put blueberries on top. It was delicious.

Puppet show
Kelsey and I presented our Progress of Redemption project (overview of the bible in relation to God’s plan) in the form of a puppet show on Thursday last week. Our puppet was more.... humorous than serious haha. Our puppets were not necessarily what they would’ve looked like back then (i.e. we had a group of girls represented through Disney princesses), but the information was correct. It was fun and everyone seemed to think it was funny so that’s good.

Kris Banes
Our teacher this last week was a guy named Kris Banes, and he was really good. Haha I think all our lecturers are really good though. He is originally from England so he had an English accent. He taught us through the book of Colossians and Jonah. Colossians is the most Christ centered book in the bible, it warns us about the dangers of legalism and focuses not on what we do, but rather on what Christ did. He also taught us about the book of Jonah which is one of my favorite books now.

Hayden Johns & Werner Schreiber
Hayden, who is from the Capernwray on the north island in NZ, came in to teach us about making bible studies and emphasized the point of thinking for ourselves and not just being spoon fed answers. He questioned on us why we believe the things we do and how we back that up, he was really interesting. Werner (who taught the first week) came back and taught us through the book of Ephesians, he’s always a lot of fun to have around, he is very quirky as well

Mud Pits & Mary Kay
So last Friday night we kind of had another guys and girls night. All the guys stayed at The Crossing and did some mud wrestling; it was quite funny they made this giant mud pit on the outskirts of our property. While they were in the mud pit Joseph got this huge gouge in his leg and James found this really thick broken glass which is probably what caused Joseph’s wound. After that they did this jousting thing, which I don’t even really know what it was, and then they watched The Italian Job. All the girls went over to Patti’s and of course she had a bunch of delicious baking. We had a big Mary Kay night with a bunch of other ladies from the community. The Mary Kay person here has so much more than what I’ve seen at home, it was cool. We basically just hung out and then watched a movie and slept over at Patti’s. The next morning we had the most delicious baked French toast ever.

Timaru
The next morning after our French toast breakfast Sheryl, Hanna, Cameron and I went into a town called Timaru about ½ hour away from us and got some shopping down. It is a really nice little town with some good shopping and an ocean view. We all decided to go to this Thai restaurant for lunch which was also quite good.

The Beach
Bryan’s good friend named Stephen from Canada just moved to New Zealand for 6 months a week ago and he lives about an hour away from us. He decided to come stay at the crossing for the weekend to see Bryan and meet some of us. He has his own car so on Saturday night Amber, Kelsey, Cameron, Bryan and I went with him to the beach about 20 minutes away. The beach was absolutely lovely that night to see the sunset off into the mountains. We stayed there for a couple hours and talked with some random people who were fishing on the beach. A lot of people always seem to be fishing at that beach.

Concert
Just yesterday on Sunday we had Kris Banes come back to The Crossing for a piano concert, as he is a musician. We invited a bunch of people from the community to come and listen to him play. He was really good, he played a bunch of hymns and told us the stories behind how the hymns were written, which makes the songs so much more powerful.

Present Day
So that’s a little bit of what’s been going on for the last week or so. This week we have the local pastor Ian Hyslop teaching us through the book of Exodus, but only until Thursday. This week we have a travel weekend where all the students leave from Thursday to Sunday to travel somewhere in New Zealand. So I am going with Cameron, Angela, Bryan, Robert, Colin, Jordan and Stephen to an Oceanside town 2 hours-ish away called Akaroa, which is where I will also turn 18 this Saturday =)

Thanks to Ellen & Rod and Aunty Bup & Ted for the birthday cards you sent, I appreciate it!

I probably won’t blog again for another week or two because I’ve got travel weekend coming up and I have an assignment to finish this week.

Much Love
Cara Lee