Adventures in Character.... Homeschool Convention

Hey everyone!  Can you believe that this is my fourth post in four days????  While I normally do not post this close together, so much has been happening lately that I really want to try to catch the blog up with everything.  This post takes place back on the first weekend of June.  For the past seven years I have enjoyed teaching in the children's program, Adventures in Character (AIC for short), at the local homeschool convention.  I love working with kids so it was always a time of year I have looked forward to.  Last year though, as I was teaching I felt the Lord telling me that it was my last year to teach in AIC.  While I was a little sad at the thought, I was thankful God had prepared me ahead of time and I just enjoyed treasuring all of the lasts that were taking place.  This past December the staff of AIC contacted me and asked me to come on staff as the student workbook designer.  I was quite surprised, but agreed to pray about it.  After spending several weeks in prayer I agreed to join staff, and I am glad I did.  I really enjoyed designing the student workbooks.  I had never done a project like this before and found it to be quite enjoyable.

Every Thursday for the month of May there are teacher training sessions everyone attends.  It was at the first session I met a girl around fifteen.  I really enjoyed getting to know her, and it was so neat because God gave me the opportunity to share with her what He has done in my life.  I have really been praying lately that God would give me opportunities to share what He has done in my life with others in a way that can be used to help or encourage them.  This was one of those opportunities and I really enjoyed it.  Talking with her has actually inspired me for a future blog series I hope to do.

The Thursday before the convention I went up early in the morning to help set up the area that would be used for the convention.  Mom and Jacqueline were so sweet and came up to bring me a snack and some supplies I had left at home.  After all of the work, the convention began the next day.

In my uniform ready to leave for the convention hall.

The first day of the convention was fun, but I quickly began finding myself missing the constant interaction with the kids.  However,  the time was not wasted as it was the perfect opportunity to go over James from The Challenge.  Mom came up for lunch and we had fun having a picnic with the friend I had made and her family.  We really enjoyed talking and were almost late getting back because we had lost track of time!

Over dinner break I had fun going shopping and found my favorite booth, the YWAM booth.  This has always been my favorite booth, in fact, it is at this booth where I spend most of my time when shopping at the convention.  I love their missionary books and have read them so many times.  This time though I enjoyed getting in a conversation with the man who ran the booth and discovered that he knew the missionary from one of favorite book, Totally Surrounded!!!  I was so excited to discover this and greatly enjoyed getting to learn more about her from him, this became one of the highlights of my weekend.

Come the second day though, it was getting harder to watch everyone else work with the kids while I did not have the interaction with them that the teachers were having.  God already had plans to help with this though.  :-)  On Thursday while setting up I had met a little girl named Amirah that had been my little helper.  I had not really seen her on Friday, but she came and found me on Saturday and I enjoyed getting to take care of her the whole day!  Her parents had not enrolled her in AIC so I had fun playing with her and letting her help me.  She helped me so much since I had been missing the interaction with the kids so badly. 

Amirah with me.  :-)

I really enjoyed AIC this year, even though it was a different set up.  While I missed teaching, I really enjoyed getting to spend one on one time with Amirah.  God had worked out the details so that I still got to be involved in a child's life, just in a different way than in the past.  It was also so exciting to learn more about a missionary whom I greatly respect and look up to.
Have a blessed week everyone!
Michelle