Midtown Friends is Dreaming of an Orange Christmas! In a movement to fight slavery, we are giving slave-free, handmade gifts for Christmas! In the months of November and December, Midtown Friends will be hosting a space to create handmade gifts before services every Sunday. Tune in for more info!
So I was tasked with creating a menu for 75 people under $300 for our Easter party at our new location and I totally did it! Well, mostly... A few on the items are being donated...
Went to visit our new Sunday meeting space today and it is so awesome! It's really hip and the owner (?) Brandon was really cool about Cohen coming in with Becky and I... There was a news crew there interviewing people about co-working and we took "hip" pictures for the Midtown website :). I am really excited for the chance to go in with Becky during the week. I am going to start working on generating some funds for Midtown. I am taking up a challenge to get our tithe matched through some sponsors... Since the community we are reaching out to is filled with artists, students, and a lot of other people who tend not to make much money, the incoming tithe is pretty meager... Becky and I spoke about starting a Community Etsy to rasie some funds, which I really like the idea of since the thought of starting an Etsy and supplying it only with items I make is daunting. I did volunteer to take on the responsibility of managing it and shipping stuff... Hopefully that will start soon :) Exciting stuff!
I told myself I would keep on blogging after Motherhood struck me, but yeah, that's pretty naive of me... In recent news, our church got in at the Urban Hive!!! This is really exciting news, I get to co-work with Nanny Goats In Panties and Midlife Bloggers... I. am. so. psyched! I am adjusting back to being an active part of our community with Cohen in tow... It is great to hang out with my new pals, still working on balancing new friends and old friends, I keep singing the old girl scout song "Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other's gold" to Cohen, but I think I am really singing it to myself... I miss Gracie and Karen and Xica and Ashley... I have also been going through a bout of homesickness after a month in LA... I know we can afford to live down there, but I really miss my Mom and Dad, Brothers, Sis-in-law, and my sweet Niece and Nephew... I want Cohen to grow up with them... I know God has a plan for us, and I hope it includes us all living near each other, but I wish it was now... In other news, I have eaten some great food this week: Amazing BLT's a la Spanglish (so good I am going to have them again tonight for dinner with our proximity group) and Goat cheese, pistachio, and orange salad with Blush wine vinaigrette fashioned after a salad I really like at Matteo's... Well that's all I have time for, Cohen is stirring!
So every time I have something amazingly awesome to blog about, I seem to forget that I keep a digi cam in my behemoth big mama purse to snap some shots of said awesome blog fodder... So my words will have to do for now :)
Last night, my friends and I had a Break-fast party... We had been fasting from specific things for the entire month of September to focus on our launch service (which you can check out here). Toby fasted from video games, Becky fasted from watching anything involving sarcastic humor (ie: Jon Stewart, Arrested Development, The Office), and I gave up refined sugar (because I had slightly elevated glucose levels and decided to give up something a little more than soda or candy)... I didn't think mine would be as hard as it was, because I am not really a sugar hound, but I didn't think of all the small things like Soy Chai's, Carmel Apple Cider's, and fro-yo... It was much harder than I imagined... Because I couldn't have them, pastries started invading my dreams... Donuts, Fritters, Funnel Cake... It was sick...
But anyway, last night we indulged in the things we fasted from together... And ate Breakfast for Dinner (or Brinner, as Frank likes to call it), consisting of Pancakes, Applewood Smoked Bacon, and Scrambled Eggs... Being the almost 8 month pregnant woman that I am, I also served up a nice 7 layer bean dip because I was craving it... Vicki also made Veggie soup as an appetizer and a bowl of Candy Corn was passed around too :)... It was quite a random meal lol... When we were done stuffing our faces, we busted out our dusty Rockband set and played some Beatles Rockband for a good couple of hours :)... Vicki and Frank kept debating what grades they were in when certain albums came out and we all had a blast singing and rocking out together :)...
Tonight I got the opportunity to join the fantastic Margret of Nanny Goats in Panties, her niece, who is a fellow WoW player and Horde girl :), and Jane of MidLife Bloggers in screening Clive Owen's latest film, "The Boys Are Back" at Downtown Plaza (or DTP as we like to refer to it as)...
Yesterday we had church in the park and a "Grand Opening" style picnic... It was not warm by any means, but we managed :)...
We had art to look at
and stuff to make art laid out, a drum circle, and fair trade coffee and chocolate tastings :)...
We BBQ'd for about 65-70 people and somehow, even though we used all our meat (and meat substitutes), everyone seemed to get fed...
The music went well, and despite our worst fears, the generator stayed on through the whole service... The stories that were told really touched some hearts
as did the reverb (Becky's sermon)...
We may not see the fruit of this labor right away, but there were some real conversations had with real people seeking something to fill the void in their lives and Lord willing, they will find a home at Midtown with us :)...
This was our "Communal" art piece that really came together well I think... I had a lot of fun working on it with Becky and it turned out pretty much how we envisioned it :) Thanks to everyone who prayed for us!
