Week 4 - Recap

Week four (6/24-6/30/12) was a pretty epic week.

It started with our first Forefront BROOKLYN campus Preview Service. The full Brooklyn Campus will be opening in September, but to generate interest and get our name into the community. We are also having a lot of community building events throughout the summer as well. I got to help set up the Children's Ministry for the church, including getting the necessarily equipment and setting up the room. A lovely volunteer, Heather, and I got the lesson ready and we had a great time with the kids, teaching them about Noah's Ark. It was great because I really felt in tune with my mission to reach kids in the New York/Brooklyn area. Best service yet!

A really awesome CRAZY thing was that one of the girls, Co-Co, who was in my Sunday School class back in Joplin was there!! Her dad works for the church planting company that helped plant Forefront (they also help plant churches all over the world) and the whole family is in New York for the summer!!

After church Michelle and I went to explore SoHo. It was fun, though there weren't enough SoHo Hipster stuff for Michelle! Although I did find a SUPER hipster shop that sold One Piece Shirts! (One Piece is a Japanese Anime that my best friend, Brandon, and I love). I think it's hilarious because it is the cool thing to do now is to wear Anime and Geek clothing, even if you don't know what it is. But hey, I'm not going to dis it, because it means I have access to A LOT more geek clothes than I normally would!

Michelle took me to the very corner of China Town, since I hadn't been there yet. She wanted me to get to see one of the "Purse Guys". It was SO sketch!! (fyi - 'sketch' is a slang word used to describe something that is on the brink of being scary/dangerous/generally bad) Michelle went up to the man with a big bag, which was just a sheet, obviously filled with purses. She asked to look at them. But then we saw police lights, and he was like, "Hold on". I looked down the street toward the cop car. The street looked pretty normal. The cop car pulled away, and Michelle told me to look again, and in those 2 second I wasn't looking the entire sidewalk filled up with the men with big sheet bags! It was crazy.

Michelle, Lili and I went to get Frozen
Yougurt on a STICK!

After the dip into China Town we met up with Lili and went to eat a late lunch in Little Italy. I LOVE Little Italy. It is so cute! Just a long road completely dedicated to truly Italian restaurants. We picked a cute place that we noticed gave out free bread (we are college kids after all). It was very yummy. Then Kait called and we decided to go to the Newsies to put out name in the Lottery. Broadway Lottery's are awesome. You put your name in a bowl, and they draw out about 20 names and each person gets to buy 2 $30 tickets! Way cheaper than normal ticket prices! Sad news is that when we got there, they weren't doing another lottery. So we decided to Google what was going on for free.

We ended up going to wait 5 hours to see a free showing of the Upright Citizens Brigade, an improv show that usually has NBC stars there, specifically Saturday Night Live stars. We had a lot of fun in line. We played an intense game of Spades, and got to know a girl sitting near us in line. The show was worth the wait, though there were no SNL people there that night. There was however 2 people from 30 Rock and 1 from Community, plus my personal favorite Lennon Parham one of the writers and stars of Best Friends Forever, which sadly got canceled!


That week I got to go to dinner with my Aunt Missy who was in town, my cousin's Alix and Jordan and Alix's sister and boyfriend. It was a really great night! It's still crazy that I live in the same city as 3 of my cousins! I wish we got to see each other more often!! And I hadn't seen my Aunt for like 10 years! She lives not too far, so I can foresee a road trip with Alix, Sam and Jordan out there!


That week at work was really fun. I got to organize a middle/high school overnighter, which we called INSOMNIA. So I spent most of the work week getting the games ready and buying supplies! It was fun. Michelle and I went all around the city getting very random things, which you can see from our shopping list! It was a work intensive week, but that was what I needed. I like working! I particularly love the view I have when I go to the Tea Shop right next to the office to work. I love New York!

This week ended with a Family Picnic/Field Day in Prospect Park for the Brooklyn families of Forefront. Heather and I organized a LOT of games for the kids, and we only ended up having 3! But they sure got spoiled! I painted all of their faces, and had time to be very detailed on the Butterfly, Cat and Bunny! It was a beautiful day and a lot of adults came. We played games, and everyone had brought their dogs. My landlords, Mike and Mira, brought Adam, their German Shepard. He is so much fun!!