What I did over “Summer Vacation” . . . .month 1
Wow It has been a while since my last post! It has been a pretty busy summer. School started this past week for most students all across the US of A. I remember that first day back to school. Everyone wanted to know what you did that summer. My homeroom teacher in 6th grade even made it an assignment to give a speech on what we did over “Summer Vacation.”
Well, this past summer has been fun, but not much of a Vacation. Let’s see. . .I guess summer started off with VBS at church. I filled my role as technerd and ran the computer and sound systems. I actually really enjoy running the tech end of things. It allows me to realize how crippled our worship services would be without capable people running the sound, TV, and computer systems each week! It was a pretty fun week, and Lucy had a blast at her first VBS at FBC Olney!
The following wednesday was a pretty awesome day for me. I won an iPhone 3GS from trackle.com! I know what you are saying, i’m lucky and all, bust seriously I don’t win anything and this was a pretty exciting thing for me to win!! I actually had saved up money from Christmas and Birthday gifts to get the new iphone, but since I won it I used that money to pay for the data plan.
Later that week I had the opportunity to preach my cousin Amanda’s wedding. It was a great time and really awesome to see family. The whole Toller clan set up shop in the conference room of the hotel. It was pretty funny cause me and dad had our macs out and then Wes, April and Chris took there “inferior” computers out and started surfing the web and twittering the day away. We also were able to eat Chic-fi-la TWO TIMES!!! Back to the wedding though. . . .What an honor and privilege to be able to be a part of joining two families together! This being my first wedding to preach I was a little nervous but everything came together and God gave me the words to say! Thank you Amanda and Steven for letting me be a part of your special day! One funny thing about the wedding. My cousin Amanda is a Toller and her now husband Steven’s last name is Michael. So I, Michael Toller officiated the Toller – Michael Wedding. Let it soak a while you will get it eventually!
My sister Bekah came home with us after the wedding and stayed for over a month. We really enjoyed spending time with Bekah, and she was such a huge help with Lucy while she was here! The picture to the left is us at a The Jalapeno Tree in Wichita Falls. It was a pretty good restaurant. I will say one thing though, taking care of a teenager is sooooo much more different than a toddler. Lucy is a little more tidey than Bekah (HA!) Actually, it was just a change from a little toddler asking to play tea party to a teenager wanting to go hang out with BOYS!
Bekah made friends so easy here in Olney. She became great friends with our neighbor Katie (who she roomed with at FUGE more on FUGE and Katie later) and a young man, Zach Mayers from our youth group. If it was any other boy in Olney I probably wouldn’t have let Bekah hang out with him, but Zach is a good kid and I think he fears me enough not to do anything stupid! (HAHA!)Lucy started calling Bekah “Bubba” which is pretty funny since that is what Bekah called me when she was a little girl.
While Bekah was here she came to Centrifuge Youth Camp with our youth ministry at FBC Olney. I also went as a Chaperone which was pretty awesome since I normally have been the “in charge” person for camp. It was refreshing to not have to “be in charge” THANKS CARTER!
Centrifuge was held at Glorieta Baptist Conference Center in Glorieta, New Mexico. Glorieta is such a beautiful place. Surrounded by Mountains and crisp mountain air, it is a perfect place to meet with God and worship Him! The worship leader was Todd Agnew, who was amazing! As a worship leader it is hard for me to just sit back and worship (I guess this is because I’m so used to leading), but Todd really set the stage for everyone to have a freedom in worship at camp and I was so thankful for this. Ben Stuart was the camp pastor for the week and let me tell you. . .he brought it! He is such a gifted speaker! He brings a very intellectual message with a great humor and personal stories that you can relate to. You can download his free podcast on itunes here. It was such a great renewal time for me. I hope next year PB and Lucy can come with so they can experience the beautiful landscape of Glorieta, and the awesome worship time of FUGE! You can check out our camp blog, pictures, and videos of FUGE 2009 here. I was also glad to be able to spend some time with my sister at camp. I think this was her first real “camp” experience with a church group! She roomed with a girl named Katie (I mentioned her earlier) who ends up being one of our neighbors from across the street! Katie has become a great friend of ours as well and I’ll be talking about her more later.
Well, believe it or not that was just the first month of Summer! June was pretty packed, but not as packed as July and August. I will post parts 2 and 3 next week! Hope you enjoy!
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