VBS 2013 - Kingdom Rock

I respectfully ask that you not pin pictures of my children to Pinterest. Thank you!

Our church's VBS was all about knights, ladies, castles, and standing strong for God! It was such a fun theme to decorate and participate in! Even cooler, it's the perfect lead in for our homeschool curriculum this year when we go through the Middle Ages. It took a couple months to prep all the decor but we had a great set-up team and things came together very well.
We had a record number of kids this year but the leaders made it through the week and we had enough supplies. :) Here are a ton of pics of our set-up:
The royal throne

 The throne room (where we met for our opening and closing sessions as well as the elementary crew Bible lessons.)

 The portcullis entry into the throne room

 The preschool classroom

 the long castle gallery

Our resident knight I painted using my 'paint by numbers' projector method

and fair maiden

and the jester

 Chadder's theater

 The King's Kitchen

My young squire and maiden helping me to lead the singing

I made my costumes this year. The green corset only took 5 tries to get it right. Ugh! The red dress took a few attempts to get the zipper right too. They turned out okay in the end. However, I'm hoping next year's theme will allow me to just buy an outfit. :)

Craft time

Sir Wally was part of the cast each knight. The kids absolutely loved him!

 Entering the castle over the drawbridge

and the craft tent

 

It was a great week but totally exhausting. Which is why it's taken me two months to get around to even post pics. We've already been talking about next year... I just might need another month or two to recover!

God is bigger than the storm...

A few songs keep running through my head while we are beginning to see the effects of Hurricane Sandy.

A Shelter in the Time of Storm

The Lord’s our Rock, in Him we hide,
A Shelter in the time of storm;
Secure whatever ill betide,
A Shelter in the time of storm.

A shade by day, defense by night,
A Shelter in the time of storm;
No fears alarm, no foes afright,
A Shelter in the time of storm.

The raging storms may round us beat,
A Shelter in the time of storm
We’ll never leave our safe retreat,
A Shelter in the time of storm.

O Rock divine, O Refuge dear,
A Shelter in the time of storm;
Be Thou our Helper ever near,
A Shelter in the time of storm.

Chorus: Oh, Jesus is a Rock in a weary land,
A weary land, a weary land;
Oh, Jesus is a Rock in a weary land,
A Shelter in the time of storm.



And God Will Take Care of You 
Be not dismayed whate’er betide,
God will take care of you;
Beneath His wings of love abide,
God will take care of you. 

Through days of toil when heart doth fail,
God will take care of you;
When dangers fierce your path assail,
God will take care of you.

All you may need He will provide,
God will take care of you;
Nothing you ask will be denied,
God will take care of you.

No matter what may be the test,
God will take care of you;
Lean, weary one, upon His breast,
God will take care of you.

Refrain: God will take care of you,
Through every day, o’er all the way;
He will take care of you,
God will take care of you.

Birds + Music = DIY Art

I saw these great graphics that used a text background with black and white images on another blog. I was totally inspired to create my own and knew just the spot that needed a little something. We added these cabinets in our kitchen to create a pantry of sorts. We have a breakfast cabinet, a snack/baking/dinner items cabinet, and a canned goods/cookbook cabinet. For the time being, we're keeping the paneling and in the hopefully not too distant future, we'll add a countertop on this wall. So the little space below the cabinets just cried out for some attention and dressing up.

Using the Serenade Cricut Cartridge, I cut a bird cage, bird nest, and 2 different bird shapes out of black cardstock. I cut 2 little eggs out of a scrap of some Basic Gray scrapbook paper. Then using the Stamped font cartridge, I cut the letters for 'Rest', 'Sing', 'Soar', and 'Fly.'
I really liked the text backgrounds in the Winterberry Cottage graphics but being a musician (and having a damaged hymnal in my craft stash that I felt okay with dismantling) I decided to use some favorite hymns instead.

I tried to match the hymn with the word and came up with "I Am Thine, O Lord" for 'Fly,' "What If It Were Today?" for 'Soar,' "Under His Wings" for 'Rest,' and "I'll Sing the Wondrous Story" for 'Sing.'

The last step was to glue it all together and pop them into these little frames we used in our family room in the last house but were in my stash to be repurposed since we moved.

 

Well, the last 'last' step was to get the hubs to fix the phone cord that hung down like this for the first 5 months we've been in this house. Down the road we might add an outlet for the phone in another location so the cord won't have to run down the wall but for now we went from this....

...to this. Definitely less obnoxious!

And now I can cross one more project off the to-do list!

Linking up to these fun parties! Come check 'em out!!

Wherever You Are

This morning, I had the great privilege of singing with 2 dear friends. (I begged them to sing this song with me and they agreed!) This was the last week Tom will be on stage and the last time for a long while that I'll get to sing with him. Next Sunday, the Fords will be around and then they're off to China for 2 years. This song, sung by The Martins, has always been a favorite and was quite appropriate for different things that we are each going through right now. I'm thrilled I could sing it with Tom and Sharon!