Mid-year Retreat Funness!!

Our mid-year retreat was held in beautiful Denver, CO. We all gathered (in person and through skype) on Thursday to begin our retreat. Stefanie and Tony's homework for all of the volunteers was to tell our stories using 5 criteria we had been given ahead of time, but also to be creative. Everyone did a wonderful job of creatively sharing their story especially when it came to using each of our 5 senses during the presentation.

After everyone had shared, we came together to talk about our collective story. It was incredible how many of us had gone through the exact same roller coaster of emotions without realizing everyone was feeling many of the same emotions. I think this realization brought our group even closer and helped us all to feel not so alone in our community life and ministry. We were also given the task to write our collective story in a short paragraph and were given a very limited amount of time to do so. This proved to be a little challenging, especially trying to make sure that everyone was being heard including the NY girls, but we were able to push through and come up with a short paragraph about our time so far as Dominican Volunteers (at the end of this blog entry.

As the retreat came to an end, it was hard to see everyone scatter to many different parts of the country, but comforting to know we would be together soon enough for our end of the year retreat. The retreat was a great time to come back to our ministry sites refreshed and energetic!

*I want to especially thank Tony and Stefanie for all they do for the DVUSA. There is no way that my year, and I am sure the same is for the other volunteers, would be as life changing if the two of you were not part of it. You do so much behind the scenes work and as much as some of us complained about sharing our stories, I think we all had a great time listening to one another! Thanks a bunch!!!*

"We have learned that we need personal time and time with others as well as that personalities can change. We can see God's power in our lives and the need to trust God's will. We learned that faith is diverse within intergenerational relationships. We have struggled with communication with both those we serve and within the communities we live.

We have experienced challenges concerning trusting the Holy Spirit and patience. We have also experienced growth in self and relational knowledge, new things, trust, and vulnerability."

Un-invited Friday excitement

Today at lunchtime another Teacher Assistant (TA) and I were with the kids, instead of the usual 3 people. We were on a trip to the bathroom before sitting the kids down to eat and then nap. As I was making sure that the boys were washing their hands and behaving one of them yells "Dennifer! Deres wader on da foor!!" He's right. Crap. Literally. The toilet is flooding. After I stare at it for .2secs and realize there is no local water shut off like on a house toilet to stop it, I shuttle the boys down to the girls bathroom to the other TA to finish business. Miraculously it stops running, and the secretary is super nice and brings two mops and helps me start cleaning.

As we are mopping, one of the ladies runs into the bathroon and yells "There's a fire in the church!!!" Tracy and I both stare at eachother, drop the mops and start rushing to get the kids down to the room for their coats. (Torch is in the old convent which is semi-attached to St. Nicholas Tolentine Church. They're separated by huge thick stone walls) We get the kids back to the classroom for their coats and are told that we have not been instructed to evacuate by the firemen yet but be ready. I pulled the "Mom voice" out of somewhere, and it worked! The kids listened amazingly well and put on their coats. We were told to feed the kids lunch because the firemen were aware of our situation and they will let us know if we need to leave. Five minutes into the kids attempting to eat lasagna while wearing poufy parkas and scarves we are told to leave and stand accross the street. We were there for about 30-45min. Luckily, my kids were pretty good and semi-entertained by the 2 news helicopters circling like vultures and the fire trucks.

No one was hurt in the fire, but there looks like a lot of damage done to the sanctuary. From what I hear the police are still looking into the cause of the fire, which may have begun in a supply closet.

Atleast this excitement happened on a Friday, I dont think I could handle a Monday with this much action :)