Zacchaeus: 2011 Vacation Bible School

A VBS banner

In July, we had Vacation Bible School at the Barton United (UCC & UMC) Church. I was the teller and discussion leader of the story of Zacchaeus who hid in a tree when Jesus visited his town. I worked with the older children. We had quite a discussion about making choices and our faith:

Luke 19: 3-13 [Zacchaeus] was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, ‘Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.’ So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. All who saw it began to grumble and said, ‘He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.’ Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, ‘Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.’ Then Jesus said to him, ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.’ As they were listening to this, he went on to tell a parable, because he was near Jerusalem, and because they supposed that the kingdom of God was to appear immediately. So he said, ‘A nobleman went to a distant country to get royal power for himself and then return. He summoned ten of his slaves, and gave them ten pounds,* and said to them, “Do business with these until I come back.”

Anne's bulletin board for an activity

The tree that Zacchaeus sat in

Snack time behind the church under the ash tree next to Crystal Lake Outlet

Pastor Evelyn gives a puppet show

Agrimony was in bloom behind the church

We sat on the beach of Crystal Lake, at Pageant Park, as the children swam and played

We are all looking forward to our next Vacation Bible School!

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The End of a Busy Day

After the tractor ride and after the chicken baths, Ironman thought he would crawl through the new culvert! I began hollering that he shouldn't do that. Who knew what animals might be calling that culvert their new home? But the other adults shushed me and in Ironman went! He wasn't in danger. The culvert itself is strong, and if there were any animals in there, they could leave by the other end. Trapping a wild animal in a spot where there is no escape is dangerous. This wasn't. Hearing my earlier hollering, Buddy came out of the woods where he was hunting to see what the ruckus was about.

Vacation Bible School day was over and we were exhausted!

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A Scary Ride

After the great day at Vacation Bible School, Catgirl, Ironman and I returned home. John was grading the new leach field with the tractor. The kids love the tractor as much as Tractor Chicken does — not because of the grubs and worms that are uncovered but because they get to "drive" the tractor or, as on that hot July day, they get tractor rides. Catgirl loved this. Ironman? Not so much!

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Vacation Bible School Part 3: The Ducks

I'm glad that it is October for only one reason: Crystal Lake State Park is closed. The reason I'm glad about this is simply because I am confessing that we fed the ducks. The park rangers are gone now and won't harangue us! There were two duck families at the beach on the day that we went for Vacation Bible School. They were so engaging (even though the mother ducks tried to prevent their ducklings from mingling with people!) that we couldn’t resist feeding them. The mother ducks would also yap at each other and would nip another mom's duckling if it tried to join her brood or eat her duckling's food. These are my favorite duck photographs of the day.

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Vacation Bible School Part 2: The Seagulls

There are no photographs of children swimming and playing at Crystal Lake State Park. I was so busy photographing ducks and seagulls and talking to all of the other women there (after moving back to Barton and being recently married) that I'm afraid I neglected my duties of archiving the children's fun. The cookout was fantastic. The minister's husband and some others cooked the hot dogs and hamburgers, and they were perfect!

I tried to get seagulls soaring and diving about us. I got a couple of good shots and a couple of bad ones. The worst ones you will never see!

The photo above is not photographically good but it shows enough of how a seagull swoops and changes course in midair. Her legs are set out in front of her while her wings are forced back so that she can brake and change direction. I am fascinated with this photograph.

The photo above is my favorite of the bunch. The gull is actually above us but you can see Hardscrabble Mountain behind him on the right. Hardscrabble is at the far southern end of the lake in Sheffield. It is the site of the wind farm that has just begun construction after years of legal fights trying to prevent development of the ridge line.

I hope we return to the lake for Vacation Bible School next year. I need more seagull photography practice!

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July Vacation Bible School Part 1

Vacation Bible School was only one day, in July, this year. It worked out very well. I was given "the older kids" for instruction and crafts — the first through third grades! I haven't taught children that young for so long that it was a wonderful treat. The theme this year was Jonah and the Whale. It was a perfect theme for a hot day. We spent half of the day at Crystal Lake State Park in the water. In the photograph above the children are learning a song about Jonah. You can see the whale and Jonah's ship that M. made for us. D. is teaching them the song.

And here is Jonah, above! He told the children his story and they were enthralled with his ordeal. You can see how much fun the children had as they acted out Jonah's story — it was one of the highlights of the day! Everyone wanted to be Jonah so they could be spit out by the whale.

We had arts and crafts after that. We made beach bags, sea shell picture frames, octopus mobiles and lots of other fun things. We also had puzzles, word searches and readings of Jonah's story from the Bible. You can see Catgirl above as she designed her beach bag before we went to the beach. Below you can see her creation:

Meanwhile, in the preschool room, the littler kids were doing their crafts. Ironman is wearing the orange shirt:

Another mother, R., took the kids outside for some running around games, giving us older moms a break!

We closed the morning with more singing that we acted out. Below, D is teaching them a new song and it required feet stomping and clapping!

We were starving by lunch time, but we had to go to the park for our picnic at the lake. It was a wonderful morning and I hope to help out next year, too. I just hope it is cooler out!

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