Children Worldwide - Blog

Preparation for all things summer started last weekend with the Hungarton Camp training day. The week one team were treated to a Hungarton breakfast before learning all that will be happening on week one, and then doing some clean up/set up work as team building activities – see photo of one of them! (Our favourite sort of team building – no embarrassment factor!) From that day we can see what a great team we have – for both weeks.
During this week we have finalised the teaching for week 1 of Hungarton – we’ll be looking at Joshua, and applying the theme using sporting themes. The evening theme is “Building” (For those who know we did a building theme for Whizz Kids – we didn’t decide this one – it’s totally different…. although some of the props may be familiar!!)
Hungarton 1 and 2 are both full to overflowing, it’s going to be two very full on weeks for the leaders! Please pray for suitable weather, fun and safety, as well as for children’s hearts open to what God has to say to them during their camp.
There is still space on the Dalesdown Camps (Nr Horsham) – check out www.dalesdowncamps.co.uk if you know any youngster who would like to go (Bursaries available if the cost is too much) contact the office on admin@childrenworldwide.co.uk
For the rest of this week, Kay has been finalising Spring Harvest accounts, as well as preparing presentations, and finalising child protection (safeguarding) documents. Steve has been doing battle with the garden and household DIY – and winning!

Last weekend was a great one, spent looking after twelve 4 – 8 yr olds at a church weekend. We always enjoy working with St. Luke’s Thurnby – always welcoming, friendly and a pleasure to be with. It also makes us feel old seeing youngsters who have been with us over the years now ‘all growed up’!
If you check out the twitter updates on the left, you will see some of the things we taught.

A Children Worldwide management meeting on Tuesday was really good. We spent some time looking at the future and how we should develop what we do. Our ‘fresh vision’ for the future isn’t earth shattering – It’s to keep doing what we do – but do it better! One new idea was to put on lunch time events to bless other children’s workers who need to know they are loved and appreciated. Children Worldwide is mainly about fellowship and support – so we hope to be implementing this soon! There were lots of other ideas that will benefit our existing membership – we all just need the time to put them in place… All very exciting though!

News hot off the press from Wednesday – those who follow our blog will know Kay had an operation last March. For various reasons, the full operation Kay was expecting wasn’t done, so she is due to go back and have a total hysterectomy on August 4th (As long as the anesthetist gives the go ahead). This is very soon after the previous surgery – and having fibromyalgia means recovery is generally slower, but having the op then gives a longer time frame for recovery (No large event to dash off to only 3 ½ weeks later as we did last time!)

Meanwhile – back to preparing for Hungarton Camps!

This last week has been non stop journeyings! 

From Broadstairs, to Hassocks, to Cheltenham, to London, and tomorrow on to Sheffield.

Lots of meals have been had with lots of lovely people, as well as some meetings, time for ourselves, and even an ‘interview’ for ‘In Good Company’, Jeff Lucas and Ruth Dearnley’s Chat show on Premier Radio. This will air some time in August on a Sunday night at around 8pm. Kay was very nervous about it, but Steve seemed to take things in his stride – as usual!

Next week the traveling continues with a trip to Falmouth for Peter’s (Steve’s oldest son’s) graduation – taking grandma with us too! Then we travel back to a local conference centre to do the children’s work for a church weekend (St.Lukes, Thurnby)

Do keep an eye on the twitter updates (On the left) for real time updates on all we’re doing, as it covers more than we can in blog updates!

We’ve finally updated the diary! Do keep an eye on the tweet updates and you’ll see what else we’re up to!! If you look at the diary and can’t get back to the main page (I had this problem!) try clicking on ‘The Morgan-Gurrs’ title at the top of the page….

Yes - we’ve changed the look of the blog!

This is to try to make it more accessible to those who need a larger print to read the updates. This theme should stop the titles and text overlapping in large print mode.

Since the last blog entry we have done three assemblies - on the theme of “Seeing the Light”, using the account of Saul’s conversion. Today Steve used his newest trick, to very good affect, to show the children how Saul turned around and changed when he “saw the light”.

Tomorrow afternoon is the Spring Harvest Children’s leaders debrief, followed by a Hungarton Camp planning meeting in the afternoon.

We’re not sure if it’s going to be a useful tool or not - but Kay has joined twitter! We’ll give it a go for a while and see. We’ll probably just use it for posting useful or interesting articles, or making comment on various areas of Children’s Work. If you want to follow Kay on twitter, click the link on the right of the page.

Last weekend we were in Latvia for he first ‘formal’ annual meeting of the CW Latvia Team. Although ‘formal’ it was deliberately informal and relaxed, with the chance for the Team to get to know each other better away from the usual pressures of running an activity.
The team over there share a common council of reference/support group, and it was great to have one of the newer members of this group there with us. He had already been doing this job unofficially as he pastors the church where the CW Latvia office is!
On Saturday Morning Kay led discussion about Child Protection and Children with Special Needs - both were lively and helpful debates.
This time we weren’t at Norkalni - it was booked by others -, but at another (beautiful) centre called Vagneris. If you’re interested have a look at www.vagneris.lv
It was lovely to finally meet members we had heard about, and those who have so much to do with the running of the many fantastic camps out there.

We’re back from Spring Harvest - and it was great! 

Sorry we didn’t update the blog whilst there, but internet access wasn’t very good. (Neither was the phone signal - but that’s a different story!)

On weeks one and two we were leading Whizz Kids (5 - 7 year olds) as usual. The teams were great on both weeks, and the leadership teams, both Whizz Kids and Spring Harvest, were amazingly supportive - especially in light of Kay’s recent op.

The children were a pleasure to have - which was much appreciated as we had more children than we were expecting on both weeks, stretching resources somewhat, but we managed to make everything stretch to fit the numbers.

Many children became Christians - but the way this happened was amazing. We are careful in how we talk about becoming Christians - always avoiding asking the “If you want to become a Christian put your hand up” type question, because we are very aware of peer pressure and the need to please in this age group. We want to be sure that children who become Christians are sure of what they are doing and are genuine in wanting to follow Jesus.

This year children kept coming up to us to tell us how they became Christians in the night - woken up with the desire to give their lives to God! The one exception was a girl who became a Christian on the fair, because she saw Christians having fun! 

Week three was a different role for Kay, as the disabilities consultant. This is a role she has done before and enjoys very much, making sure that all guests who have disabilities - children and adults, can access the programmes they want. It was a great week with only small issues to sort out, and many friends made - once again she was supported brilliantly by head office staff and the site leadership. Steve’s role was supposedly that of a guest, but he spent most of the time working side by side with Kay, helping move and park buggies in the big top, and making sure Kay could get into the less accessible venues to support the special needs teams in the children and youth work.

Even with all the hard work, Kay’s health has continued to improve - obviously so. She did get the ‘Bultins sniffle’ along with lots of others on site, which like everyone else made her feel a bit rough for a couple of days, but even that hasn’t slowed down her progress.

Next is the Latvian team member’s meeting - we’ll be flying out on 30^th April!

Thankyou everyone for praying for Kay, and thanks for the many cards and good wishes.
The surgery went well, and her recovery is going to plan too. The biggest problem is sitting still when she knows there is still much to do for Spring Harvest - but she is managing it.
Steve is multi-tasking in the extreme and looking after Kay very well (Many references to Dobby the house elf have been made on facebook!)
Biggest prayer requests are:
For Steve - enough hours in the day, and the ability to record all his new songs in time for Spring Harvest, with the least amount of hassle.
For Kay - continued good recovery and no more coughing or sneezing…. it hurts! To know the right time to start gently doing some of the paper work and printing for Spring Harvest, and a clear, unworried mind until that time.
Thanks again!

This is a picture of “Huggy Bear”! One of our lovely God Daughters bought him especially to go into hospital with me…. all her idea - not her parents! He sitting in my overnight bag to make sure he goes with me - he doesn’t want to be forgotten!! He’s also keeping safe a little paper heart that another one of our lovely God daughters gave to me to take into hospital - it has a squiggly line on it. All I have to do is follow the line with my finger and remember that God walks this path with me. 

What Lovely God daughters we have…….