Gen Next Apprentices

So far what I have schedule for 8-12 year old:
June 7th - Monday - Cumberland Mountain State Park- Meet the rangers, picnic lunch and 2 mile hike around the park.

June 14th - Monday - Connections Ranch - learn about horses, horse training, fun on the farm.

June 22nd City Park - Tennis, skateboard, playground and picnic.

Will be organizing a date to create baked goods ourselves and sell them at the Threads of Hope. Maybe also on the 22nd and sell at the House of Hope yard sale which is the last weekend in July.

GENERATION NEXT SUMMER 2010

Generation Next Summer 2010 Excursions

I am posting the current schedule for our summer trips. This set of trips is only for 13-17yr. olds. A seperate set will be posted for the 8-12 group. There will be a maximum of 12 for each group.

June17th Connections Ranch- Horse Ranch and Training Facility, picnic areas, trails and just a great day on the ranch. We meet at the House of Hope at 9am. Contact me if a pick up and drop off is needed.

July 1st Fall Creek Falls Hiking trails to waterfalls, park activities, lunch and whatever else we can get into.

July 7th. City Park- Tennis Play and Instruction, Kevin Byrne will be teaching basic and helpful tennis skills, skateboard, we'll play and eat lunch.

July 15th Survival in the woods Edible herbs, nature walk with Do’s and don’ts of surviving in the woods.

July 27th Library fest for Kids The library is needing volunteers to help with kids activities during this festival. The festival hours are 8am to 1pm. Services setting up, running and taking down booths, helping with the kids, keeping the area clean. The kids will have a blast and it will be fun for us.

Upcoming top schedule ( let me know if you are interested)
1) Dat Pro audio jam session- You will need to bring a guitar


Contact Cheryl Derrick at the email here for Sign up information. There will always be 2 adults to accompany each trip.

These trips are currently sponsored and overseen by the Cumberland County Childrens Center House of Hope and myself. CAll Cheryl if you are interested in helping in any way.

Where your heart is

I am the type of person that once I get my mind on something, the world would literally have to implode in order for me to shake it. Just about a month ago I was sitting in my coffee drinking chair thinking. I was thinking about this summer. I recently have had the luxury of staying at home with my son the past couple of summers and was thinking about what excursions we could go on this year. I also began to remember the time when I had to work and dreaded trying to find something for him to do while I was working. That lead me to thinking what do you do in rural America with kids too old for daycare and too young to go out alone and hang with friends? Here where the nearest store is 10 miles away, its not like you can walk. Alot of this thinking would have never come about if I hadn't spent so much time listening to stories about local children who are just out there in the world during the summer, home alone, eating junk food if they ate at all, always surrounded by drugs or alcohol or both, spending an entire summer looking forward to the first day of school just to get away. That makes me mad. That makes me want to get a van and scoop them all up and take them to fun places where they can be kids and run and play and have exciting things happen to them.......

Oh wait, this is the part where I tell you that that's what I decided to do. My grieving heart showed up one day at the door of the House of Hope to do some computer work with Karen, one of the mentors there, and as I shared my vision of volunteering my summer up to take these children/Teens out to have some cool experiences, I heard Denise , the director of the House of Hope and so focused on children, say in the other room "Hey, we can do that!" (She says that alot). So the ball starts rolling. I have spent alot of time working out plans and people and times and days but I have to admit I am overwhelmed with joy.

All the people I have talked to or approached about giving a little of their business or their time were more than willing to do so for these kids. Wow, thats just awesome. The short of the story is, if you stop by my blog and I haven't written, you can be pretty sure I'm working it out for the kids or living it up with them. There are two things that go through my head everyday:

1) Where your heart is, there your treasure is also. and

2) The closest you can get to God's heart, is to love a child.

Nashville Clean Up Day

Last Friday was a very cool day.  It actually all started on Thursday.  I decided that after following the flood stories in Nashville through Cross Point Church for days and days and my heart breaking and breaking for all those people, I wanted to do something. I called my son Kevin and he and his friend Neil and another friend Caroline from church agreed to meet with me.  The 4 of us set out that next morning early to donate our time to the cause to help anyone.  We met up with the Cross Point Church team in west Nashville early on Friday morning and we set out on our mission.  These people were amazing.  They were organized and focused. I was stunned at what had been accomplished so far and how many people just kept diving in to help.  As we ventured into the flood zone it really wasn’t at all what I imagined.  Some houses had huge piles of garbage and sheet rock that had been extracted sitting out in front and other houses were left virtually unscathed due to the hilly nature of the landscape.  We arrived at the one house that we would spend the day working at and immediately noticed the attitude of the world around us.  Every so often a car would come by and if they couldn’t physically help clean up, they were handing out water or ice cream or anything else that workers and volunteers would need.
These people weren’t part of any organization, they were part of America.  Loving their neighbor and answering the call.  Many times random people would come by to ask who needs helps and what could they do. My heart really went out to the couple and their young son as they dealt with all the loss the best they could. But these homeowners had an incredible positive and gracious attitude. They were thankful for the help, happy they were all fine and pleasant to work around.  I could write a seven page journal on all that I experienced that day but it is just a blog so you get the abbreviated version.  The day had been a success and as my son put it, “We punched the Nashville flood in the face today”.

Summer break is almost here.

Parents dread it, kids love it. Some parents may love it and some kids may dread it...Summer break.  For parents its probably the most complicated time of year, especially if you have a child too old for day care and too young to be left home alone if you work.  If you dont work, you can't just let them play video games or watch TV for 3 months and most of us dont have tons of cash laying around to entertain all summer.  When I first started suffering bad from Fibromyalgia it was in July of 2007. I had left my job and was staying home. Most of that summer I hurt so bad I could hardly move nevermind throw a baseball or take a hike.  The pain in my heart from watching my 7 year old watch tv alone, ride his bike alone and just plain tire of summer break was almost worse than the disease.  It was after that summer that I vowed,  never have to watch my child dread another summer break.  I di all I could do in my power to get my illness under control and now I am going to spend some time looking into this summer thing and get a bunch of great ideas for what to do with a kid or kids during the summer.

Idea #1- I talked to the local manager of the music store and asked him if they had any places kids could jam together over the summer.  Any ages from like 9 to 19.  He is going to look into it and maybe we can get something going.  Contact me if you want to help or have ideas on this as well. 
Keep checking back and new ideas will come!!!  Lets keep these kids busy and happy.

National Day of Prayer. Pray for Nashville

Nashville Flood Update from Pete Wilson on Vimeo.

Nashville Flood

This is just so incredible.

Grassy Cove after the rain

Its been a crazy two days of thunderstorms, tornado watches, floods and I would say that it was stressful but it really wasn't. In Tennessee we get this a lot. I hate to be complacent but after being through some really crazy weather, seeing consecutive tornadoes hit our county one after another in the same night, being awake during my first earthquake, watching flood water rise so high we have had to take a boat across the road to get home, I have learned that stress, fear and worry have no place here.  Instead, my family, my county, my state and I spend time praying for safety, keeping up with our neighbors and finding out what ways we can best help each other. That's the Volunteer State. I have been keeping up with people in Nashville during this flood and I am not surprised by the stories of help, support, rescue and good will they are giving each other and stepping up to share a common task. You people make me proud to be a Tennessean.