Tuesday Nights

....for a late night MENSA meeting.

2011-12-08T07:41:00.001-08:00

SAUSAGE GRAVY AND BISCUITS
PANCAKES / BLUEBERRY WAFFLES
SAUSAGE PATTIES
LASAGNA (SECOND STOP)

ELAINE / CECELIA / BECCA / HELEN / EMMA / BEN / BEN / CHARLES /DAVE / ELANA / JENNA / LAUREN / LINDSAY / WAYNE / SAM / WAYNE / BLAKE / STEVE / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! /CHUCK / MARK / TIM / LORRAINE / ZUPAAAAAAAAHN! /

Ahhh...breakfast for supper. Always a big hit. At the second stop we broke out the lasagna for seconds - an even bigger hit! We went through that fast.

We've made the switch to eating inside for the rest of the winter. It's always interesting to see the difference that a setting makes in people's behavior. If you look at some of the pictures I've posted, you'll see that the courtyard we have used for the first stop is basically a big circle that our friends sit along the edge of. Somebody is on the left and right but not right in front of them. It's a big group but you're still in a singular spot, so it's easy to eat and not engage in conversation if you don't want to. Being inside at a table puts you in a group of people and more likely to be included in conversation.

It's easier for most of the youth to engage them at the tables, too. Some of them, however, are great at it wherever we do it. Elaine King might be one of the best listeners in the world. She's great at sitting down beside one of our friends and letting them tell her everything they need to. Bailey and Sam Gates were good it it, too.

Congratulations to Mark Carr. Mark, who planned and led a Tuesday night a couple of weeks ago as part of his Graduation project, presented his project to the Graduation Board judges last night and knocked it out of the park, just like I knew he would.

Trying to think about the Christmas meal. We were kicking around ideas the other night in the parking lot when we were done. We came up with a couple of ideas, which is actually pretty good for us. We never need to worry about being mistaken......

....the night me and the 5 guys in my Men's Bible Study ate 50 Chick-fil-a sandwiches at the Activity Center!

2011-11-30T09:10:00.001-08:00

Are you a Facebook kind of person?
I'm kinda half and half with it. I have a page and friends, but I rarely post anything and I hardly ever sit down at the computer and get on it. I have it on my phone and it alerts me if someone posts to me and that's pretty much the only time I check it. It rarely occupies any of my time.
But......
I'm a BIG FAN of it today The folks at the Mayfaire Chick-fil-a held a Facebook promotion, asking people what they would with 50 Chick-fil-a sandwiches. They got a wide range of responses. Some folks said they would give them away to hungry and homeless people.
So they gave those people 50 Chick-fil-a sandwiches! Some of the people who they were given to got in contact with us and we had 150 Chick-fil-a sandwiches to pass out for supper last night! How cool is that?

I appreciate the manager, Valerie, and her husband Skip for coming out and helping serve at the first stop.
The folks who donated their sandwich windfall to us were Shey, Misty and get this.....Tim Ballard in Pageland, S.C.! He doesn't even live here! Thanks Tim!
Shey is a regular helper with us and Misty came and helped serve at the first stop with us, along with her friend Lana.

Post about last night some more later, but I wanted to get this part out quick so I could tell you about the generosity of the folks at the Mayfaire Chick-fil-a and the folks that like them on Facebook.

It's probably a good thing I didn't win. This post would most likely would have been about......

More Pictures from Mark Carr's Graduation project

2011-11-18T10:39:00.001-08:00

The man, the myth, the legend in his own mind,....Mark Bolton Carr II

Johanna and Mark, sitting in my "office".

Johanna's Graduation Project.....

2011-11-18T06:39:00.001-08:00

We took over 250 pictures each night, so.....we'll be putting up pictures for a while......

2011-11-17T09:15:00.001-08:00

I realize the photos below are oversized but they look better big, so I'm not worried about bleeding off the side of the page.
Tonight I'll post some pictures from Johanna's Graduation Project night.

Mark's Graduation Project Night

2011-11-16T18:41:00.001-08:00

Mark Carr and his wonderful mother, Donna

Now that's a good looking plate of food.....but where's the Deviled Eggs?

Group picture at the end of the night

Blake showing off his plastic glove

For some reason the condiments are receiving a lot of special attention

Cathy in the kitchen

In line at the first stop

Winding down at the Mercy House

Some of our 1st stop friends

.....someone to beat the crap out of the Dallas Cowgirls on national TV

2011-11-16T09:03:00.001-08:00

BARBECUE!
The Boy Scout troop at FBC had their annual Boston Butt Sale this weekend. Wayne Currie, one of our weekly regulars, is a troop leader and spent Friday night and Saturday helping. We had 8 butts donated to us for feeding on Tuesday nights. Wayne brought them and put them in the fridge for us.
We came in yesterday and started chopping it. Man, it was good. It would not be a good thing for me to be out there when they are cooking those things. I don't have enough self control.

MY plan for supper was to have Barbecue and whatever leftover stuff I had in the freezer, that way I would have more room next week for our Thanksgiving meal leftovers. But then God started sending more and more food down the line for us to use last night and I wound up not using one single thing out of the freezer.
We had:
BARBECUE
COLE SLAW
POTATO SALAD
SQUASH CASSEROLE
YAMS
MASHED POTATOES
COLLARDS
BREAD
DESSERT
SWEET TEA/WATER

and passed out bananas to people as they left.

The folks putting it all together were:
ELAINE / CECELIA / LIZZIE / JOHANNA / BRIANNA / PEYTON / TOM / ELLYN / WAYNE / SHEA / ALEX / BRETT / LUKE / RICHARD / GRAYSON / DAVE / MERRITT / MADELYN / JENNA / ELENA / BEN / CHARLES

We were getting a light rain at the second stop but it quit as soon as we said grace.
Had over 60 people at the first stop again for the second week in a row. The increase in people at the first stop is making it harder to serve seconds, because we need to insure we have enough for the second stop.

This coming Tuesday is our Thanksgiving meal. If anyone wants to donate a turkey(s) or dessert, just give me a call or post on here and I'll get up with you.
We're going to pick up the guys at the 2nd stop and bring them to the church for their meal. We do that for the Super Bowl party but haven't ever done it on a Tuesday night. Looking forward to it.

THE ONLY THINGS I NEED FOR A PERFECT THANKSGIVING:
Turkey
Mashed Potatoes w/gravy
and........

...outside might be another way of doing that.

2011-11-07T10:20:00.000-08:00

(This might ramble and take a while, but stay with me......)

Our normal setup for both stops is to go outside and put out four tables (2 for food, 1 for cutlery/desserts, and 1 for drinks), get the servers in place, say grace and then have the folks come through in a line and get their food. That's the way we've done it since we started years ago. It's functional and it works.
And at the second stop, which is not at the church but the parking lot of the Mercy House, it's the pretty much the way we have to do it.

But...
I think we can do better at the first stop. I think we need to do better at the first stop.

In the past two years, the number of folks coming to eat at the first stop has grown significantly. It's a rare night when we don't have 40 people there when we say grace to start, which means 40 people get in a line to be served food. Depending on what we're serving and who's doing it, it can take a while to get that 40th person (and the ones who walk up afterward) through the line.
As much as I struggle with people standing in line to get food, I'm struggling even more with having them sit outside of the church when there's an empty dining hall inside of it. That's where we bring them when it's raining. If I was one of the folks being fed, I think I might wonder Why can't we eat there all the time?
So after Thanksgiving I think we're going to try and make a change in how we do the first stop. We're going to eat inside Fireside Hall every week. And instead of setting up inside the exact same way we do outside, do things differently. No lines. Have them come in and sit down at the tables and serve them there. There's a couple of ways that can work and it might take some trial and error to see how we can do it best. In a perfect world*, I can see us eating family style. Have one or two "table hosts" at each table and bring the food out in platters for each table and have the "table hosts" serve our friends, with others running drinks and food back and forth from the kitchen. Because that's a normal meal, sitting in chairs at a table, not balancing it on your knees in a courtyard on a short concrete wall.
Would that make things harder for us? Heck yeah. One of the beauties of the way we do it now is no matter who comes or how often they've come, I can plug them in just about anywhere and we're fine. the new way would require a much more coordinated effort, especially from the kitchen to the table. And it would mean doing two different styles of preparation between first and second stops.

This isn't written in stone and there things to work out before we try it, but it seems like a direction to move toward. We've been at it long enough that if we do this, I think the people we serve will trust us enough to go along with it.
I'll keep you posted on how it's going.

We talk a lot on Tuesday nights about showing and bringing the Kingdom of God to the folks we serve. Showing them they are welcome to eat inside the walls of our church instead of feeding them ....

*which we don't live in, so we might have to work up to that a little slowly. Maybe make plates up and bring them to the table or something similar to that at first.

11/1/11

2011-11-02T09:45:00.000-07:00

Lack of routine is killing me! Gotta set aside the exact same time every week to post or it gets pushed aside.
Working on it.....

Tonight was JOHANNA's Graduation Project. She planned, shopped, and took my place tonight making sure things got done. She did a great job. She also learned the hard way the benefits of making lists.

MENU
Cheesy Baked Spaghetti
Green beans
Yams
Garlic Bread
Desserts
Sweet Tea/Water

JOHANNA / LAUREN / LINDSAY / BRIANNA / CONNOR / BILLY / CHET / HOLLAND / MADELYNE / MERRITT / CAYLA / NICKY / DAVE / TAMMY / TWIG / CHUCK / CHARLES /
DON / BLAKE / GEORGE / STEVE / CREEEEEECH! /MARK / TJ / EBY /

I'll post the pics from last night when I get them from Don.

2011-10-19T09:09:00.000-07:00

ELAINE / CECELIA / LIZZIE / CATHY / CHUCK / CHARLES / WAYNE / STEVE / TOM / ASHLEY / SAVANNAH / ELLYN / NINA / PERRY / BRETT / HUNTER / JOHANNA / LINDSAY / LAUREN / BRIANNA / PEYTON / ANNA FRAZIER / PEYSON / MERRITT / HOLLAND / SHANE / TREY / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH / BLAKE / MARK / TJ / J.BOGGS / EBY /

Clam Chowder / Vegetable Beef
Baked Potatoes
Meatloaf / gravy
Field peas
Ice Cream Sandwiches
Sweet Tea / Water / Coffee

Had a pretty basic meal planned and then God just kept giving and giving, so we wound up with a table full of food to pass out. We also passed out To-Go bags as they left, with sandwiches and snacks inside.

....and Cruise.

2011-09-21T10:42:00.000-07:00

Brisket?
Two things come to my mind when I hear "Brisket":
1. Old women up north asking the butcher if the brisket is any good
and
2. Food Network shows about Texas BBQ joints

The way we cook it (low and slow), it comes out tasting like super good pot roast, and the way we serve it (w/Sweet Baby ray's BBQ sauce as an option), it's more like the Texas stuff.
But I don't get hung up on the words.
It was flat out tasty.

We had Brisket sandwiches last night. Got these nice big rolls- the exact ones Burger King uses on their BIG FISH and CHICKEN sandwiches- and put some Velveeta cheese potatoes and green beans with it. Man, it was good.

And so was the help:
ELAINE / CECELIA / BLAZE / THOMAS / TJ / MARK / EBY / DAVE / JENNA / TWIG / LAUREN / LINDSAY / JOHANNA / BRIANNA / JAMIE / BLAKE / STEVE / JBOGGS / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH / JANE / ANDY / CHARLES / TREY /

MENU
Brisket sandwiches
Cheesy Potatoes
Green beans
Banana pudding
Sweet Tea / Water
(for seconds we had cheese quesadillas and BBQ chicken. Random? Yes. But we had it to pass out, so we did)

Ate inside at the first stop because it had rained and was still a little wet.

Got two kids who help regularly doing their Graduation Project on some aspect of Homelessness.

That's it for now. Gotta make like Tom ......

...looking forward to the next time

2011-08-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

So.....my last post was June 8.
Hmmm....that's......78 days ago?
NO WAY!
Man, I knew it was most of the summer, but geez.....

I've had a great summer. Hit the road a lot, like usual. Went to the Bahamas, Arkansas and New York in one summer. That's a crazy travel hat trick.

Had a pretty nice birthday. I'll make time one day this week or weekend to tell you about it in more detail. "Pretty nice" is a huge understatement.

Tuesday nights have gone great. This was easily the most people we've had helping over a summer and we needed it because we've had consistently large numbers showing up to eat.

The big regret I have about not posting this summer is not listing the folks who came to help each week. They deserve to be recognized.

BRITTANY / KIMBERLY / SHEILA / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! / ALEXIS / TOM / J.BOGGS / JEREMY / SHANE / DAVE / JENNA / ALAINA / DAVE / CATHY / DONNA / CECELIA / LIZ / SUSIE / JAMIE / MAGGIE / BLAKE / STEVE / BRYSON / TWIG / EBY / JANE / CHARLES / ANDY / LAUREN / LINDSAY /PHILLIP / WAYNE / were all tremendous tonight working in the Kingdom of God.

Tonight's menu was a Dirty Rice Chicken bowl. We've never tried it, but lately we've been on a roll with new dishes. We did Chicken Parmesan sandwiches last week-so good!
We cut up a bunch of chicken breast to go on it and I was given the job of coming up with a seasoning to put on it. I went to the pantry and just started mixing-a base of cajun seasoning but I also tossed in cayenne, Old Bay, cummin, paprika, a smoky chipotle paprika, red pepper flakes, white mustard powder, garlic powder,and seasoning salt.
Not only was it spicy but it kinda bit you on the way down too. It was good but next time I will dial a back a bit.
Got some things to catch you up on, but I'll have to do it later. Gotta run now.
I missed doing this with y'all. I'm already....

.....haven't spoiled the magic for you!

2011-06-08T12:15:00.000-07:00

Yikes.
Where have I been?

I haven't posted anything for the last 2 Tuesdays, but I do have a reason. I had a medical issue that put me on my back for about 5 days and slowed me down for several after that. I missed the Tuesday 2 weeks ago and was back last week in a slowed-up capacity. Still requires "wound care" twice a day but that's about to end along with my excuses.

Last night was great. Here's why:

Lots of good people cooking and serving.
Lots of food to cook and serve.
Lots of people at each stop to be served.

Ran into a buddy named Casey at The Bowl the other week and he asked about his small group Bible study coming to help one Tuesday. He called me last week and they came this week. Great bunch of guys. They jumped in and did a great job in the kitchen and also on the serving line. Wouldn't bother me at all if they came back.

MATT / DALLAS / CASEY / PRESTON / BRIAN / MICHAEL / HEATH / ADAM / CONNOR / KYLE / T.J. / HAMPTON / WADE / BLAKE / BRYCE / STEVE / WAYNE / DAVID / CHARLES / TYLER / LANE / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! / LAUREN / LINDSEY / KILLER / CAITLYN / CAYLA / BROOKE / ELAINE / CECELIA / SAM / MYRTLE / SAM / BRIEN / THERESA / ELLYN / SAVANNAH / ALAINA / JENNA / HAYLEY / PEYTON / CHAMBERLAIN /

The decision on what to cook this week was mine alone again. Now, I'm not a dictator or a control freak, I ask the folks on Tuesday night for suggestions all the time. I tell them I'm open to what they want to cook. I tell them Let me know what you want to do and I'll make it happen. But I still wind up making the call most of the time. So, I gave it some thought during the day and by 3:30 I was still undecided. The whole day, though, while I was debating and brainstorming and searching for a meal idea, it felt like there was something in the back of my mind kicking around, jumping up and down to be noticed and I just couldn't see it.
I picked up the truck (pun intended), drove to Sam's and somewhere around 5:00, between the parking lot and walking to the back of the store, Hamburger steak with mashed potatoes jumped into my thoughts and the thing that been kicking around in my head all day screamed FINALLY!

HAMBURGER STEAK w/ MASHED POTATOES AND GRAVY
CORN
ASPARAGUS SPEARS
VEGETABLE MEDLEY
PINEAPPLE SPEARS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

FACTORS THAT DETERMINE WHAT WE SERVE ON ANY GIVEN NIGHT(IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)
1. What have we got? We try to stockpile some things until we have enough to serve a lot; fish, chicken. We also receive stuff at the last minute and that shapes the menu
2. What can we get?
3. Have we done it lately? ( Which is really a matter of perspective. I may say Oh, we did that last week and in my mind I'm thinking two times in a row, but to a person in line, It's been a week since they had it and they probably wouldn't be concerned with two times in a row.)
4.Will it involve lots of people in the kitchen and the serving line? ( Nobody wants to come and watch 2 people stir pots or stand around while 3 people pass out the meal. Ever notice we have a bunch of toppings almost every week? Somebody's got to squirt that TEXAS PETE.)
5. Will they eat it? ( Over a period of time, we've observed and noticed some things. Garden Salad is not a big hit with our crowd. Taco Salad is.)
6. What's the weather going to be like? (When it's cold we try to do hot hearty meals and when it's hot, we try to have things like freeze pops, etc. Things like rain and wind can affect the menu, too.
7. How many people are going to be helping? Most times it's not something we know, but there are times when we know I'll be gone and most of the Youth Group kids will be with me, so whoever is in charge plans accordingly.

Now that I've pulled that curtain back for you and given you a behind the scenes peek, I hope I.........

...but I doubt it.

2011-05-18T11:21:00.000-07:00

All right, let's do this before I forget:

EMILY / JULIEANNE / LONDON / PAUL / SOPHIE / DANIEL / ROBERT / JACOB / BRIE / MARY BETH / MERRITT / MADELYNE / PEYSON / HAMPTON / MITCH / BRIEN / DAVE / JENNA / ALAINA / MGAN / ASH / ANNA / CONNOR / KYLE / MEREDITH / MARK / ELAINE / SAVANNAH / ASHLEY / BAILEY / SAM / CHRISTIAN / EBY / TYLER / LANE / LIZ / MORGZILLA / RYAN / CHARLES / CHUCK /JONATHAN / LAUREN / LINDSAY / KILLER / JOHANNA /....make a total of 45 people serving others last night without expecting anything in return.

Looking back, tonight was B_A_N_A_N_A_S !

46 people total and 37 of them were there in the kitchen by 6:30. Twig was still out of town so I was very glad Mitch, Dave, and Brien were there to help me when I was already in 3 places at one time and needed to be in a 4th and 5th.
Tonight's meal was stovetop-centric. At the start, all 6 burners were being used with 2 more things still needing to be done when room opened up. Big pot of water for pasta (2 burners), sauce, green beans, water for corn on the cob, water for tea, and a burner for asparagus.

There's a word you're seeing for the first time on this blog. Asparagus?"shudder"
I've never eaten it and for several reasons:
1. Mom didn't cook it. She was straight off the farm and they didn't grow asparagus on the one she grew up on. Beans, corn, tomatoes, squash, okra, potatoes,- That's what Cleo was all about.
2. The smell
3. The texture. My theory: Feels like rubber before you cook it, probably gonna taste like it after you cook it.
4. You steam it to cook it. The only thing I want to eat steamed? A hot dog bun.

BUT.......somebody gave us a large amount of Asparagus yesterday. Didn't want to waste it, so about 6:30 I stopped everything and asked if anyone knew how to cook asparagus. I got 4 or 5 muttered responses that didn't inspire confidence in me and then MARYBETH came to the rescue. She said I'll call my mom and see how she does it. A couple of minutes later she came back and said I got it. So I let her take it and run with it. She and a partner got the sauce pan and went to work! 30 minutes later we had a huge pan of asparagus. Good job!*

And then, as if the sheer number of people wasn't enough to deal with, we had door prizes!
I had several bags of gummy bears, 5 leather jackets (LEATHER JACKETS? Yep.) and 3 camp chairs. Not enough for everyone, but I needed to get them in the hands of someone, so we drew #'s out of a bowl and left it to God to put everything in the hands of the ones who could use it.

The coloring on the names tonight is easy. Kids from New Hanover are in black and orange, and college kids are written in white on a blue background.

Regular readers know ELAINE is the our SWEET TEA maker. She nails it every week. The only thing I do is taste it when she's done. Tonight, she had to wait for space on the stove and we got to a point where a critical decision had to be made. Would the tea be made in time for the first stop or should we throw some instant cold water mix like lemonade in the cooler for the first stop and use the brewed tea for the second?
I showed ELAINE what we had and what we could do and let her make the call. She thought about it and said Let's just do what we're doing. I think it'll be done in time. I said OK. I went back to what was going on and eventually went up top to get things set up. We said grace and the tea still had not come out. I told the kids to tell everybody when they came by that we would bring them their drinks when they came out. As the first person in line got near, they brought the tea out and had cups ready to go before the first person got to them. Way to come through in the clutch, ELAINE!

Penne Pasta with Italian Sausage
Corn on the cob
Green Beans
Asparagus
Carrots and Cucumbers w/Ranch
Dessert
Sweet Tea / Water

MaryBeth was quick to remind me that when she won "Prettiest Christmas Sweater" at the FCA Christmas party, I failed to include it in the announcements at School the next day. So.....
" MaryBeth Sullivan won the "Prettiest Christmas sweater " contest last December at the FCA Christmas Party. Tyler Antonelli won the "Ugliest Christmas Sweater" contest."
Hope that makes up for it.......

...taste sensation that's sweeping the nation.

2011-05-12T07:48:00.000-07:00

Tonight was such a good night!
I know I say that a lot, but ....truth must be spoke!

MEGAN / MCKENZIE / EMILY / ELAINE /KILLER / JOHANNA / ELLYN / SAVANNAH / KATHLYNN / CONNOR / CLIFF / KYLE / TOM / ED / CHUCK / CHARLES / JERRY / WAYNE / JERRY / TJ / J.BOGGS / MARK / BLAKE / STEVE / ASHLEY / SCOTT / .....had things in the kitchen running at full speed !

Twig has been out of town the past 3 weeks (more on that later) and as I have mentioned more than once in these posts, if I don't have to confirm or get anyone else involved in the pickup of food, I tend to make my decision on what we're cooking somewhere around 4:00 on Tuesday. So, when someone called me at 2:30 on Tuesday and said they were at Costco and did I need anything, I had to say I don't know, because I haven't decided what the meal is yet.
We brainstormed over the phone, finally deciding they would check ground beef prices and call me back. They called back back 10 minutes later and said What about Italian sausage? It's cheaper than hamburger.
I said That works, but last week we fed over 100 people and it would take a lot to cover us this week.
They said No problem, let me help out and pick up the sausage and pay for it.
!!!!!!
Sooooo......

ITALIAN SAUSAGE SUBS with PEPPERS AND ONIONS
HOMEMADE MAC'n CHEESE
OVEN FRIES
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

I didn't have time to get the pig cooker out and throw them on that so we put some on the griddle in the kitchen and put the rest in the oven and when they were done we pulled them out and threw them on the griddle to brown them up a little. Delicioso!

We used sub rolls but that's almost too much bread for a lot of our friends so next time I'll probably just use hot dog buns or no buns at all.

Twig has been in Florida the past couple of weeks. He was already heading to see an ailing grandmother when his aunt, who was visiting the grandmother in the hospital, had a brain aneurysm. She was on life support for a while and now is in Hospice and Twig is still down there. Keep him and the family in your prayers.

BEST IDEA I'VE HAD IN A WEEK WHERE I'VE HAD A LOT OF THEM:
You know the big Pilsbury brownie you can buy at Sam's? The one that you can cut into 42 pieces?
I had one of those in the freezer. I saw it in there and then walked into my pantry and guess what I saw?
A can of chocolate icing.
BOOM goes the dynamite !
Chocolate Iced Brownies.
It's the .......

......Gift certificate to came eat with us free any Tuesday he wants!

2011-05-04T11:54:00.000-07:00

SHAUN / LONDON / CHUCK / CHARLES / DAVE / BLAKE / STEVE / DON / TYLER / CONNOR / DENNIS / MARK / BRIEN / KATHLYNN / ALAINA / JENNA / LANE /

Some things you just can't explain

Didn't have a single middle school, high school, or college age girl helping last night and only 4 total. Alaina and Yenna are young girls who come with their dad, and Brien and Kathlynn are grown women.
The first Tuesday of a month is usually a smaller crowd to come eat, mainly because some of our crowd get gov't checks and they get off the street for a little while. This means we might not see them during the first week of the month. Tonight however, we had at least 55 at the first stop. Go figure.

PORCUPINE MEATBALLS
BAKED ZITI
ORZO
PASTA SALAD
VEGGIE TRAY
FRUIT TRAY
CRAB DIP
DESSERT
FREEZE POPS
SWEET TEA / WATER

We also made lunch bags to go with CHICKEN SALAD SANDWICHES , chips and sweets.

What's a PORCUPINE MEATBALL? Well, you take 20 pounds of porcupine meat, add some rice.........
My bad. Couldn't help it.
It's hamburger, rice, a little onion, salt, pepper, and some water mixed up and rolled into 1 1/2 inch balls. Put them in a pan with a tomato sauce mixture that almost covers them, cook them covered at 350 for 45 minutes, then uncovered for 20.
My mom used to make them and it was one of my favorites. I think I've had them once in the last 30 years. My sister made them for me a couple of years ago, which I greatly appreciate. I figured even if i messed it up, it would still be decent, so I rolled the dice and we cooked them. Turned out very nice. We wound up running out at the end of the 2nd stop and started dishing out the BAKED ZITI. Made somewhere in the neighborhood of 280 meatballs.

Did a little detective work and discovered who the 10,000th visitor to the blog was. It was a Mr. Harold DeBoever of Hickory NC. (Writing it like that was purely for my benefit, because it makes me laugh. He's my college roommate, we talk on the phone 2 or three times a week and he goes by "Butch". NOBODY calls him Harold.)
He called me last night and wanted to know what he'd won. I'm thinking about sending him a ........

Milestone?

2011-04-29T08:18:00.000-07:00

At 4:35 p.m. yesterday, someone in Hickory, NC visited this blog. No big deal, except for the fact they were the 10,000th visitor!*
Party at my house.

*Officially, they were the 10,000th visitor since I put the hit counter on it. I put it on a couple of weeks after I started, but since I was probably the only one visiting for the first months anyway, we'll just go with it

Letting the pictures speak for themselves.......

2011-04-28T17:55:00.000-07:00

More pictures, less captions......

2011-04-27T11:27:00.000-07:00

Day 3 - We had a Midnight run to do at night but had the daytime set aside for a shopping day for the girls and they took full advantage of it. The guys broke off and went sightseeing. Wayne and I hung with the girls

Never heard of it but the girls were excited to go.

Just getting started.......

Subway art

It's a federal law. If there's three or more girls in a picture, they have to smash their heads together.

Day 2

2011-04-27T11:06:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was our day at the NYC Rescue Mission, a trip into Chinatown and and a night taking it easy back at the David Dean House

Sending letters to potential contributors

Hair nets are going to be "in" this year

Working in the pantry

One of my favorite things about NYC - STREET MEAT!

Pictures from Day 1 of NY Trip

2011-04-27T08:02:00.000-07:00

Outside of our home for the week in Brooklyn

Always impressive

Barry, our Missionary contact at the David Dean House, talking with Don

9/11 memorial at the firehouse across from Ground Zero

Alexandra and Savannah

Shopping for stuff to make our Midnight Run bags

Working hard

Molly, Elaine, and Savannah passing out clothes

More clothes getting passed out at a Midnight Run stop

Alyssa helping with the size

2011-04-25T11:50:00.000-07:00

The first NY Spring Break Homeless Ministry Mission Trip is in the book and everyone agrees we ought to do it again next year.

It was a great trip in just about every way you would want to measure it.
Homeless ministry objectives? Amazing
Expose kids to what God is doing in NYC? Yep
Group bonding? Tons of it.
The whole New York touristy experience? Every chance we got.
Let the Girls get their "shop" on? Got boring pictures to prove it
Stay up late playing games? Oh yeah.

One of the best things you can do to make a mission trip successful (or any trip) is take good chaperons. Don and I hit the jackpot with ours this time. Wayne Currie and Steve Leger were GREAT adults to have on this trip. They were good with the kids, on the ball, willing to do anything to make the trip better and maybe most importantly, flexible. Rigidity is not a great characteristic for folks on a mission trip, where schedules get readjusted and changed, plans must be reassessed, and things aren't always as promised. Steve and Wayne showed they could go with the flow and play it by ear when needed.
Plus they're both funny.

Tried to let kids post one day from NY but had trouble with connectivity. I'll try to get it up now that we're back.

Spring break mission trip update

2011-04-25T11:49:00.000-07:00

After a long ride up, we finally made it to see 3 innings of a Yankees game along with a lively group of fans.... Today we went to see the Statue of Liberty from the Staten Island Ferry and then to ground zero. Tonight we are getting some nyc pizza at Luigi's, "voted #2 in the nation" as we discovered from their refrigerator magnet then we will go to our first midnight feeding the homeless ministry project and hand out meals. hello this is careech and now i am blogging. please keep us in your prayers this week even though God has already worked his MAGIC thats right COMPLETE MAGIC. New York has been great so far and trust me mimicking "elf"scenes throughout the city makes us look like tourists as much as a fanny pack would.
Now Ellyn is taking over :)
We thoroughly wiped out the little grocery store down the street, dropping $171 bills on enough food to make 200 sandwiches for the next two nights. I had a dance party with myself while everyone shopped, but at least we got the job done. It's not my fault they play good music. I also poked Alyssa in the eye.

...just got less exciting

2011-04-14T12:11:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, MORGZILLA and CREEEEEECH! asked if they could have a Tuesday night to plan, cook and run things. I said Sure.
We met Monday to look at their menu, and make a shopping plan. We hit the grocery store and made a Sam's run, then headed downtown where I let them have at it. I tried to do get in their way as little as possible.
The result was a great Taco Salad meal that tasted as good as it looked coming off the line.
MORGZILLA and CREEEEEECH! are sophomores at UNCW and have been a part of us since they were in High School. They have commitments early on Tuesday so they usually get downtown around 7:30 or as we refer to it "after all the hard work is done". Seriously. CREEEEEECH actually had to ask me what time we started because they're never there for that part of the night. But, they do stay for the second stop and go back to the church with me to put stuff up and are the last ones to leave, so it evens out.

Caroline Cook and her friend Cayla made 7 dozen cupcakes for us this week. Beautiful cupcakes with different decorations and patterns on them. It was a wonderful gesture by them. They stayed at the first stop and passed them out. We appreciate their (and I'm sure their parents) efforts and kindness. Caroline knows about us because her brother (HAMPTON) and father (MITCH) have been a part of us for a couple of years now.

Leaving on our New York Feeding Ministry Mission Trip this Sunday. We have tickets to see the yankees and the Rangers. AL MVP Josh Hamilton broke his arm Tuesday night. Still excited about the trip and seeing the new Yankee Stadium for the first time, but the game itself......

...pulled up last week's WIPEOUT.

2011-04-06T08:27:00.000-07:00

My bad.
Sure meant to post last week, but somewhere between Tuesday Night and leaving town for the weekend on Friday, it didn't get done.

We had BBQ Chicken. It was real good.

All righty then.
Let's move on.....

SHAUN / CHARLES / ED / MITCH / HAMPTON / TYLER / J. BOGGS / LANE / MARK / BLAKE / WAYNE / STEVE / KYLE / CHUCK / ELIZABETH / ELAINE / MEREDITH / MEGAN / MADDY / SAVANNAH / ELLYN / BRIEN / ZUPON! / LAUREN / KILLER / LINDSAY /

MEATBALL SUBS
PASTA SALAD / COLE SLAW / GARDEN SALAD
OVEN FRIES
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / SODA / WATER

STUFF TO PUT ON THE MEATBALL SUB:
JALAPENOES / BANANA PEPPERS / PEPERONCINIS / MUSTARD / MAYO / TEXAS PETE / ONIONS / CHEESE

Monday night I drove the small church bus to the Mercy House, picked up whoever wanted to watch the NCAA Championship game, and went back to the church with them to watch it. It's a late start (9:30) and those guys go to bed early, so I knew it wouldn't be a big crowd and that was fine. I had 10 guys come and we met DON / LANE / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! / J.BOGGS / at the church. We had pizza and, in keeping with the post I did find time for last week, KNOCKOFF SODAS. Can you say DR. PERKY?
MORGZILLA and CREEEEEECH! made mini cupcakes that decorated like basketballs. Nice touch and muis delicioso.
I really appreciate the 5 of them coming down and and helping. The game was a dog, though. The big hit was Ice Cream sandwiches at halftime.
Everybody had at least 2 and about half of them had 3.

Speaking of knockoffs, I don't know if there's anything out there in the Ice Cream Sandwich world that would be the equivalent of Coke or Pepsi; an Industry giant or standard. So technically, a store brand ICS wouldn't be "knocking", it would just be their version. I say all that just to get to this point: Harris Teeter brand is the best ICS.*

Since I had some pizza and sodas left over, we used those last night, too. We wrapped individual slices of pizza in aluminum foil and passed 'em out as seconds.

Had a good time watching the game with the Mercy House guys, but it wasn't because of the game.Two teams I don't give a rat about, playing like rec teams? If I had been at the house I would've gone to the DVR list and......

*According to me and Steve Leger, anyway.

And now for something completely different........

2011-03-24T07:19:00.000-07:00

For years now, I've had a weird fascination with "knockoffs"- cheaper versions of a more expensive or mainstream item. One of my favorites is store brand Dr. Pepper wannabes. The thing I like about them is the names they give them. It's not like the name "Dr. Pepper" has anyhing to do with suggesting satisfying cola flavor, but it has become synonymous with the drink. The knockoffs use the medical degree to let you know right away which drink they are trying to imitate.
Over time I've made it a point to check out places when I travel to see if they have new knockoff "Dr." drinks I havent seen. I actually have a list I keep. I was up to 26.
THEN.... I found a site that shares my fascination! It has found 52 and counting! My limited time on the west coast is hurting me. Anyway, check it out http://postmyportfolio.com/Generic_Dr_Pepper.htm. My favorite of the ones I've actually seen is Dr. Perky. Gotta keep my eye out for Doc Holiday.

Might put a better title here later

2011-03-23T11:49:00.000-07:00

LONDON / SHAUN / EMILY / TARA / BROOK / GABBY / EMILY / SCOTT / BAILEY / CHANCE / ELAINE / LAUREN / LINDSAY / BRYANNA / STEVE / TWIG / ANNA / BRIEN / DON / MITCH / HAMPTON / CHUCK / CHARLES / DAVE / JENNa / ALAINA / J.BOGGS / TYLER / DENNIS /

MENU
BAKED POTATO BAR
BREADSTICKS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

The past couple of years the New Hanover High School Beta Club has picked a night and made lunch bags for us to pass out. It counts as a service project for them and they always do a great job. They did it again last night. They put PB&J sandwiches in the bags, which is good because we don't make PB&J as much as we do other sandwiches. Donna Livingstone, a math teacher at NHHS and a member of First Baptist, organizes the whole process. We appreciate it very much.
Liking the first stop so much better now that it is staying lighter later in the day. It makes things easier, too, I believe.

Getting ready to go to NY in a couple of weeks on our first Spring Break Homeless Ministry Mission Trip. Looking forward to it. Kinda thinking about trying to figure out a way to see the Spider-Man musical but it looks like it's about to implode before it even gets on Broadway and would be a waste of ticket money.

Baked potatoes were, and always are, a big favorite. There's a ton of stuff to top them with and we cook a bunch, so everyone gets as much as they want.

Plus, in the GOD PROVIDES MORE THAN WE COULD EVER EXPECT file, Dennis Pittman, a member of the church and employee of Smithfield Pork, brought us 5 styrofoam coolers full of mini ham sandwiches, wrapped and ready to hand out. They were made from the King's Hawaiian bread rolls and Smithfield Select ham. We added about 3 of those to each of the lunch bags the Beta Club brought.
AND......somebody made and brought us a big batch of Banana Pudding, which probably is in a tie with Chocolate Cake for the favorite Dessert with our friends. When there's a Banana Pudding, nobody asks for any of the other desserts until the BP is gone.

We'll be having a NCAA CHAMPIONSHIP BASKETBALL GAME party in a couple of Mondays. It's a little more subdued and scaled back than the SUPER BOWL PARTY, because of it starting later and being a Monday night, but still a good time.

What do you think?

2011-03-18T11:55:00.000-07:00

Did a quick little turnaround from a St Pat's Day green to a NCAA Tournament Bracket theme. Wish the picture was smaller so you could see more of the ball and the brackets, but it still works.

...that's never stopped me from doing things in the past.

2011-03-17T11:53:00.000-07:00

LONDON / SHAUN / MARK / TYLER / J.BOGGS / LINDSAY / BRYANNA / LEFTY / KILLER / DAVE / BARBARA / MYRA / TOM / TERESA / STEVE / TWIG / WAYNE / DAVID / JENNA / ALAINA / MARISSA / MARY / SAM / McCALL / ELAINE / SHELBY / STEPHANIE / KELSEY / MEGAN / MEREDITH / CHANCE / MORGZILLA / CREEEEECH ! / ALEXANDRA / CECELIA / MERRITT / HOLLAND / CHARLES / CHUCK / DAVE

MENU
MEATLOAF
MASHED POTATOES
GREEN BEANS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

LUNCH BAGS:
PBJ or BALONEY AND CHEESE
CHIPS
BAG OF CASHEWS/ALMONDS

This week Sam Gates was home on Spring Break from Stevens College in New Jersey and brought some of her friends home with her. She brought 2 of them (MARISSA, MARY) with her Tuesday night.
Merritt Hunt came with her friend HOLLAND.
Elaine had 3 friends with her - SHELBY, KELSEY, and STEPHANIE.
CHUCK brought DAVE.
Lauren and Lindsay Powell have been bringing their friend BRYANNA

Why am I telling you this?
Because I think it's a great thing. I'm glad they want to share it with their friends. I'm glad they feel enough ownership in the ministry to try and plug others into it. I think it's a good way for them to share their faith with their friends through actions instead of words. Sometimes kids are reluctant to invite friends to a church service and this can be an alternative
I talk to them a lot about Andrew, and how, after meeting Jesus, he immediately went and got his brother Peter and brought him to meet him. I let them know one of the best things they can do is invite someone to come join them when they serve God and others.

Towards the end of the 2nd stop, we ran out of plates. We brought 90, a couple of people at 2nd stop threw theirs away before getting seconds, and we probably used a couple for other reasons, so what that means is we probably fed close to 85-90 folks. We were serving in cups and empty pie pans at the end. Seeing that many this time of the year is a pretty good indicator that we'll the summer numbers will probably be over 100 each week.
No worries. God is faithful and generous. He has yet to fail us.

Glad to see Daylight Savings time get here. My mood improves when it stays light outside longer. Always has.

'Bout ready to do hot dogs and cheesesburgers soon.

We're going to do FISHFRY soon and I was wondering how our crowd would react if we took butcher's paper and rolled it up like a cone and served the fish and hushpuppies in that. No reason other than just to do something different, although they could walk away with it and eat as they went. Which is kinda cool. You can use newspaper but some of them would probably not go for that. I could see the whole thing being a big fiasco, although,.....

The weather and the meal were the same last night

2011-03-09T11:52:00.000-08:00

So it was one of those weeks where we could cook whatever we wanted. I didn't have anything sitting in the fridge I had to use before it went bad, nobody was bringing thing I needed to be a good steward of.....nothing

So Twig and I had a meeting of the minds and the first thing he suggested was Chili and grilled cheese.
Fine with me.

MENU
CHILI
GRILLED CHEESE
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

We had grated cheese, sour cream, crackers and TEXAS PETE to garnish the chili with. I had some ham we sliced up and put on some of the sandwiches.
We also passed out Blow-Pops and individual sized bags of cashews and mixed nuts.

Got a friend named Joy who has a Bible Study that came down once in the summer and helped out when I was out town. She brought them down this week to help. It was nice for them to come and join us. Half of them were able to stay for the 2nd stop.

The temperature was pretty low last night. Keep thinking that's behind us now, but I continue to be wrong every week. If you walk up, I'm easy to spot. I'm the one in short sleeves among a crowd of people wearing hoodies and coats. But it's ok. Working for the Eckerd camps toughened me up.

NY Spring Break Feeding Ministry Trip is getting closer!

JOY / ANNA / EMMA / LAURA / PETE / COACH ZEBOR / DAVE / MIKE / MERRITT / MADELYNE / ELLYN / ZUPON! / SAVANNA / ELAINE / MS. POTTER / T.J. / J.BOGGS / CHRISTIAN / KILLER / LAUREN / LINDSAY / BRIANNA / PEYTON / JAMIE / TWIG / BRIEN / WAYNE / ANNA / STEVE / BLAKE / MORGZILLA / ALEXANDRA / CREEEEEECH! / ASHLEY / LANE / CHRIS / ISAAC / CHANCE / were the hands and feet and smile of God last night.

2011-03-03T12:11:00.000-08:00

ERIC / BRIANNA / ALEXIS / TIFFANY / MISSY / ISAAC / SCOTT / MARY ANNE / SARAH / CHRIS / EMILY / LONDON / MADELYNE / MERRITT / ANNA / SAVANNAH / BLAKE / LAUREN / LINDSAY / BRIANNA / MORGAN / MEREDITH // MARK / T.J. / ELAINE / PATRICK / ANDY / DON / ASHLEY / BRIEN / ANNA / DAVID / JENNA / ALAINA / CHARLES / STEVE /

Had a large High School turn out this week.
New Hanover kids are in black and orange.
Ashley in maroon and gold.
Laney in blue and yellow.
Hoggard in blue and white.
Andy's name is in UNCW"s colors, sort of.

Had as much help as I did food this week.

The Menu:
BAKED SPAGHETTI
SALAD
BREAD! BREAD! BREAD! BREAD!
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER
and...
BAG LUNCHES to take with them for the next day.

This past Sunday we had The Follies, which is a spaghetti dinner/fundraiser for the Youth Mission Trip. There's always spaghetti sauce left over which they generously donate to us. After trying to figure out a use for it other than spaghetti, I gave in and figured we'd just have baked spaghetti, which would be good for at least two reasons. One, our guys like it and it was going to be chilly so a hot dish would be good. Secondly, baked spaghetti is the kind of dish you construct, which is good for getting kids involved and engaged.
Had bread coming out of our ears this week. Had breadsticks, sourdough sliced, sourdough loaves and whole wheat rounds.
Several members of the New Hanover Honor Society came out this week to help. Most of them had been before. All the kids that came out this week did a great job. They always do.

It was a lot of fun in the kitchen tonight, but then it always is.

One of the guys at the Mercy House told me he might be moving and getting his own place to stay.
I said That's great.
The look on his face didn't agree.
I said That's a good thing, right?
He said I guess. I'm going to miss getting fed though.

About 2 years ago, a couple of kids starting showing up at the Mercy House every week to eat with us. It was a 8th grade boy and his 3rd grade sister. They lived a couple of blocks away. The mom and dad came down occasionally and the 2 kids became regulars. One of our kids went to school with the boy and he started bringing him to Youth Group. Before long, they were simply a part of us.
Dad had some trouble and wasn't in the home anymore. Mom felt she was going to lose the kids to DSS so she took them (the boy, now a sophomore in high school, the girl , now a 5th grader and 2 younger daughters) and fled to New York City. Word got back to us that they were (and still are) staying in a Homeless shelter. It breaks my heart to think of them in that situation.
We're going to NYC over Spring Break with kids to do Homeless ministry. We figured we would try to find the mom and her family while we were there to see them and see how they were doing. Some of the kids in Youth Group have kept up with the boy through texting. Now that they've told him we're going to be up there, his texts have become pleas to take him back to Wilmington with us when we leave. Kidnap him. Get him out.
As good as it will be to see them, it's going to be very hard to see them, too. It will be difficult to interact with them, then say goodbye, leaving them in a shelter. Especially if the boy is pleading for us to take him with us.
Pray for them and their situation, and pray for us as we head up to see them. Pray for grace and peace, for wisdom and discernment and for God's presence to be felt the whole time.

It's going to be tough.

2011-03-03T11:01:00.000-08:00

ANNA / MEREDITH / SAVANNAH / BLAKE / STEVE / DAVE / ALAINA / JENNA / CHARLES / BRIEN / MERRITT / PEYSON / ELAINE / ALEXANDRA / CREEEEEECH! / MORGZILLA / EMILY / JERRY / TERESA / TOM / KATHLYNN / TWIG / WAYNE / ELLYN / MADDY / ISAAC / TYLER /

PANCAKES
GRITS 'n SAUSAGE
BISCUITS WITH FRUIT
DESSERT
HOT CHOCOLATE / WATER

L

2011-02-18T07:56:00.000-08:00

BBQ SANDWICHES
MASHED POTATOES
CORN
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

SAVANNAH / ELLYN / ANNA / MEREDITH / LANE / TYLER / MERRITT / HAMPTON / MARK / T. J. / CECELIA / KAYLA / WILLIAM / JACK / BRIANNA / LINDSAY / LAUREN / ELAINE / BLAKE / PEYTON / HAYLEY / EMILY / ISAAC / DAVID / ALAINA / JENNA / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! / ALEXANDRA / TOM / KATHLYNN / BRIEN / WAYNE / CHARLES / ROCK 'N ROLL / STEVE / DON / PHILIP / CARTER / ZUPONNNNNN! / were a lot of fun to spend time with this week while they invested themselves in other peoples lives.

We made 160+ sandwiches and gave out all but 5. We had 2 pans of BBQ extra that didn't get made into sandwiches, so we just spooned it out onto plates if anyone wanted. One of the best feelings is having lots of food that you can pile on as long as they keep coming and that's what we had this week.

Twig was in Charlotte this week, so I didn't decide what to serve until around noon on Tuesday.

Carter Sutton, who is 5, and his dad, Philip, came out to see us this week. Carter made Valentines for our friends and they brought them and passed them out. The pictures are from Elaine's cellphone, so enlarging them made them a little grainy.

Here's Carter passing out his Valentines

They had extra Valentines they let me keep for the next stop, but I had to put them in a different bag. Carter wouldn't let me keep his TOY STORY bag.

2011-02-10T12:09:00.000-08:00

Huevos Rancheros?
Yep.
Why?
Not really sure how those words popped out of my mouth last week but they did. Someone said they could get bell peppers and onions, so I said Then let's do Huevos Rancheros.
Have I ever made Huevos Rancheros?
No.
I've never even ordered them in a restaurant.
But those are the words that came out of my mouth, so when a bushel of bell peppers and 25 lbs of onions showed up, we froze our barbecue we had left from the SUPER BOWL PARTY and went with something new. It threw our friends for a curve because they all assumed we'd be eating barbecue sandwiches, so that was good.
Hate to be predictable.

KAYLA / DANNI / KILLER / ANNA / CAROLINE / LUKE / BRETT / LAUREN / LINDSAY / BRIANNA / BLAKE / ALEXANDRA / JENNA / AILANA / DAVID / EMILY / JERRY / CHARLES / TERESA / TWIG / TYLER / ANDY / STEVE / MEREDITH / ELIZABETH / MORGZILLA / CREEEEEECH! / DON / came out and stayed on a cold night when they could have been doing something else.

For us Huevos Rancheros meant a tortilla with eggs that had been scrambled with peppers, onions and garlic, with a grilled deer sausage link or bacon on the side and salsa, chili con carne and cheese for toppings.
We served home fries with it.
There was a lot of positive feedback on it so we'll probably do it again.

Super Bowl Recap

2011-02-09T08:25:00.000-08:00

TWIG / DON / CRAIG / PRUDEN / COLLEEN / GARY AND LAINE McKNIGHT / MORGZILLA / CONNIE / THERESA / DAVID / ANNA / ALAN / MARY / ANDY / MALIK / CLEO / ANDREW / KIMBERLY / TOM / JOHN / WAYNE / JACK / CANDACE / ERIC / all spent their time, resources, and efforts Sunday night to help our guys enjoy the Super Bowl.

T.J. / ELAINE / PATRICK / ELISE / EMILY / CECELIA / stayed after church on Sunday and helped me mix, bake and decorate the 12 cakes we had for dessert.

It was a long day for me and Twig. We got to the church about 8 in the morning to get the pig on the grill. We were there the rest of the day getting ready for the party. We started baking cakes around 11. We put some chicken and baked potatoes on the grill and stopped about 12:30 to eat and let the cakes cool. Then we decorated them, made tea, counted plates, etc.
I ran and got the bus at 3:30 and people started showing up to help between 4 and 4:30. The folks that came were incredible and did a fantastic job.
We chopped up half the pig and put the other half on the table to pick . It looked pretty cool laying there. Somebody gave Twig 3 gallons of a BBQ sauce called SPIVEY'S SAUCE. It was just about as good a sauce as I've ever had on pork. It's a vinegar base but it's heavy and dark. Way good.

I picked up the Mercy House guys at 5:20, the other folks came around then too and we ate from 5:45 til kickoff, with walk-ins showing up throughout. At halftime we went back in to Fireside Hall for another round of eating, this time putting out appetizers and finger foods, plus more of the "meal" food if they wanted.

As good as the game was, it's as much fun to watch them watch it. It's hard to imagine there was a crowd anywhere else that laughs harder at the commercials or reacts more to the plays than these guys. Alan and Mary brought about 20 "Terrible Towels". Everybody wanted one, even the Packer fans.

As far as I know, no one knocked over a drink that sitting on the floor, which was a first.

We went through 40 dozen hush puppies.
Drank 9 gallons of tea.

A couple mentioned they expected leftovers this Tuesday and we planned enough BBq to have some left over for sandwiches but we won"t do that this week. BBQ will freeze.
We're planning HUEVOS RANCHEROS this Tuesday. Ole'

Our goal for the night was to provide them with a great meal and a relaxing place for to them to enjoy the game and to let them know we were doing it because we cared for them and wanted them to know that God did, too. By those criteria, the night was huge success.

PICTURES! PICTURES! PICTURES!

2011-02-07T19:58:00.000-08:00

SUPER BOWL PARTY report:
It was Great! Wish you could've been there.

Pruden and Twig

David and Jenna

The Cake Table

Hanging out

Malik and Cleo. Friends of Andy at UNCW

David and Don

Morgzilla and some of the Guys

More eating and relaxing

JENNA!

Alaina, Connie, and Jenna pulling for the Steelers. That's Kimberly and Laine in the background.

The serving line

Pete and Danny

Charles, with Colleen in the background fixing drinks

The one thing our guys ask for every year is Cocktail wieners wrapped in bacon and baked with brown sugar. Morgzilla and her parents always oblige.

Chopped pig. Mmmmmm......

Behind the scenes in the kitchen

Mary Dyar

Andy showing Twig how it's done while Morgzilla supervises

Alan and Mary Dyar, the Terrible Towel suppliers

Halftime

Connie and Theresa

More Halftime. Most everybody had gone back to Fireside Hall for the appetizer portion of the night. We had the lights off during the game

Morgzilla "supervising" Andy again

Pictures today - words tomorrow.

.........TEXAS PETE !

2011-02-02T08:33:00.000-08:00

/ BRIANNA / KILLER ELAINE / CECELIA / ANNA / JOHANNA/ ALEXANDRA / BLAKE / MARK / WAYNE / ELLYN / ZUPON! / BRIEN / STEVE / DON / TERESA / CHARLES / came out last night and put Love into action and their faith into practice.

Sunday night was a church get together to discuss business that needed to be taken care of. Folks were invited to bring a pot of chili. When it was over they were invited to donate their leftover chili to us to use. When it was all collected and compiled, we had about 9 gallons of chili to use.
Some people might say Eeewww? You just dump different chili's together?
Yes. After all, chili is a dish where you dump various things together to begin with, so dumping different chilis together isn't all that different. Once you let it cool and sit in the fridge for a couple of days, it's good to go.
MENU
CHILI
JALAPENO CORNBREAD
COLLARDS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER
We made jalapeno cornbread and put crackers and some foccacia out if they wanted it. Cheese, sourcream, jalapenoes, and TEXAS PETE rounded out the table. We had someone give us a big pan of collards at the last minute. That's not how I roll, but some people loved it.

One of the guys whose name you see listed every week is homeless. He joined the church and is there every week. He attends a Sunday School class and many of the social functions offered. He has spent most of the past year sleeping under the Isabella Holmes Bridge. Occasionally there has been money to put him and his buddy in a motel for a week or two at a time.
The first thing he did when he saw me last night was hold up some keys on a keyring and tell me he had moved in to his new place. He was very excited about it and he should be. After we finished and I drove him home, I walked up with him to take a look at it. He said the power guy hadn't showed up to cut the power on and it would be dark, but there was a hanger on the doorknob saying he'd come by and things were good. The look on his face when the lights came on was something I wish you could have seen. A lot of good people were instrumental in making this a reality and although they don't want thanks , they deserve it.

Plans have been made to take a High School Spring Break Mission Trip to New York City to help with homeless ministries in the area. More on that later as it gets closer.

Our friend in the hospital was discharged and doing OK.

Elaine King is a freshman at Hoggard High School and the person I trust most to make the Sweet Tea every week. She has "apprenticed " under me for a long time now and I know all I have to do is say Elaine- you got Tea, and in 40 minutes she'll be handing me a cup of iced tea to taste. I don't have to check in or look over shoulder to make sure she's doing it the way I would. That's peace of mind.

When it comes to our SUPER BOWL PARTY! we've been fortunate in several ways; I've had great help every year, we've gotten larger by approximately 10 people each year, and the games themselves have been fun and exciting. This year's should be as good as the others.

I want to have some door prizes this year, but I haven't figured out what to use for prizes. I don't want do things like blankets or gloves, because that feels like I'm saying One person wins a basic life necessity and no one else does!YaY! I thought about getting some Packer or Steeler gear, or maybe some gift cards. Not sure. I'm open to suggestions, though, if you have any.

We're getting a bigger pig (120 lb) this year because we're expecting more folks. Last year's 85 lb'er was just enough. Gonna pick it up Saturday. Part of me wants to get some of the skin and try to make some homemade pork rinds. That would be cool!
If I did, you know the first flavor I'd try to make? .............

Tuesday January 25

2011-01-27T12:05:00.000-08:00

Rainy. Rainy. Rainy.
Saw it coming, too. The forecast was 100% rain, so we had a plan.
First stop was easy- eat inside. But the second stop is always trickier depending on what we're serving. This week we served meatball sandwiches and white potatoes, so once we started serving in the dining room, Brien started making "setups" - take-out trays with potatoes, dessert, and a open roll with cheese waiting for meatballs. we were going to need the take-out rays because the 2nd stop is always outside, raining or not.
having the setups ready made it very quick to put together right before we left.
CREEEEEEEECH! / ALEXANDRA / ALEXIS / MORGZILLA / BRIEN / TYLER / BOGGS / BLAKE / DON / CHARLES / STEVE / TWIG / WAYNE / JAMIE / .......came out in the rain and cold to make sure things got done for people who needed it.

Don called me about 6:30 and said he'd bring a pop up gazebo tent, so we slapped that beside the porch at the Mercy House and extended our usable space.

MEATBALL SUBS
BOILED WHITE POTATOES
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / COFFEE

Believe it or not, this week was the first time ever that we offered coffee. sodas, hot, chocolate, tea, gatorade, ....but never coffee. I have never drank one single drop of coffee, so it's never on my mind, but we've never really had anyone clamor for it, either.
The reason we did it this week is because I saw a 3 lb can of it in our pantry and figured we needed to use it sometime, so why not now. Wayne Currie was in charge of making it, because he had more experience than I did (none). Lot of guys drank it, so we'll make it til we run out and see if they want us to keep on, at least while it's cold.

I noticed one of the guys we see every week at the Mercy House wasn't in line so I asked where he was and found out he was in the hospital. I went by and saw him the next day, and took him a run of WEB OF SPIDERMAN comic books to read, because he told me likes comic books. He should be getting discharged today. His medical needs are ongoing so we continue to pray for him.

We passed out a flyer for the New York mission trip we're planning for spring break. We're going to go for 6 days and volunteer with organizations that feed and assist the homeless in the New York area. We'll take 25 total, shooting for around 20 kids.

Started planning for the SUPER BOWL PARTY. We watch it in the youth room but last year we were close to capacity as far as seating comfortably. It's currently the only room downtown with cable so we're locked in there unless we can figure or work something out. We'll see. If nothing changes, we'll still be fine.

We cooked an 80 lb hog last year. Gonna get a 110 lb one this time. We had 50 guys show up and figure we'll have more this year. The first year we did it we had 20 and have added about 10 every year.

Went skiing this past weekend with the youth group. We went to Canaan Valley, W VA. It was 0 degrees when we got there and -14 degrees when we left. Skiing was great, though.

......"UPER BOWL PART" in the middle.

2011-01-19T08:15:00.000-08:00

BAKED SPAGHETTI w/MEATBALLS
ROLLS
DESSERT
HOT CHOCOLATE / WATER

SAVANNA / ASHLEY / WAYNE / TWIG / MASON / LACE / COLE / ELAINE / BLAKE / TYLER / MARK / JOHANNA / BRIANNA / BRIEN / ANNA / CHUCK / CHARLES / KELLY / DON / are the folks who gave time and effort to help our friends tonight.

Not a huge crowd helping tonight and that's OK. There was a time when this many would have been a huge number. Felt small and intimate tonight.

Alan and Mary Dyar bought 70 toboggans for us to pass out tonight. That was very kind and needed.

Tonight was Blake Leger's 16th birthday. I've had kids call and say I won't be there tonight. It's my birthday and I've got something planned.....which is cool. That's a good thing. I am all for that. I don't expect them to pass that up to come wash dishes with me. But.....one of the great things about Blake (and there are a lot), is that he wanted to do what he always does on Tuesdays, and that's come help others. Matter of fact, he would've been upset if his parents had planned something that kept him away. And one of the great things about his parents is they didn't.

We ate inside again at the first stop. When we were making the decision we felt it wasn't that cold to us, but then realized we hadn't been out in it all day. To someone who'd been outside for awhile, a simple thing such as eating indoors might be something to look forward to.
We've pretty much made the decision when we're inside now, to do away with them standing in line to get their food. We get them seated and then we fix their plates and bring them to their table. Same with their drinks and dessert. That lets them relax and take a load off their feet for a longer time. I think that's better but I'm not sure. There's a nice interaction that happens on both sides of the table when we serve cafeteria style. But we're not inside all year so .....it works in there.

Saw more women tonight than we usually do. That bothered me. It's harder to think about, I guess, that women are that situation. I'm glad we could help. Just wish we didn't have to.

Random things from the past

An old skinny guy named Otis ate 9 hot dogs one night
Saw a guy get tasered
A guy got in a car and T-boned another guy's car in front of the Mercy House
We got low on food and I sent Brien to the Burger King drive thru to get 40 Whopper Jr.'s (a.k.a. a "Stoner Run")
A guy once asked Gary McKnight for his pants (You need to ask Gary McKnight why)

Guess what's coming up that I'm getting excited about?
Here's a hint: It starts with an "S", ends with a "Y", and has........

...I wasn't the one who was going to school the next day with hair looking like that.

2011-01-13T13:37:00.000-08:00

We've been serving, I've just been lazy about blogging.
And not really lazy about it, just poor at setting aside time for it. I used to do it on Tuesday nights after we finished, which was good for consistency but tough for making it to the gym the next morning before school. Once I started doing it the next day, it became easier for things to come up and push it back. I don't know about you, but the further away from something I get, the less likely it is I get back to it. My intent is to improve on my promptness this year.

The meals for Christmas and New Years went well. Lots of help, lots to pass out. College kids were around and came back to help. e got moved into the pantry beside the kitchen, so we could finally bring our stuff up out of the Dungeon (the storage room under the Jail). The stand alone pantry had an internal shelf collapse and David Allegood grabbed some guys and repaired it on the spot. Much better now.

The past 2 months have probably been the longest string of really cold Tuesdays we've had. The low temps affect where we serve, how we serve and what we serve. We've been passing out blankets, clothes and accessories every week.

COLLEEN / CECIL / SETH / ERICA / MILLER / BRIANNA / DAVID / SAMMY / ELAINE / SAM / HAMPTON / ELANA / JENNA / DAVID / CHUCK / CHARLES / SHAWNA / TERESA / ANNA / TWIG / WAYNE / DON / TYLER / BLAKE / STEVE / TOM / did a great job of spreading themselves out in the dining hall and interacting with our guests.

CHILI w/Texas Pete, cheese, sour cream. vinegar, and jalapenoes for toppings.
JALAPENO CORNBREAD
DESSERT
HOT CHOCOLATE

The jalapeno cornbread turned out sooooo good and was really easy. I like those kinds of things.

NOT SO QUICK STORY
We're in the dining hall and winding down and Don Vigus says "Gary, this guy says he needs a haircut!"
And the guy does. So I told him I'd bring my clippers next week and cut his hair.
The only problem is I don't really cut hair.......I buzz heads.
Big difference.
Big. Honkin'. Difference.
I don't scissor cut, I ask you what # guard you want and I just plow through. One length every where.
And I can do that like a champ. This guy, however, did not strike me as someone who was going to want a buzzcut
So I was thinking about this the next day while I was getting ready for school. I figured if I cut one guys hair, other guys would want theirs cut, too. What about them?
When I have hair to cut, I go to a pretty nice Barber named Jeff. I wondered if he would cut our friends hair for a discount, like $10 bucks a head. Then I was wondering how to get them there and when and blah, blah, blah.... and I had an idea.
There are a couple of places in town that have cosmetology courses. Students need hours and practice. If I could get several of them to volunteer one afternoon, maybe I could knock out a bunch of free haircuts at one time.
In the process of brainstorming all this, it dawned on me that I hadn't consulted God about it.
I have ideas and sometimes, in addition to being dumb and goofy, they aren't always part of what God might want me to be doing. I figured I might want to slow down and pray about this one. And while it might be true God could have had something to do with planting the idea in my head, I still figured it best to pray. So I did and basically left it at "If this is something worthwhile and you want me to do, let me know. Somehow, someway today, show me that this is okay."
I leave out for school and roll through the day. It crosses my mind at different parts of the day but I'm not dwelling on it or looking for signs in everything that happens. In terms of signs, omens and otherwise deep meanings, it's actually an uneventful day.
Until.......
10:30 p.m. my phone rings. It's a friend of mine, the mom of one of the kids in Youth Group.
She says You're not asleep, are you?
No.
Are you getting ready to go to bed?
No, I'm a late-nighter.
We have a crisis here at the house.
When the house has a teenage son in it, the word crisis can cover a lot of ground. I start racing through things in my head, and then she continues.
I was cutting TEENAGE SON's hair and I've messed up and can't fix it. He said call you. Can you come over and fix it or just buzz it. He said you would know what to do.
Sure. Be there in 15 minutes.

It wasn't a lightning bolt epiphany.
I didn't yell "There's what I was looking for!".
At first I just found it funny and was amused at the situation........but on the way over there it started coming to me that on a day I had prayed for verification to try and organize something to get people's hair cut (even though I'm no barber), someone was calling me to come cut their hair (even though I'm no barber)!

And it got me thinking Did I miss any subtle signs somewhere else along the way today? Am I so slow, he had to bring me out in freezing temperatures at 11 0'clock at night to cut someone's hair for me to catch his drift?

My best guess on that is, Yeah,... probably.

So I go over and we have a good laugh about the situation. We make the call to buzz it and I tell them everything about the idea and the prayer and seeing them calling as the way God was telling me it was OK to do it.

As far as it being a crisis, i don't know if I would have used that word, but then again, I wasn't the one who messed it up and......

......I like a fried egg on my hamburger!

2010-12-21T03:51:00.000-08:00

FISH STEW
GRILLED CHEESE
DESSERTS
HOT CHOCOLATE

Another very cold night. Went inside for the the first stop. I was working the door for a while and it was crazy how cold and raw the wind was every time I let folks in. Just about every single person had the same look of relief when they walked in and got out of the cold. I say just about because some folks never show any joy or pleasure on their face, regardless of how things change. We see a few of those, but mostly our friends are very appreciative of things and let us know it.

ELAINE / TYLER / BRIEN / TWIG / LUKE / ZUPON! / LUKE / BRETT / T.J. / DON / BAILEY / MORGZILLA / CREEEECH! / PEYSON / JOHANNA / KYLE / WAYNE / ANNA / MERRITT

God continues to bless us with an amazing amount of resources every week, and not just in food. Clothes, blankets, socks,....all of these have come our way and continue to do so. God's faithfulness in meeting our needs has never wavered the whole time we've been doing this.
A little self disclosure here:
The whole "blanket, socks, toboggan" thing is one of the toughest things I've dealt with on Tuesday nights.
There are a couple of reasons for this and for the most part they stem from my way of thinking things should go and the way I want things to be........which are often in direct conflict with God's ways and thoughts on things.
And it shames me to say it, but it's true. Sometimes I stop and re-evaluate what I'm thinking and planning and it is the exact opposite of how Jesus would be doing it. Blankets are a good example. I usually have a good idea of how many people have been coming at each stop and what to prepare for. If forty people had been coming to the first stop and I had 15 blankets, my thinking used to be not to pass out blankets until I got more and I could try to ensure everybody got one. But...... that meant 15 people didn't get blankets at all. It also didn't allow for the idea that God gave me those 15 blankets right then for that week and He would make sure they got where He wanted them to go. I didn't have to make that call. I just had to make them available. God had to show and prove that to me several times before I saw what he wanted me to learn.
Another thing is letting go of my way of loving (conditional) and trying to be more Christ-like (unconditional) in the ways I love on Tuesday nights.
Blankets ....again.
Pass them out, everybody gets one...yay!
Next week you ask who needs a blanket and some of the same people say they do.
?
They say it got stole or got wet or something like that.
Week or two later they're back asking for another blanket.
And I don't feel like giving them one. They should've kept up with the other ones I gave them.
My selfish conditional Love says I'll give you one, maybe two, but that's all you deserve. No more.
And I start to resent them for needing another blanket! How bad is that? They're not even my blankets. They're not taking anything off my bed or keeping me from staying warm.
I struggled with this until I realized I was no different from them. I go to God asking for "blankets" all the time and he doesn't hold back or resent me for it. He continues to love me unconditionally and meet my needs.
Now...should they keep up with them or be better about taking care of them? Yeah, but not doing so doesn't change how God loves them and it shouldn't with me either.
Still not the best in the world at that. Working on it.
End of embarrassing self-disclosure

We were leaning towards a FISH FRY! this week for Christmas but have decided not to. The weather, the preparation, the crush of other things on either side of the day......just not the best time.
It is, however, the best time for a mack daddy jacked-up HAMBURGER / HOT DOG throwdown!
We were gonna hit 'em tomorrow night with hamburgers, hot dogs, and every kind of topping we can think of to pile on them.
I'm thinking.....
KETCHUP MUSTARD MAYONNAISE CHEESE PICKLES LETTUCE TOMATO ONIONS JALAPENOES RELISH CHILI SALSA A-1 SAUCE TEXAS PETE BACON ...... and maybe, just maybe....FRIED EGG.
Man alive, ........

...but no sense taking any chances!

2010-12-13T05:21:00.000-08:00

Cold.
Real cold. Windy, too.
On nights like that, we try to come inside at the first stop to serve and eat. Fireside Hall is big enough to meet our needs and the tables are always set up. This week, however, there was another group scheduled to use it for a dinner so there went the option of being indoors.
We took the "breakfast for dinner" route this week and had pancakes and cheese grits. It was a good call for a cold night.

PANCAKES AND SAUSAGE
JACKED-UP CHEESE GRITS w/ EGGS and SAUSAGE
HOT CHOCOLATE

ELAINE / CECELIA / JORDAN / MORGAN / ALEXANDRA / ANDREW / FLETCH / MARK / T.J. / TYLER / BRIEN / WAYNE / ELLYN / BLAKE / CHARLES / STEVE / TWIG / DON / SHANNON / CJ / SHARON / MAX / KYLE / AMY / and about 20 other kids and adults with the WILMINGTON FEAR little league baseball team

ANDREW Croom moved up to Youth Group this year and came to Beach Camp. That's when I met his mom Amy. He has come to help on Tuesday nights several time s since and Amy has been very good about asking what we needed and bringing stuff. We planned awhile back for the FEAR team her younger son plays on to come this week and pass out to-go bags they had made. They did an awesome job with the to-go bags! When we do it, we use the ordinary brown lunch bag, but they took big brown paper grocery bags and had a carry out tray in it, a bottle of water, fruit, cards they'd made.....really nice. There at least 10 kids and 5 sets of parents that came to do that.
We got double duty out of them because they also set up the youth room and helped us pass out hoodies, blankets, gloves, and socks.

One of the reasons we had things like blankets and socks to pass out is because of the generous way the congregation at First Baptist gives to help meet needs. The Children's Ministry had their Celebrate Christmas program this past Saturday and collected blankets for us. There was a great response to that for which we are extremely grateful. Don Vigus' SS class collected heavy socks and gloves for us to pass out and the Friendship class takes up a collection for us year round and is incredibly faithful in providing that for us.

A good thing about passing out blankets this week was that everybody at the first stop had something to sit on instead of cold concrete. It might be an old wive's tale, .......

....this week we're doing BREAKFAST!

2010-12-07T06:36:00.000-08:00

I wish I could tell you about this past Tuesday but I can't. I wasn't there.
Somehow, somewhere, sometime I pulled or tore something on my back up around my shoulder blade. It wasn't too painful at first but after a week of just kinda ignoring it, it wore me down. I had to go home last Tuesday and hit the rack and put some heat on it.
Things I know.......
.....they had a lot of help.....
.....they had a lot of people come through and eat....
.....they served Turkey Pot Pie and sweet potato fries....
.....ZUPON!'s dad, Kyle, came with some members of his Bible study and helped
.....Tom Varno was in town and came to help. Hate I missed him.

The best thing I know is.......

Thanksgiving wrapup

2010-11-23T10:09:00.001-08:00

100 + fed.
Almost 50 people helping.
82 lunch bags passed out.
80 pairs of new socks distributed.
Coats, hoodies and shirts taken away.

It was a great Thanksgiving Tuesday night.

Since it was a holiday and a big meal. we served inside. We put place settings on the table instead of just passing out cutlery in line and after they came through the line and got food we had people walk them to their seat and ask them what they wanted to drink and what type of dessert they wanted, then got it for them.It was a nice change of pace to be able to do those little things for them in a nice relaxed setting.

TURKEY / HAM / DRESSING / MASHED POTATOES / GREEN BEAN CASSEROLE / SWEET POTATO CASSEROLE / ROLLS / DESSERT / SWEET TEA / WATER

The lunch bags had 2 SANDWICHES / CHIPS / SWEET

We wound up cooking 12 turkeys (4 fried, 8 grilled). We had 16 donated, so we have a head start on Christmas. All of them were graciously obtained and donated by folks willing to help and be a part of Tuesday night. Several folks bought and donated pies and desserts for us to use also. Thank you to everyone who helped us with these gifts.

LONDON / SHAUN / LUKE / CHASE / ALYSSA / SUMMER / SYDNEY / RACHEL / CAROLINE / DAVE / JENNA / ALENA / DON / ALEXIS / CREEEEEECH! / BLAKE / STEVE / TWIG / HALEY / EMILY / WAYNE / ELLYN / ZUPON! / LAURA / BRIEN / HAMPTON / MITCH / JACK / BETH / MILLER / ANDREW ///KATRINA / CHRISTIAN / BAILEY / J.BOGGS / BRYANNA / ALEXIS / LANE / KILLER / CAITLYN / ANDY / TJ / ERIC / CANDACE / CHARLES / ...........
.......are people I give thanks for.

Cutting it short

2010-11-23T10:09:00.000-08:00

Amazing amounts of food to be given out by amazing groups of people. That's tonight in a nutshell.
We had enough on hand to serve a meal and, as they left, hand them another meal.
And that's without using the 6 Boston Butts Wayne Currie"s scout Troop donated to us this week. We froze those to best use later on in the month. (if you're keeping score at home, that's 2 consecutive weeks we were blessed with donations of Boston Butts. Incredible)

Menu
Stew Beef/Venison and gravy
Rice
Rolls
Collards
Dessert
Sweet Tea/Water

Twig's son Sprig killed a deer last week and donated a ham and some other pieces to us, so we had a Venison /Stew Beef plan in place for Tuesday night. Then John Liverman brought down enough turkey'n gravy, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, dressing and collards to feed the first stop. we decided to continue with the original plan and make to-go plates with the stuff John brought and that way they could leave with a plate for lunch tomorrow. We also made about 40 PB&J to give out.
So much food.

....the first motorcycle rides of their lives!

2010-11-11T16:05:00.000-08:00

Tonight was a really cool night because:
1. God was faithful and good, providing us with an abundance of food to share with our friends, like he does every week.
2. We had a chance to distribute clothes to our friends. That's always a great blessing to be able to do.
3. The New Hanover High School National Honor Society came and helped us. I work at New Hanover so I know several of them from classes and FCA. They did a great job and were a lot of fun.
4. I got a visit from someone that was totally unexpected and out of left field- but still great.
5. Tuesday nights are always really cool.
6. One other thing I'll tell you about at the end...............
LONDON / ERICA / MALLORY / ELIZABETH / MARY ANNE / SARA / EMILY HOBBS / EMILY HILL / HANNAH / JESSICA / BRIANNA / ALEXIS / MARGARET / ELAINE / CECELIA / MACKENZIE / MISSY / ROCHELLE (I've always called her Ms. Bongiornio and she told me last night to call her Rochelle, so....) / HAYLEY / PAUL / DANIEL / ROBERT / TYLER / SHAUN / SCOTT / ELLYN / WAYNE C. / TWIG / CHUCK / CHARLES / DON / CREEEEEECH! / MORGZILLA / ALEXIS / BRYANNA / GRANT / MR. TRAINER / TYLER / JOHANNA / KILLER / MERRITT / WAYNE
Count 'em up. 42, surpassing the record of 41 we had 3 weeks ago.
42!
And we needed every single one of them. (The ones in orange are National Honor Society students and the ones in bold orange are the ones who stayed for both stops.)

We had 6 cooked Boston Butts donated to us by a local men's ministry that was selling them as a fundraiser. We chopped them up and made BBQ sandwiches. A friend of mine called and gave us a pile of Sweet Potatoes and we had a lot of other produce donated to us this week.

MENU
BBQ SANDWICHES
BAKED BEANS
COLE SLAW
SWEET POTATOES w/BROWN SUGAR, CINNAMON & BUTTER
DESSERT
SODAS
SWEET TEA / WATER

We also had bags with an apple and a bag of cookies to take with them as they left.

We had a room full of t-shirts, hoodies. sweatshirts, and sweaters, as well a decent amount of pants and shoes to pass out. We walked them through that first, then served the meal. It was a good night to do this because there was enough people to have in two places doing stuff.
The National Honor students from New Hanover did a fantastic job all night. To their credit, half of the 20 had already been and helped before so they had an idea what was going on. They were quick to jump in. We chopped our own BBQ and made our cole slaw from scratch and they were on it in a flash.

Now for the other thing........
I'm in the kitchen with everybody, just riding herd on the chaos and noise that comes with that many people, when my phone rings.
It's my sister, Sherry.
She says I know you're busy and I don't want to spoil a surprise, but you need to call Wayne (my brother who lives in Fayetteville).
I say OK.
Before I can get away and call him, he calls me.
Where are you at? he says.
I'm at the church. Why?
Cause I'm in Wilmington looking for you!
????????????????????????????????????

Surprised would be one way to describe me.
Shocked out of my socks would be a better one.
Wayne and I are a year and a half apart in age and light years apart in personality.And not in a bad way. Just different.
Most people don't even know I have a brother.

We get along fine, but don't spend much time together outside of holidays and family reunions.
So for him to ride 100 miles on a motorcycle to see me.........not something I would expect.

It was good to see him. He'd heard my sister talk about when she came to help a couple of months ago and wanted to come help, too. That, and the fact he wanted to take his motorcycle out on the road.
So he did. He helped at the first stop and headed back after we packed up to go to the Mercy House.

But not before he'd given Creeeeeeech and Morgzilla .......

.......When it comes back four seconds!

2010-11-03T12:02:00.000-07:00

LONDON / LUKE / BRETT / SHAUN / SAMMY / ERICA / MALLORY / ZUPON! / ELLYN / TWIG / MITCH / HAMPTON / J. BOGGS / CREEEEECH! / ALEXANDRA / BLAKE / STEVE / DAVID / JENNA / T.J. / MARK / CHARLES / LUKE / BRIEN / IAN / DON (#24) / .....got out in the chill last night night and put Faith into action and Love onto a plate for people who needed both.

GRILLED CHEESE
HOMEMADE CHICKEN NOODLE SOUP
FRIED FISH
FRIED SCALLOPS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

Twig made the call for the grilled cheese and soup tonight. I'd made about 5 dictatorial decisions in a row for meals so I was glad to hand it off this week. I got a call late in the afternoon that someone had a pan of freshly cooked spots and hush puppies for us. Then when I got downtown I remembered we had some scallops we had been sitting for a while, so I pulled them out (5 gallon-size Zip-Locs) and we had them tonight, too. It is always amazing and humbling to see how much God is capable of putting in our hands to distribute each week. Last week, fried shrimp. Tonight , spots and scallops.
How wild is that for a feeding ministry to be able to do?
It doesn't go unnoticed by our friends either. They comment often on the variety they see and we always give the credit back to God and his graciousness.

There has a been a nice response to the boxes at the Activity Center asking for coat and clothing donations. We're going to distribute them next week.
We'd like to put together a package deal of a toboggan, a pair of socks and a pair of gloves, if we can come up with enough.

We're rearranging some of our storage downtown to make things more efficient and a little easier at the end of the night.

Having the spots last night reminded me that we haven't had a FISH FRY in a while. I'd like to, it's just a matter of can we fit one in now that the Holiday season is on top of us. We'll see.

Don Vigus and I have been working on a plan for a Spring Break Mission Trip with the High School kids that come and help on Tuesday nights. The current thought is to go to New York City and spend 3-4 days plugged in to some homeless/food distribution programs up there. Let you know more as it develops.

Had 45 people in line at the first stop last night when we said the Blessing. That number will go up as it gets colder.

Fixed 10 gallons of homemade chicken soup last night. Went through about half of it, so now we have 5 gallons ready to be used another week. We're smart like that.

It's about time to start switching Sweet Tea for Hot Chocolate. I've never drank one cup of coffee in my life, but I've drunk enough Hot Chocolate to float a battleship. Love the stuff. I like to dunk graham crackers in it. Don't know where that came from but I've done it ever since I can remember.

FOOD JOKE
How do you know when a clock is hungry?...........

Upon further review.......

2010-10-29T11:34:00.000-07:00

....I've changed my mind.
Blame my parents for me not knowing what carrots tasted like!
If they hadn't been so intent on trying to cram collards, turnips and rutabagas in me as a kid, maybe I'd have tried a carrot or two somewhere along the way.

....they tried.

2010-10-27T12:09:00.000-07:00

Last week's vote for Thanksgiving dinner was......Traditional. Turkey. dressing. Sweet potatoes and all the rest.
DON / WAYNE / ANDY / CHAMBERLAIN / ANDREW / JOHN / ELAINE / ELLYN / TYLER / J.BOGGS / CREEEEEECH! / CHARLES / STEVE /
? ? ? ?
Notice anything different about this week's roster of folks?
There's a 28 person difference!

But that's the way it goes - the week after we have the largest volunteer night ever, we come back with the lightest crowd in a long time.
The biggest reason for youth not being there to help last night was Mid-terms. It's the last week of this grading period and the mid -terms began to day, so I hope and assume they were home studying, which is exactly where they should have been.

The food was inversely proportional to the amount of helpers, though. God absolutely opened up and showered us with abundance this week to pass on to our friends.

My plan was to simply to cook hamburgers patties, bake them in gravy and serve it over rice. I had all that sitting downtown already, so no shopping or running around. But guess who had a better plan?
God.

I got a call Sunday afternoon and someone gave me approx. 45 kielbasas, a pan of sauerkraut, bags of grapes and cheese, bottles of water and a big tub of pretzel sticks.
Sweet!

Then our buddy John Liverman called and dropped off a huge pan of fried shrimp, a pan of Roast Beef and gravy, and a pan of Banana Pudding.
Also Sweet!

Then I remembered I had a couple of gallons of stew beef broth we saved from last week still in the refrigerator, waiting to be used somehow. Who needs to make Gravy? We just cooked the hamburgers, placed them in pans and ladled the hot stew beef broth over them and covered them in foil. Good to go.

So, literally, the hardest decision I had last night was How to get all this food out? and Where to serve what?
That's a good position to be in.

We had rice tonight. Rice is a good thing for us. As Mitch Hedberg once said Rice is great if you're really hungry and want to eat 2,000 of something. The tough thing about it for us, though, is the quantity (100+) and keeping it from 7:30 when it's done cooking until 9:00 when we start serving at The Mercy House. In the past we boiled, drained it and put in a Gatorade cooler. Before long it would clump and get gummy. Not appetizing.
So I researched.
And researched some more.
Then i found a recipe for cooking it differently that guaranteed it would be perfect and keep that way for a long time.
So I gave it a shot, knowing that if I blew it, we'd be out of luck.
I put 2 cups of rice and 4 cups of warm water in a 9x13 pan, then covered it with Saran Wrap and aluminum foil. Let it sit for 30 minutes, then in the oven for 40 minutes at 350 degrees. Pulled it out and waited until I was ready to serve it to take the foil and wrap off.
PERFECT! Cooked just right and no clumping or gumming at all the rest of the night. Each pan was just right.
NEVER BOILING RICE ON TUESDAY NIGHTS AGAIN!

MENU
Hamburger Steak
Rice and Gravy
Fried Shrimp
Kielbasa and Bratwurst
Roast Beef
Bread
Cheese and Grapes

Desserts
Sweet Tea / Water

Didn't have any cocktail sauce for the shrimp, but we did have ketchup and Horseradish sauce, so.....we made FBC Special Sauce! It was actually pretty good. I snuck a little TEXAS PETE in it. Shocker.

QUICK STORY
When I pulled the beef stew broth out of the fridge, I gave it the standard look'n sniff to make sure it was good. Seemed fine. Got it on the stove warming and being stirred. After a while I got Elaine to put a little in a bowl to see how it was.
It wasn't good. There was a strong, kind of sharp mint or mediciney taste to it. so I asked Elaine to try it.
She said it was fine.
?
So I got Andy to taste it.
He said it was fine.
??
Tried Tyler.
He said it tasted better than last week.
???
Two more people and they all said it was fine.

I was afraid that it had absorbed something funky in the fridge (although the fridge smelled fine and was clean), but everybody said it was fine. I had even taken stuff to make gravy because I was sure everyone would agree with me.
So I said Fine we'll use it.
Later, when I pulled it off the stove and looked it into and stirred it, it hit me like a ton of bricks.
Carrots.
What I thought was a bad taste was simply the influence of carrots, which had gotten stronger as it sat for a week.
I didn't know what carrots tasted like!

I don't like carrots. I don't eat them. I guarantee you 99.99 per cent of any carrots ever entering my system has been the direct result of Carrot cake.
Everyone else didn't taste anything wrong because they had eaten carrots before.
I realize this does not reflect well on me, but don't hold it against my parents.........

....I'll tell you next time.

2010-10-21T08:28:00.000-07:00

MARK / T.J. / ZUPON! / JOHANNA / DON / TANYA / ZOEY / CHARLES / CHUCK / LUKE / BRETT / SARAH / MARY ANNE / EMILY / PAUL / DANIEL / MALLORY / SHAUN / BROOKE / TYLER / JACOB / LONDON / TYLER / BLAKE /MACKENZIE / TREY / MS. BONGIORNIO / ELLIE / BRIEN / TWIG / DAVID / JENNA / SANDRA / BETTY / CREEEEECH! / STEVE / ELAINE / ANDREW / SAM / ANDY ....in addition to being a huge crowd (41), this was also an All-Star crowd when it came to cooking and serving to meet other peoples needs.

STEW BEEF MASHED POTATOES GREEN BEANS ROLLS DESSERT SWEET TEA / WATER

Every time I turned around, more people kept walking in tonight. The names in orange are kids that go to New Hanover, which is my school where I am an FCA sponsor. It was good to see them come out and help. I didn't even know they were coming. Speaking of which.....

Here's a story you can file under "GREAT MINDS THINK ALIKE".....
I was on my way down to the church from the AC and was thirsty, so I hit the only drive thru on the way - Checkers. I'm in the middle of getting my Diet Coke and the phone rings. It's Paul Fleck, one of my FCA guys. So I answer and he says We're coming tonight to help feed. Where do we go?
I start to tell him how to get to the church and I pull away from the window and go left across the front of the joint (they have the drive thru on both sides) and I start hearing yelling through my phone and outside the truck. I look over and they're sitting in the other drive thru!
Paul said he hadn't been to Checkers in 3 years and just decided to stop on the way.
How's that for random?

Zoey brought her mom, Tanya, with her tonight.

Elaine has gotten so good at making the Sweet Tea, she's now totally in charge of it and I use her to teach new people how to do it. My role now is just to taste it when they're done. She also knows exactly what to with our desserts (slice, bag, wrap, etc.) so we can best distribute them. Love Elaine.
Plus, she keeps reminding me it's time for ScaryGary Movie Night now that Halloween is close. Last year's was a great time.

Twig was back this week after being ghone on a mission trip to Guatemala last week. It was a good trip. I'm jealous because they had 3 tremors while they were there (3!). I've always wanted to feel a tremor.(_______________________________________Insert your own joke here)

We always do a traditional Turkey/dressing/cranberry meal the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. Knowing that there are lots of people who donate food after during and after the holidays, we worry that they might get "Turkey'd" out and whether we should switch up to something else. It's a lot of fun for us to do the Turkey thing but maybe they'd rather have something else.
So I asked them.
I had a minute to kill while we were waiting for the stew beef to come up from the kitchen so I told them what I just told you, then asked for a show of hands if they wanted traditional or something different.
What do you think won?..........

2010-10-19T12:06:00.000-07:00

Stew beef, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans, Dinner rolls and dessert.
Working the "comfort food angle" tonight. Check back to see how it went.
Getting pressure from the college guys to pull the trigger on a Griiled cheese spaghetti sandwich night.
Which I really like, but I have learned over the years that things I "really" like aren't always "widely" liked,sooooo.......we'll see.

....too easy and too cheap to be that good

2010-10-13T08:31:00.000-07:00

So.....I had last week's post half written, full of names and menu items and all the things we offered to put on the Hot Dogs, and funny incidents. I saved it to come back and finish on Wednesday morning and then.....???? The rest of the week happened and I never finished it. Probably would have been the best ever but now we will probably never know.
Oh well.

BUT THIS WEEK WAS JUST AS AWESOME!

Just ask....
LONDON / SEAN / ELAINE / CECELIA / VIRGINIA / PAT / CHUCK / WAYNE / STEVE / BLAKE / PEYSON / T. J. / SAM / ANDY / ZOE / DALIA / MAC / KELSEY / ALEXANDRA / MS. BONGIORNIO / BRIANNA / TYLER / J.BOGGS / BRITTANY / DON / LAUREN / SHARICE / ....
because they are the ones who cooked
LEMON PEPPER CHICKEN
BUTTER NOODLES
GREEN BEANS AND POTATOES
DINNER ROLLS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER
and did a great job.

It was another day for "Game time decision" on what to cook. It was 4:30 and I was in HarrisTeeter waffling between kielbasa and chicken. I finally decided on chicken, mainly because on Sunday I told Elaine that's probably what we'd do. That, plus the fact that kielbasa was running $2.25/lb. and chicken was $ .99/lb.

London Paulson got a quick how-to on using a meat cleaver to separate leg quarters. After about the 3rd one he realized what most people do; chopping stuff with a big knife is fun.

There's a million ways to do it, but here's how we made Lemon Peppper Chicken last night:
Separate the leg quarters
Wash it
Dry it
Pan it
Put a pat of butter on top of each piece
Hit 'em with the lemon pepper seasoning
Bake for 20 at 400
Take them out and squirt a little TEXAS PETE on them
bake for another 20 - 30 minutes.
Done.

The butter melts and browns up and helps crisp the chicken. The TEXAS PETE just makes something good even better.

The number we've fed the past couple of weeks has gone down a little, mostly at the 2nd stop. The first stop continues to be 35 + at the start.

If you see STEVE LEGER this week, get him to tell you his story about the birds on the golf course. He had us rolling. Matter of fact, don't wait 'til you see him. Call him up and get him to tell it to you. It's that funny!

About 14 kids from Hoggard High School's Key club came last week as part of a service project. This week, 4 of them came back just because they liked doing it so much last week! Gotta love that.

Slowly getting over the old truck being gone but it's tough. The new truck doesn't have power windows or locks,so every time I have to roll the window or lock the door, I'm reminded of the old FORD.
Good times, good times......

Butter noodles are like Instant Mashed Potatoes, Cookout, and NETFLIX.....

2010-09-29T12:08:00.000-07:00

ELAINE / SAM / JUSTIN / ANDY / TYLER / HAYLEY / DON / MITCH / HAMPTON / TWIG / WAYNE / ELLYN / WADE / T.J. / MARK / BRIANNA / JOHANNA / ALEXIS / CREEEEEECH! / ALEXANDRA / BRIEN / CHARLES / MRS. BONGIORNIO / SHELBY / BLAKE / STEVE / LONDON / SHAUN / did not let a little rain keep them from being God's hands and feet .

What did we have tonight?
Better question- What didn't we have?
God put so much food in our hands this week, we were able to be incredibly generous.

We had our meal and we were able to give people a bag lunch for the next day that was crammed with stuff

MENU
CHEESEBURGERS POTATO CHIPS DESSERT SWEET TEA/WATER

BAG LUNCH
Turkey, Ham, or Roast Beef sandwich
Slice of Pizza
Hot Dog
Bag of Chips
Bag of Cookies

There was a large retreat at Ft. Caswell this weekend we took the youth group. One of the thing I helped with was cooking Hot dogs and Hamburgers for supper for the 1100 people that were there. We had quite a few left over and they gave them to me to use on Tuesday Night. We also brought back the unused chips and cookies. So Tonight we had approx. 250 hamburger patties ready to go for supper. We put out the usuals - ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, but we also had onions, tomatoes, TEXAS PETE, pickles, banana peppers, and red peppers.
Brett Queen donated 40 Panera Bread sandwiches from a catered event, which we used in the to go bags, along with several pizzas.
John Liverman also brought a pan of roast pork from his Rotary Club luncheon that we used.

The rain had us eating inside, which means we started a little earlier than usual. the rain also kept the numbers down, but not by very much.

People have asked about clothing and blankets the past 3 weeks. We have not collected any this year so far. I usually wait until after October to put out a call for items. Might need to start earlier ths year.

The new truck is doing okay. I miss the old one, though. If you've read past blogs, you've noticed I'm not the biggest fan of change when it comes to physical things. Once something gets broke in and works for me, my inclination is to hold on to it forever.

We made take-out boxes for the second stop because of the chance of rain. Bad call. We were fine. Should've done it the regular way. We hardly ever get rained on at the Mercy House. Even the guys in line commented that the rain always seems to stop before we get there.

Twig made it back after being gone for a few weeks. He went to Alska and then came back for his son's Graduation Exercise from Army Boot camp in Oklahoma. His son's name is Justin but I hung "Sprig" on him a couple of years ago and it stuck.
We're all very proud of him.

Tuesday 9/21

2010-09-23T12:07:00.000-07:00

ELAINE / CHAMBERLAIN / JOHANNA / WAYNE / BLAKE / STEVE / ANNA / BRIEN / DON / VICK / ANDY / TYLER / DAVID / EMILY /
MS. BONGIORNIO / HER MOM SHELBY / CHUCK / CHARLES put the smackdown on some Grilled cheese and tomato soup tonight.

GRILLED CHEESE
TOMATO SOUP
HOME FRIES
DESSERT
SWEET TEA/WATER

Tonight was a really good night with a lot of cool things happening, but right from the start we got tough news. We found out that T.J. Alexander, who comes every week, was in the hospital at that moment having an emergency appendectomy. We took a moment to pray for him and his family. We got word later that night that he came through fine and everything was going to be all right.

We made 180 grilled cheese sandwiches tonight.
Not an easy feat, considering every slice of bread has to be buttered, each one has to be flipped and watched and the griddle maxes out at at about 12 at a time. I put Andy on griddle duty and he worked it like a champ. The folks buttering and assembling were great, too.

When Danielle Bongiornio's mom came in tonight with her mom, they became the first 4 generation family represented on Tuesday nights. I wished I'd had a plaque ready or something. That's kinda cool.
It goes: Shelby(grandmom) Ms. Bongiornio, Danielle and her sisters Jessica and Mac, and Jessica's daughter Ellie.

Guess how many sandwiches we had leftover? ZERO!
The last person in line got the last sandwich. (we were giving out two the first time through so they wouldn't have to wait for seconds on them.) That's pretty much God at work, because we had prepared all the regular bread and at the last minute we went back and did another 2 loaves of wheat bread and because of that, we nailed it. Of course that meant there were none left for Tyler and Blake to eat but we had some tomato soup left and that was good enough.

The new truck did okay. It's a 2003 Ford. It sits lower than the other one. Just saying.....

I continue to be amazed at the number of people showing up at the first stop. We used to get started with maybe 10-15 there. Now there's at least 30 people there every week when we say grace.

Vick Griffin came and shot some video footage to use at the multi-church "Imagine Hope" conference that's being held at FBC this fall. He also helped cook and serve.

Don took pictures tonight also. I'll try to get them on soon.

Couple of things about tonight......

2010-09-21T12:10:00.000-07:00

It's looking like grilled cheese and tomato soup tonight! YUM. YUM. YUM.

We've got a new truck! Actually the church got a new truck but we use it every week and look at it as part of the family, so.....we've got a new truck!
It was put in the shop because the right front brake was feeling and sounding bad. They looked at it and said it would be $1800 to fix because they found a bunch of other brake and wheel related problems. The choice of the property management committee was fix and keep it long term or get something else. "Get something else" won. They traded it in and we got a 2003.
I'm kinda sad, though. I liked that truck. That truck had been with us since we started.
In honor of the service the truck gave us all these years, I'm going to tell a story about the truck.....plus it's a funny story and needs to be told every so often.

A couple of months into this ministry, back when it was still pretty much just me, Skyler, Jonathan, Mason, Drew and Colby, we loaded up the truck at The Activity Center and got ready to take our stuff downtown. The tailgate on the truck was a little hinky and you had to slam it good to make sure it was shut. We had two 8 ft. portable tables (the brown ones that took 2 people to carry), and 4 rectangular coolers with ice, drinks(this was back when we served canned drinks every week), and our food in the back. I was driving the truck and everyone else was in Jonathan's explorer.
As I pulled off out of the parking lot, I heard a large thump. I looked and saw someone had left a cooler on top of another and it had slid off. It wasn't the first time.

When we finished that night we loaded up to come back and one of the guys shut the tailgate. I said Did you slam it? They said Yeah.

I was in front of them at the stoplight at Dawson and 17th. When I pulled off I heard another thump. I thought Who keeps stacking coolers on top of each other?
I drove on to the A.C. and pulled around to back to unload. I got out and started to reach in the back to grab a cooler and....nothing. There wasn't a single thing in the back of the truck! NOTHING!
Aw crap.
So I jump in the truck and head back the way I came. When I get to the intersection of Independence and College, I see Jonathan's Explorer coming towards me, loaded down with everything I had lost.
They were still laughing and howling when they got out of his car.
Here's what happened:
When I took off at the light, one of the coolers slid and hit the tailgate, knocking it open (the thump I heard). The bed of the truck had a plastic liner which was fairly slick and when the tailgate went down, the tables now had nothing to keep them from sliding out, did exactly that. And tthe tables took all four coolers with them, right there in the middle of the intersection, in front of Jonathan and the other guys.
So now there's 4 coolers and 2 tables strowed across the intersection. A car comes through and slams into one of the coolers, knocking the top off the hinges. The guys pull over and start trying to get things out of the intersection. The ice cooler has upended and spilled out and Mason slips in it and goes feet up flat on his back in the middle of the road! They're laughing at that, laughing at the situation in general, trying not to get run over, wondering why I don't know everything fell out of the truck, trying to get it all loaded....just a big chaotic adventure.

The tables survived. The coolers were okay, except for the one that got hit, but we still used it. Mason had a nice bruise but was fine. I got the tailgate fixed and a reminder of the need to check everything myself before we pull out.

R.I.P. 1993 Ford truck

Tuesday Sept 14

2010-09-21T11:13:00.000-07:00

ELAINE / EMILY /CECELIA / JOHANNA / KAYLA / CAITLYN / KILLER / BRYANNA / LAUREN / LINDSAY / TYLER / MARK / T.J. / WADE / ALYSSA / ELLYN / MORGZILLA / DAVID / DON / STEVE / BLAKE / J. BOGGS / CHUCK /

MENU
HOT DOGS
GREEN BEANS
MASHED POTATOES with GRAVY
DESSERT
SWEET TEA / WATER

The #of people that we feed at the first stop jumped up over the summer and continues to stay there. There has been at least 30 people waiting in line when we say grace for several weeks now. Then another 15 or 20 walk up. That's huge for the first stop.
It has made us more aware of portion size and forces us to keep an eye on how much we have to make sure that we've got enough for the 2nd stop.

The menu components might seem a little odd at first glance, but it worked for us. It made for full plates, we had it on hand and we could involve lots of people in the prep and the serving.

Most of my regular adults were not there last night. I missed Wayne, Twig, Brien, Anna, Teresa, Teresa, and Mitch. But Don ( an irregular adult if there ever was one) showed up and we managed. It was tougher without them. Plus the truck's in the shop, so everything about transporting was a little different. And both long tables and a short table decided to just fall apart in different ways. It's funny how everything can be thrown off in big ways when a few little things change.
We'll make it though.

Tuesday 7, 2010

2010-09-10T12:11:00.000-07:00

5 onions, 5 lbs of dry kidney beans, 10 lbs of kielbasa, 15 lbs of chicken breasts, 15 lbs of rice, some Old Bay, a little Gumbo File and a big pot of water. That's what we used to make our CHICKEN BOG Tuesday night.
We wound up with close to 14 gallons of it and were scraping the bottom of the cooler at the end of the night.
We served it with a couple of slices of light bread and had TEXAS PETE and cheese if you wanted it.
Now, as much as i love cheese, I don't want it on something like Chicken Bog, but nearly the folks coming through the line did.

Menu
CHICKEN BOG/LIGHT BREAD/DESSERT/SWEET TEA/WATER and Little Debbie Blackberry pies to hand out as they left.

PEYSON / MERRITT / ELLYN / T.J. / MARK / TYLER / ANDY / ANNA / BLAKE / STEVE / WAYNE / BRIEN / JESSICA / ELLIE / MAC / MRS. BONGIORNIO / CRUMP / ALYSSA / ELAINE / TREY / ASHLEY / KILLER / LAUREN / LINDSEY put thoughts into actions and words into service this week.

Danielle Bongiornio was one of our regulars who went off to college this year. She's a freshman playing basketball at Lenoir-Rhyne. The week before she left for school, she brought her two sisters (one older, one younger) with her so they could see what she's been doing on Tuesday nights for the past couple of years. That was a really neat thing. But the really cool thing is ....they've been coming ever since!
This past week they brought their Mom! It was like having 3 Danielle's with us. I hope they keep coming.

The plan for tonight....

2010-09-07T11:57:00.000-07:00

...is CHICKEN BOG.
Never made it.
Chicken and Pastry - done it.
Chicken and rice- done it.
Chicken Bog?
I'll let you know how it goes.
Maybe J. BOGGS knows how to make it.

Tuesday August 24, 2010

2010-08-31T11:38:00.000-07:00

We had the smallest volunteer turnout in a long time tonight on what might have been the night where we had the most people come through the line in a long time. Pretty sure we had right at 100 people come through the line tonight.
Public school starts back tomorrow so that probably accounts for the light turnout of youth. We had one of our women's bible study groups helping us tonight, too. They did a great job.

We have talked about doing burritos for a long time but never pulled the trigger on it. Tonight we pulled the trigger and hit the bulls-eye. They were good, we had plenty and our friends loved them.

The womens bible study helped cook and serve at the first stop, but weren't going to the 2nd stop. A couple of youth had to leave because of school the next day. When we loaded up to go serve at the second stop we only had 5 people going to serve a meal that had a lot of items on the table to be served. That could make things tough and slow it down. As we were pulling out to go, Kelsey and Alexis pulled up. They had been at a meeting and were running late.That made 7. When we got to the Mercy House, Blake Leger and his dad Steve rolled up, giving us 9.
No problem. Give me 9 and we can knock any serving job out.

It's pretty amazing to look back at the end of a night and realize you've put food in the hands of over 100 people. It's also pretty amazing the way God continually puts the means and the resources in our hands to do this every Tuesday.

TRYING TO CATCH UP.........

2010-08-24T20:47:00.000-07:00

(. This was written last Tuesday but went into SAVE instead of POST. My bad. Tonight was pretty amazing. Tell you about it tomorrow. I'll put up the post for tonight tomorrow. Got all that? )

I know I've been slack the past couple of weeks about posting.
No excuses.
No apologies, either.

Two tuesdays ago a youth group from Gastonia was in town and came down to help us. They did a good job. We had spaghetti.

This past week Kelly Leger brought her Youth Group from Wrightsville Beach Methodist to help us. Kelly and her family were members of our church befors she accepted the position at Wrightsville Beach last year. Her husband Steve and son Blake still come and help every week. They planned the menu and we had Sloppy Joes, which is always a big hit with out crowd. Johnny Liverman also brought down some baked chicken and barbecue. We took that and made sandwiches for them to take for their lunch the next day.
I like it when we have something they can put in their hands as they leave.

This was our last week before all the colleges started up and over the last couple of weeks we've had to say "adios"* to all the graduated seniors heading off to college and our college kids going back. It was kind of sad but exciting , too, because I can picture some of them taking initiative and doing something like this where they go to school. I tried to put the seed in their mind and even offered to come up and do it with them one night. Who knows?

SLOPPY JOES POTATO CHIPS WATERMELON DESSERTS SWEET TEA/WATER
and BAKED CHICKEN/BARBECUE SANDWICHES for lunch the next day.

Danielle Bongiorno has been a regular for a couple of years now, whenever basketball wasn't in season. This was her last week before she headed off to Lenoir-Rhyne to attend school and play basketball. She brought her sisters Jessica and Mac to show them where she goes and what she does on Tuesday Nights. And what she does as well as anybody is smile and interact. all of our friends like it when she sits down and spends time with them. W
We're going to miss her.

DANIELLE / JESSICA / MAC / HAYLEY / CHRIS / TYLER / MARK / T.J. / PEYSON / HAMPTON / BLAKE / BRYCE / CHAMBERLAIN / WAYNE / MITCH / ANNA / JON / TWIG / THE GROUP FROM WRIGHTSVILLE BEACH METHODIST /

I'm in Guatemala.......

2010-08-02T22:35:00.000-07:00

Go to fbcguatemalatrip.blogspot.com to see what's happening there.

Gotta be quick so I can crash. Doctor Appointment tomorrow at 9 a.am.

2010-07-27T21:23:00.000-07:00

It's late and I'll post more tomorrow, but I wanted to put something up tonight before I crashed.

Tonight was really, really, good. For lots of reasons; some I can put my finger on and explain, and for others that I won't do justice to and you just had to be there to feel and experience it.

It just felt good to be there. Good ........and right.

My sister Sherry and her husband Dave came down from Fayetteville with my nephews Jonathan and Daniel to help us tonight. She's been wanting to bring them for a while and finally got a chance this week. I really enjoyed them being there tonight.

Maggie Miller and Lauren Powell each brought 2 people with them tonight. I always try to remember to tell them what a great thing it is to bring people to share what God is doing and I tell them about Peter meeting Jesus because his brother Andrew brought him to him.

Taylor Campbell came tonight! I love Taylor Campbell!

We fixed cheeseburgers tonight.....Carolina style....Cole slaw, Chili, Mustard and Onions. Plus the usual other stuff if that's what you wanted.

Homemade Banana Pudding.

I'll leave you with that............

3 TRIPS DOWN, 1 TO GO.......

2010-07-21T20:03:00.000-07:00

Man.
I haven't posted since June 10.
But in my defense, I have been busy. I've been on trips to Beach Camp/Ft. Caswell (out of the COUNTY), Bimini (out of the COUNTRY) and Helena, Arkansas (out in the COUNTRY).

I've been gone most of the Tuesday nights, but I was there for the 2nd time this summer this past Tuesday.
We had open-faced sandwiches. They turned out great and we served out just about all of it.

BAILEY / DANIELLE / SAM / SEAN / ALEX / BRIEN / TWIG / MITCH / WAYNE / WADE / ELAINE / CECELIA / HAYLEY / CHUCK / SHANE / JOHN / MO-GAN / ALEXIS / ALEXANDRA / CREEEEECH! / EBY / T.J. / MARK / HAMPTON / were just the people I neede to see and be with on Tuesday.
Tyler Bordeaux is one of our regular workers on Tuesday night and was with me on the Helena Mission Trip last week, when he found out his Grandmother had passed away. The funeral was on Tuesday in New Jersey. Prayer for him and his family are greatly appreciated.

There were over 90 people served last week and almost that many this week. Unfortunately, that's the way the summers usually play out. More people needing more help.

I'll be here next Tuesday also, then leave for Guatemala on Thursday. Looking forward to heading back to the Guate for the 4th year in a row.

Love, Peace and chicken grease. g

....one of the guys who invented Silly Bandz or the Wii.

2010-06-10T08:04:00.000-07:00

I always expect Tuesday night to be good, but tonight was exceptionally good and for lots of reasons. I'll try to give you as many as I can remember.
First and most importantly, God's goodness and blessings. We had so much food to pass out last night. God provides us with so much great food it's unbelievable. And not leftovers we just reheat. Wonderful fresh stuff that our friends can tell was cooked specifically for them.
To be able to create and cook something, then put it in someone's hands for them to eat and have them come back and tell you how good it was and how much they appreciate you doing it, might be the biggest long term benefit kids get from this ministry. It's the kind of thing that makes an impression and sparks them to do (and lead) similar things when they go off to college and beyond.
Another great thing was a lot of people came and helped last night.
HOLT / KEVIN / CUTTER / MARCUS /CHRIS / CHRISTIAN / TYLER / CHRIS ADAMS / EBY / MARK / /HAMPTON / TJ / TWIG / MITCH / CHUCK (my new favorite person and hero!) / JAMIE / ELAINE / MADELYNE / MERRITT / CECELIA / JOHANNA / CAITLYN / KAYLA / ALEX / ALEXANDRA / BRIANNA / CREEEEECH! / ALEXIS / DAVID / STEPHANIE / TERESA F. / BRIEN / MARILYN / put faith into action by putting food in people's hands last night.

Teresa Fountain was able to obtain a tremendous amount of fruit and vegetables for last nights meal, which was :
CHICKEN SKEWERS
VEGETABLE SKEWERS
BAKED BEANS
DINNER ROLLS
CANTALOUPE SLICES
WATERMELON SLICES
PEACHES
DESSERT
WATER / SWEET TEA / GINGER ALE

It's been at least 4 years since we did any kind of kabobs or skewers, so last night was a real treat. The kitchen was a well oiled machine with people cutting and skewering, making tea, slicing watermelon and cantaloupe,washing dishes, etc.

We had cherry tomatoes, zucchini, squash, bell peppers, and mushrooms on the vegetable skewers. (That's a lineup I go 1 for 5 on. I like cherry tomatoes but you can have the other stuff.)
We also had peaches to give out as they were leaving.
The second stop guys can't take food back into the Mercy House, so with something like peaches, I take them in to the Night Captain and he hands them out in the morning as they leave.

Susan Lewis was kind enough to provide half of the chicken we used last night and we greatly appreciate her thinking of us.

At the Sr. Banquet last Sunday night, I looked at the 20 Seniors there and realized 10 of them are die hard Tuesday night regulars. My first thought was That's really neat but my second thought was Yikes!* I'm losing 10 people that help almost every week!
It'll actually only be 9 because J.BOGGS is staying here to go to UNCW and he'll still come. Plus I won't lose TYLER right away because the current plan doesn't have him leaving for the NAVY until December. Still, that's a big loss. I'm gonna miss seeing them on Tuesdays. BAILEY /SAM /CHRISTIAN / ALEX / DANIELLE / ELLEN / EBY / LIZ / are heading out!

HERE'S WHY CHUCK IS MY NEW FAVORITE PERSON AND HERO

I love to read. Books, magazines, online, mysteries, thrillers, historical- everything. But my absolute favorite thing to read is Comic Books. I make no apologies for it. I love them. I did when I was a kid and I do now. I deeply care what happens to Batman, Superman and The Flash every month. Here's the depth of my love for comic books: If I was ever in a "last man on earth" scenario (I am Legend, or the Twilight Zone episode with Burgess Meredith) , I 'd cope by heading to the comic book store and reading everything they have. And it would take a long while. Oh, I imagine eventually I would get around to missing some of y'all, but ....
Anyway, CHUCK has been coming for a few months now. He's an older gentleman who's a big help, but I've never had a sit down discussion about what he does now or used to do. Chuck noticed that CHRIS ADAMS, the Minister of Students, had on a Justice League T-shirt and a conversation started. Out of the blue he mentioned Green Arrow and Green Lantern and referenced a story done in 1970. I said "Hard Travelin' Heroes" and we proceeded to go back and forth about who drew it(Neal Adams), who wrote it (Denny O'Neal, who inked it (Dick Giordano), etc.
I was amazed. But that was nothing.

Then he says I remember talking to Neal.........
WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT!

Neal Adams? My favorite artist of all time? The most definitive Batman artist of all time?
Yep. CHUCK knows him.

CHUCK used to work in the comic book industry!
CHUCK used to do covers for comic books and paper backs. He starts naming off comics that I have read and characters that I know.
Then he says the magic words: I used to help on the DOC SAVAGE paperback covers.

FLASHBACK: 1970 - I'm a little kid and an older friend of mine lets me read a paperback book called DOC SAVAGE : THE MAN OF BRONZE.

I loved the book, and thought it had the coolest paperback cover of all time. A publisher called BAMA was reissuing the DOC SAVAGE books from the 30's and 40's with all new cover art. I liked the cover to the one above so much that I tracked down a poster of it and bought it. Then I started reading every one of the 100+ books I could find.

And now, years later, I'm talking to the guy who played a role in all of that. Way beyond cool.
I start dropping Hall of Fame names from the comic book industry and he knows them all.

He had to leave towards the end of the first stop, but we're not done by a long shot.
I'm going to do everything I can to make sure he keeps coming. I don't care if he helps cook or not, I want him for the stories.
The kids couldn't believe how excited I got the more CHUCK and I talked.
They will one day.
Maybe they'll meet .........

....I could be swayed if someone had a better idea.

2010-06-02T09:32:00.000-07:00

2 bags of grits, 180 eggs, 20 lbs. of deer sausage, a #2 can of cheese sauce and 60 slices of white cheese.
That's all you need to feed 80 people a couple of bowls of jacked-up cheese grits.
It wound up being about 10 gallons altogether. We had 5 gallons of grits and 5 gallons worth of the other stuff. Mixed together it was pretty thick and hearty.
We had TEXAS PETE and jalapenos for anyone who wanted to go that route - and lots did. Got back to the church after the 2nd stop with about a ladle and a half left.

The rain earlier in the day actually made for a pleasant first stop. It wasn't muggy like I was expecting. the second stop did turn out that way, but it was still ok.

BAILEY / SAM / DANIELLE / CHRISTIAN / TYLER / J.BOGGS / EBY / JASON / JADE / EMILY / HAMPTON / LIZ / JANE / CHUCK / FIRST TERESA / SECOND TERESA / BRIEN / WAYNE / TWIG / BLAKE / MARK / JOHANNA / MORGZILLA / ALEXIS / CREEEEEEEEEEEECH! / BRIEN / CHRIS / NICK / JOSH / ALEX / STEVE / MARILYN / are all every bit as colorful and lively on Tuesday nights as their names are on the blog.

John Liverman brought us a pan of baked chicken and a half pan of barbecue from his Rotary Club luncheon. We pulled the chicken off the bone to use next week and put the barbecue in the freezer. John's a good man.

I'm gonna be gone some this summer with YG trips and stuff. People have stepped up and offered to help in my absence. If you want to help and get us through the summer, contact me and let me know(gamyharns@gmail.com). A group of families can get together and do it, a Sunday School class, it doesn't matter. I've already been contacted by another church's youth group and our church's Boy Scout troop.
The reason we need help covering is not that I'm gone, but it's because when I'm gone it's with the Youth Group, and as you notice in the list of who helps every week, they make up a lot of the crowd that comes. I don't have to be replaced- but 20 kids do.

Gene McIntyre and Mitch Cook are the ones responsible for supplying us with Deer Sausage this time. We appreciate it.

We've got chicken to use for next week's meal. Right now I'm leaning toweards some kind of kabobs.
But I'm flexible........

...slap some peanut butter on it.

2010-05-27T06:02:00.000-07:00

MEAT LOAF
ROAST BEEF
MASHED POTATOES
GREEN BEANS
COLE SLAW
A TON OF DESSERTS (more on that later)
SWEET TEA/ WATER/ SODA

TYLER / CHRISTIAN / J.BOGGS / CHRIS / JOSH / HAMPTON / MARK / TOMMY / CHUCK / TWIG / WAYNE / MITCH / SAM / BOONE / WADE / JANE / BECCA MORGAN / MORGZILLA /CREEEECH! /
ALEXIS / ALEX / JAMIE / ELAINE / CECELIA / CHAMBERLAIN / BRIEN / MARILYN /

Some of the things that happened this week -

Tuesday was the birthday of Charles Grimes Rollins, Jr. aka "TWIG". Jane brought him a cookie cake and shared it with everyone.

CECELIA has been wanting to bake a cake for a couple of weeks and we finally got to it this week. Turned out great. CHAMBERLAIN and JAMIE helped. They actually made two. They iced one with chocolate icing but didn't have enough for the second one. Keep reading and you'll see what they came up with for the second cake.

CHRIS and JOSH Armstrong are home from college for the summer and came down. Always good to see them.

Had a guy visit last week named TOMMY. He's an older gentleman who says he comes to FBC sometimes. He asked about what we we did and said he had worked for a hotel chain in the food services area for a long time. He said he'd like to help and he'd be back. He came back this week.

John Liverman brought a pan of Roast beef and Mashed potatoes, a pan of green beans, and a pan of Banana Puddding from his Rotary Club luncheon. It was catered by Pearl's. That was a huge help because it allowed us to load up the plates.

If it ever comes down to a situation where I'm gonna be allowed a last meal (let's hope not, but.....), roast beef and mashed potatoes will be in the conversation.

If you read the names each week, you might notice CREEEECH! is in there every week. That's Kelsey Creech. She was in my Bible classes at Hoggard, and I never called anybody by their first name, just Mr. or Miss "their last name". And with her, it wasn't even that, it was just her last name. And when she walked in for the first time every day, it was longer and louder-CREEEEEEEEECH!
Well a couple of weeks ago I was at the comic book store looking in the dollar boxes and saw a Comic called "The Creech". I grabbed it and gave it to her last night. She got a kick out of it and that's what I was shooting for.

ALEX Miller came late and she'd never driven by herself to the 2nd stop. For some reason, she drives a big ol' full size truck. She called and got directions and I told her to just pull in the parking lot when she got there.
I saw her pull up and go past us. About 10 minutes later she came walking up. I asked where she'd been. She said"I'm not a good parallel parker". She'd been wrestling that truck into a parking space out on the street the whole time!

We set out the Banana Pudding at the 2nd stop and told them they had a choice between that and yellow cake with chocolate icing for dessert. It was never even a contest. Only 3 people had opted for the cake by the time the Banana Pudding ran out.
Duh. We're in the South.

My night was already complete the minute BECCA MORGAN showed up. I love BECCA MORGAN. If you don't, it's only because you haven't met her yet. She just graduated from Davidson and is home for the week before she heads for training with TEACH AMERICA. She'll be teaching High School in Charlotte next year. I have known her since she was very little. She tried to bust me last night. We were talking and a kid walked over and I said something to them and BECCA said You still using that line? You were using that when I was in Youth Group!
It's all right. I still love her. Plus, she's right. You only got to have 6 years worth of material, then you can start using it all over again.

When we started up to the first stop, I let Cecelia stay down to ice her cakes. When she came up, she showed me the chocolate iced cake and then showed me the other one. It had a fancy looking crumbly topping on it. She said it was pineapple and rice krispies with some butter. ?. I didn't even know we had any of that stuff. I asked her who made that?
Take a guess.
TOMMY.
First week in the kitchen and he whips up some kind of gourmet topping for cake out of scratch.
Hope he comes back. I would've told her to just.....

Gotta start posting these when I write 'em.........

2010-05-24T08:23:00.000-07:00

BAILEY / SAM / CHRISTIAN / J.BOGGS / LIZ / MARK / RYAN / ELAINE / MERRITT / ELLEN /HALEY / BLAKE / HAMPTON / JASON / TYLER / TWIG / WAYNE / TERESA / TERESA /MITCH / SEAN / make the kitchen downtown a great place to be on Tuesday night.
It was "Breakfast for Supper" time again. Instead of serving the sausage separately, though, we crumbled sausage into the pancakes once we poured them on the griddle so it was in the pancake. Heard about it being done that way so we tried it. It was okay. We didn't do all of them like that, though. Believe it or not, some people don't like sausage.
I like to pour the batter and let it cook, drop a cooked sausage patty in the center, cover it with batter and then flip it. Then when you're done - you've got a sausage patty inside your pancake. NICE. It also works for bacon, you just have to pour a strip of batter instead of a circle. It looks cool, too; a plate full of long pancakes instead of round ones.

Twig's stepson Hayden is an RA at N.C. State. He and a group of them from University Towers were down for training and helped serve at the first and second stops.

Tuesdays with Warden

2010-05-17T05:18:00.000-07:00

This week's meal was planned and provided by the Fellowship Sunday School class. This crowd was organized and ready to go. I made sure I got there at 5:55 because I told them 6:00. I walked in and they already beans and corn on the stove, and the ham sliced, ready to go in the oven.
I could get used to that.
They came in two waves. The first wave was the cooking wave and then the serving wave came around 7:00, ready to carry food out and start passing out food.
I had kids come, too, so I set up as much interaction between the two groups as I could. I sort of assigned kids places to hang out to show the adults where things were and to answer questions about how we did things. They liked having answers for the adults.

The menu
BAKED HAM
CORN
GREEN BEANS
DINNER ROLLS
DESSERT
SWEET TEA/ WATER

It was another one of those great days where heaven just opened up and rained food on us. We were given a huge box of fruit, somebody brought a big garbage bag full of artisan breads and bagels and we had more cookies than we could use for the meal.
Hmmmm .....bread....fruit....cookies.....The Walkaway Special!
We took the lunch meat we had and made ham and cheese bagels and peanut butter bagels, and tossed them in lunch bags with a couple of pieces of fruit and 2 cookies.
Nice.

WAYNE AND KATIE HILL / GAYE THOMAS / JIMMY AND TOM WALLACE / GLENDA AND JIM CURRIN / LINDA GURGANUS / VICKIE PORTER / MIKE AND ANNE COCKERHAM / CHARLES LIESE / JERRI ROGERS / KERRY TAYLOR were the members of the class who were able to come and be a part of the night. I'd also like to recognize and thank the members of the class who weren't able to come but provided money and prayed for us. We appreciate their efforts.
WAYNE / STEVE / ANNA / J.BOGGS / TYLER / EBY / CHRISTIAN / JASON / BAILEY / SHANE / PEYSON / ALEXIS / CREEEECH! / MO-GAN / BLAKE / are great people that do amazing things on Tuesday nights.

Not so quick story: Mike Cockerham is in the Fellowship class and came Tuesday night. I haven't called him "Mike" or "Mr. Cockerham" in years. He's always "Warden".
He was a chaperon with us years ago on a ski trip. We had a rule about no CD players on the trip because we wanted kids interacting not secluding. Most of the kids brought them anyway and there were several wearing them on the bus ride. Don saw them and we talked about it and decided everyone that brought one would miss the morning ski session. "Mike" volunteered to stay back at the house with the rule breakers. We started joking about house arrest and when we came in for lunch I saw him and said" How'd it go, Warden?"
And to this day that's the only name I've ever needed for him.
He doesn't call me "Gary" either, but you'll have to ask him about the reason for that. g

......Mother's Day Special !

2010-05-05T08:24:00.000-07:00

Boggs has writer's block and hasn't posted so I'm going to recap last week real quick and then move on to last night.
He served a great meal of baked chicken, mac'n cheese, and homemade banana pudding. Knocked the meal out of the park. Had a beautiful spring night for it. I stayed out of the kitchen so J.Boggs would have to be the voice and the ramrod for getting things done. He did a great job all the way around. He'll fill in on the rest.

Last Wednesday, another one of our regular Seniors, Tyler Bordeaux, held a chili supper as part of his Sr. Project. It was a donation affair and the proceeds went to us, the Tuesday Night Feeding Ministry. It was very well attended and he raised over $900. Very nice. He did a great job.

Wayne and Katie Hill donated 5 Boston pork butts to us from a fundraiser that Wayne is part of. It was a no-brainer to go with BBQ sandwiches this week. We thawed some brunswick stew we had saved, put some baked beans in it, got some cole slaw, and used the pans of mac'n cheese we saved from last week and we were good to go! We also switched it up a little this week. Instead of Sweet Tea we served.....Lemonade. That cool refreshing drink. (Eddie Murphy reference!)

Everything outside was wet so the first stop was served inside, which is always kinda nice but different.
We serve in Fireside Hall which is comfortable and roomy but it feels muted. No traffic noise, everybody is aware of their volume (most people anyway)....it's different. Time goes faster, too. We looked outside, saw some blue and decided to roll the dice on the next stop and set up outside instead of fixing plates to hand out. Turned out to be a good call.

One of our guys is leaving to go to S.C. and start an Electrical business with a partner. Next week will probably be his last. His name's Omar and we'll be praying for him. He's going to bring his daughter to church Sunday.
BBQ SANDWICHES
COLE SLAW
BRUNSWICK STEW
MAC'N CHEESE
DESSERTS
LEMONADE/WATER .....were fixed and served by....

... ELAINE / CECELIA / HAMPTON / EBY / J.BOGGS / TWIG / TERESA / BRIEN / MITCH / WAYNE / STEVE /
TYLER / CHRISTIAN / MO -GAN / ALEXIS / BLAKE / CREEEEEEECH! / JASON / LITTLE THUG / JADE / ALYSSA / ELLYN /
The thing kids like about making BBQ sandwiches is tearing up the Boston butts and chopping them into BBQ. Our guys like it "wet" so we mix Sonny's Sweet BBQ sauce into it. My spectrum for how I like my BBQ is wide enough to be classified as "It's all good".
So, I'm easy like that.

Gonna be a showing of THE BLIND SIDE this weekend at FBC Cinema 1. You're invited to come hang out with us and watch it. Admission is free, concessions are free, sodas are free.
For those of y'all who forget what day it is until you get to church, it could turn into a .......

.....Sharing is Caring.

2010-04-30T11:50:00.000-07:00

2 things:

J.Boggs did his Sr. Project on Tuesday night. I tried my best to step back and let him take charge and give direction.
I thought I'll let him write the blog, too.
So look for that in a day or two.

Tuesday night after we were done Sam Gates sent me a text about how much she enjoyed it and thanking me for letting her do it. I got to thinking that other people might feel like that and others would like to hear it.
So I think Sunday night I'm gonna grab some of the ones that help and set up a new blog with open access that the ones who help can log on to and share their experiences. That way it's more than just my voice being heard about what's happening on Tuesday nights.

Probably what I should have done in the first place.
You know what Karl Marx said........

.....I'm 0 for 2.

2010-04-27T08:31:00.000-07:00

I wrote this the day after the NCAA championship game and thought I had posted it. WRONG. My bad. Here you go.........
The Super Bowl party we do for our friends on the street is always a blast and getting bigger each year.
3 years ago we watched the NCAA Championship Basketball game and it was fun but the last 2 years I've been out of town on the Guys Sr. High Surf Trip and not able to be in Wilmington.
Checked the calendar and saw I'd be in town for the game this year. Told the guys at the Mercy House if they wanted to watch it I'd come get them and take them back to the church and we'd watch it there.

Because it tipped off so late, I knew it wouldn't be a lot of guys. They go to bed early and have to be out by 6:00 a.m., so a 9:15 tip off is too late for some of them. I didn't ask for much help because of that also. Not a lot of people want to be downtown until midnight watching a game however good a cause it's for.
I went by around 8:30 and grabbed the ones who wanted to come, which was around 10 guys.
Pruden came down about 8:45 and gave me a hand.
We had Pizza Rolls, Bagel Bites, Baked Potato Chili, and Sweet Tea. We ate before the game and had ice cream at half time. I bought a variety pack of ice cream items (sandwiches, fudge bars, eskimo pies, and nutty buddy's). I gave everybody their choice of one at halftime. Couple of minutes into the 2nd half one of the guys says You got any more of those Nutty Buddy's? I said yeah.
Can I get another one?
Sure......and everybody else asked for another one.
10 minutes later ....same thing.
Every single one of them hit me for thirds on ice cream treats.
And you know what? Good for them.
It was a lot of fun. Because there weren't that many of us, everybody was sitting on a couch with plenty of room. The noise level was low and a more relaxed atmosphere than the Super Bowl.
We always have a good time seeing who wants which team to win. I talk junk about the team I don't want to win and they jump on it and talk back.
Between the Super Bowl and this game ......

.......makes me grin.

2010-04-22T08:23:00.000-07:00

Hands on Wilmington
John Liverman's Rotary Club Luncheon
Laura Barkley"s Wedding

What do these all have in common? They're the reason we didn't have to buy a single thing this week for the meal.

Hands on Wilmington was a big volunteer push this past weekend that gave us 28 pizzas. John Liverman brought us BBQ Chicken, Collards, and Sweet Potatoes from his luncheon and David and Ann Barkley brought us pasta salad, fresh vegetables, and turkey from their daughter's wedding reception.

I said last post it was a good week to be behind the table because we had so much to give. Well, this week was a great week, because we had even more than last week.
We split it up and served everything except pizza at the first stop. We took the leftovers to the second stop with us. At the second stop we served the pizza first (3-4 slices) and then offered the first stop leftovers for seconds.
It worked out well.

And again, it required nothing on our part except to be willing to receive it and pass it on.
Just be Hands and Feet.

MO-GAN / KILLER / ALEXANDRA / PEYSON / SHANE / HAMPTON / MITCH / TWIG / CHUCK / MIKE / MIKE'S WIFE / MARK / ALEX / J.BOGGS / TYLER / CECILIA / ZOOEY / ELAINE / BRIEN / TERESA / DAVID / HIS 2 GIRLS / SAM / DANIELLE / and JADE are people I like to spend my Tuesday nights with.

We pray a lot over the course of the night. Before we go up to serve, Grace at the first stop, before we leave for the second stop, Grace again, and then to close the night. Most times I ask one of the youth to say the Grace (sometimes one of our friends will volunteer).
It's cool to watch them get better and more confident at it. I remind them they are praying to God, and not to any of us. They pray some pretty incredible and humbling prayers when given the chance.

For the Record
PIZZA (second stop)
BBQ CHICKEN
PASTA SALAD
BAKED ZITI
COLLARDS
BEANS/CORN
SWEET POTATOES
DESSERT
SWEET TEA/ WATER

Next week J.Boggs is gonna run the show as part of his Sr. Project. He passed out a survey of services for the Homeless this week as part of that also.
His menu for next week is Baked Chicken, Mac'n Cheese, Dinner rolls, and Banana Pudding. We sat down last night and walked through everything he needed to get and needed to do for next week. J.Boggs will do fine.
Tyler is doing a chili supper as part of his Sr. Project with the donations going toward the Tuesday night ministry. It's April 28 at the Activity Supper from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Drop by and help him out if you can. He's a good guy.

I forgot to mention this in the last post. The first choice for the next movie we see on Sunday afternoon is THE BLIND SIDE.....you want to know what their next choice to watch is?
TRANSFORMERS.
And that just .........