Scavenger hunt

For the second time in three weeks, at Wednesday's Children's Fellowship at church we spent time with the kids touring around the church buildings. Last time it was for a Stations of the Cross-style Holy Week exercise, organized by Ms. Martha. This time we went outside too, as Ms. Kate and Ms. Stephanie had come with a long (almost two dozen items) scavenger hunt. We asked the ten kids there to count off and split into teams. The two teams were supposed to be in competition and they were supposed to find all of the items on the list - everything from a pastor to information for visitors to a bilingual Bible - and have the items photographed. Ms. Kate, husband Ian, and Vincent went with one team, and Ms. Stephanie, Daniela, and I went with the other team. Kate and Ian are the church's children's and youth ministries coordinators, and so they had a key to get into the pastor's office, and so they were able to get into Pastor Jane's office to photograph a (stuffed toy) bat on her computer. We photographed everyone but me with the items, including with a fish (on a stained glass window) (pictured), with the church sign (pictured), and with Free Trade coffee (for sale in the entry way) (pictured). One of the funnest parts of the exercise for me was getting the kids to say wacky "Cheese!" type statements before I took the picture. We started out yelling "fish head" and "We love Crescent Hill church!" The kids balked when I suggested "Let's burn down the scout hut." The kids are smart. No yelling when we quietly dropped in on Ms. Martha leading the once-a-month parents' workshop (which I usually attend - a little like our old Faith and Families Sunday school class in Tallahassee) because Stephanie thought she might be an ordained minister (Stephanie and Kate put "pastor" on the scavenger hunt list even though our pastor is away at a retreat. Then we - kids and parents - all had pizza.