One Month

Wow I can’t believe that I have been in Manderson for a month. It seems like it has been so much longer than that. I feel like time out here on the Rez slows down. Relationships and people are more important than getting tasks done and I’ve found that I really take the time now to get to know people, whereas before I was more tasks focused.
Well a lot has happened since I last had a chance to blog. Here is a recap:

Wounded Knee Elementary School-
Working in the Kindergarten classroom has improved greatly. It appears that the kids trust me now because they know that I’ll be here for a while. It has been amazing this past week to see their behavior improve and not to have them test me as much. Also recently I have been taking more leadership in my classroom. The teacher has been out the past couple of days and the other assistants have asked me to step up and teach the kids. Now I use the word teach loosely. I have no educational experience; I just know the right games to use to help teach the kids their letters and their numbers. I thank my niece Audrey, who is 5, for showing me the best games at pbskids.org. Today I was facilitating a letter game with them and there was complete silence in the room and all of the kids attention was focused on me, this have never happened before. They were captivated and they were learning. Praise God for the Cookie Monster and educational games.

555 White Clay-
On Saturday 555 held their first Fall Festival, where furniture, appliances, arts & crafts, and clothes were sold at reasonable prices. There were also games for kids and a free lunch given out. One of the coolest parts of the day was at noon there was a diaper giveaway. Over $1200 worth of diapers were given away. It was really cool because Bruce gave an amazing prayer before the giveaway and he gave the Gospel message. I had a great time talking with people and getting to know a woman named Norma. Norma is going to start a quilting business where she will teach Lakota women how to quilt. The 555 serves as a business incubator for her business. I am excited to work with her in the future.

Wounded Knee Church of God-
On Sunday I started teaching Sunday School at church. I am really excited to be getting more involved there. I am going to be teaching the older kids in the Sunday School. I asked them what they wanted to be learning and they said Daniel and Jesus. So I am going to start with Daniel and the Lions Den, and focus on courage and I am going to go through some parables of Jesus.

Neighbors-
Last week we had our first neighbor over for dinner. Her name is Lois and she lives behind us. After preparing a great meal of ham and mashed potatoes we were prepared at the time we told her for dinner but she didn’t come over until an hour after she was supposed to be here. After getting over my initial frustrations and the fact that the food was cold by the time we ate it, we had a great time with her. Lois had amazing stories to tell and it was great to listen to her. I am excited to get know her further.

Hiking-
My teammates and I celebrated our Sunday Sabbath by hiking up Camel’s Back Rock Cliff. It was possibly the last nice day of the year and the weather couldn’t have been better. It was so beautiful and it was such a good reminder of God’s beauty. It was also a great team bonding. We had fun singing at the top of our lungs on the walk down and making silly videos while we were on the top. It was also amazing how we encouraged each other to keep going when the hike got ruff. We didn’t leave anyone behind.

Well I’m sure a thousand other things have happened that I could blog about but this is all I can think of for now. Thanks for the prayers, keep them coming.