2013 Vacation Bible School
The 2013 Vacation Bible School began on Sunday evening, July 14th with Registration.
Parents could register their child on their first day of attendance.
Registering the children are Angela, Renee and Roberta.
Pastor Paul opened each evening with prayer.
Children's Ministries Director, Becky Buss, led the children in reciting the "Pledge of Allegiance", the "Pledge to the Bible" and the Bible verses for the week from
Mark 12:29-31.
Bible Verses from Mark 12:29-31.
The children then learned what they would be doing during the week.
The main topic for the week was "Serving".
Each day the children would learn to Serve someone or something different.
And the most important...
The first day attendance was fairly light with 12 children.
They learned about Serving Family while having fun in the process
through classroom lessons, crafts, songs & games.
The children learned several songs throughout the week in preparation for the
last night where they would put on a program for their parents, family & friends.
VBS song leaders Mariah & Alaina.
Children singing and learning new songs.
Classroom Time
Each day the children spent time in class discussing the daily topic; Serving Family, Serving Friends, Serving Neighbors, Serving Community and Serving Jesus. Also during this classroom time they acted out scenarios applicable to the daily topic.
On the first day, Teresa & Cindy with the kindergarten/1st grade children and
Marcia & Jacob with the 2nd/3rd grade children, discuss Serving Family.
On the second day, Mark teaches the 4th/5th grade children about Serving Friends
while Sue & Jana have the K/1st grade act it out.
On the 4th day, Mark discusses Serving Community with the class.
Craft Time
Craft time was a fun time for the children to be creative. For Serving Family, they built a house from popsicle sticks and added "popsicle stick" people for each member of their family.
Lana & Sharon help children with their Popsicle Stick Houses.
Taylor ties on a string to hang the house.
For Serving Friends, the children made "Popcorn Pal" bags for
them to share popcorn with their friends.
Lana & Taylor help children get started with their "Popcorn Pal" bags.
Liz helps children with their "Popcorn Pal" Bags.
Sue helps children with their "Popcorn Pal" Bags.
Lana assists children with making their "Popcorn Pal" bags.
For Serving Neighbors, the children made bookmarks for their Bibles using chenille stems and beads.The message here was to bookmark Mark 12:31; ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
Some made bookmarks/bracelets.
Sharon & Sue assist children in making their Bookmarks.
The children really enjoyed making the craft for Serving Community.
They each made hand prints on square paper and added comments like "Serve Community", "Lend a Helping Hand" or simply "Lend a Hand".
The process begins by putting paint on the hand as Cindy is doing. A bit messy?
Then press hand on paper and... PRESTO! One hand print.
Press hand on paper then...Whoa! Now what do I do with this blue hand?
Lana applies paint to the hand in preparation for the hand print.
Press...and Print.
Lana applies paint to another hand... press and...Hand print!
But, the most important part of Serving Community was the project of collecting food for Church Community Services. The children & their families did that well with their generous donations of non-perishable food items along with some cash donations.
Thank you for helping to serve your community!
And finally, for Serving Jesus, the children made crosses using string & beads.
This project was slightly harder than the others so it took a lot of help from volunteers to get the kids not only started but all through the process until finished.
Game Activities
Always one of the children's favorite activities at VBS is the games.
This year was no different.
The first game involved passing a soap bubble from person to person.
Not as easy as it sounds. Just ask the volunteers.
Have you ever tried sliding a laundry basket across grass? With a child in it???
It's not all that easy, right Kids??
It's a Team Effort.
The object of this next Game was to toss the ball over the sheet without letting the other team know when or where it's going. A receiving team player needed to catch the ball then run around the end of the sheet with it and try to hit an opposing player.
If successful, the hit player changed teams.
Sounds simple, right? Even the big kids had trouble with it.
And as much trouble as the 4th & 5th graders had catching on to this...
can you guess how well it went with Kindergarten & 1st graders?
Just let them run around and have fun. To heck with the rules.
Well...So much for "Sheet Ball"!!!
Now, the next game was a little easier to figure out,
even for the little ones, and it involved a lot more running.
Each child wore a nylon stocking on their head with a "tail" hanging down.
The object here was to pull the stocking off the other players heads and be the last one to keep the stocking on your head. Watch out!!!!
As the girls do "battle"...a sneak attack is in progress.
Boom! You're out!!
Two go down...And then another!
And then a younger group gives it a try.
Oh No! He's in Trouble!! But Wait!! He escaped!
And then another one tries to take him out of the game.
And then, the final game of the week was all wet...or at least the kids were.
The object of this game was to take a cup of water, with holes in the bottom of the cup, and pass it over each team member's head and pour what's left of the water into a bucket.
The first team to fill the bucket was the winner.
They got a little wet in the process.
WOW! What a busy week!
With all those activities and all the running around, snack time was a welcome treat.
Some of our snack makers put together some interesting treats.
Smores are always a welcome snack.
Even Mariah needed a snack break from all that singing and dancing.
There was the "Edible Firepit" with grapes, Nachos, pretzels & cheese and the "Rocky Road Pudding Cups" with chocolate pudding, graham crackers & marshmallows.
"The Community Mix In"
And then there's the BEST for last..."Servant Sundaes"!!
The kids designed their own Sundaes.
Wow! What talent!
Now, earlier in the week, Pastor Paul put down a challenge to the kids... double the number of kids from the first night and selected kids from each group can throw a cream pie in his face.
Well, GUESS WHAT?!?! The kids did that the very next night.
Two children were selected from each age group.
Beginning with the youngest group, Paul begins the count...1-2-3, WHAM!
The second pie takes flight!
The first child from the middle group takes aim...POW!!!
The second pie hits its mark! You asked for it, Paul!
And then the oldest group. Ready...Set...Hit!!!
YES!!!!
And the last pie from the kids hit its target. Had enough, Paul?
Don't think so!!
Surprise!! Mariah get her shot at good ole Dad.
"Be careful", he says. "I know where you live".
Then as the final pie is handed out, Liz makes it a two-handed shot.
The children finally got to show their families what they've been doing all week.
After a brief slide show of the week's activities, the children sang
some of the songs they learned; like the one in this video:
After getting all the cream pie out of his ears, nose, eyes and hair (hair?),
Pastor Paul gives the closing comments for the 2013 VBS.
Lord, we thank you for bringing these children to us & giving us the opportunity to teach them how to Serve Family, Serve Friends, Serve Neighbors, Serve Community and most of all, Serve Jesus. Bless these young lives that they may grow to follow You & be good servants.
Amen.
Thank You!
Thank you parents for allowing us to teach your children during their time at VBS 2013, "God's Backyard Bible Camp". We hope their experiences during VBS will be a lasting memory that they will pass on to others so that they may understand God's word.
Thanks to Becky Buss, our VBS leader and Director of Children's Ministry
for the many hours she put in to making VBS a success.
VBS was also a huge success because of this list of outstanding volunteers that gave their time and energy to help with the children or other activities. They are truly Serving the Lord.
| Lana Berg | Jane Rapp | Cindy Campbell |
| Jacob Biller | Becky Buss | Gary Buss |
| Geneva Cook | Mark Campbell | Angela Cook |
| Sue Cook | Ray Hochstetler | Marcia Clark |
| Marta Clark | Mariah Rogers | Maggie Farwig |
| Jana Risemas | Pastor Paul Rogers | Sharon Hirstein |
| Micah Rogers | Mark Cook | Teresa Rogers |
| Taylor Konrath | Molly Magyar | Roberta Mann |
| Carlee Miller | Paige Miller | Jill Biller |
| Curt Wenger | LeRoy Schrock | Taylor Schappals |
| Renee Wenger | Elizabeth Starr | Tyler Wenger |
| Caitlyn Wenger | Regann Cook | Alaina Williams |
Every effort was made to include in this presentation photos of each child that attended VBS.
Because of the many activities going on at the same time, it's possible that someone was missed and we apologize for that.