South African Family Bible Conference 2011

We enjoyed our 2nd annual Dragon Peaks Family Bible Conference in the Drakensberg mountains

October 2011

Here are the awesome theme shirts

We put this into action with a great outreach day organized by the Scheepers at a local creche (preschool)

Papa Bear (aka Barry Van H) was the creative talent behind the wall mural

We were blessed to spend the week sharing a chalet with the Szabo family plus a few other kids that joined us.

Unfortunately, along with 11 people that came in the Szabos car, the plague decided to hitch a ride, so we spent most of the week tending to the sick and half dying contingency.

We were able to make it out to the outreach day and last couple days of classes.

Rick and Cam made a quick recovery just in time to go on a 2 day hike in the Berg.

The week was filled with uplifting classes and great musical praise!

Here is our Joyful, Joyful P2P team leading the music

Phil, Rachel, Richard and Tim

Loved hearing the new Ignite theme song for our 2010-2020 preaching campaign

Secret keeper Girl

It's so exciting and terrifying to have a daughter who is now officially in the preteen years.  Wonderful times full of new adventures and journeys, uncharted territory full of obstacles and valleys.  

I've found a wonderful resource to help moms like me through these years of change.

Helping both of us to find out how to follow God's plan for our lives as godly women who want to make good choices.

Secret Keeper Girl

A great book called 8 great dates for Moms and daughters gave us the idea to tackle the issues of modesty, dating, beauty and self image in a fun way by going on dates that would give us a great way to discuss these important topics.

Our first date was at a lovely tea shop where we enjoyed browsing through the antiques, looking at the quirky decor and drinking cappuccino and hot chocolate.  The lesson was to remember what our beauty is in God's eyes.  We compared the beautiful and unique teacup that Ani had to the plain ceramic cup that I had and a styrofoam travel cup that we brought.  We talked about how when we look at ourselves through God's eyes - we are a rare and unique treasure like the antique teacup.  If we settle for the world's view of us, best case we'll be like a dime a dozen ceramic mug - replicas on every corner.  And if we allow the world to define who we are then we'll become like the styrofoam cup - crumbly and easy to throw away.  

 After our tea time, we went to pick out a journal that we could use as a scrapbook for our time together.  

 Then it was off to a show at the theatre - watching the fabulous South African dancers (including our friend Lindsay performing Irish dancing and A's teacher performing interpretive dancing)

Our second date was discussing real physical beauty

We talked about models in magazines and airbrushing, our view of our bodies, using makeup, etc.

A was treated to her first facial from our beautician (and dancing) friend Lindsay.  

Lindsay taught A how to take care of her changing skin and how the important part of her beauty is what glows from the inside out.

We then went shopping to buy her skincare products and enjoy dessert along the way.

We challenged ourselves to spend a little more time each day with God making ourselves beautiful on the inside than we do in front of the mirror making ourselves beautiful on the outside.