Messy Church!
Today was Messy Church. I am very tired!
In theory I was the person who did the welcome and made sure everyone had a sticker with their name on, and then 'floated'. It didn't quite work like that....
Late last night I got a message from Ali who was doing the 'food craft'; the concert her daughter was playing in was not, as she had thought, this evening, but this afternoon! So she brought all the stuff she had ready around to me this morning and I took her table.
I had also offered to do the prep for two of the others - my sister who was happy to help but too busy to prep, and Sandy who only got home from holiday last night.
Everything was prepped by lunch time, and we were all set up ready to go by 4pm. I started doing the welcome, then had to go to my table, turning welcoming and stickering over to one of the church folk who had come with her daughter and grandchildren and was happy to help!
It was a very busy Messy Church, and as I wasn't the 'floater' I took no pictures of things whilst they happened - but I do have some pictures of a few of the activities, taken whilst the children had Story Time.
Our theme was fish and fishing - the story was that of Peter, James, and John fishing unsuccessfully until Jesus told them where to cast their nets, then called them to be Fishers of Men.
Here is the magnetic fishing game I made for my sister to lead -
Most of the fish had a letter on the back and the aim was to see if you could find the letters to spell Jesus, or Peter, or men. This was a big hit - some of the older children spent a long time to find all the words, some of the smaller ones just liked to catch the fish.
This is one of the paper-plate jellyfish Lizzy was making.
Sandy was making 'the sea in a bottle' - take a large plastic bottle, 1/4 fill with water, add blue colouring, then take up to half with oil. Add a few tinfoil fish to twinkle in it and then fasten the top, firmly. Now hold the bottle horizontal and give it a wee shake - there you have a stormy sea in a bottle. (You can tell I didn't need to do much prep for that - a large bottle of oil, a couple of funnels and some blue colouring! We had a stack of plastic bottles at church, and tinfoil).
I didn't get a picture of those as they went straight into the take home bags when they went through for the story.
Val was making beautiful fish with woven sections - they were all in the take home bags too!
Jackie was in charge of a giant painting project. Take a roll of lining paper, roll out enough to cover one of the big tables - draw on the horizon, and a boat - put out lots of paint.... Here are a few highlights;
You can see Peter's Boat, fish, a crab or two... and also a small desert island with palm tree, and Peter line fishing! But all the children added something, and we will put it up on the wall next time for them to see.
And finally - the food related topic I took over from Ali (who arrived in time to help Pat in the kitchen doing the food).
You have heard of crab apples? Well here are some apple crabs!
Alison had worked out how to make them, gave me 'one she made earlier' and all the things we needed - but even so by the time we had made 18 of them (and ran out of apples) I felt as if I had seen enough apples for a while! But aren't they fun? I then cling filmed them all before they took them home - although I can imagine there was still desiccated coconut in a few cars later. There was also quite a bit of clearing up to do.
But all the families who came had a good time, and go home with reminders of the bible story - it's all good!
In theory I was the person who did the welcome and made sure everyone had a sticker with their name on, and then 'floated'. It didn't quite work like that....
Late last night I got a message from Ali who was doing the 'food craft'; the concert her daughter was playing in was not, as she had thought, this evening, but this afternoon! So she brought all the stuff she had ready around to me this morning and I took her table.
I had also offered to do the prep for two of the others - my sister who was happy to help but too busy to prep, and Sandy who only got home from holiday last night.
Everything was prepped by lunch time, and we were all set up ready to go by 4pm. I started doing the welcome, then had to go to my table, turning welcoming and stickering over to one of the church folk who had come with her daughter and grandchildren and was happy to help!
It was a very busy Messy Church, and as I wasn't the 'floater' I took no pictures of things whilst they happened - but I do have some pictures of a few of the activities, taken whilst the children had Story Time.
Our theme was fish and fishing - the story was that of Peter, James, and John fishing unsuccessfully until Jesus told them where to cast their nets, then called them to be Fishers of Men.
Here is the magnetic fishing game I made for my sister to lead -
Most of the fish had a letter on the back and the aim was to see if you could find the letters to spell Jesus, or Peter, or men. This was a big hit - some of the older children spent a long time to find all the words, some of the smaller ones just liked to catch the fish.
This is one of the paper-plate jellyfish Lizzy was making.
Sandy was making 'the sea in a bottle' - take a large plastic bottle, 1/4 fill with water, add blue colouring, then take up to half with oil. Add a few tinfoil fish to twinkle in it and then fasten the top, firmly. Now hold the bottle horizontal and give it a wee shake - there you have a stormy sea in a bottle. (You can tell I didn't need to do much prep for that - a large bottle of oil, a couple of funnels and some blue colouring! We had a stack of plastic bottles at church, and tinfoil).
I didn't get a picture of those as they went straight into the take home bags when they went through for the story.
Val was making beautiful fish with woven sections - they were all in the take home bags too!
Jackie was in charge of a giant painting project. Take a roll of lining paper, roll out enough to cover one of the big tables - draw on the horizon, and a boat - put out lots of paint.... Here are a few highlights;
You can see Peter's Boat, fish, a crab or two... and also a small desert island with palm tree, and Peter line fishing! But all the children added something, and we will put it up on the wall next time for them to see.
And finally - the food related topic I took over from Ali (who arrived in time to help Pat in the kitchen doing the food).
You have heard of crab apples? Well here are some apple crabs!
Alison had worked out how to make them, gave me 'one she made earlier' and all the things we needed - but even so by the time we had made 18 of them (and ran out of apples) I felt as if I had seen enough apples for a while! But aren't they fun? I then cling filmed them all before they took them home - although I can imagine there was still desiccated coconut in a few cars later. There was also quite a bit of clearing up to do.
But all the families who came had a good time, and go home with reminders of the bible story - it's all good!