Parent Appreciation Dinner

So, yesterday was Hangtime, and it was awesome as usual.  We did homework, had snacks, and then the kids went to their various workshops.  The Lego Workshop has been a fan favorite for quite a few weeks now.

In between running around (because that is what I tend to do most Wednesdays) one of my Hangtime friends updated me on how many teeth she’s lost recently, proof shown in the picture below.  I love catching up with the kids each week and hearing about the things that are going on in their lives.

In other areas of the church, little girls were making Easter Eggs

And all of them were assisted by the beautiful Ms. Sandy.  She’s a faithful leader in the Craft Workshop and she had her hands full with lots of fun projects and sweet kids yesterday.

Pastor Jerry was there helping out as well.  Him and his wife DeAnna have been such a blessing to our church this year and we are so thankful for them and their ministry here.

Down in the kitchen, some of our older students were helping out with preparations for our Parent Appreciation Dinner. This one in particular promised me that she would not chop off her fingers and that she would work diligently as she sliced through the red peppers.

For the record, she did not slice off any of her fingers, and neither did anyone else, which was a good thing.  I did tell the girls working that I would take this picture so their parents would see how capable they were to help out in the kitchen from now on.

While they were working, Ms. Gina taught them how to make dressing from scratch.  She is an incredible woman and an incredible cook and we are so thankful to have her help and instruction each week in the Cooking workshop.

While the workshops were going on, all of these amazing people came to help set up for our dinner.  I have to say, we are so blessed to have so many people in our church that have hearts to serve.  We could never do the programs and events that we do without them.

I didn’t take quite as many pictures during workshop time as I would have liked.  Knowing we had a dinner to prepare for that would happen right after Hangtime, there was much to do.  I did however, get a chance to hang with these sweet girls.  We worked a little on drawing faces and composition and I was very proud of their hard work.

I walked downstairs right before lesson time, and this is the beautiful and peaceful scene that greeted me.  It was so wonderful, thinking that in just an hour this room would be filled with many of our wonderful Hangtime families.

Upstairs, Ms. Brenda played a game with the kids as they walked in for lesson time.

Our lesson for the day was on appreciating our parents and our families.  All of the kids took time at the end to write letters of appreciation to their parents and it was so sweet to see them all working so hard.

Right after Hangtime, we walked downstairs to meet up with our families.  We had the idea to host a Parent Appreciation Dinner a few months ago.  We wanted to let the parents of our Hangtime students know that they were loved and appreciated and this was the night that we would do just that.

We had about 70 parents and children who were able to stay for the dinner and it was so awesome.  In addition to all of the leaders who stayed to help out, we had a pretty full house.

Everyone enjoyed rolls and salad and then a main course of Baked Ziti.  We had many members of our church bring in beautiful trays of the ziti and it was much enjoyed by all of the Hangtime families.

Our night was spent enjoying our wonderful families and friends, eating delicious food and we also had a short devotional to encourage the families that came for the dinner.  All in all, it was a wonderfully successful night and I’m so thankful to everyone who came and especially to everyone who helped to make this evening wonderful.