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    "result": {"data":{"mdx":{"body":"var _excluded = [\"components\"];\n\nfunction _extends() { _extends = Object.assign || function (target) { for (var i = 1; i < arguments.length; i++) { var source = arguments[i]; for (var key in source) { if (Object.prototype.hasOwnProperty.call(source, key)) { target[key] = source[key]; } } } return target; }; return _extends.apply(this, arguments); }\n\nfunction _objectWithoutProperties(source, excluded) { if (source == null) return {}; var target = _objectWithoutPropertiesLoose(source, excluded); var key, i; if (Object.getOwnPropertySymbols) { var sourceSymbolKeys = Object.getOwnPropertySymbols(source); for (i = 0; i < sourceSymbolKeys.length; i++) { key = sourceSymbolKeys[i]; if (excluded.indexOf(key) >= 0) continue; if (!Object.prototype.propertyIsEnumerable.call(source, key)) continue; target[key] = source[key]; } } return target; }\n\nfunction _objectWithoutPropertiesLoose(source, excluded) { if (source == null) return {}; var target = {}; var sourceKeys = Object.keys(source); var key, i; for (i = 0; i < sourceKeys.length; i++) { key = sourceKeys[i]; if (excluded.indexOf(key) >= 0) continue; target[key] = source[key]; } return target; }\n\n/* @jsxRuntime classic */\n\n/* @jsx mdx */\nvar _frontmatter = {\n  \"title\": \"Celebrate Kids & VBS\",\n  \"date\": \"2007-08-30\",\n  \"excerpt\": \"Two weekends ago, my church, Irvington Covenant, had an outdoor festival for\\nthe community called Celebrate Kids. Then last week we had Vacation Bible\\nSchool (VBS) every weeknight from 6:30 to 8:30. I was involved with ...\\n\"\n};\nvar layoutProps = {\n  _frontmatter: _frontmatter\n};\nvar MDXLayout = \"wrapper\";\nreturn function MDXContent(_ref) {\n  var components = _ref.components,\n      props = _objectWithoutProperties(_ref, _excluded);\n\n  return mdx(MDXLayout, _extends({}, layoutProps, props, {\n    components: components,\n    mdxType: \"MDXLayout\"\n  }), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Wow, these last few weeks have been absolutely \", mdx(\"strong\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"crazy\"), \". I have tons of posts\\nthat I need to write about things that have gone on lately, but I'm going to\\nstart with this one 'cause it's actually pretty fresh (as in, recent). Two\\nweekends ago, my church, Irvington Covenant, had an outdoor festival for the\\ncommunity called \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"Celebrate Kids\"), \". Then last week we had Vacation Bible School\\n(VBS) every weeknight from 6:30 to 8:30. I was involved with both events to\\ndifferent extents. For VBS I was just helping my friend Cindy teach the 5th and\\n6th grade class. We had an average of about 3 kids each night, so it wasn't too\\nintense. Cindy did most of the work. I was nervous about it 'cause I was so\\ntired from the work I did on Celebrate, but it ended up being really good and I\\ngot the opportunity to get to know the kids from our church and a few from the\\nneighborhood who came as a result of coming to Celebrate. I used to work with\\nkids a lot in Seattle, but this is the first time I have at all since then. It\\nwas kinda fun. :)\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"So, back to Celebrate. My friend Ariel and I were in charge of games. We had\\nfour carnival style booths and were also planning a couple of events that were\\nto happen at various points throughout the afternoon. So, we had to gather the\\nsupplies for the games, recruit volunteers and all that as well as plan the\\nevents. We ended up having a ring toss, a bean bag toss, a fishing game and a\\nballoon darts game. They all went really well and the volunteers who ran them\\ndid an excellent job with the steady stream of kids that kept them busy. I\\nthink the kids had a really good time.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Of the three events we were supposed to coordinate, one was a wheelchair race,\\nand a young lady named Angel ran that. She is (or used to be) the events\\ncoordinator for Irvington Village, a retirement community adjacent to and\\naffiliated with our church. She enjoys giving the kids an opportunity to\\ninteract with some of the residents of the Village. We didn't have to do\\nanything fort hat part, but it looked like it went really well. Then the second\\nevent was a cake walk! It was pretty fun stuff. We asked people in the church\\nto sign up to make or bring cakes or other desserts and whoever wanted to could\\nwalk around the circle and if their number was called when the music stopped...\\nfree cake! Pretty good deal, eh? The third event was a set of team relay races\\nthat Ariel and I had planned, one of which involved filling up a \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"ton\"), \"\\nof water balloons at 1:00am the night before!\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"The idea with these was that we would close down the carnival game booths\\nand have all the kids come over and split up into two teams and compete in a\\nseries of events. Because of how much stuff was going on and a little bit of\\nlast minute planning on all of our parts, we ended up deciding to skip the team\\nevents and just keep the game booths open a little later. At about the time\\nwhen we were going to have that last event our youth pastor Sahaan got in the\\ndunk tank, and for $1 toward the youth ministry anyone who paid had three\\nchances to dunk him. There were \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"a lot\"), \" of takers. Needless to say he got\\ndunked many times. So, trying to compete with that was a lost cause. I think it\\nwas a good decision to cancel the group games.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"So, other than games, there was free food for everyone who came, crafts and\\nplay areas (sand and water, etc) for little kids, and great music going on the\\nwhole time. It was definitely a success. A lot of people came, and even thought\\nI was working most of the time, even I had a blast. You might think that\\nhelping to plan that stuff would take some time and could perhaps be sort of\\ntiring, but the main thing that made me really exhausted in the weeks before\\nand after Celebrate was something else I volunteered to do that I just went a\\nlittle overboard on. My friend Vanessa was in charge of registration for the\\nevent, and Toby, the guy who was in charge of the whole thing had asked her if\\nshe could make name tags for the volunteers to wear. I heard Vanessa mention\\nthat in a list of things she had to do, and I offered to take that over for\\nher, 'cause I like creative stuff like that. So, as with many things I do, I\\nkinda went over and above unnecessarily and decided to hand paint and laminate\\neach one. Everyone thought I was crazy, but it was a fun process, if extremely\\ntiring.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"So, I'm not sure exactly how many days I worked on it for, but I know there\\nwere at least five late nights, four of which I had friends helping me\\nconsiderably.The first night was with my friend Heather, who I hadn't talked to\\nfor maybe four years. She called me up because my dad had called her work by\\ncoincidence, and we decided to hang out and in the process she would help me\\nwith the project. So, we got dinner, went to a couple different stores and\\nbought the supplies we needed and headed over to Fireside Coffee Lodge to get\\nstarted. I started cutting out name-tag-sized pieces of card stock and as I got\\nthem cut Heather started painting backgrounds on them in watercolor. Once I was\\ndone with the cutting I started painting as well. Heather set the standard\\nreally high; I was just going to do abstract stuff or solid color backgrounds\\nwith gradients or something, but she started actually painting images. So, I\\nfollowed suit, and everyone that helped me thereafter did the same. I think the\\nresults are a lot cooler than they would have been because she did that.\\nGranted, it took a lot longer! So, that night we stayed up until maybe just\\nafter midnight I think.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"The next late night event was with my friend Audra and my sister, again at\\nFireside Coffee Lodge (a good place to do stuff like this). They agreed to help\\nme out with painting more backgrounds and we got the majority of them painted\\nthat night. Actually, we got all the ones I had already cut out done. Their\\nhelp was greatly appreciated and they too came up with some great backgrounds.\\nThen, the third and fourth nights were hanging out with my friend\\n\", mdx(\"a\", {\n    parentName: \"p\",\n    \"href\": \"https://esotropiart.com\"\n  }, \"Phil\"), \". The first night was on a Monday and we started\\nout at his place, setting up a document on the computer with everyone's names\\nin a font I liked and printing those out and cutting them to the appropriate\\nsizes. Once we had all the names printed out and cut to the same size as the\\npainted backgrounds, we also cut out equal sized pieces of carbon paper, and\\nbegan transferring the outlines of the names from the print outs onto the\\npainted backgrounds. We got all the outlines of the names transferred by maybe\\n11:00 or something, but we hadn't started painting them in yet. I had so much\\nto do and so little time that I wanted to get a lot done that night, so Phil\\nwas willing to stay up late and keep working on it with me. He and I used to\\nstay up all night in high school working on projects like this, so it was kinda\\nfun in a crazy sleep-depraved way.\"), mdx(Image, {\n    image: props.images['shelf.jpg'],\n    alt: \"Name tags on the window sill at Fireside Coffee Lodge\",\n    mdxType: \"Image\"\n  }), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Phil's wife was going to sleep and he needed to go grocery shopping still that\\nnight, so we embarked on our crazy plan. We went together over to Winco and did\\nthe shopping, came back and unloaded it all, and then drove over to Fireside\\nCoffee Lodge once again. This was Phil's first experience working at a\\ncoffeeshop, as he's not a coffee drinker, but I think he enjoyed the atmosphere\\n(if not the lack of large quantities of readily available and cheap caffeinated\\nsoda). Anyway, while we were there we painted in all of the letters on all the\\nname tags we had transferred the outlines for using some acrylic paint that\\nPhil supplied. This long night had my neck killing me as we finished up at\\nnearly 3:30am. But we had the name tags almost done! As we finished each one we\\nput them up on the ledge by the window, and Phil took this cool photo right\\nbefore we left.\"), mdx(Image, {\n    image: props.images['table.jpg'],\n    alt: \"Laminated name tags on the table at Phil's apartment\",\n    mdxType: \"Image\"\n  }), mdx(\"p\", null, \"After that I took a break (well, from name tags at least) until Thursday when\\nPhil and I normally hang out during the week. He graciously was willing to help\\nme finish them up that night at his place. That night we added about five names\\nto the list that we didn't have before and did the whole process for those\\nfive. Then we did the outlines for all the ones we had painted. For this Phil\\nhad suggested using \\\"paint markers\\\" and he bought some from his work,\\n\", mdx(\"a\", {\n    parentName: \"p\",\n    \"href\": \"http://www.c2f.com\"\n  }, \"C2F\"), \", for this purpose. This was the first time I had used\\nthem and they worked really well. After we had finished the outlining we\\nlaminated them in sets of five using Phil's laminating machine, and then cut\\nthem out individually with X-Acto knives. We finished all of them that we had\\nto do at around 2:00am that night. It was a good feeling. We took this second\\nphoto of them all spread out on our cutting boards. They look pretty cool all\\ntogether like that.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"So, after that night I was almost done, but the next morning I received or\\njust thought of a few more names that really needed to be done, so I did about\\nfour more myself the night before Celebrate--actually with the help of my three\\nyear old niece, Allie. I was painting the backgrounds when she came in, and of\\ncourse she wanted to paint too. So, I let her try, and I think she made two of\\nthe best backgrounds of the whole set. :) Anyway, that night I finished those\\nfour by driving to Kinko's at 11:00pm to have them laminated. And as I was\\ndriving there, I got a text message from my friend Ariel asking if I was still\\nup. \\\"Yep, I'm driving to Kinko's right now.\\\" was my reply. So, she called me\\nand wanted to see if I could come over and help fill water balloons. See, water\\nballoons won't fill unless you blow them up with air first, so that was my job.\\nWe filled a huge bin of them until about 1:00am or so. Then, I went back home\\nand made the cords for the name tags by cutting lengths of black nylon rope and\\nmelting each end over a candle until 4:00am. I never get any sleep the night\\nbefore anything big. Oh well. They turned out really nice and the volunteers\\nappreciated how much work went into them. It was a fun project. :)\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Phil wisely suggested that I scan each name tag before laminating them and\\ngiving them out so that we wouldn't loose all that work forever, so we did\\nthat. (I forgot to mention, we did that on that second night at his place as\\nwell, and I scanned the last four in at my house on that Friday night before\\nthe event). So, if you'd like to check out the fruits of our labor, click\\n\", mdx(\"a\", {\n    parentName: \"p\",\n    \"href\": \"http://drueck.net/photos-and-stories/celebrate-kids-name-tags/\",\n    \"title\": \"Celebrate Kids Name Tags\"\n  }, \"here\"), \" to see them all, along with the credits of who\\npainted each background and who painted each one's lettering. :) Hope you like\\n'em. Also, Phil wrote a blog entry about our nights working on this together\\nand you can see all the rest of his photos of the process\\n\", mdx(\"a\", {\n    parentName: \"p\",\n    \"href\": \"https://www.esotropiart.com/blog.php?b=374\",\n    \"title\": \"Celebrate Kids Name Tags\"\n  }, \"there\"), \".\\nThanks for reading.\"));\n}\n;\nMDXContent.isMDXComponent = true;","fields":{"relativeDirectory":"2007/2007-08-30-celebrate-kids-and-vbs"},"frontmatter":{"title":"Celebrate Kids & VBS","date":"08/30/2007"}},"allFile":{"edges":[{"node":{"base":"shelf.jpg","childImageSharp":{"gatsbyImageData":{"layout":"constrained","backgroundColor":"#080808","images":{"fallback":{"src":"/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/77859/shelf.jpg","srcSet":"/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/9f4ec/shelf.jpg 384w,\n/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/3b4fe/shelf.jpg 768w,\n/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/77859/shelf.jpg 1536w","sizes":"(min-width: 1536px) 1536px, 100vw"},"sources":[{"srcSet":"/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/56bb2/shelf.webp 384w,\n/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/9f5d6/shelf.webp 768w,\n/static/5662aa4ef19e52fa8db7b93ccd3e9f4d/e4a40/shelf.webp 1536w","type":"image/webp","sizes":"(min-width: 1536px) 1536px, 100vw"}]},"width":1536,"height":2048}}}},{"node":{"base":"table.jpg","childImageSharp":{"gatsbyImageData":{"layout":"constrained","backgroundColor":"#080808","images":{"fallback":{"src":"/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/77859/table.jpg","srcSet":"/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/9f4ec/table.jpg 384w,\n/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/3b4fe/table.jpg 768w,\n/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/77859/table.jpg 1536w","sizes":"(min-width: 1536px) 1536px, 100vw"},"sources":[{"srcSet":"/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/56bb2/table.webp 384w,\n/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/9f5d6/table.webp 768w,\n/static/e0561581345bda2b10702f8eed497763/e4a40/table.webp 1536w","type":"image/webp","sizes":"(min-width: 1536px) 1536px, 100vw"}]},"width":1536,"height":2048}}}}]}},"pageContext":{"slug":"/2007-08-30-celebrate-kids-and-vbs/","relativeDirectory":"2007/2007-08-30-celebrate-kids-and-vbs","next":{"fields":{"slug":"/2007-07-23-sphere-of-hip-hop-tv/","relativeDirectory":"2007/2007-07-23-sphere-of-hip-hop-tv"},"frontmatter":{"title":"Sphere of Hip Hop TV"}},"previous":{"fields":{"slug":"/2007-09-04-taylor-park-trip/","relativeDirectory":"2007/2007-09-04-taylor-park-trip"},"frontmatter":{"title":"Taylor Park Trip"}}}},
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