Relatives from Michigan and more........

Holly, Vera, Diondra, LenaBella and LouAnnWe had a fun time visiting with 2 of Gary's cousins, Dale and Barb and Sharon and Dwayne. They arrived Thursday afternoon and left Sunday afternoon.

On Saturday Sharon, Barb and I (Barb) drove through the reservation picking up several girls to come to our place and do a craft. We ended up with a good number......5 girls. We worked on a plastic mesh / yarn craft. The girls caught on right away and did very nice work. I really couldn't have done it very well without Barb and Sharon to help. We all kept busy threading needles and so on. Diondra still had to finish her scrapbook and she handled that very nicely on her own.

It's so nice to be able to go to the kids' home and meet their families. Sharon purchased a very nice necklace that one of the moms had made from seed beads.

So if you ever want to come out and visit the beautiful prairies......come on out....we have plenty of room for visitors and we will put you to work. :-)

Gary and Barb

5th and 6th, 7th and 8th graders

These are the 7th and 8th Graders.....

And these are the 5th and 6th graders.....

Today we had the older groups for Promised Land. Once again everything went very good. Time flys when you're having fun and that hour really went fast. With the older groups it's harder to tell whether or not they enjoyed Promised Land.......you know.....they're at that "be cool" age. But we know they heard God's message because they were very attentive. Our message this week (and last week with the little ones) was based on Psalm 139: 14-15. And the Bible Verses were from Jeremiah. The K-4 had Jeremiah 31:3 I have loved you with an everlasting love. And the 5th - 8th had Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. We wanted the kids to know right away that they are unique and special to God.

It's really neat to have a young man sitting in the group who you know has no (or very little) knowledge of God...because his "mom" (she is actually an aunt but to this young man she is mom) sat down at Family Night and told us his story. Pray for this young man.....he seems to be a really nice kid but has had a tough life so far.

Thank you again for all of your support.

Gary and Barb

Another fun Saturday with 4 boys......

We headed out to Grass Mountain hoping to pick up the Gary boys...Joseph and Robert Gary. These boys don't have a phone at their house so we really can't plan ahead. Yes! we found them at home and they wanted to come along for another adventure and "could Shiloh and Lowel come along too". That was just what we wanted --- just 4 boys to build another catapult....a little bigger this time. Well, they got it a little bigger......but not necessarily better. They did get one good 50 foot shot but couldn't duplicate it again. By the way they are shooting zucchini (we are about sick of eating zucchini!!)

Gary said Joseph has "really got a head on his shoulders".....figuring out what had to happen right along side Gary. The other 3 boys grew tired of all the trying, I think, and they were in the house.......Robert asked if there was anything he could help with. So I asked if he wanted to help make pizza for supper..."Yes!" So while Gary and Joseph brainstormed....Robert, Shiloh and Lowel and I made pizza. They pressed the dough out and everything....did a great job and loved every minute of it.

We are finding out that these kids are really different when they come to our house....then what they are with all of their peers at camp. We are liking what we see.... REALLY nice kids!

Promised Land Kids

2nd, 3rd and 4th graders

Kindergarten and 1st grade

Promised Land has begun!!!! Hurrah!! We had a fun time with the kids. They are a sweet bunch. We don't work with Kindergarteners very often so we wondered how that would go. What fun!!! It went great. And the one we were told was trouble with a capital T was just as good as all the rest of them!

Thank you for all the prayers!!! Keep them coming. Next week we will have the 5-6 and 7-8. Many of these kids from K-8 come to Prairie Light Youth Camp and we all recognize each other. It's so neat to hear "hey, I know you."

Tonight the school is having a Family Night and we have been invited to the Sub Sandwich supper. We will be introduced and if there are any questions for us we can address them.

Gary and Barb

Sunday, September 14----a day full of kids

Charles, Clayton, Jeremy and Holly by the car looking at a photo album of her last year at camp.....

These are kids that came to camp several years ago...

Sunday morning we travel west toward Spring Creek and picked up 4 children for church..... Tyler, Clayton, Jayden, and Tillia Left Hand Bull. Tyler and Clayton have been coming to Lakeview CRC for the past year - enjoying Sunday School and now a little sister and brother came along. They went home full of smiles.

We don't have church in the evening because Lakeview is without a Pastor right now and so it makes for a long day. About 4:00 I called a young gal who had been in our camp group a year ago. She had called "Ms. Marlys" and said school was going good but the weekends were so boring. Marlys told Holly that we had been having kids over of and on and would she like to come some time. She said "Yes". I was thrilled to know that!!!! Holly and I hadn't gotten along very good at our last meeting (that's a long story)......and I was afraid she wouldn't want to see me........ Anyway, we decided to go to St. Francis and pick up her and her brother Clayton for the rest of the afternoon. We ended up with a car full. Another brother Jeremy came along and we then went to pick up Charles.

We had a FUN day. The boys built a catapult that threw a huge zucchini 35 feet across the yard. Holly and I hung out.....she made some flipflops and we went for a short quad ride and came upon 2 mule deer....we got so close you could see their eyelashes!!!! Holly really enjoyed the ride.

We ended the day with burgers on the grill. Jeremy is a young man full of questions.........He said he was stressed out at school and so we shared with all of them that if they have Christ in their hearts and put all their trust in him as their Savior that He will always be there for them. But they have to be willing to admit that they are sinners and come to Him to change them. He also asked...."is it OK to kiss before marriage"......WOW.....got into some real good discussions because of Jeremy. And because we were eating supper or driving in the car when he asked.......everyone heard our "advice".

Now we would ask that you put Promised Land in your prayers .....we will start tomorrow afternoon at 1:00. Thank you!!!

Gary and Barb

FINALLY "Promised Land" (Release Time) all set.....

We knew that Release Time had been approved by the school board, but still had not been contacted by anyone to begin Release Time. I decided that I should go to school around recess time and then maybe I could talk to the head teacher at Lakeview School. I know the secretary and so while I waited for recess she asked if I wanted to visit the 2nd, 3rd and 4th grade room (all in the same room). "YES!" I recognized 5 of the kids from camp but 7 of them recognized me :-). It was a good experience for me to see how the teacher got them to respond to some of her rules....we will be able to use them at release time !!

Anyway......we had asked to have the kids released to us on Tuesday and Thursday afternoon......but there was a conflict on Thurs. because they have roving teachers for music, PE, and band and these activities have all been scheduled. That made it next to impossible to have the kids on Thursday. They didn't have anything extra on Tuesday so that was real good. We decided to have the K-1 and 2-4 on one week and then the following week we will have the 5-6 and 7-8. This will put a lighter load on us as far as the lesson preparation goes. And I think we will be more likely to keep up with our other activies with the older kids we have been meeting with because we shouldn't feel too much of an overload.

So you can all pray for us on Tuesday.......we have been told that one of the kindegarten kids is a REAL challenge.....temper tantrums and biting.....they have already decided to send the aid along for that hour. Thank you Lord :-)!!

And on another note............We went to my cousins football game. The other team drove 160 miles (one way) for this game. That tells you how sparsely populated this area is. The game started at 2:30 because Cody does not have lights. Disappointing game....our Cody/Kilgore team lost........

Thanks for the support.
Gary and Barb

GRASSHOPPERS EVERYWHERE...........

Our area was invaded by grasshoppers this year. As you walk on the grass hundreds of them hop out in front of you. This is a photo of the rascals at work and our rhubarb plant after they have been munching.........

We are sure that the cold weather will put an end to them this year........but what about all those eggs they have laid......will it be a repeat next year?? We are afraid so.

Gary tried some insect spray on some of the bushes....but we didn't find any dead ones so we figure they aren't afftected by the spray.

Barb

WEDDING NEWS

Our daughter Marti is engaged to a young man who came all the way out to South Dakota to ask our permission. We enjoyed his visit very much and feel he also enjoyed his time here. He even got in on a little bit of cattle chasing on the quads. Feels like he is part rancher already :-) He did do a bit of lieing.......He told Marti that he was in Kansas City on a conference....she knew nothing of his visit. But she has forgiven him...... :-)

We are very happy for both of them.

Gary and Barb

Saturday was a day of fun and much, much more....

Saturday was a beautiful day.....partly cloudy, cool, no wind --- a perfect day. It was the day the boys would put the tower up and be able to climb around on it. At about 1:40 we headed out for the first of our pick-ups. We expected Tyler Left Hand Bull -- but his brother Mark who had helped build the tower said he was going to a movie with a friend. However, when we arrived.....3 boys came out....Tyler, Mark and older brother Joe. GOOD DEAL we need a lot of muscle to pull this off. When we went out to Grass Mountain to see if we could find Joseph Gary and his brother Robert.....we had a real interesting time. We made our first stop at the Gary home....no the boys weren't there but possibly next door. So we drove over to the neighbors house...nope not here....but maybe the green house up the hill. So we drove over to the green house. First person I saw was Shiloh - a boy who had been at camp..... Robert Gary was also there but both boys said they didn't want to come. However, a young boy that we didn't know said he wanted to come. We told him he could come if his parents said he could -- so he went in the house. As it turned out all three of the boys came along....Shiloh, Robert and Lowel. Two of the boys we had hoped could come weren't able to make it----one was watching kids but wants to come some other time and the other wasn't home. Two other boys were brought to our place by his mom and stepdad - which saved us a lot of miles. This weekend we put on 133 miles, Last week we put on 160 miles. We also had two of the boys from the Lakeview church help too.

We had 3 girls come to do scrapbooking.

I did a lot of praying for safety as I watched those boys begin to climb on the 20 foot tower. And God was faithful once again. The boys had a wonderful time and all went well. We had a supper of hamburgs on the grill, jello salad, chips, cheese curls, peaches and brownies for dessert. Everything was devoured which always makes me happy!!!! We then went outside for a Bible Lesson on the lawn.

Last weekend when the boys were here building the tower, one of them asked Gary if he could roll in the grass. This weekend we had 10 boys rolling in our green grass. We take something as simple as grass for granted -- and get sick of mowing it.....Most of these boys don't have grass on their yards -- just dirt.

We noticed that when the boys would come in the house they would leave the door open. When we pick them up and drop off we noticed front doors are open Shiloh and Lowel didn't even have a door knob.

When we stop for gas I notice on the pumps that the person before me put in 2.75 Gallons, looking on the next pump I see 4 Gallons. I don't think we have a clue how these people live from day to day.

One of the boys in our house stood in front of a china cabinet looking at the fancy tea pots inside, wonder what he was thinking. Kinda makes me feel bad, guilty, thankful, blessed, and wondering why. Many houses we visit have windows boarded up or no windows at all, and large families in small homes. Kids come to our house and ask -- do just two of you live here? Cassie says they have four in her bedroom.

On a side note of interest.......trees are hard to come by out here. Anyway nice straight ones. The corner posts were fence posts from one of my cousins, the X braces were from Leadville, Colorado and the platform logs were cottonwoods from nearby Nebraska. Took some time just to gather the material. But it was all worth it!!!

Hope you are enjoying our posts.......we enjoy sharing our fun with you!

Gary and Barb

Has to go to School Board....

We received an email today saying that Release Time has to go for approval from the School Board. It's not a matter of "can we do it" because other schools have a release time, but rather a formality. I know that things don't move too fast on the reservation......so please pray that things will happen in a speedy fashion....and that we will be able to begin "Promised Land" next week if at all possible.
Thank you so much!!

Gary and Barb