Hey y'all! It's been so long, my apologies... I find that sometimes I need my winter take a little break from photography and focus on school and other things in life....so I had to put aside the blogging for a little while, but I'm back! I'm excited so so so excited for the upcoming sessions I have booked and to officially kick off my 2013 blogging (just a little late)... I want to share with y'all my last spring break!
I went to WARM & SUNNY Dallas. Perfect to reminisce on a day like today with snow on the ground...come on, it's the first day of Spring! Bring on the warmth!....I'm SO ready for warm weather like Dallas, and SO sick of this snow! Any who, enough complaining about the weather ;) ...
I want to take you back all the way to the beginning of March: I had the absolutely amazing opportunity to road trip down to Dallas to serve in the community of Oak Cliff with 11 other GVSU student's through GVSU'S Campus Ministries. We had a busy week volunteering through C2K (Connect to the Kingdom) and Project Transformation.
In the mornings we would get up and leave the house, that C2K hosted us at, around 8am and head to Ms. Daisy's house. Ms. Daisy is a widow, and the city of Dallas requires houses to be up to "standard," so we helped her get to those standards by scrapping off the paint on the outside of her house and re-painting it (to toasted almond and brick dust, in case you were wondering :)... ). We would leave the site around 1:00pm and head back to the house to shower up and head to our sites for Project Transformation.
Our team had the opportunity to serve at 3 separate PT sites, so at this point our groups would split up...and we got to just love on these kids that attend their after-school program. We helped them with their homework, did some crafts, and played outside. They were pretty crazy kids let me tell you... Full of energy, life, and love! We were all there to pour out lots of love to these kiddos, but really I think the kiddos poured more love into us! They loved to play soccer, hula-hoop, jump off the stage, play tag, they even played rock-paper-scissors for like a half hour. They were happy with the simple things, like rock-paper-scissors, which is something I think I forget to think about! [Simplify]. They didn't need the fancy technology stuff, just their imaginations and friends. It was also really fun, for me especially, to watch all of the group interact with the kids. It may not be a surprise to you, but I'm pretty good with kids, they're my element, I love to bring out my inner-kid-self, but that doesn't come natural to all us-and to see the people that were out of their element completely let go and have fun was pretty stinking neat.
We also ended our nights with family dinner, testimonies, devotions, worship, and team bonding. Probably one of my favorite parts of the trip, besides the kids! :) One night we hosted a game night for all the highschoolers and site coordinators to attend, and I thought to myself- How awesome of an opportunity for kids to just come to this sweet house and play games together...I wish something like this existed when I was in high school! SO COOL! Everything was just so cool about this trip. I'm running out of descriptive words, because nothing does it justice! haha
We also had the opportunity to have some fun and explore Dallas a bit. Our house we stayed at was right across from Tyler Street United Methodist Church. This church was GORGEOUS and HUGE! They had a gym on their 5th floor where we played a fun game of volleyball. We also explored a bit and found out that if we kept going up the stairs, we would open the door to the absolutely stunning view of the Dallas skyline. We found this out one night, and we were all speechless...and so excited that the next day we went back up and ate some pie from the pie emporium...mmmm such good pie! And spent a little time soaking up the rays, I mean come on it was still spring break :) We also ate lunch after church on Sunday at Cafe Brazil, some tacos from a taqueria, and mexican icecream from a mexican icecream truck (aka a guy on a bike), and at Chuy's (which was basically on the border on steroids..yup hard to imagine, I know). Lots of food...sooo much food. Good food. Like Takis-Flaming Hot Cheetos x's 10000. Mmm. We also rented bikes and did a 9mile trail around White Rock Lake, possibly the most beautiful bike ride of my life. I could of done lap after lap...
The week was full of so much fun, love, laughter, smiles, memories, God, and great community. It was kind of a hard transition to swing back in to the things back in Michigan. When you're surrounded by such beautiful, amazing people you don't want to do anything but that! I remember the first morning I came back, nobody was downstairs at my apartment and it was the weirdest feeling not to say good morning to one person! But needless to say, these friends are true friends and I'm so excited to see the ways that God continues to work in all of our lives back here in the mitten, and the ways He continues to bring us closer together. [D.A.DALLAS!]
A special thanks for all the prayers and supports my friends and family contributed towards our team! This was an amazing trip, and I hope it shows through the pictures! :)
Peace & Blessings,
Lindsay 
One of our team members raised enough money for us to get $400 worth of supplies and toys to bring to our PT sites and surprise the kids!!!
