Photos courtesy Юлия Рахматулина :)
Monday, February 26, 2007
Sunday, February 25, 2007
A Colorful Lesson
Today I helped teach Sunday school. Our lesson was based on Genesis 37, Joseph and the coat of many colors.
Our lesson was a theatrical performance featuring live action, puppets, and flannel-graph. I played the part of Jacob, wearing a wig, beard, and robe. My 12 “sons” were puppets, engineered and voiced by Olya. Yulia was story-teller and flannel-graph engineer.
So I came in, pretended I was a visitor from a far-off land, and told about my sons. I told about my son Joseph’s dreams with the help of the flannel-graph. After that it got tricky. We switched to a scene with the brothers and I went behind the curtain and helped to make sheep noises. Olya and I got a little confused about which puppet was which. Then I went back out again to play Jacob. The brothers came to deliver the sad news, and the puppets then threw a “bloody cloth” towards me. This was problematic in two ways: 1) the blood consisted of magenta colored paint. 2) The cloth didn’t make it to me but sort of dangled on the edge of the puppet-show curtain. I laughed out loud and had to try to turn it into grief. Then as I “grieved,” the kids giggled. Yulia told them not to laugh because my “son” was dead. One of the older girls yelled, “I know what happens later! He’s not really dead!” Finally I stumbled out of the room saying goodbye.
I changed out of my Jacob outfit and was standing in the hallway trying to decide when to go back in. Suddenly I heard one of the little girls ask to go to the bathroom, and I rushed further down the hallway to hide. But she came right up to me. I thought she was going to say something about the costume, but she said, “Leeza, what’s ‘perfect’?” Like the great teacher that I am, I said, “Ummm, didn’t Yulia tell you?” I didn’t know what point they were at in the lesson anyway. I went back into the room and Yulia was trying to explain to the kids about God’s perfect love. I think they got it. Then we closed in prayer and did a craft.
Maybe it wasn’t the “perfect” Sunday school lesson. But it was memorable!
Our lesson was a theatrical performance featuring live action, puppets, and flannel-graph. I played the part of Jacob, wearing a wig, beard, and robe. My 12 “sons” were puppets, engineered and voiced by Olya. Yulia was story-teller and flannel-graph engineer.
So I came in, pretended I was a visitor from a far-off land, and told about my sons. I told about my son Joseph’s dreams with the help of the flannel-graph. After that it got tricky. We switched to a scene with the brothers and I went behind the curtain and helped to make sheep noises. Olya and I got a little confused about which puppet was which. Then I went back out again to play Jacob. The brothers came to deliver the sad news, and the puppets then threw a “bloody cloth” towards me. This was problematic in two ways: 1) the blood consisted of magenta colored paint. 2) The cloth didn’t make it to me but sort of dangled on the edge of the puppet-show curtain. I laughed out loud and had to try to turn it into grief. Then as I “grieved,” the kids giggled. Yulia told them not to laugh because my “son” was dead. One of the older girls yelled, “I know what happens later! He’s not really dead!” Finally I stumbled out of the room saying goodbye.
I changed out of my Jacob outfit and was standing in the hallway trying to decide when to go back in. Suddenly I heard one of the little girls ask to go to the bathroom, and I rushed further down the hallway to hide. But she came right up to me. I thought she was going to say something about the costume, but she said, “Leeza, what’s ‘perfect’?” Like the great teacher that I am, I said, “Ummm, didn’t Yulia tell you?” I didn’t know what point they were at in the lesson anyway. I went back into the room and Yulia was trying to explain to the kids about God’s perfect love. I think they got it. Then we closed in prayer and did a craft.
Maybe it wasn’t the “perfect” Sunday school lesson. But it was memorable!
Random Blogger experimentation
I tried adding comments to the sidebar (I know very minimal HTML). Right now it only shows the author and date, but if you hover with the mouse, it displays the actual comment. If anyone has any other ideas, feel free to share. :)
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Camp Karavella-where it all began, #1
The dock by the lake...my favorite place to watch the sunset and pray at 11 pm during White Nights! :)
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