Spring break!!

I cannot believe that spring break was only little more than a week ago - it seems so much longer! Christian Challenge went to Colorado Springs and stayed at Glen Eyrie, which is a retreat center owned by the Navigator ministry. It is a beautiful castle surrounded by lovely trees and red rocks.


mmmm, the castle, how I miss it so...

The weather was surprisingly nice too, no snow this time which was a bit sad, but then again it was beautiful regardless! We had three speakers:
- Brett Yohn who is the Challenge director of University of Nebraska
- Jim Peterson who lived in Brazil for over 30 years, has written multiple books, 2 of which I have read and LOVED - The Insider and Living Proof - highly, *highly* recommend you read them because they helped to re-shape my concept of evangelism!!
- Jim Downing, who is a whopping 97 years old and is still going strong for Christ! He was in Pearl Harbor, yes you read that right, he was actually IN Pearl Harbor!! He is now retired but still speaks all around the nation (and world I think) about walking with Christ.


Jim as he spoke to the USC and California Baptist Univ. groups

The conference was long, but it was not exhausting. The schedule has a good amount of free time and so even though the mornings were packed with breakfast (we had crepes one day, CREPES!! the food there was crazy delicious and not at all what you would expect at a retreat center :), then main session followed by a work shop we still had the afternoons free! It was lovely and I am still in the process of re-writing my notes so that I can organize them better because they gave us a notebook, but in order to have them handy by topic I thought I'd re-write them, plus helps me to go over them at the same time so it's a win-win!!

I'll update more tomorrow and this week with updates of things I learned, but for now here are some pictures :)


this is a bird's eye view of the Great Hall where we would have our main sessions. Lots of people as you can see! We maxed out the castle with bringing 350 people :)


This is a pic of Olivia, myself and Makena. Both Olivia and Makena are freshmen, even though I look like I'm the youngster because they are a FOOT taller than me!! Makena said they were just being my bodyguards for the day, so I'll take that :)


Rebekah and I :) she is in my life group and really has the strong desire to grow in her walk with God!!


This is a photo of the USC group on the last day. It had snowed a little bit and we were just about to leave but you can't leave before taking a group photo right?


and of course you need a fun one right? ;)


we also had a large group photo of all 350 of us, and of course the USC-ers in the back had to flash the victory sign :)

and now for the piece de resistance, I will end this post with a video from spring break. The last night we have what is called "Follies" which is basically a funny talent show. This year saw everything from a kazoo choir from Oklahoma State "kazoo-ing" Katy Perry's "Firework" to Spartan cheerleaders from Univ. of Oklahoma (a la Will Ferrell and Cheri O'teri) and a lip-synch to Mulan's "I'll make a man out of you." My personal favorite, however, was a joint effort between the schools. There was a band called the Shnazzy Shoes and the lead singer was USC's very own worship leader, back-up was an Oklahoma State-an and playing the djembe was a guy from OU. Their song? "Metabolism Baby" and it is crazy catchy and everyone was singing it that night! I have since watched it a few times on youtube :) So without further ado, I give you "Metabolism Baby"