A Random Run Down of The Past Month

The past number of weeks have been very busy for our family and in our ministry at Berkshire. I'll randomly mention what I can recall that has happened in our lives over the past month.
As most of you know, Elizabeth and Emily are in an amazing children and youth choir. For the past four years they have been making weekly, and sometime several trips to the south part of the city for practices. Gayle is a parent volunteer and actively helps in fund raising efforts. During these days, the practices have been ramped up along with a number of fund raising activities thrown in. As a family we helped with bottle drives, selling meat pies and assisted in running an Octoberfest evening. There have also been a couple of major concerts thrown in as the girls along with Gayle prepare for a two week choir tour of Germany in a months time. Kathryn is also in this choir, although in a beginning level group. They are too young for a tour although the concerts and fund raising remain the same.
In these weeks there have been school parent teacher interviews, after music practices (Jazz vocal, jazz band, concert band - Elizabeth) (concert band for Emily and Nathan), concerts involving Elizabeth, Emily and Nathan. Nightly homework is also par for the course.
There are the regular activities of church - Sunday morning worship, worship team practices (Elizabeth), Berkshire Brass practices (Elizabeth, Emily, Nathan) teaching Sunday school (Elizabeth), Sunday school classes (Emily, Nathan, Kathryn) weekly mid-week youth outreach ministry (Elizabeth, Emily, Nathan), weekly youth group - Friday nights (Elizabeth, Nathan, Emily), Beavers (Kathryn), Scouts (Nathan), weekly teen small groups (Elizabeth, Emily, Nathan), woman's small group (Gayle), Men's small group (Stephen). Without going into detail there were a number of significant ministry/pastoral issues we had to deal with. During this time my main computer crashed - I lost most of my files including my e-mail addresses - thus I have been unable to send out my weekly Berkshire E-Chat (some of you may have wondering why I have'nt sent anything for severall weeks - now you know why). Fortuntely most of photos were backed up on disks along with all my sermons and study notes and important files for my ministry. In all of this we are dealing with some significant issues within the Salvation Army when it comes to the current economic situation - that has led all SA ministry units to rework their budgets for re-approval within a tight window of time.
There have also been a huge garage sale conducted by the corps (church) in support of our Partner's in Mission, board meetings, a highly successful silent auction and dinner to support 28 of our youth and their leaders to attend YC up in Edmonton and then there is the YC weekend itself (Gayle was one of the chaperons, Elizabeth, Emily attended).
In all of this both Emily and Elizabeth squeeze in part time jobs on Saturdays.
We also had a family we met up in the North West Territories come down and stay with us for ten days. It was such a great time to share with them. We took the kids out of school one day and headed into the mountains for a picnic - an absolutely spectacular day!
Gayle and I also help a mother with four boys three times a week. We watch her autistic son for 2.5 hours three times a week during the immediate after school time period. This allows her some respite.
Needless to say we are a busy family.
By the way, it is snowing today after experiencing wonderful summer temps for the past couple of weeks!!! My flowers and tomato plants will not be very happy. As everyone who has lived here for most of their lives say, "That's Alberta weather for you."