Saturday, October 6, 2007

One Step Short of Crazy- Passionate

Today I went to a junior high jive. What is it? you ask. Well, it is a huge messy games party at my church for sixth, seventh, and eighth graders. And yes, it was extremely messy! First, we tied balloons to our ankles and were going to play a game with them,but the freshly cut grass that was sharp popped all of the balloons. "POP! POP! POP!" It sounded like someone was popping bubble wrap, but it was much, much louder. Since that game did not work, Bro. Josh, my youth pastor, moved on to the next game- a sack race. We all thought," Sack races are not messy." But this one was. We divided into two teams and Bro. Josh filled two trash bags with liquid soap - yes liquid soap. Then it started raining. Now this was getting interesting. One by one, we stepped into the slippery contraption, raced to the other end of the playing area,went around a person serving as a boundary, and ran, well hobbled back to our team, all while trying to stay in a bag filled with soap in the pouring rain. Difficult? Yes. Crazy? Yes. Awesomely fun? Absolutely! At the end of this game, we could have served as a washcloth. People that were driving by were staring at us like we were absolute idiots. If you think about it though, we kinda were.
The next activity was the biggest and longest. And the nastiest. The first five people on each team had to bob for baby toys in a two-gallon bucket. But the bucket was not filled with water. Oh No. They had to make it messier than that. The buckets were full of syrup. Once you grabbed the toy with your mouth, you had to hold it in your mouth and look up toward a person standing above you with a plate of flour in their hands. That person proceeded to throw that flour in your face. Then you got up, ran back to your team, and the next person went. After the first five had gone, everyone else(one by one) had to run to the table and eat baby food. (Some got lucky and had to chug down a can of vegetable juice.) I was not that lucky. I had to eat a jar of thick, mushy, gross, baby food. I think it was carrots. Maybe. I'm not sure Whatever it was, I just could not swallow that so called "edible" substance. I tried to quickly pour it into my mouth, but it had a mind of its own. It slowly and deliberately dripped into my mouth. It was so thick that I put it in my mouth and spit it out. Everyone else did the same. We then ran back to the team. But that was not the end of this monstrous relay. We now had to race to the table, put our face in a plate of flour, and search for pineapple chunks. Once we got about five of them we could go back to the team. Or that's what happened to everyone but the last person. Guess what. I was that last person. I had to get the remainder of the pineapple chunks out of the flour that had been touched by other people's mouths before mine. There were so many chunks in my mouth that I actually had to chew some up and eat them. Gross! I then ran back to my team, trying to finish before the last person on the other team. This I did successfully. My team had won the relay. Each person on that team was given a number between one and eleven. One of the adults was asked to pick a random number in that range. The person whose number was picked would win two tickets to the Mercy Me concert coming up. My number was not picked,but I already had tickets to the concert, so it was o.k. That was the end of that insane relay, but not the junior high jive. The end of a battle, but not the war, if you will.
Next came the egg toss. The cleanest of all games. Of course my partner and I dropped our egg first, other than my nine- year- old sister and her three- year- old partner(Bro. Josh's son) who were just playing for fun. Isn't that just pitiful? The winners received prizes- the new Casting Crowns CD and a Todd Agnew CD. But no. I did not win. the friend that I brought won. Oh well. There was still one game left.
That game was a bubble gum contest. It was the normal " first and biggest bubble wins" kind of thing, but that was not all. The gum was frozen. As we were handed one piece of gum each, we realized that fact. Some of us held the gum in our hands, rubbed our hands together, and blew on them(like we were cold and trying to warm our hands up) in order to thaw out the gum. Others challenged themselves and did not try to warm the gum. On the count of three, we all placed our piece of gum into our mouth and tried to bite into it. After some effort, we began actually chewing the gum and preparing to make a bubble. It took some time before multi- colored bubbles appeared. For some reason that I can't remember, no one won. Bro. Josh decided to do a do- over. This time, when we blew the bubble up to the desired size, we had to take it out of our mouths and hold it up in the air. The biggest bubble holder went to the center, showing their bubble. This served as the size to beat. That size to beat turned out to be my bubble, but someone stole the victory from my grasp. Yes, some one's bubble was bigger than mine. (sigh) That person won a t-shirt that said "Girl for God" on the front with cute flowers behind it.
After the last game, we all rinsed off, grabbed a sloppy Joe and a bag of chips and sat down in front of Bro. Josh. He talked to us about the fact that our souls are messy and unclean, but Jesus cleanses us, just like the water hose. This brought the junior high jive to an end. We had never been messier or happier. Bro. Josh had expected to go home clean, but the kids had another idea. We poured the two gallons of syrup on him, cracked about six eggs on his head, and put flour in his face. The only thing we were not able to do was make him eat baby food. There was none left. RATS!!! Although I never won anything, and didn't get the most messy, I had a blast! Well, I have to go now. I will try to post pictures of the junior high jive tomorrow!


1 comment:

Ruth said...

LOL! Sounds like you had a blast. I would have loved to be one of those driving by during the rain storm! See ya Monday.

Mrs. B