Today was our first day of service and it was busy. We started our morning off by volunteering at the Oakhaven Boys and Girls Club. Although we didn't get to meet the kids, we still had a lot of fun helping organize their rooms and closets. Half of us cleaned out one of the storage rooms so they could be transformed into a classroom area, and the other half organized the learning center and craft room. In order to clean out the storage room we had to rearrange the old foose ball tables, which turned out to be quite the challenge. We struggled for awhile, but finally, after screwing and unscrewing the handles multiple times, we managed to organize the little players into the broken ones and the good ones. Needless to say, we've become masters at using screwdrivers. Some of our participants also braved the cold and cleaned the facility's windows- we've deemed them the champions of the day.
When we finished organizing for the Boys and Girls club we headed over to St. Jude's to host our first craft event of the week. After a small detour [Memphis highways are tricky] we had to convince the gate security guard that we were in fact legitimate volunteers. Thankfully, he let us through and we headed inside. St. Jude's is huge. We couldn't even find the main entrance, but thankfully a lot of the buildings are connected, and the walls are decorated with pictures and paintings, mostly made by patients.
Our craft was making pictures with buttons. We set up right outside of the cafeteria and waited for the kiddos to stop by. We only had a few takers, but the ones that did stop were quite the characters. They made flowers and snowmen, and we think they enjoyed themselves! It was a good event to get our feet wet with the kids and hospital environment.
This afternoon we had a large break, so we headed back to the church to make lunch and hang out before our second craft event of the day. After lunch, our hang out time turned into everyone napping. Much needed, obviously. When everyone woke up from their hibernation we headed back to St. Jude's for our craft event at the Tri Delta Place. This time, our craft was making picture frames. We had a few more takers this time and even saw one of our little friends from earlier in the day! It's safe to say she's stolen our hearts. The Tri Delta place is beautiful, and everyone there was so welcoming. We definitely enjoyed ourselves, and we can't wait to go back Thursday for bingo night!
We made our way back to the church, but had to make a quick stop at Wal-Mart first. Naturally, our two cars went to two different Wal-Marts. Way to go, Emily. We've revoked her GPS privileges. When we got back to the church we made ourselves some dinner. It was taco night, and yes, we feasted. It was glorious. After we decided to do some bonding and took a trip to Baskin Robbins, AKA 31 Flavors, which we're all calling it now. We pulled into the parking lot at approximately 9:48, 12 minutes before they closed. We were those people. Johnny made sure to apologize for our tardiness. The girls working didn't look very amused. Finally, we made our way back to the church for the night where we had an in-depth conversation about the way joggers look on men. Johnny, the sole male on our trip, says yes, but mostly because he owns a pair. We also had our first reflection of the trip since it was our first day of service and everyone went around and gave their high and low of the day. We all had to think awhile, mostly because we couldn't necessarily think of lows.
It was a great first day, and it definitely pumped us up for the rest of the week. Tomorrow we get to go on a tour of St. Jude's and then work at the Boys and Girls club again! We can't wait!
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