Road Trip Finale

After a year on the road, I returned the truck and trailer back to Denver. I logged over 20,000 miles and 9,000 of those were with the trailer in tow. It was an amazing experience to see the Central United States from the road and the 70-odd posts before this describe that experience.

The trip was a success. There were only 2-3 semi-active chapters in the region when I started. Now there are eight active chapters (tear-drop marker) and eleven chapters in the start-up process or with expressed interest (push pin).

In the next year, I'll continue to travel to work to get those start-up chapters up and running and uncover further areas of interest. This blog will continue as a place for chapters to share what they are up to and the fun and growth inspiring events they are putting on.

A huge thanks to everybody I met along the way and have contributed to the building of these chapters, for planning and running events and for spreading the word. To get more information on contacting any of the chapters check out the interactive regional map.

Stay tuned! The Central Region is just getting warmed up!

Chicago Summit 2008

With about 140 in attendance, the Chicago Summit was again an inspirational time for the area youth to come together and enjoy the wonderful lectures and workshops. The full schedule can be seen at TMC Youth (as well as videos, a slideshow and recordings of some of the lectures).

Seventeenth Church right along the river in downtown Chicago provided space for the summit and the out of town guests were housed at Hosteling International Chicago just a mile down the road. That made for a nice stroll in the morning before the event.

I, however, did not do much sitting at all. As a volunteer, I arrived on Thursday afternoon to receive the rented AV equipment, start setting it up, and organize how the space was to be used. Friday, we were all back at the church to continue with the setup process and just as things were coming together, the first pre-registration participants started arriving at the hostel.

Saturday was filled with many great sessions, most in smaller groups, but at times the whole gang came together in the main auditorium. Lunch, snacks, dinner and dessert were provided as well as a rousing scavenger hunt that sent teams, broken up by age, racing throughout the church to chase down clues for the fabulous prize of Coldestone Creamery gift cards for the winning team. I believe it was the 12-17 year olds group that pulled off the win.

Sunday morning many of the participants gathered for Church and Sunday School, followed by small groups going out to get brunch. At 1.30pm a small meeting was held for adults (30 y/o+) who could not attend the event for a debrief complete with a slide show from the day before.

TMC Youth and the local planning committee did a great job and put on a great event. Bravo!
Some photos

New Chapter - Twin Cities, MN

With only a week notice, the Twin Cities area pulled about 30 people together for an informational meeting to learn about DiscvoeryBound at 3rd Church in Minneapolis. I stated from the start that the objective of the meeting is to form a chapter board, schedule the next board meeting, and start planning an OTM event for November. All of these were accomplished.

There were lots of good questions asked about local and national events. Emily and Anna of the National Leadership Council (NLC) gave a great presentation on what the NLC is and what their experience has been. The two of them joined the adults in the formation of the board and with a third friend have taken on the responsibility of planning the OTM events.

After the basic introductions of people and what DiscoveryBound is, we split the kids from the adults (save the NLC gals). The kids brainstormed on what sort of events they would like to do and the adults slotted themselves into board positions. After forming the board and scheduling the next board meeting (they were just jumping to get into agenda items for the next meeting!) we all regrouped with the youth and they rattled off a list of great events. The activities included a balanced assortment of parties (actually, they tagged 'party' on the end of all the events to make the sound more fun - clever, eh?), service projects, and fundraisisng events.

We talked some about how to build sustainability into the program as there was once a chapter here years ago, but petered out. This awareness is a crucial part of keeping it going and setting up a system that will continue on. There's already talk of a Boundarywaters trip... I'll be back for that!

Misc. Readings

After church at 2nd Church in Minneapolis, I joined a group of gals who are reading their way through Mrs. Eddy's writings. Accompanied by muffins and juice, each person took a turn to read a paragraph and then the group would discuss the ideas presented. In the hour we had together, we read the articles on Contagion, Time and Thanksgiving. It's so great to see groups like this delving into the books and exploring the ideas together.

From the conversation about contagion, ideas were discussed about how much the pharmaceutical market really pushes drugs and how we can defend ourselves from that contagion of thought that we need drug assistance.

The article on time was amazing. Essentially, it says not to sit around and talk about doing things, get out there and do things! Such a great reminder and we all could relate to the circumstances described as the pitfalls of wasting time.

Of course, they were curious about DiscoveryBound, so I was able to tell them a little bit about the meeting at 1pm at 3rd church.

Minneapolis/St. Paul - Mens Group

I rolled into the Twin Cities and dropped off the trailer in plenty of time to make it to the St. Paul Church for their Testimony Meeting. After connecting with the clerk about promoting our informational meeting coming up this Sunday, I got an invite by one of the members to join a group of guys from various churches around the area for lunch on Thursday.

Not unlike the mens group in the western suburbs of Chicago, these guys bring questions about the weekly bible lesson, how to apply CS to events in their lives, and to enjoy each others company. Not to mention the wide variety of choices provided at the Chinese Buffet they congregate at.

It was great to join these guys and to hear about CS being applied to their everyday lives. They were all very supportive of the idea of a DiscoveryBound Chapter in the area and had good questions about the function of a chapter and about the DB national programs.

Thanks guys!