Thursday (July 18th)
Thursday started with Scott & Katie joining Jed & I with the way early morning Manna Room routine. We all had a great time as we earned our stripes with Karen and the rest of the team that is out there bright and early every morning. We all laughed about which boxes or bags he would let the ladies carry versus the boxes and bags he made the guys carry. It is such a fun way to start every morning.
Of course, it is followed with breakfast and bible reading and more time with the guys cooking and serving. Over this past few days we have really formed relationships, and I am realizing for me that sometimes it is more about those relationships then trying to find 19 different things for 19 extra people to do. It has been such a great experience.
After our morning/early afternoon routine at the Manna Room, we headed downtown to help with the Bicycle Bread Company. This was something Jed & I were really excited to be a part of. Just a quick history on how we know the BBC crew, Stephen Gordon was a student at USC when we first met him through Kairos. With a group of people from Kairos (that have now branched into South LA Christian Life), they started making and selling bread to the local neighborhoods. It is such an awesome story.
So our job was to help spread the word. With and old friend of ours, Shalom, we flyered streets right around her house and near the bakery. The great part about flyering the neighborhoods was we didn't just drop the flyer and run, we knocked on every door and talked to anyone that would answer. It was so great to meet people in the neighborhood, hear their stories and see their excitement for a local bakery. And, I was teamed up with Shalom and we had a great time catching up on each others lives.
After a few hours of flyering the neighborhood, we walked down to a cafe that serves all their sandwiches on Bicycle Bread Company's bread, The Blu Elefant Cafe. This place was super cute and we all helped support local business as we got cool drinks after a warm afternoon of work.
We were going to get an opportunity to check out the bakery in action later in the evening so we planned on meeting up with the Neighborhood Bible Club Group for an early dinner before we headed down to the bakery. So we met everyone (and a few extra friends) at Roscoe's Chicken & Waffles. Everyone should try chicken and waffles at least once and it is such a fun place to go!
When we got done with dinner we still had plenty of time before we needed to be at the bakery so we made a very unwise decision and took everyone out to Kenneth Hahn Park. Don't get me wrong, the park is great and the views are fantastic (when it is clear) but we pushed our luck with traffic, didn't get nearly enough time at the park and were late getting to the bakery.
Even though we were late getting to the bakery, I think it ended up being perfect timing. Stephen was there and he had already started to mix everything so a lot of the prep work was already done. As he finished mixing the dough, he told us the story of where the bakery came from and where they hope it is going. I think the funniest part was when he was trying to explain that he got his mom's bread recipes from his 13 year old sister over the phone and mistook Katie for being 13. We all still laugh about that!
The bakery only bakes twice a week, shares the store front & kitchen with another bakery, and delivers bread one day a week. It is quite an undertaking to run a bakery while everyone involved has full time jobs. It is just so impressive the drive that they all have and the vision they all share to make a difference in there neighborhood. We had every expectation of seeing what they do and heading out. One hour max of their time; but Stephen had other plans for us. He let us do almost all of the baking! They even let us make cinnamon rolls with cream cheese & jalapeno with cream cheese for us to have. (Unfortunately at 11pm they still weren't done baking so they were just going to drop them by the church tomorrow.)
We all had a great time and I can not thank Shalom & Stephen enough for all they did, do, and how in everything they have gone above and beyond. (Shalom even drove the big white van around so Jed didn't have to worry about it stalling out on him!) We didn't leave the bakery until around 11pm! I felt really bad for Stephen as he still had plenty more baking to do before he was done for the night.
We dropped everyone off at the our home for the week and Jed, Terri & I took the big van out again to get it filled with gas before all the driving we were going to do tomorrow. While we were out a few things happened.
1. We decided we NEEDED to go get something to drink from Coffee Bean.
2. Found out that there a group of people playing cards in the hall.
3. Jed got a call from Kilby. He was just up the road (about 30ish minutes) for a training class.
4. Jed got a text from Mengyun. She had spent the afternoon and evening with some of her friends that live in the area. She was not going to be back until around 12:30AM and would need someone to let her in.
So after an eventful trip to Coffee Bean, we hatched a plan. I would go back to the preschool, play cards with everyone in the hall (SO FUN!!) while Jed would hit the road to go see Kilby. Then I would be in the preschool when Mengyun got back to let her in and I can do the same for Jed since we didn't have a key that worked.
The plan worked! Scott, Katie, Terri & I played Monopoly cards til we couldn't keep our eyes opened, I get the call from Mengyun at 12:30am to let her in and Jed followed suit at 1:45am. I think Mengyun & Jed both had a great time with friends that night so I am really glad they both had the chance to do it.
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