Happy Birthday to Mark!

Mark is our new Spiritual Formations Coordinator at LCC.  He is a former student of mine from Goshen College and is here for the semester to help out in our Spiritual Life department.  His birthday was at the end of January and we celebrated it in true LCC Student Life fashion...a surprise party with cake, tea, and a flower!  Welcome to LCC, Mark!

Surprise!

His first sparkler candle!  

 

And since the bulk of our department was there we decided to get 

an updated Student Life team photo.

bottom to top...Margarita, Alisha, me, Vaida, Egle, Josh, Elena, 

Amanda, Demas, Bethany and Mark!

Saturday mornings

I hate being up early on Saturday mornings, but this gal makes it worthwhile!  Rachel and I do our "proper shop" each Saturday morning at 9:00, which is much earlier than I'd prefer to start my Saturday morning, but we start with a latte at the coffee shop right outside the grocery store in the mall.  The coffee and her company make the early hour so much more bearable!  

Rach and me  

Community Life Student Leader Christmas party!

Time to catch up on my blog...

The night before finals began, the Community Life team threw a Christmas party for the student leaders that work with us.  We made snacks, passed out the Christmas ornaments that we had made and enjoyed celebrating the season with this group of wonderful students!

Some of our fab RAs...Vadim, Kiril, Ira, Natalija, and Sasha

(and Josh the photobomber in the background)

Toms and Sarune

Ina and Ausrius

Toms and some of the cookies he decorated for his roommates!

me and Olena...with Alisha photobombing in the background!

Some of our spread...veggies & dip and mandarins!

More goodies...pigs in a blanket and cheese & crackers

We also had curry popcorn party mix, chocolate raspberry truffles, and a decorate your own Christmas cookie station.  It was a delicious spread and the students apprecaited that it wasn't just sweets!

Community Life Christmas!

My team and I celebrated Christmas with a brunch at my place one morning during finals.  It was a fun time to celebrate the bonds of friendship that has developed between us all this semester and the wonder of the season!

I had barley bags made for each of them for their Christmas gifts.  

And they bought me a new mixer because mine had broken!  

Final Sunday of Advent at ICF

We celebrate Advent a week early at ICF this year so that we could celebrate all 4 Sundays together.  On the final Sunday some of the Study Abroad students led the Advent reading and the rest of the service was a Christmas carol hymn sing.  It was a beautiful way to end the semester together!

Study Abroads doing the Advent reading

Lighting the candles

Special music

Erasmus and Study Abroad guys singing

FYS Christmas party!

The last week of classes I invited my FYS group over for one last party of the semester.  We did a white elephant gift exchange and ate snacks!  After a bit of talk about we are most looking forward to over break, we did a bit of photo taking and then went on about our evenings.  It was a fun way to spend a bit more time bonding before the end of the term.  I have REALLY enjoyed this group and will miss seeing them regularly next semester.

A great group!

front - Sasha, Olga, me, Elvyra, Laura Natasha, and Erika

back- Janis, Luicija, Matas, Iki, and Alexander

The required "CrAzY pHoTo"!

And one in the snow...my FYS group and snow...I couldn't be happier!  

Crafty business!

We began a new tradition last year of making a Christmas ornament to give to our student leaders at our Christmas party.  Monday afternoon the Community Life team got together to be crafty and make this year's ornaments.  We rolled up little tubes of red and green wrapping paper and made little Christmas trees.  Unfortunately I didn't get any photos of the finished product!  :( 

Alisha looks a little confused at the task that lays before her.

Josh seems really psyched about his craft!

Josh...photo bomber extraordinaire