Tweens Spring Retreat in La Porte

By Lori Steinhiser

Eight tweens (ages 9-13) from Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio came together at LaPorte New Church Manna House in Indiana for a weekend retreat lead by SCYL Youth Leader Kurt Fekete. Friday night was spent hanging out and getting to know each other; for instance, we all now know Danny is “yarnful” (ask him sometime, he’ll fill you in on the “story”) and Bryan, Mariah and Skylor’s noses are exactly the same size. The evening ended with a much anticipated meditation by Kurt. After breakfast on Saturday, we headed over to the Fellowship Hall for an enlightening discussion about Spring, the theme of the weekend. I was really wowed by the way the kids were connecting the dots so easily between our physical and spiritual experiences of the seasons. They made tie-dyed flowers that stood for their talents and skills. After lunch we headed to Soldier’s Memorial Park to hang out on the beach and collect five smooth stones for more of the flower project. Emily made a daring attempt to sit at a picnic table high up in a tree but it was a bit too far out of reach…good try, Em. We made it back to Manna House without getting too much sand in our pants (thankfully, huh, Tony?!) and added words of truth to the stones. The evening was full of rousing games, pizza, fellowship and more flower making. We finally had to call it quits amid pleas of “one more game” when we realized it was after 1am…how did that happen?! Sunday brought on a mad dash to pull ourselves and Manna House back together before worship service. The kids shared the extra flowers they had made with the congregation, then “planted” their own during Sunday school time. The retreat was a great deal of fun, and we’re so glad Bekka and Anna were willing to come long distances to join us! Plans to make a tradition out of this weekend are in the works. Many thanks to Tam and Dawn for being a part of our first tween retreat; we could not have done it without you! Thank you also to the WA-WAs for donating the paper goods and to everyone who dropped off food and drinks!