Mission Trip Monday, July 8, 2013

Sadly - only a partial group photo this morning - maybe at lunch we can get the group together!

We arrived at the SALT office behind the Reformed Church in Schoharie and split into three groups: the barn group, the demolition group and the lunch group. 

Ginger, Miyako and Eiko were the lunch crew. We went grocery shopping and prepared lunch before the troops returned to church. The lunch crew God Sighting today: Shopping to feed twenty took longer than expected but when we arrived at the church to unload and prepare for the arrival of the rest of the group who were scheduled to arrive within the hour - Sara and her daughter came and were a great help in preparing lunch and navigating an unfamiliar kitchen. 

The barn group went to a farm where we helped unload wood from the barn and also helped load other things into the truck. Everyone in the group agreed that we saw God in the dog. The dog's name was Yingling and the whole time we were working the dog was following us. The dog was always cheerful and watching us. He made everyone that was working there happy and he brought a positive attitude to the table. While we were in line to carry wood he would be next to us and everyone would pet him. 

The demolition group. We took down walls and pulled up floors, the first floor of this house was destroyed due to water rushing into the back of the house from the road above, there was a big slope downward from the road right behind the house, nothing much had been done in the house since Irene hit and the family (husband, wife,and child) were living elsewhere. The wife came by with a friend while we were working and was overheard telling her friend that she was so excited she was going to cry, some of the kids really liked doing demolition. The God sighting at theis worksite was a flower in the rubble which symbolized that among all the hurt and destruction, the flower showed a new beginning and hope.

After lunch and clean up we headed out to Bob's cousin's family dairy farm, Danforth's, and had a wonderful tour of this family farm now in it's 7th generation. (It was begun in 1817.) We saw the plant where they make yogurt and butter. Their brand, Cowbella butter, is sold at the Pleasantville's farmer's market! The Jersey cows were milked and some of us, following Sandi's lead, hand milked Daisy the cow. Two week old kittens were also popular attraction, as well as the very cool tree house, Charlie the dog, and a sampling of kefir, their drinkable yogurt.

Ending the day eating at a local eatery, Amy's. Part of our plan was to patronize as many local businesses as possible to help in the economic recovery as well. We ate great food outside on picnic benches while the weather cooperated and then had delicious ice cream for dessert. 

We ended the day back at the hotel gathering to discuss the day's events and our God sightings.

Allison, Erica, and Marianne

Mission Trip Sunday July 7, 2013

Here are my God Sightings so far - and I am sure there were more by others.

- a blessing by our church family at Emanuel 
- arriving safely to the hotel despite the motorcyclists getting caught in a torrential downpour and hail, (one of them was literally pouring water out of his boots), one of the cars getting stuck in traffic for an hour before daringly crossing the median, and another getting to Cobleskill via NJ and PA.
- the United Prebyterian Church of Schohaire allowing us to use their space for our lunches, some dinner and meetings.
- Sara Cipperly(with the help of her daughter and mother) providing us a welcome package with maps and menus so we can get around and patronize the local businesses, for her tour of her church and the damage caused and the repairs that were done
- our Emanuel Family and friends who helped with our fundraising so that we were able to cover most of our housing cost for the week
- our time of devotion and fellowship together
- during the tour of the church, the beautiful stained glass windows around the church - none were damaged during the storm. This was amazing as the church was filled 6 feet high with water and none of the floating debris broke the windows
- a million dollars of damage to the church and its buildings and only $100,000 was covered by insurance and monies from the Presbytery. How is that a God Sighting? Despite that, the church continues through the donation of pews, chairs, hymnals, skilled and non-skilled workers who gave of their time, including weekly workdays to get things done.
- the buffet dinner that could accommodate 20 of us and the downpour that subsided so we could get back to our cars.

So many more things are planned for the week - with many more God sightings to come. 

(did not get our group shot in today - planning on tomorrow!)

(I am late in posting as my Dad is the one who is usually the webmaster - I may have to ask him to do it from home if I cannot do it from here! Also pictures to follow - another thing I forgot to ask Dad about how to do before I left!)

Eiko

Mission Trip to Schoharie New York July 7 to 12, 2013

This mission trip idea was started by Marianne and, in planning, I felt it would benefit our ringers more to be going on the mission trip rather than of our usual Area Festival. I had figured that we would somehow incorporate or bring bells into it and then... a God Sighting! Barbara suggested that Marianne  contact Lutheran Disaster Relief and found SALT (Schoharie Area Long Term Disaster Recovery).

"Why was this a God sighting?" you might ask. Well, the year before at the Hudson Valley Handbell Festival the beneficiary was the United Presbyterian Church of Schoharie handbell ringers. Their church was flooded by Hurricane Irene and their bells were covered in mud and muck, their music library and all associated equipment destroyed (tables, pads, covering, books etc). The concert raised funds to help get some of their bells restored. 

Then Hurricane Sandy hit and the discussion came up - Should we change the destination of our trip? But we found out that SALT predicted that the area still needed 3 to 5 years (even a year and a half AFTER the storm) to fully recover. We did not want those affected and still being affected to be forgotten so we stayed on course to go to Schoharie. (Incidentally, the beneficiary committee of the Hudson Valley Handbell Festival was asked again to consider the Schoharie Handbell choir to be the beneficiary as it was difficult for those not directly affected by the hurricane to see that even now there is still a lot more to be done. 

It is finally July amongst the busy lives we all lead. Twenty-two of us have come together, varying in age and ability, for 5 days to experience all the God Sightings we can.

Annual Concert on Sunday June 2nd 2013

Our Annual Concert will be held on Sunday June 2nd, 2013 at 7pm, see you all!

Handbell Concert

Emanuel Ringers I

Emanuel Ringers III

Adult Emanuel Ringers

Sunday, June 2, 2013

7:00 pm

Emanuel Evangelical Lutheran Church

197 Manville Road

Pleasantville, New York 10570

(914) 769-1559

www.emanuelelc.org

www.emanuelringersblogspot.com

Our Japanese friend, Kanto Gakuin had their Annual Concert

On March 31st, our Japanese friend who hosted us during our 2010 International Symposium visit, Kanto Gakuin Handbell Choir had their annual concert at the Minatomirao Hall, where we played with them in 2010 summer.          The numbers of ringers increased to 16  this year and had a great concert.    You can see/listen all the music uploaded to Youtube. HERE

March 2013

Upcoming events the ringers are all preparing for!

The ERIII's and ERI's will be ringing at the Palm Sunday Service on March 24.

In April, the ERI's are busy preparing for the Riverside Handbell Festival to be held on Saturday, April 13. A full day of rehearsal, then ringing in church on Sunday morning, April 14 with the concert at 4 PM at Riverside Church in NYC.

Then the AER's are busy preparing for the Hudson Valley Handbell Festival being held at Nyack College in Nyack, New York on April 27th 7:30 PM.

Save those dates! Hope to see you there.

Eiko

Fall 2012 Update

Greetings - it has been a while since I have had a chance to post - many many exciting things we have been doing.

The end of tour brought us to say good bye to HS seniors off to college, Kim, Jessie, Ashley and Jonathan.

The fall brought us combining our ERII's and ERI's to make it our Middle and High School group.  As always there is an adjustment period as they all get to know each other. They rang in church and finished the year off with their Benefit Concert with Katonah raising money for HelpHOPELive raising over $2400 for this great cause.

Christmas Eve was the last of the services for the calendar year, with alumni coming home to ring with us. There were many who came and joined us for Thanksgiving too - (pictures later!)

The ERIII's the 6 boys from 2nd grade to 5th have been busy learning their music for church service and are always enthusiastic!

The Adult Ringers rang at the Thanksgiving Ecumenical service held at St. John's this year.  Happy to have some ERI's and alumni who came to fill in.

(Ok so there is one person who is/was not a ringer but I told them to join our picture anyway, do you know who it is?:>)

The fall was also busy with our fundraisers of citrus sale, bake sale, our ongoing Gift Card sale.

We are planning this summer, in lieu of a festival, participating in the mission trip to Schoharie County, New York as the county is still recover and will be in recovery mode for the next 3-5 years after the hurricane and flooding that went through last year.

I am also in the works planning for the 16th International Handbell Symposium to be held in Korea the summer of 2014.