HELLO,

Today was a wonderful day full service and friendship! We started the morning by fueling our bodies with a nice breakfast together. (Us leaders love to witness the change of pace in the mornings as the week goes on.) We continued our morning by discussing homelessness with Katie, the woman running the service group programming at Fourth Presbyterian Church. It helped the students conceptualize the challenges of the those who we come in contact with, will be facing. After a fun ride on the L, we arrived at SOS Children's Villages. 

"The village consists of twelve family homes and four duplexes, which house children and SOS parents. The village can house up to 90 children. In addition, another 24 homes are in the process of being built for moderate-income families through the Chicago Department of Housing’s New Homes for Chicago and will round out the scattered site community. The village also has a director's house, administration building and playground."

At the village, the students helped an amazing woman named, Meg, clean up their garden. They did a variety of things including zip-tying tomatoes, pulling weeds, and even playing with a little boy and our new best friend, Big. Some of the students left the site early to go home get cleaned up, and head to another site called the Inspiration Corporation.

The Inspiration Corporation is an amazing place that serves meals to those in need. It works as many college meal plans do. They are given 20 points on a card and they can use them in whatever fashion they would like for a month. Inspiration Corp. serves breakfast; dinner, and they hand out sack lunches as well. 

We finally ended the night with much-needed showers and a nice spaghetti dinner. As one group prepared an amazing worship, the rest of us split up into groups as well to wind down for the night. We read and discussed Jonah 1 in small groups.  During worship, we discussed our day and what to think about throughout each upcoming experience of the week.

It was wonderful watching the students interact with each other today, as they were friendly and worked as a team. They really seemed to express the joy they felt through the hard work they accomplished today. We are excited to continue through the week and witness the amazing things God has to offer for us and of course help us collect all of our strength to offer what we have to these incredible people we will soon serve! 

-ANNIE M.