Back to Afterschool

Ruthie and I have been dealing with a very difficult and demanding family situation, which has kept me from communicating as much as I should.

Big, thrilling things seem to be happening every day. Yesterday, I went down to WonderRoot, a creative collective, to talk about community projects where we could collaborate. We spent some time talking about my vision to restore relationship between the Church and creative communities. They seemed very excited to see where that goes.

We left the meeting with two great ideas - 1) work together on a community mural 2) develop a film program for our kids, with the goal of holding a small festival/showing during their spring break. The films would come from all over the international village, and would focus on an inside view of the immigrant/refugee life.

Yesterday, we re-opened our afterschool program, and we had a new group of kids. We're dedicating the first hour to homework, so Ruthie and I scrambled to make sure everyone got the help they needed.

I had to leave halfway through to round up and bring some youth over to Communicycle, where David showed Aziz how to dismantle a bike for cleaning and rebuilding. It was great to see David go from knowing nothing to being able to teach another kid how to do everything. That's the dream result of our work- mobilized workers from within the community.

Communicycle Ride (Flashback to Sunday)

This Sunday after church, David, Melvin and I joined the rest of the Communicycle posse for a ride on the Silver Comet Trail.

David got to ride on the bike he built in the program. Melvin's bike is still in progress, so we borrowed one for him. They both struggled with the endurance aspect of the ride, but seemed to have a good time and feel proud after it was all over.

Communicycle

Good news: it turns out Eric isn't dead after all. We had a great time celebrating his birthday at Communicycle, Stone Mountain, then the Waffle House.

I've been meaning to post pictures of Communicycle for months now.

We regularly bring some of the older kids to a nearby warehouse where husband-and-wife team Josh and Margaret Feit head up a bike workshop. The "build a bike, earn a bike" program lets our kids learn how to take a bike apart, clean it, and rebuild it. As a bonus, they get to keep the bike at the end.

This has been a huge help to us. It gives us an environment to connect with the kids who don't really dig the whole arts-and-crafts focus of our activities center. Tonight Eric and I brought Ariel. As everyone worked, I was able to capture these totally candid, unposed pictures