• Adventures,  Fun

    Wear Your Memories on Your Sleeve

    Or on your bed. I appreciate cleanliness and limiting the number of things any one person has but I do see the value in collections that have intrinsic value to the owner. Collections are something that is curated, it is unique to that person in some ways, or has specific value to a person. Decide on an item that you can find almost anywhere and can represent each adventure well, even if it means you have something lying around you’ll have a piece of each adventure that you can touch.  For me growing up, it was primarily t-shirts. I bought one everywhere my family traveled and then was pleasantly surprised…

  • Christianity,  Fun

    Youth Group By Design

    Back in high school, I had been part of brainstorming a couple t-shirt designs for my youth group. Now that I’m a leader I’ve decided to try my hand at it again, and hopefully learn a little myself even if my designs aren’t used. It’s interesting where design, specifically graphic design, can find a home in the world. It’s not just about logos or slapping a phrase on a sticker. Design can be about bringing a group together with a visual that was thuroughly considered and planned. I like design. I’m trying to get better at it overall. I still tend to fall back on templates, but they get my brain…

  • Learning,  Philosophy

    Art in Motion (Picture)

    Throughout history, different art forms have been doubted, from the novel to the movie to the video game. Many in society saw movies s as being too different when they first came into existence to be seen as art, critics claim they were too complicated, commercialized, or counter-culture.  When the movie came about many wanted to call it an art form but that was soon challenged as many people wanted to pin down a particular artist for each film. The problem was that even for the greatest motion picture works, this was and is largely impossible.  Critics would judge that directors were writing what the audience wanted. Cantor points out…

  • Fun

    Inherently Puzzling

    I’ve tried an escape room before, it was huge, and quite hard, but my group and I enjoyed it, and I was excited about trying one again. They’re a challenge but one where you know there is, for the most part, a logical end. So when my Dad decided he wanted to try one as a family for his birthday, I was excited if not slightly concerned: Would we get frustrated as a group being that I was the only one who had tried it before? Would we get stuck? We decided to try one called the Inheritance *see title*. We were solving puzzles in what felt like a dining room…

  • Learning,  Philosophy

    Philosophy Module Week 2

    The second week of the module was really helpful. I learned about how to construct an argument from start to finish, and how to make all my points valid, and how to avoid invalid arguments, or fallacies, that is. Arguments can be good. We learn a lot more by discussing issues and claims and backing them up with arguments then we do by just spitting facts back and forth, or avoiding arguments as a whole. Fallacies are invalid arguments. I hadn’t really realized before what explicitly constituted an invalid argument, and how I may have been misled by them in the past. Now I know more about what to look,…

  • Fun

    Almost Furnished

    As I’ve gotten older I’ve taken on my Mom’s affinity for looking at home magazines, and looking past the old items at estate sales to see the home design present. All the designs I’ve seen have gotten me excited about furnishing my own home someday and since high school graduation, I’ve been collecting home items. My sister and I realized that we didn’t want to pay full price for furniture, and other items we would need, and we didn’t want to buy it all at once, so we started adding home essentials to birthday lists. We also started saving items for ourselves that my parents had replaced and were happy…

  • Philosophy,  Praxis

    Thinking in a Group – Praxis Wednesday Response

    When it comes to processing philosophy last night’s group session was helpful for me. We got the chance to talk through confusing terms, and talk about our experience with the material as a whole thus far.  I enjoyed talking through the ideas with the others. Exchanging ideas with others is helpful to me, especially since our group is so small. By starting with a mutual understanding that we all want to learn from the current module I think we avoid the perils of groupthink. I appreciate Praxis Wednesdays overall, even if I do struggle with concentrating during some of the large group ones. Now I’m looking forward to placement at my apprenticeship.…

  • Learning,  Philosophy

    Luxury Versus Necesity in Society

    The first artist came to be because society could support them. In our latest Praxis lecture, the teacher talked about how there is an economic basis for culture; because artists do not create their own means and therefore reveal a relatively sophisticated society (paraphrased, Paul A. Cantor). This lecture acknowledged that commercialization is more often than not good for the creation of art, as is capitalism. Both these force an artist to perform well to create valuable work that others are willing to sacrifice a hard-earned dollar for.  A lasting thought I had concerned Paul’s quote: “The line between artists and non-artists is increasingly blurred” (Cantor). That is, as our society…

  • Christianity,  Fun,  Uncategorized

    Senior High Ministry

    I know I just wrote about my time in junior high ministry last month but I am so excited to move on with many of the same kids and be there for them as high schoolers…at least for a little while. What’s unique about my situation is that I’ll be the only leader who hung out with all these graduating classes of kids that are current high schoolers, in middle school. From the moment I was done in senior high youth group I missed it, and then I loved junior high ministry, but coming back to senior high as a leader will be a new experience. I’ll be working with a…

  • Philosophy

    Politics, Innovation, and History

    Part of this month is looking at history and culture. A particular video I watched talks about history and timelines and what’s usually included. Inventions and sometimes the implementation of simple ideas have changed the world, but are often not prioritized as they perhaps should be. The invention of the transatlantic telegraph was monumental to society as a whole but we’re more likely to remember that World War 2 started in 1939. The invention of the internet has changed our world, communication, and economics among other things, but we’re more likely to know the names of presidents than we are to know the name of the man that started it. Not…