"I was at the end of my rope with my son when I heard about the parent's workshop," said Victoria, a sweet woman from church. She originally wanted us to talk with her son, but as we chatted over tea she realized that what she needed was to put her foot down when her teenage son talked back, mocked and criticized her.
 

We walked her through a "family contract" she could draw up with her son and she was pleased she could explain to him that it was a homework assignment for the parenting workshop. And we were pleased to see some fruit from the hours we had invested in these workshops.

When we were first asked to teach a six week series for parents we were both pleased, because we know the primary importance of parents in the spiritual growth of their kids, and apprehensive, because we are gringos who don't have kids… we didn't want everything we taught to be pure theory.
         

The attendance surprised us - between 30 and 50 people weekly - as did the amount of prep time it took... A LOT. We don't usually accept projects unless they have to do directly with training youth leaders, but since this parenting series supports the youth ministry of our local church and since Victoria's son is one of the volunteer youth leaders, our conversation with her helped us feel like our effort was worthwhile and right in line with our goals.

For those of you keeping up with our big long-term project - the 20 class, online, foundations of youth ministry course and 500 page accompanying textbook - we finished the 14th class by our deadline in July. Annette worked like a New Orleans street sweeper after Mardi Gras to get it done on time, but being able to present the classes at an important youth workers conference in Peru in July made it feel worth the effort.

Our next "milestone" is to finish the entire course - all 20 classes plus new & improved textbook. We are shooting for late-April 2005. Thanks for your all your prayers and support toward this project.