Hello Esther!

We have a new team member! Esther came to work with us as a part of her Discipleship Training School from the YWAM Belize base. She's been helping the ministry by working in the shop and doing lots of work on Pure Parks, researching where all the parks are and dividing them up into groups, not a small feat!

She's super lovely and I'm excited to have her on board (pun intended)

Pure Parks

Back in January one of our leaders Boris headed out to YWAM'S 50th anniversary conference in Canberra. He came back with a vision. To get a bible into the hand of every skateboarder in Australia. Whilst we can't measure that, we can go after it and make a big difference. This vision has developed into Pure Parks.

There are over 2000 skateparks in Australia, 250 in Queensland alone. The aim is to visit every park and:

• Pray over the park and the people who use it; against spiritual strongholds and for God's protection and presence in that area
• Clean up the park - litter picking and sweeping
• Hang out with the locals and offer free Skater Bibles

People from the local churches to each park will also be invited to help the church and the skaters get connected. The goal is to visit every skatepark in the next 5 years which would be a bit of a stretch for us to do on our own. Therefore we're also putting together a manual to send out to facilitate groups elsewhere in the country to visit parks in their area.

There are plans for a website so that you can go online and see which parks have been visited with information and stories about what happened and a photo of the team who visited.

I'm so stoked on this vision.

What you can do

• If you are in Australia and would like to organise a Pure Parks visit to your local skatepark or indeed are outside of Australia, have a heart for skaters and are interested in coming with a team you can get in touch with me at claire@boardstore.com.au
• Pray. You don't need to be on the same continent to reach these kids!
• Donate. We want to give Skaters Bibles out for free at all these parks and we've put the estimation at 13,000 bibles. They cost $5 (£3) to buy, if you would like to buy some that would be brilliant, you can donate online via the ywamwaves by clicking here: website http://www.ywamwaves.com/payments.pay.ews (If paying online by card, please write in the reference box that the donation is for Pure Parks Bibles)

God provides as per usual

I went round to my friends Rob and Lauren's house for an Australia Day BBQ yesterday and they offered me their spare room until space becomes available at my new house! So now I'm in a bed that I could sleep sideways on! So awesome. God is awesome, they are awesome.

Lauren, Nikita and Rob

Heels on Wheels starts up again tomorrow night as long as we don't get a storm...

Happy Australia Day!

Phew it's a toasty 32 degrees today and no-one's working because it's Australia Day and on Australia Day you have to have a BBQ. It's the law. I've been back for a week now and things are going great. I'm between houses right now just waiting for a room to become available in a friend's house in Mooloolabah. It's a lovely place to live, about ten minutes closer to work than where I'm staying now so I'm looking forward to moving in. It will cost more than living in YWAM housing but the prospect of sharing a room with three other girls when I come in so late from skating wasn't really ideal and I really wanted to be in a more homely environment rather than a house that always has people coming and going. So for the next few weeks I'm staying in a friend's garage then I'll be moving to my new room with a king size bed! (Thanks Andy you're awesome!)

I had a great two months back home over Christmas, it was precious to spend so much time with my family and to reconnect with my friends and all their new babies (and bumps!). I also appreciated the opportunity to share with many people at Churches and again the support I received had a big impact on me. A massive thank you to everyone who took an interest in the work I'm doing and supported me in prayer and financially. It really does make such a huge difference to my life and it's not something I take for granted.

One Friday Ministry

I've been having good talks with Boris about my role in the ministry and have started working more at the warehouse helping with the admin side of the Boardstores. I'm excited to get stuck in. Whilst I was in the UK the guys built and opened Caloundra Boardstore. I haven't managed to get a camera down there yet but here's a taster that Kodan took on his mobile:

It's smaller than the Maroochy store and has a different almost boutiquey vibe which is cool. I like that they have different identities. Plus all the woodworking done by friends who own a kitchen factory is super steezy.

Heels on Wheels will start up again on Thursday, I'm excited to see everyone again and want to plan a few girl's trips this term so we'll have heaps to talk about.

Last Saturday Skate Church kicked off 2010 with a skate and scooter competition. Mark and his family did such a great job and loads of kids came and heard the impact of the gospel through his talk. Praise God for Skate Church! They've been doing this event for years now, are a constant presence at Coolum skate park and must have seen and talked to so many young people in that time. God is really laying hammers through this amazing family who live by faith and push hard for Him.

Other ministry

Yesterday morning Des took the lecture for the current DTS for the introduction to "Hearing God." He spoke about being wholeheated and and not being double minded and did a great job. He asked me to share with them about surrendering rights and being open to hear God speak about things that involve sacrifice. I spoke to them about being away from my family back home and about surrendering my art to God last year and how much he taught me through those things. It was good to share and I feel God taught me even more about my experiences in those areas just through recapping them. Des and I were tripping out a bit over how this time last year that was us doing our DTS and now we're standing in front of a class teaching. It's awesome to see such a clear indicator of where God has taken you in just a year and it excited me to wonder where He will have taken me a year from now.

Over Christmas I had an email from a lady from the council asking if I would run some skateboard art workshops and a competition as a part of National Youth Week in April. I'm really stoked on the idea and think it'll be great to work with the council and build relationship with them as well as meeting more kids. I'll be giving her a call tomorrow to talk about it further, if you could pray for that I'd appreciate it.

Super cool.

Thanks again everyone, please do let me know if there's anything I can pray into for you. If you feel like you would like to partner with me financially in the work I'm doing please do let me know. Like the loaves and fishes, what seems like a small thing can make a big difference.

In Him with love

Claire

Ready to Roll

The last Create2Skate session last night went so well. The kids were all stoked to take away their boards and those who wanted to ride them added grip tape and transferred their hardware over. Their parents came to pick them up and I took a minute to tell the kids that Boardstore is run and staffed by people who loves Jesus and that God loves them and gave them the option of taking away a free Skaters Bible. They were all excited to take one and alot of them exchanged email addresses and phone numbers with each other. I loved that they had made friends and that the workshops had been a chance to build more relationships. We also invited them to Skate Church in Coolum this Saturday so hopefully some will make it.

I'm so stoked on how these workshops have gone and it's made me really excited about doing it again.

Click on photos for larger views

Liam finishing off his sun rays with oil pastels

Matt's fully stencilled board - he came up with it all himself! Sick!

Mark showing the potential of Posca pens

Like father like son; Jye working on his wave

Josh and Matt making some fancy grip tape

The finished products! L-R Josh, Matt, Jye, Harrison, Jesse, Liam, Marshall and Jesse.

Awesome ay. All the glory goes to God for giving me the idea and making it a success.

Create2Skate

Hey everybody

So the Create2Skate workshops are three weeks in! There are 8 kids taking part and it's been SO GOOD! Super tiring but worth it. Mark who runs skate church has been coming every week to draw and connect with parents that come and Dave Fisher who is head of visual arts at Caloundra Christian College has been coming and showing the kids new techniques. It's been a great opportunity to chat to the kids, encourage them and invite them to skate church and our bbqs.

In the first week the kids spent time coming up with ideas using books and magazines that I brought in. In the second week they experimented with painting techniques on MDF and primed their skateboards and this week they got started on their decks.

Here are some photos:

Everything laid out ready to go on the first session

Marshall, Jesse and Liam's board designs

Liam getting into oil pastels

Jesse using Posca pens for his awesome pirate

Harrison outlining his "Chairman of the Board"

Matt helps Josh spray through some mesh

Matt creating checkers with a stencil he made

I'm so stoked on how they're doing - last week next week!

Philippines update

Hey everyone... here's some PRAISE HAMMERS! Our friends in the Philippines just sent us through photos of the new kitchen in the home for the blind that we stayed in during our trip there earlier this year. Look how big God is! And Pastor Pat did an amazing job, you are anointed!

Before:

After:

God is so good.