Our get-together would not have been complete without a photo shoot, and thankfully Charise was very patient with us! :)
Jess & Laura
So, there was this Christmas tree sitting on the table, and someone (I'm not sure who, but it was probably Julie!) got the idea of putting it on top of Christa's head (I guess as a crown since she was getting married the next day?), and we all took a picture looking at it like it was so cool. When I looked at the picture, the flash had reflected in the mirror, which made the tree look like it was glowing at the top and totally added to the silliness of the photo! So, if you're wondering what this one is about, just chalk it up to some giddy girls who just drank highly caffeinated beverages! ;)
Another silly one
And here we are with Charise!(left to right: me, Julie, Christa, Charity, Jess, Charise, Laura)
When I look back on life (the 24 years I've lived so far, anyway), I marvel at how God used certain things to mold me into the person I am. The VoP are one of those things I marvel at. When I was 16, our old pastor and his family moved away and the Schofields began coming to our church. Pastor Schofield interim-pastored for about 6 months before we took him on as our full-time pastor. Christa and Charity were our age, and we tried desperately hard to befriend them. However, they weren't really very excited about moving to Granada and were not very interested in making friends with anyone! One Sunday after church, my sisters and I and our friend Laura were in the auditorium talking to Christa and Charity (this group would later become the VoP). It was another one of those 'stiff' conversations, and I was starting to wonder if we were ever going to be able to break the ice with those Schofield girls! Then, Christa suddenly broke the ice for us! She was standing between two pews, and thought she would lift herself up onto the back of the one and sit on it...but she fell backwards over the pew! We all started laughing so hard! That laughing session opened the door for many many more good times. We soon discovered that we had a common interest: music. We began doing a little singing together, and by the time of Pastor Schofield's 'installation service,' we were comfortable enough to do our first really hard song, an arrangement of "Come Thou Fount." After that, we sang all the time until we earned ourselves a name: the Voices of Praise, which we have since shortened to the 'VoP.' Our arrangements became more complicated as we became more creative and our ears became more trained. We mostly sang in 3- or 4- parts, but sometimes pulled off some 5- or 6- part sections. We were constantly adding more and more music to our repertoire and it was all memorized. We did nursing home services, chapels at Christian schools, banquets, special services at our own church, and even recorded for the local Christian television program. How did we find the time to do all this music? Slumber parties!!! :D Most of our music prep and memorization happened between 10pm and 3am! Those girls became my closest friends, and I love them all like sisters. Now the years have gone by, half of us are married, one is a mommy, one is engaged, two are in college. Our times together are few and far between, but our friendship will be treasured forever. I am thankful for the way God shaped my values and goals through the close godly friendship I shared with those girls. I pray for each of them every day that they would know the love of God in a personal way and bring glory to Him in their daily lives.
2 comments:
Nice post Jenn! So many fond memories with such good friends. Love you!
really sweet post! you girls are so cute and its so fun to think of the many years you guys have been friends! God is so good.
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