Life Lately at the Cottage..

Our senior, Morgan 

As the school year winds to a close we are busy here on campus with the preparations for graduating another senior. Our bright, smiling, leader, Morgan, will soon walk across the stage and complete his high school career. He is such an incredible young man who, though we can not really take much credit for, having only had him for a very short time while we have been in C6, we are so proud of. He has served on the Boys and Girls Country Leadership Council for a number of years now and most recently as their student elected president. He has taken part in Spanish Club, Choir and Color Guard at school, all while maintaining an A, B average. 

Morgan with his cottage Sponsors Trish and Pat Kelly as they celebrated his last birthday in C6 as a resident of this campus before moving to our College and Career campus. 

Morgan singing in his last Choir performance in high school. 

He has been accepted to Blinn College in Bryan-College Station where he plans to attend in the fall and he hopes to transfer to A&M after completing his first two years there. He is considering a calling into some type of medical mission work, so that is a prayer request for him as he draws in more closely over the next few years to exactly what it is that God is calling him to do. He will be moving over next weekend to our Transitional Living Program on the College and Career Campus of Boys and Girls Country where he will begin the process of preparing for college and moving into the dorms this August. He will always be a Cottage 6 boy but in this last week that he officially lives here as a resident of this campus continue to pray for him and for his brother, Marcus, who he leaves behind in the cottage. They are excited for this next phase of Morgan's life but also dealing with the emotions that go along with graduation and moving on. 

Last night was our cotillion party. The kids attend Cotillion classes once a month throughout the spring and learn things like table manners, etiquette, and how to dress for different occasions along with learning various dances like the waltz, the two step, and to salsa. It is always so much fun to see them get to practice all that they have learned at this party at the end. This year's theme was Western Wear and so they had a good time dressing up in their boots and jeans and "getting down"! It did my heart so well to see them laughing and enjoying themselves so much. At one point another teaching parent leaned over to me and remarked on how he has really seen one of our young men come back to life and smile so much more now that we are in C6. That made me feel like all the little things we do everyday really do add up to very big things in the lives of the young men we serve. 

Mean mugging but they really did have a good time! Love Erick's big smile!! 

Leo letting loose and enjoying the spotlight! 

We are so proud of our guys hard work academically. Several of them were struggling back in November when we took over the cottage and they have all brought their grades up considerably. One young man in particular who was a few grades behind had all but given up on graduation. Some of his grades were in the low twenties or even in the teens last fall. We have been blessed to see his outlook on things change greatly in the last few months. He is now more motivated to graduate and he has made a complete turn around. We are so proud to say that this last six weeks he was passing all of his classes!! With these grades he will hopefully be able to get into the high school's credit recovery program this fall and graduate next May with the rest of his peers.  I was speaking to our campus director the other day and he wants to do a piece on him in the campus newsletter possibly, because, as he put it, sometimes C's can mean more than even A's when there has been so much hard work put into achieving them. That is what BGC is all about. Our successes may not all look the same, but for these kids and what they have been through in their lives, any success can be a big success. 

These next few weeks are going to fly by with Prom, end of the year testing, and all our senior graduation activities. One of our former C3 girls is also graduating and I will be giving her speech at our on campus Senior Night where we honor those kids who are graduating. I am so excited to get to speak for her and it pleases me much that she asked me to. We are very proud of her as well. I will try to do a blog later on her this spring.

Please continue to pray for us as there are many changes happening on campus. We are excited about the future and know that God is moving forward to better and brighter things but we covet your prayers in the meantime as the changes take place. 

Pray for Morgan and all our graduating seniors. 

Pray for the rest of our boys as they try to end the academic year strong. 

Pray for one of our young men as some changes are taking place in his family life. 

Pray for the cottages on campus who are going through some staff changes and please pray for us, the remaining staff, as we fill in the gaps working extra shifts until this new training class is complete. 

God is at work here in great and mighty ways. We can feel him all around us and we are so thankful for your prayers as we journey along with Him in the work He is doing here. 

I will leave you with a few more pics of life lately in C6. 

Carlos traces Bug in sidewalk chalk as Snoopy looks on. 

Snoopy gives Bug kisses! 

Bug and one of his little neighbor friends enjoy one of the warmer days before Spring decided to become Winter again! 

Morgan and I cheesing! 

Bug using his love for vacuums to do a service project and clean in the campus clothing closet. 

Bug and Daddy-o enjoy breakfast at one of their favorite spots in Bride City. Bug got to spend some good fun time with mom and dad this last week while we came back to campus and worked the end of of a short shift. He sure does love his Neano and Daddy-o! 

Bug and Jeremiah work together to cook breakfast for the cottage.