Welcome!

Lockdown (Day 1)  ~Dianne Hamilton

Welcome to our blog. Here, over the coming weeks/months, you will find a series of stories, photographs, moanings and insight into the lives of the Youth of The United Parish of Ballynure and Ballyclare. 

Its only Tuesday... which means that the youth have been off school for two days and already they are at a loss of what to do. Some are struggling with boredom, others with the lack of routine, many are missing friends.... and all of them just want to be able to go outside and see people. 

But we all know things are different now.... we don't know for how long. But, we do know that for our own safety we must stay home. (and wash our hands! ....Always WASH YOUR HANDS!!) 

So, now its time to get creative! I've spent the past week thinking of ideas of how we can engage with our young people now that we can no longer meet with our groups and church is closed but we cant let the youth feel alone! As a youth leader our role is always to encourage and to journey with our teens... and now its more important than ever that we do that well.... 

Therefore; 

                 we now love Zoom - this helps us to engage in bible studies online....

                 facebook groups are our friend! Here we find helpful youth work resources to 

                 engage with parents... 

                 Instagram has given us a great opportunity to share bible studies and

                 encouraging verses with Young people... 

                 and time.... time is a gift that we didn't know we needed! but now we have time

                 to call friends, do the project we always wanted to do, time to stop and take stock

                 of what's important to us.... 

....and in time i think we will come out of this re-birthed..... with new priorities, new talents and skills that we managed to learn whilst "stuck in our homes", for me personally - a deeper faith and encouraged by a town who is trying to work together to look after the elderly and vulnerable... 

Time is good! 

So now we are writing this blog to share all that we may learn, to be honest about our struggles and the challenges we face, to laugh at all the silly things we will get up to....and in time - it will be interesting to look back and see what's become important to us and what's kept us going. 

Hope you can join us on this journey! 

God Bless, 

Dianne x