Learning party

The last couple of days have been a learning party.
Yesterday there was a meet and greet where we learned a bit about the evening speakers. Then we all packed into cars and drove to the Salvation Army Citadel for the evening event.
There was music and speakers and it was well done.

Today was the learning party.
We started the day at 8am with breakfast. I had the eggs which were good and the potatoes which were ok.
9am was a liturgical prayer with some music.
9:30 was a set of 3 speakers (10 minutes each):
Elle talking about doing new things with church (thus the point of the learning party)
Jeremy talked about a new church in Brockville with a culture of eating together and celebrating together: https://www.wearereunion.com/
Kevin talked about Morningstar mission that feeds the Napanee community (focus on homeless)
Then we walked the Rustle neighbourhood with the intention of having the neighbourhood speak to us. There is a lot of industrial bleakness in the neighbourhood. There were some benches by the homeless shelter that look out onto a lovely view of an industrial parking lot. My group went down Duff. St. which has a dead end at a giant rock wall. I saw the beauty in the rock wall. One of my co-walkers only saw the negative, so it was interesting to see the contrast.
Then we had lunch (chicken stew) and lots of donuts. I don't know where all the donuts came from but there were a lot.
After lunch we had another set of 3 speakers:
Monica speaking on working with people with developmental disabilities
Steven about a ministry for students and how to be intentional about growth (huddles method)
Andrew about the Joyful project that sells clothing made by women who have been freed from trafficking. They also give away socks to homeless. https://www.thejoyfulproject.com/ 
Then we had some discussion
Then 3 more speakers:
Travis who has a group of people who take all the leftovers from Costco food(thousands of dollars of dollars of merchandise and distribute them all over Kingston to different services that feed people) He also runs the Embassy which is a clean music night.
Brandon talked about intentional design
and Carla talked about innovation and renovating spaces http://www.edge-ucc.ca/
So there was a lot of information but all designed for inspiration.