one of our incredible volunteers, jeff, has been spending his saturdays volunteering at lily of the valley orphanages in tijuana, mexico. three weeks ago he had the chance to meet with a local city offical and the head of the orphanage. they were talking about how much they wanted to convert an empty lot next to the orphanage into a community center soccer field. many of the kids play on the empty lot and the field would mean so much for the orphanage and kids!

jeff came back to san diego and told nate, his connect group leader, how the orphanage needed $10,000 to develop the field and how cool it would be to help!

they came up with a stroke of genius...they went to their connect group and asked them to go through things they had in their houses that they no longer used so they could sell them on ebay and craigslist. all the proceeds go towards the goal! everyone got excited and on board donating climbing gear, playground equipment, bikes, surfboards, golf clubs, clothes and washers/dryers and to date they've raised $4000!

nate said, "its been amazing to see god take a simple idea and multiply our efforts. we hope to meet our goal over the next sixty days and present the orphange with a check!"

here's a shot of the group: adam, brad, jeff, rebecca, dr terry, nick, dr brian, nate and pete (not available for photo is yvette, matt, angela, jason, nick, michael, eric, tara, josh and effi.)

you guys rock!

well the magical date for the petersons is june 9! charlize or "little charlie" as she's already affectionately called is kicking and moving around and seems to always be craving twix bars...especially on sunday mornings :)

ps jurgen and leanne are due in august and they find out the gender of their baby on tuesday!!! (you can take a guess below!)

ps leanne and ps summer, you're both ridiculously good looking...

what you see from the worship and creative arts team on sundays is the result of heaps of hard work + fun at rehearsals on monday nights. a typical rehearsal is a mini worship set, then some prayer for the team and church, a quick word from ps andrew and then we get to rocking! the detonate band splits off to rehearse for thursdays, the singers go do singer stuff and the sunday band rocks the sunday tunes.

pedroton tuning up

josiah the groove machine and paul fixing a pedal with his teeth??

brad and ben

elle writing some charts

the beautiful detonate worship leader...faith

it gets LOUD in there. this is justin concentrating on finding his part.

two oranges...

thomas giglio aka 'grem'

**bonus feature** this is a quick clip shot in july 2005...a month before we launched ccc. our first rehearsal venue was 'prestige motors' in little italy. we would back the cars out and set up our p.a. system in the garage. special kudos to the original team members who are still here two-and-a-half years later...yvette, patrick and ben! you guys rock!

thanks to san diego christian worship center for the rehearsal venue...its a huge step up from a car garage :) we love you guys!

on thursday nights the coolest kids in san diego come out to rock at detonate…the 11-18’s at christian city church...here's a few shots of the fun.

andrea, kate, roger and aaron in clash of the clans

chiddick and lou-breeziana aka ‘briana’ lead detonate!

roger, brant and brandon about to sock wrestle...

anthony (hot dog)

food games are the BEST!!

some of the junior highers...ashley, dustin, kyle and alex

call us crazy but we had a ccc skydiving day. about 50 of us met down at the beautiful otay lakes just south of san diego to take the plunge...
it was INSANELY FUN!!!

here's scott, rob, michelle and stacy excited and ready to go...

she may look like malibu barbie, but she's got guts of steel...here's pastor leanne

thanks to jeff bram, billy and all the other rockers at skydive san diego for keeping us safe up there!

every month audrey goes through sweat, tears and agony as she is forced to pick just one of the 250 insanely amazing volunteers we have at christian city church for the 'extra mile' award.

this month went to alissa!!!

so here is a quick look into a few random facts + cool stuff about the amazing-incredibly lovable-extra mile-radtastic-wehopesheneverleaves-superstar-alissa...

so alissa, you just won the prize...how are you feeling? hmm...i feel so special, very honored. i absolutely love ccc and have grown so much since i have been involved. i love serving with some of the most amazing people on the planet!

what was your first job? i was a "courtesy clerk" aka "bagger" at a local grocery store named ukrops's in good ole virginia

what was your childhood ambition? i wanted at the very early age of 6 to be an amazing ballerina/dancer.

if you were an animal what type would you be and why? a giraffe because everday i wake up and dream about being tall.

what was your proudest moment? when I moved out to san diego last summer for the second time and truly found a home out here.

if you had a job at a circus, what would it be? trapezist

which ccc teams are you in? ccc kidz, best team ever :) and detonate

how far ahead have you planned your life? i have general things that I will love to see happen in the next five years, but my life is constantly changing so i am learning to go with the flow.

emo or girly? emo, it is a process for me to be girly

what would you like to say to all the other people who would love to be you right now? that you can be.

so from all of us here at ccc, we love you alissa! you rock!

our very own ps natalie got married to the incredible dave williams! it was a fairy tale story...natalie moved over from perth, australia in 2006 to take on the job of kids pastor here at christian city church. dave started coming to ccc shortly after. on valentines day 2007 they hooked up and have been together ever since! the wedding was magical...it was like a page out of vogue magazine. once again, nate from the image is found worked his photographic charm and captured these incredible moments...

happy v-day everyone!!

we know its february but here are some shots from our chrissie bash (thats australian for christmas :). it was a great night...the kids were so cute in their costumes and the dancers flippin rocked!!!
(for extra fun, watch this video of tina and the dancers...)

the ccc boys had a big night out last night playing LASER TAG!!! after lots of pizza, the war was on. a fierce rivalry broke out between the four teams...the detonate team, the hillcrest hammers, the subluxators and the twelve disciples.

after a few rounds of laser tag the twelve disciples started playing the jowling game...you loosen up all your face muscles and then fling your head around and make the most ridiculous faces.

girls, you should be glad you weren't there :)