Messy Olympics

Last night at youth group we hosted our annual Messy Olympics. It is a chance for students to get messy with our silly games that we would never play otherwise, and a chance to for our small groups to dig into the messiness of life. Everything about the event and the youth group that followed was great - but it was too long! This year to maximize the daylight, our messy olympics was held before youth group - starting at 5:00 pm. It was a good strategy because it allowed students to choose to participate and then stay for youth group or avoid messy olympics and just attend youth group. I was honestly surprised that half of our students skipped the messy part and just came to youth group, until I realized that the kids who came to the whole thing were here for close to 4 hours... that's a long time on a Sunday night when you might have already been to church that morning for a few hours.

The other difference this year was an attempt to keep the chaos more controlled and have less food/mess fighting. It worked in a lot of ways: sitting at tables in the grass, having contestants from each team participate in smaller events where others could watch, a leader was assigned to each team, adding a sound system and playing some music... these were all good for our group.

Here was our schedule:

5:00 Gathering in the youth room

5:10 Break into 6 teams, decide event participants, make team flags out of edible sticky paint and poster board (this was a great opening because it got everyone a little messy. Just cornsyrup and food coloring and it's really sticky)

5:20 First Event - Whipcream Whistle (faces into pie pans filled with whipcream trying to find a whistle and make the sound - fun to watch and play)

5:25 Second Event – Mud Makers (sculpting relay with mud - very messy! we used tupper ware boxes prefilled with mud and was really fun to watch)

5:35 Third Event – Donut Dash (blindfolded contestants attempt to eat powdered donuts suspended from a string - didn't go over as well as I had hoped. I was trying to modify a game that would normally involve suspending them from the ceiling and the stick I used just wasn't as good.)

5:40 Fourth Event – Raisin Bran Mayhem (bowls of cereal trying to sort out raisins from bran wasn't too bad, but not very messy)

5:45 Fifth Event – Jello Toss (using prepackaged jello cups we had a tossing competition like a waterballoon toss. It was fun but the mess happened after a team was out and would hurl jello at other teams)

5:55 Sixth Event – Marshmallow toss (dipping marshmallows in cups of chocolate syrup and then tossing into their partners mouth - really fun, pretty messy!)

6:00 Dinner Setup

6:10 Messy Dinner (spaghetti eaten in different ways. It was just okay - some students were just tired of being messy at this point, others really wanted to get more messy so it was a weird mix)

6:30 Clean up

6:45 Gather in Youth Room (Ice breaker, Joys and Concerns, Awards)

7:00 Message (I used a video from youteach - the skit guys - about playing the cards you've been dealt. It's powerful and fit the message of the evening. Then I recapped the video by talking about Job and Niccodemus and the different ways they dealt with fear adn doubt, the different cards they had been dealt. And then I mentioned my own cards that I've been dealt - good and bad)

7:20 Small groups (we sent each small group leader with a pack of cards, scrap paper, markers and tape. The first thing each student did was identify some cards that they had been dealt in life good and bad. And as they shared and made their cards they discussed honestly how their lives were going. It was very intense. Very good conversations!)

8:05 Worship