Saturday was a first for me, which just doesn’t happen that often now at age 60. The Carroll County High School 🏫 VB team competed in an event called a Jamboree down at Patrick Henry – Glade Springs HS.

The average Family 👪 departure time from Carroll County would be in the ballpark of 7:15 am and my best guess for getting all the way home 🏡 would be after 9pm. One would have to assume that each family would have made one stop on the way back for food.

Fourteen or Fifteen hours spent together and while it would be easy to spend this time filling this Post 📫 with Stats on the day I would rather focus on the day itself. The team finished the event with a 2-2 mark and Aza Petty had herself a day on the court but let’s talk about the group effort it took for the day to be accomplished.

It’s also worth noting that the Junior Varsity team was back in Hillsville handling Fund Raising duties parking cars 🚗 at the Labor Day festivities in town. Holiday weekend commitment there !!

Next group to salute – the Varsity VB players. They rode 75 miles up and over and took the Court for the first time shortly before 10:00am. The last point was scored at 6:13 pm and I only know the exact time because Marion Harris was keeping me posted after I had to head back to work shortly after 4pm. I hadn’t seen that level of play, wait, play and wait since sitting in the Salem Civic Center for the State Wrestling Tournament.

The matches were shortened to Best 2 out of 3 instead of 3 out of 5. Our Ladies played 4 matches which totalled 8 full games and 2 games up to 15. Kudos to each one of the players for their efforts 👏 on the long, long day.

This picture 📷 was taken from above by Marion Harris during one of the lengthy breaks between matches. I will not pretend that I know the game but it was very obvious that the team was having fun while playing it.

The next group that deserves to be recognized for their efforts 👏 is the Parents !!! Let’s start out by blocking off the entire day for Volleyball and traveling between 120 – 160 miles depending on where 🤔 one lives in the County. The next thing the group did was combine to purchase and the set-up the food table for our Ladies after the second Match. The entire process just flowed and even included a heart ❤ felt rendition of Happy Birthday 🎂 sung to one of the Mothers 👩. It was both appreciated and embarrassing for the young lady. I only know this because I had to ask her afterwards.

The parents were even good natured in the warm-up periods when the occasional Volleyball 🏐 would come flying at their heads.

The demeanor of this group is why I wanted the Mothers 👩 to get to be standing next to their daughters on the floor opening night. I don’t know how true it is from Sport to Sport but its safe to say that after a year plus with this group that Volleyball is very much a Family Affair.

If Volleyball 🏐 is a Family 👪 then that makes Coach Edwards the Mother. Maybe plug Coach Petty as the energetic Uncle but one things for sure – the Family 👪 Business is in a Great Place all together and it sure worked on a long, long Saturday in Glade Springs. I feel honored to get to assist in the journey and I am already looking forward to trying to amp up the Gymnasium on Tuesday night 🌙.

Saturday Volleyball 🏐

Sunday Afternoon – App State Field Hockey 🏑

We will pick-up the coverage shortly ..

Between match Entertainment !

App State 1, Davidson 0 (F)

Ashton shared your thoughts in two parts:

God has been telling me to share this, so I wanted to share it with everyone. Yesterday I had the opportunity to share a little bit about my experience in Peru. Ron had prepared each of us one question that differed from everyone else’s. My question was, “Tell us about one experience that really impacted you the most-tell us why it impacted you so much?” As I shared with the church in the video below, I already had planned out what I was going to say, which was about the first two experiences I had when evangelizing; however, during worship God was speaking to me and said “plant a seed.” I knew God was telling me to change what I had prepared and to trust in him, so that is what I decided to do. After the first day in Peru, we had a recap and all the different groups shared their favorite part of the day. We were split into groups of 3 and my group had 4. For example, in my group it was Cody, Julie, Linda, and myself. Almost every group shared that they had led someone in a salvation prayer, but I knew our group hadn’t and thought it was odd. The second day, we did the same thing. We had a recap of our day and shared some experiences we enjoyed the most. Some shared experiences while evangelizing, but some said the event we had with the kids. After the recap, I was talking to some of the people who weren’t in my group and realized that our group was the only group who hadn’t yet said the salvation prayer. I was so confused why our group didn’t get to do that yet because I felt so ready to be able to help someone do that. Although I was confused, I knew God had a plan and I should just lean into that and trust him. A couple days later, we traveled from Jicamara to Iquitos. Us girls, Katie, Dianna, Veronica, Christin, Linda, and myself were able to do a little devotion with the girls who stayed with Donna in the jungle and I was able to share my testimony. The girls didn’t really say much at all, if anything it was dead silent for a while. One of the adults who helps do ministry with Donna shared a little more in depth of her thoughts and some things from my story that God can use to teach people who I share it with. This was yet another moment God was trying to teach me to simply plant a seed, I just didn’t realize it at the moment. I was asked to do a devotional for our team the following day, so after the talk with the girls I was asking God to help me prepare a message that we all needed to hear, which led me to Esther. The verses I had were Esther 4:14, John 15:16, and Ephesians 2:10. Basically in all these verses and the devotion, it was saying that we were created, chosen, and appointed to do good works for God. We were put here at this specific moment to do the specific thing God is asking us to do. For me, I now see God was telling me that he placed me where he did to plant seeds and that is okay. Now that I’m back, God has been pounding that onto me recently, it’s my job to go and tell and allow God to do the rest. This morning I was reading in 1 Corinthians 3:5-9, which says “What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.” I know that I have to occupy my God-given space which is planting seeds, not saving them because only God can do that. The person who plants a seed is just as important as the one who waters it. The body of Christ is different and called to perform a variety of tasks because we need eachother. A hand needs the foot just as much as the eye and the ear. We all have gifts God plans to use, so if you are the “foot” of the body of Christ know that you are just as important as the “hand.”

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Part 2 :

Last month I had the most amazing opportunity to go to Peru on a missions trip. Before going, I thought I knew what to expect, I thought I knew what poverty was, I thought I understood what it meant to be hungry, or to not have, but I was so wrong. No one can ever truly understand all of these things and more until they experience it for themselves. People who use anything they can find to make shelter for themselves and their families. Items we would consider trash can be treasures to them. It is so humbling to see it and to see how much even the poorest of people have in America. When you see with your own eyes the poverty, yes, but the humility, the kindness, and the welcomeness these individuals have all while having not much at all is astonishing. I saw so many things for the 10 days I was there, but one thing that stuck out to me was how hard these people work, how much they care, and their extreme generosity and kindness all while having nothing at all. They make the most of nothing, yet so many times we have everything and do nothing with it. When you get to “live” like this for a little over a week, we think we know how it feels, yet we still don’t. These people go without basic needs every single day and are still some of the kindest and happiest people you will ever meet. They are the definition of working paycheck to paycheck. They work daily just to make enough money to buy food for their families and so many people struggle to even do that. It blows my mind how incredibly blessed I am. I have so much compared to these Peruvians; I don’t worry about where my next meal is coming from, I don’t worry about not having water to drink or to shower with, I don’t worry about having clothes to wear, or a roof over my head. I look at my life and think of how ungrateful I am when it comes to the simplest and unsubstantial things. Most importantly, I was able to share the gospel, I was able to pray over people whom God placed in our path for a purpose. I was able to share my testimony with girls from ages 8-16 and plant a seed with them. I was able to do funny skits for the kids to share a simple Bible story. I was able to talk to the full term missionaries and see the struggles they have daily. I went to Peru to share the gospel, teaching people about Christ, and help those who are in desperate need, yet I found myself learning from them in so many ways. When we were in the jungle, it was super wet and muddy and it began to pack onto our shoes and feet, making our feet weigh several pounds more. One lady invited us into her home, so we could wash our feet. Wow. A lady who could later not have much water at all offered it to us, to wash our feet. How amazing that is. She was so so generous and caring. This is one of the many experiences where I saw and learned from them and their actions. God was working in so many ways while we were there, ways we may never even know. Our goal was to go and tell and we were able to plant those seeds and now allow God to do the rest. This was an experience I am so incredibly thankful for, I am so thankful for the experience and the lessons I learned while being there and while reflecting the experience. I ask you to help me pray for the missionaries in Peru, the lost souls, and the ones who have found Christ-they need our prayers so much more than you think they do.

We are so very grateful 🙏 for having this impressive Young Lady 👩 representing our Community of Laurel Fork. She makes all of us out here very, very proud !

Greetings from Patrick Henry – Glade Springs!

The 9am matches are in the Books and we are ready for the first of three Pool games! Twin Springs Lady Titans are our first opponents

10:03 – Underway

TO after Cavs open a 6-0 lead!

Cavs10-4. 18-4 with Callie on a service run with Alyssa with some Big League Kills.

22-7, 25-8 win (10:18)

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Game 2 –

Cavs up 10-7, 15-7, 20-9, 25-11 (10:34)

Match #1 is in the Books 📚! Cavs Win !!

Nice crowd here for CCHS but we knew that would be the case.

The Harris family 👪

Holding Court !

#Family

Warning ⚠️ up for 2nd Match now….

The next match should start right at 11am then the Ladies will sit out 2 rounds.

10:55 – Match #2 is underway versus George Wythe High

Cavs5-4, 7-4, 10-4, 13-4, 14-4 and the Maroons call TO. – Alderman with the service run.

15-4 after trailing 4-2…. 18-6, 20-7, 22-7, 24-8

Madison with the Kill to finish off the 25-8 win.

Cavs closed on a 23-4 run (11:11am)

11:15 – Start Next Game……

Cavs up 4-2, 8-2, 9-4…

Laiken with an Ace for 11-4

Sarah makes it 13-5 with another Ace!

TO GW

15-7 Cavs

18-9, 19-11, Coach Edwards calls 📞 a TO, lead down to 19-15….20-16, 20-18, 21-18, 21-19

Lead now 21-20, 22-20, 22-21, 23-21, 23-22,

Madison’s kill and Alyssa’s winner make it 25-22 at 11:37 am.

We will be on a break for a couple of hours after starting out 2-0.

Northwood and CCHS are now both 2-0 and will face each other shortly.

1:25 – GW completes sweep of Twin Springs so our Ladies are back warming up !

1:38 – Game On !

Cavs5-1 early momentum

Panthers 6-5, 9-9, Panthers 12-10

Carroll T.O. – down 14-11, down 18-14

Carroll T0 – down 21-14

Northwood takes Game #1 – 25/14 (1:57)

GAME #2 – Cavs 7-5

Cavs 14-11

CCHS TO, up 16-15, 18-18, 20-20

CCHS TO – down 22-20, UP 23-22, 24-22

Northwood TO…..

CAVS Win 25-22 after scoring the final five points with Alyssa serving and Callie with an aggressive winner from back line. (2:24) Aza is playing at a High Level

Match #3, Set #3:

Cavs go from 2-4 to 6-4 and Northwood call a TO

Cavs10-9…..TO Cavs, down 12-10

TO – Cavs down 14-12

Northwood takes Game #3 – 15/12 (2:41)

Pool Play is now complete – Pool B results:

Northwood 3-0

CCHS 2-1

George Wythe 1-2

Twin Springs 0-3

Once Pool A is complete the 8 teams will be seated for the next round!

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Marion has sent in a batch of photos 📷

We are awaiting our Seeding for the Semi-finals

Finishing 2-1 will put Carroll County in the 5pm bracket as either a #3 seed or a #4 seed.

#3 Seed vs #2 Northwood

Time to head back to Northern Virginia now but Marion will take us the rest of the way !

Semi-finals :

CCHS 26, Northwood 24

Northwood 27, CCHS 25

Northwood 15, CCHS 9

Plenty more to come on the day long experience once the Final Overnight shift up here is complete. Thanks to Marion for the Updates during the final match. Hopefully everyone 🙏 made it home 🏡 safely.