The moment you've all been waiting for...

This summer, the band has had nothing less than a junior high crush on Steven Curtis Chapman's hit single from the 90's entitled "The Great Adventure." It all started when our fearless leader, Jordan Frye, serenaded us with the magical melody encompassed in the chorus of this life changing tune. 

We decided to honor Mr. Chapman with the hard work and dedication that went into making this music video. I hope you feel the same emotional impact during this film that we felt when "The Great Adventure" first graced our ears. 

 

"wake up, wake up, come on let's go!"

So this week I am a counselor for 9 junior highers and they are seriously one of the talkative/diverse/sleep deprived group of boys I've seen. The cabin I have are the kids that either don't have a youth pastor or just don't have enough male counselors from their church here. To sum it up... on the first night with them, most of them went to bed around 1:30am but for some reason they felt the urge to wake up at 3am and leave the cabin. I rounded them up and slept from 4-5:30am because they all woke up at 5:30. Either I'm getting old and need more sleep or they are insanely able to sleep only three hours a night and still retain energy throughout the day. Regardless, these guys are really fun and I'm excited to see what happens this week. 

Last night we played this game... (correction), we fought in a battle. They pretty much gave everyone pool noodles, nerf rockets, and dodge balls to beat the heck out of each other for an hour straight. It was a counselor's dream come true. hehe.

Sometimes you just "got to go!" (if you know what i mean). We had to make a bathroom stop at this gas station and according to Lindsay, it was the worst she's ever seen. This Chevron = Sketchy to the MAX

On Sunday night (a.k.a. our last night of freedom before we get our counselor game face on, we all went out to Red Robbin. As I am at the opposite end of the table from Jordan, the waitress comes over to me and a few others and quietly whispers, "we'll bring out the desert for the birthday boy at the end of table as soon as we can gather all of the waiters for a birthday song." Meanwhile, I had no idea our table planned such a witty scheme on our epic leader Jordan Lawrence Frye. He was embarrassed/stoked that we just scored a free Chocolate Sunday. 

This is Buffy. She slept with me on sunday night. Think Mr. Bigglesworth/Clydesdale horse haircut. 

Mark and I taking artsy pictures. 

Keep it real amigos. I have some videos on the way. 

Get excited. Stay tuned.

gare

The Road

Howdy friends...

I thought I'd share some pictures with you of what the road has looked like for us the last few weeks. Today it was 114 degrees when we played at a church outside of Phoenix. Welcome to the desert Transparent. 

Time for a haircut

So last night, Shelby gave Jordan a LONG awaited hair cut. Here are some shots of last nights event: 

Before::

          

After::

Highs, Lows, and Viva La Vida.

Wow... what a crazy week. I will do my best attempt to update ya'll on what has been going on this past week at Camp Pinerock, with Transparent, and what's been on my mind. 

Camp Pinerock has been a really cool camp for a few reasons.

1) it's located in Prescott, Arizona, which is this awesome little town an hour and a half north of Phoenix with a super tight nit community and downtown with a courthouse in the middle like in Back to the Future. 

2) the director and staff work really hard to make the best camp experience possible

3) they are real about their faith and not ashamed of the gospel 

4) they plan rad activities like service projects and solid theological seminars 

5) they use the power of prayer to work in the hearts of everyone at camp

6) they have a sweet snack shack that we got to work in. just think... rad 70's dinner and that's what it looked like. 

The band has had such a blast singing with the high schoolers this week! They sing louder than any camp I've been to.  As a family/band/group of college students, we have come closer together this week than ever before. We faced certain trials and conflicts outside of our band this week that we haven't experienced before. I won't go in depth about them but I will say that I find it ironic sometimes when I read something in the Bible that applies to my life so perfectly. I guess what I am trying to say is that I've been reading James lately and in chapter 1 verse 2 it says, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trails of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." I think that in such a time such as this when we as a band are fighting spiritual warfare at its finest, I would stubble upon this chapter that gives hope to those who face trails in the lives we live everyday.

 

Coming into this summer, I hoped that I would grow in my understanding of what worship looks like and how we can bring honest worship to our Father. Throughout this week, my faith has really been challenged.  With the thoughts I've wrestled with and conversations I had with this week, despite times when our faith might be challenged and our beliefs might be weak, I've come to realization that at the end of the day I can tell myself that I believe in a God who loves us more than we can ever fathom and that one day... we can spend eternity with Him. I say all of this because my mind has been spinning of these things and more this week than ever and I want this blog to be a place that I can share of what's going on this summer in every capacity. 

Ok, let's lighten the mood a bit shall we? 

Who bought Coldplay's new cd Viva La Vida?? 

If you did, I want to hear what you think. I've had it for a few weeks now and we listen to it more than we breath and I've come to LOVE it. I think it is my favorite album by them but I'm not ready to make it official. For Coldplay being my favorite band, I am very satisfied in this one. So, friends... if you don't have a copy, go purchase it and support them.

Yesterday I was sitting in the chapel after the morning service and a baby bat managed to find his way on the stage and he didn't like the idea of us being up there either. You'll see what I mean... haha.

I have a some more pictures that I still need to show you but that will come at another time. For now, I'm going to bed but thanks for reading friends. 

Lastly, our Transparent Myspace looks pretty pimped out now. Take a look and listen to some garageband recorded tunes!

www.myspace.com/transparentsmt

Here's the good ol' camp picture!

 

xoxo,

garrett

Camp del Dos!

Hey! 

We arrived here in Kingman, Arizona around 12:30am tonight after a 9 hour, 600 mile drive from central california. What a week it has been though. I feel like the kids had an awesome experience gaging off of some of the responses that they shared at the closing bomfire last night. Jordan and I played some worship songs and the kids talked about some pretty heavy ways that God impacted them this past week. It was super cool to see them change as the week went on. 

I had the fun role of being the guy in charge of the lake games. I had kids belly flopping as hard as they could off the dock to score extra points for their team. It was hilarious! The first night, Mark, Jordan, and Justin and I went out for a night security check to make sure everyone was safe and in their cabins. In stead of Mark and I thoroughly checking EVERY cabin, we would scare the kids instead. We saw two boys walking to the bathrooms so we hid behind a tree and chucked pine cones near them... they freaked out and ran off thinking it was a bear, haha. Their are plenty more stories to share but they'd take far too long. 

If you've been praying for our group, Thank you! God really worked in the lives of junior highers this week and it was awesome to stand behind a sound board and watch God's children surrender their lives in worship to a King that is so worthy of our praise. 

We are driving 4 hours to Prescott, AZ tomorrow for our next camp of High Schoolers. It's going to be one hot week my friends! Hope all is well... here are some pictures. :)

Burger stop in old fashion Springville, Ca. 

This is one of the night time chapels that was really powerful

Jordan driving the bus down the mountain this afternoon. 

Once again, It's kinda late so I'm going to hit the hay. 

love,

Garrett

First Camp

Hey friends, I'm about to leave for the Sierra's for our first camp called Quaker Meadow. I'm pretty stoked for this one. I grew up going to this camp so it will definitely bring back some cool memories. In fact... here's one of me at QM from sophomore year... haha

We've been staying at people's houses from local churches here in Bakersfield and we've met some of the must supportive families out here. Here's a picture of us after playing at First Church here in good ol' Bakersfield: 

Alright, I'll be back on here on next weekend and probably be in Arizona then. 

See ya!

-G

The Great Adventure

I was never really a fan of Steven Curtis Chapman but way back in the '90s, he wrote a song entitled "The Great Adventure." As cheesy as this song is, our band has fully embraced it. In fact, today marked the day that Transparent would depart from Point Loma Nazarene University and finally see the rubble meet the road after 2 1/2 weeks of training and practice. So, as we were driving away... I managed to grab The Great Adventure off of iTunes since it is a must for the road as we embark on a pretty fun journey. 

check out how incredibly cheesy this video is while paying close attention to its greatness...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrrjbTc0urk 

It's been quite a long day. Jordan and I finally have our Class B licenses and are owning that fact that we can drive a bus. Speaking of buses, our's pretty rad looking. That's all I have to say about that. The last few days have been filled with Frozen Yogurt runs, shopping for attire that is acceptable according to old ladies on a sunday morning at church services in nowhereville, and preparing mentally when on the road and spiritually when discipling junior highers and high schoolers that, to be completely honest, aren't much younger than me. That will be a fun challenge. hint, hint... if you pray, that would be a huge pray request that I God could use me even though I feel young. 

On to a lighter subject, tonight we ate "the best BBQ restaurant" in San Diego called Phil's BBQ. Yes, you can quote me on that. 

We drove from SD to some hotel near Six Flags Magic Mountain. Tomorrow we're off the Beautiful Bakersfield. Yeah! We're really excited though for our first stop on the road. Here are some pictures of my week: 

First Church in San Diego. 

Last sunday night, I drove to Pasadena to surprise my girlfriend when she came home from Thailand and I took this picture on the way up. There is no better drive than the 5 freeway my friends.

This was taken before our commissioning service on tuesday night in the rec room at loma. 

It's late and I'm tired but hope you're all well. Thanks for reading! 

Garrett

xoxo