Update #1

Greetings from sunny CA,

Yesterday we ate a great breakfast at the Residence Inn in El Segundo where we are staying.  A quick meeting, devotions and off to Freeways 105 and 110.  We have five minivans.  We saw hundreds of fellow Petal Pushers as we arrived at the Rose Palace.  Petal Pushers are volunteers who donate their time and talents to help spread the love of Jesus through the process of decorating floats and through the end result of the beautiful Lutheran Hour float as it will head down Colorado Blvd on Jan 1.

We decorate, not only the Lutheran Hour float, which most of you know is the ONLY Christian float in the Rose Parade, but we decorate others.  That donated time is credited to the Lutheran Hour float which helps pay for the expenses of the Lutheran float.  Pretty cool deal.. Someone had a great idea on that!!!!  This is the 60th year of proclaiming Jesus to the world by way of the Float in the Rose Parade.

Some of our group worked for hours on scaffolding putting red carnations on the Farmer’s Insurance float.  Look for it in the parade.  It is a huge float.  The majority of our group spent our time on the Alhambra, CA float.  We are working with a great crew chief who has been a crew chief for twelve years.  His assistant is his 13 year old daughter who has been involved with the decorating of floats for the last 11 years.  We cut, glued and attached thousands of silver leaves.  Another group glued thousands of gingko leaves.( that’s what I think they were) J  Many worked on scaffolding gluing a zillion J yellow button mums and copper colored mums to the float.  It is a fun time.  We worked hard for eight hours 8-3, and had a great time interacting and visiting with others who we are working with.

We enjoy seeing the zillion flowers in the flower tent.  Part of our team visited with the Home and Garden Show TV crew who were gathering information for their presentation of the floats on Jan 1.  We told them that we always promote HG TV so here it is again …………….the best coverage is always Home and Garden channel because they show all the floats.  Some of the major channels conveniently decide that it is a great time to go to commercial when the only Christian float is heading toward them down Colorado Blvd.  I have been told that RFD TV also does a great coverage.  Look for the Lutheran Hour float…..it is the 38th entry this year.

It boldly proclaims the word of God…..two tablets with the 10 commandments, 3 crosses and the ark of the covenant.

After our 8 hour shift we headed to the home of the Pastor and his wife who we will be working with on January 2 on Skid Row.  They are totally amazing people who love Jesus with all they do and say.  They cooked all day and we enjoyed an amazing meal at their home.  (More on that tomorrow)  Then we headed to the “famous” Ralph’s Grocery to get snacks for the week and to make a scene J as our group all descend on the store in matching Petal Pusher shirts.  Great witnessing opportunity because people continually ask what we are doing.  One guy asked me last night if we were a bicycle club.  Yeah right J

We left the hotel at 7 yesterday AM and returned at around 9:00 PM.  Long but great day.

I need to close for now and get ready for another great day of serving God.  It’s 5:30 AM now and heading out at 7:00 after breakfast and devotions.  Please pray for our team.

Thank you and God bless your day.  Serve the Lord with GLADNESS !!!

Ellie Menz

PS:  Had a nice visit with Pastor Settgast yesterday afternoon.  He sends his greetings to his friends in Iowa District West.  (He is now the interim Pastor for Hope Memorial in LA)