Thanksgiving before Christmas

So I am definitely a "let's celebrate Thanksgiving before we get to Christmas" kind of girl. We had a fantastic Thanksgiving that I want to remember here. As we are doing SO MANY fun things for Christmas right now that I want to post, I thought I should first document Thanksgiving. Clearly, I neglected the blog the whole month of November :)

Ben and I traveled to New Orleans to spend the whole week of Thanksgiving with my family. It was nice because we had not seen any of them since Christmas, almost a year. I miss my family, especially my two sweet nieces who are getting too old, too quick! I think I was there for all of 30 seconds when they suckered me into to jumping on the trampoline. Life where I grew up is so different from our lives right now. Not better or worse, just completely different. So it was nice to be in wide open spaces, in a house with no internet, a yard full of trees and a kitchen full of cajun food....all with my crazy family! Here are some pictures along the way...

*After Thanksgiving, we let them open presents since we wouldn't see them for Christmas

I didn't manage to get any pictures but I also got to spend time with one of my oldest childhood friends and meet her precious baby boy. Ben and I were spoiled when some of best friends drove several hours in the rain to have dinner with us :) A week well spent with those we love.

We have SO SO much to be thankful for. We have experienced SO much this year and people in our lives have been so generous with us. We are grateful for the lives we are living and for everyone who plays a part in them. Thank you!

Now bring on Christmas!!!

Chicken that will change your life...

I LOVE to cook. I really do. It's a stress reliever for me. There is just something about making a mess in the kitchen that makes me really happy.

I rarely blog recipes - mostly because I feel like my cooking is pretty ordinary. However, I came upon this chicken recipe on Pinterest and I had to share. It has changed our lives... maybe it can change yours too :) It's good, super easy and makes meals for days!

Step #1 - Mix 1 bottle of BBQ sauce, 1TBS of garlic powder & 1 TBS of crushed red pepper

Step #2 - Put frozen (yes frozen) chicken in the crockpot. Three or Four pieces

Step #3 - Pour BBQ mixture over chicken and turn on low for 5 hours

Step #4 - It's cooked :) - You can stop here and serve with sides OR .....

Step #5 - Shred the chicken with a knife and fork

Step #6 - Makes 8 BBQ Chicken Sandwiches :)

**This is the part that changed our lives. Ben was tired of taking turkey sandwiches to work. I made these bags and put them in the fridge. Every morning for a week, we grab a bag of chicken and a bun and just heat it up at work. One of the main reasons we eat out is because we don't make time to make lunch. Now, I make this on a Sunday night and we have lunch for the entire week!!! *It freezes well also :)

Baptism

Recently, Epic held it's 3rd Baptism celebration! It was so much fun as 4 more people from our community of faith decided to be baptized.

A couple from our Epic Group were baptized that night. There is something special about seeing a husband and wife follow God together in this way. I was overjoyed to witness this defining moment with them!

Tour The 543 :)

Ben Pilgreen made this video recently of our new facility! Click on the link below to check it out.

http://www.vimeo.com/30047806

Lindsey :)

Camping Adventures :)

Recently, Ben and I kept all three of the Pilgreen boys overnight. Ben P. and Shauna were at a wedding in Sonoma for a couple from Epic. Ben performed the ceremony.

We decided to make their stay an adventure!

It was just me and Asher on Friday while Elijah and Sam were at school. We spent the morning playing baseball and reading books. I got a call from a friend who I needed to meet up with to pick up some tickets. She works at AT&T park and said we could stop by. While we were there, she gave us a private tour of the ballpark! Asher is a HUGE Giants fan so it was a ton of fun :)

*This is us down by the field behind home plate

*Asher got to see the World Series ring up close & we left with a TON of treats

It was SUCH a fun start to the day!! We headed to pick the boys up from school. It was a sunny day so we decided to go swimming for a little bit. Sun can be rare at times so I thought we would take advantage of it.

After swimming the big adventure of the weekend began - CAMPING!! ....well sort of :) We thought it would be fun to "camp" out on our patio for the night. Shauna rented a tent and I got stuff to make s'mores . Putting up the tent was tougher than it looks. And yes...that is an air mattress you see. Me, Asher and Sam started out in the tent watching movies and playing games. At 9:30, Asher asked if we could go inside so we did. Ben and Elijah came out and stayed the night in the tent with Sam. **Funny story - I didn't want to sleep with the patio door unlocked so I locked the door and told Ben to call me if they needed anything. At 5:30am, Ben texted because they needed to use the restroom. After that they decided to stay in! It was such a fun time and an adventure for sure :)

Ben turns 30!!!!

So in the midst of all the crazy business of moving Epic into the 543 Ben turned 30!! On August 17th was Ben's official birthday but don't worry we started celebrating long before then :) Here is just a glimpse of all the ways we celebrated his 30 years of life...

*Kicked off the party on July 16th when we set sail to the Caribbean with our best friends (this will get a full post when I get all the pictures together)

*Chris and Caryn had us and the Milners over to celebrate and play settlers - homemade cake and ice cream! And on another night Adrion made gumbo for us :)

*On his birthday eve we celebrated with Hendersons again (in spirit this time) as he opened his very first pair of Chacos

*On his actual day of birth his co-wrokers took him to lunch and he got balloons from my mom

...and Starbucks decided to celebrate

and finally we ended the night celebrating with 40 volunteers from Epic as we also prayed for the opening of our new space!!!

For an encoure I cooked his favorite meal and had friends but I didn't seem to snap a picture. We had french onion chicken, hash brown casserole and green bean bundles :)

I adore my husband and couldn't let 30 pass by without celebrating him over and over again. I am so grateful for who he is and the chance to walk through life by his side.

:) Lindsey

Pictures of The 543 - Grand Opening!

So here are some pictures from the new space at Epic Church. We had our Grand Opening on August 21 and these seats have been full ever since!!

*Just chairs in the room

*Worship Service & Band rehearsal

*Birth-23 months room

*Grand Opening Pictures

We are absolutely LOVING having this space and we are grateful to God for providing it for us!

:) Lindsey

Bittersweet & Stopping Traffic

Epic Church met at the W Hotel for the very last time this past Sunday. It was also our very last time to have to set-up and tear down for a service. We are THRILLED to have permanent space for Epic Church and not to have to wake up so early each week. With that said, I couldn't help having a bittersweet emotional moment as the service ended.

When no one in SF would rent us space on a weekly basis, The W Hotel did. And I am so grateful for that. The Great Room on the 3rd floor will always be the very first public gathering for Epic met. Such good memories and many defining moments there.

We are excited and ready to move forward in the new space. I can't wait to post pictures from The 543. This Sunday is our very first time to gather in the new building so hopefully I can get some pictures up next week.

Until then, ever wonder how 230 chairs get delivered in downtown San Francisco?? We were told that an 18 wheeler would be delivering the chairs. The chairs were in stacks of ten. What we didn't know was where the truck could park. Here are a couple of pictures from the delivery :)

Got to love church planting in an urban setting! We may have stopped some traffic momentarily but we were able to get all the chairs unloaded. If you are interested in investing in the new space you can purchase a chair for $60. Click here to find out more details.

With love,

Lindsey

BIG NEWS!!!

It is with great excitement that we announce that God has given Epic a permanent space in our target area. Many of you know we have been praying about this for the past few months. We signed a 3-year lease this past Monday afternoon. To say it was a surreal moment would be an understatement. Without going into all of the details, things happened in this process that only God could have done.

We shared this incredible news with our church yesterday morning. Our faith community is excited about what this means for our church. We have space on the lower level of a great building that is located at 543 Howard Street, right in the middle of downtown San Francisco. It is less than 2 blocks from where we currently meet at the W Hotel on 3rd and Howard.

Because it is already properly zoned and there is no major construction necessary, we will actually hold our first worship service there on August 21, 2011. One of the coolest things about getting this space this week is that momentum has never been greater at Epic. Attendance has averaged over 130 people the last 4 weeks and we are preparing for our second baptism on August 7th.

How You Can Help Furnish 543 Howard

There are quite a few things that we will have to purchase to get our space ready at 543 Howard. We have been using the W Hotel’s stage and chairs, so we’ll have to purchase those for starters. There are some other things that will have to be bought as well. You can click here to see how you can be a part of moving Epic Church into its new space. For as little as $60, you can purchase one of the 230 chairs that we will be buying for the space. You can do more or less, of course. You’ve helped us so much to get this far and we are excited to partner together on this endeavor as well.

We will continue to keep you updated about the process of moving into this space. I could not be more excited about the future of our church!

*copied from Ben Pilgreen's Blog

A year in review...

It's hard to believe that Ben and I have lived in San Francisco for over a year now. Since we moved to the city on May 31, 2010 SO much has happened. Time seems like it passing faster than ever before. I wanted to share the last year in review through some pictures. In the last year our faith has been tested, our hope renewed and through the joys and struggles we have seen many prayers answered. It's been a fun year, full of adventure and unknown. Here's a look back...

*Our first apartment - sometimes we miss the 430sq ft studio....just kidding :)

*MK came to live with us

*Our very first launch team meeting (12) & our last meeting before we launched (~36)

*Ben turned 29 & I turned 27

*Ben got a job!!!

*Many of you bought gifts for our Epic Kids Baby Shower

*After months of working out of Panera Bread, Epic got offices!

*Our first Christmas in our new 1br apartment :)

*Epic Church launched weekly services & our first Easter

*3 ladies share stories of redeemed lives and get baptized

*Our first big serving event in the city

Looking forward to seeing all that happens in the next 12 months!