Back home...

We left Redding just before 6 to drive to Vacaville. When we arrived, we had a couple of hours to kill so I was able to get the rough mix of the project onto my iPod so that I could listen while we travelled. It is going to sound amazing when we've tweaked a little - but Rob has done an amazing job in a short time!

Rob and Michele then dropped us off at the airport - we had to move some luggage around to distribute the weight better! We then had a last cup of coffee and boarded to fly to London.

We then spent about 10 hours in Heathrow - I bought a cover and armband for my iPod and we got some other small nick-nacks. We managed to find a couple of seats that we could lie down on and napped and walked Nia in turns.

The London-Joburg flight was uneventful - I managed to get some shut-eye. Then we were saying goodbye to Pat, paying extra for too much weight (20kg over) for the domestic flights and flying to EL.

Nia did amazingly - she is such a special girl! She took the whole trip in her stride and still managed to be cute and friendly - she is gorgeous!

Carol, Lauren and Carmen were waiting for us at the airport and Nigel arrived a little later (bearing biltong and Cadburys chocolate - what a champ!). We then got a shower, did some shopping for milk and bread and other necessities and then it was off to bed.

I can't believe the trip is over - it has been life-changing! I am excited to see what God is going to do in the next couple of months and beyond - life for the Dembovskys will never be the same!

Thank you Jesus for everything!

P.S. I will be posting the address of the next blog soon - as well as details about the Project!

Fini!

Just a quick note to say that we are finished with BSSW 2009! Ah, boo! We had a great day - some amazing worship followed by a time of impartation (some firebombs headed home - from Dano to Corne especially!). Then it was gift-buying and cleaning up and then back to Bethel for the graduation service. They made a band of worship school students and we had some great worship. After that they called us up one by one to give us a certificate and let us say final goodbyes to the staff. We were the 10th class to graduate! Yeeha!

So now we are packing (how do we distribute the weight so that none of our bags are over the limit? Hmmmm) and we leave very early tomorrow to head into Vacaville. Rob will then take over driving and drop us off at San Francisco airport and we fly out 14:30 (11:30pm SA time). We have 10 hours or so in London before our Sunday evening flight from London to Joburg and we arrive in EL just before 1pm on Monday - so pray for us!

Bye bye Bethel - we love you and we're ready to spread what you've sown into us! Whohoo! I'll catch you bloggers for a wrap up post when we get home. Thanks for riding along!

Barbeque

This morning we slept in a bit and only got to Bethel at 10:45. Dano preached in the morning session again - it was amazing! He continuously blows the socks off of everyone! I feel really priveledged to have spent so much time with him recently.

We then headed out to the Vallotton's farm for a barbeque and hang out - a School of Worship tradition. Their house is amazing - they even have an "African Room" which has all sorts of African nick-nacks.


This picture shows the sign above Kris's office door... hmmm...

This is Tanya with Katie Wheeler - she played bass in the band that I did band session with the other day. She is from Seattle!

This is me and a guy called David Schuster - I gave him a prophetic word in the 2nd week of school and we have been friends since. He is a great guy! (Jenn Johnson is in the background with the purple top facing into the house - Brian was sitting on a rocking chair with a bunch of adoring students surrounding him - he looked like a grandpa sharing stories!)

This is a pic of Sarah and Gail - we sat with them at a table in the 1st week of school and have been friends since. Sarah is also pregnant - about 6 months, though you'd never guess it! They are really great.

I can't believe we only have 1 day left!

Tanya and I then went shopping at Walmart and I got a new iPod, Pat got an iPod shuffle and Tanya got a Nikon Coolpix camera. Yay!

Some Studio Shoot Pics

Here are a few of my studio pics - I got permission to post them from Heather once we had given her all our pics.

This is Amanda Manwarring - she is Paul Manwarring's daughter-in-law.

This is Danielle - she is in her final year of high school.

This is Carter Armstrong - Heather's oldest child. He has a great destiny on him!

This is Heather's oldest daughter, Kira. She is really beautiful and was lots of fun.

Yesterday when we were giving Heather our pics, she had some cards for us - she asked that if we have prophetic words for the models that we should write them down. So I did - you know me, I never pass up and opportunity to practice the prophetic!

I have been inspired to start doing some prophetic photography - to ask the Holy Spirit to enable me to capture the gold in someone through photography. So don't be surprised if I ask you to do some modelling...

Sundial Bridge

When Nia, Pat and I collected Tanya from her Sozo, we decided to pop out to Sundial Bridge. The sun was just setting and it was a very pleasant evening. Here are some pics (including Nia sucking on a piece of dried mango). At the bottom of the dial, there is an amphitheatre and a group of worship school students were worshipping there - just to change the atmosphere. We joined them for a song or two before heading back.

We then had some coffee and cookies with the Overstreets - they are such a great couple! They are planning on coming out to SA again in Feb or April next year and they absolutely loved East London so much that they are definitely going to come again. Yay!

Carl's Junior

After school, I left Tanya at Bethel for her Sozo session. I then went to collect Nia and Pat and we did some shopping and went to Carl's Junior for supper (I had the Teriyaki burger - just a burger with a slice of pineapple) and fries. Pat had a grilled chicken burger with chips. Nia had chips. I also had an orange milkshake - yummm!

Wednesday

This is Tanya with one of our friends - Alecia (or, as we affectionately call her, Alice in Wonderland). We sat next to her in one of the main sessions and I gave her a word about her being an Alice in Wonderland and since then we have been friends!

Dano preached in the main session and was amazing (of course!). After lunch I went to the final photography class where Heather showed us some of her secrets in Photoshop. She is so cool! I really liked her - here is a pic of us.

Band Session

This morning instead of worship, Brian Johnson had us all cram into the centre of the sanctuary like a huge choir. They put up a few mics and recorded us singing to some tracks from the next Bethel CD - so we will be on it! Yahoo!

They will mix our voices into the tracks that they have recorded to add some atmosphere and "crowd singing" - even though they have recorded this CD live, they wanted more "in tune" crowd singing! Even though we were "faking" a live congregation, the anointing on our singing was amazing! I have gained some ideas for our next live album - hint hint!

In the afternoon our instrument classes combined so that we could do a "band session". The grouped us into bands and we had 15 minutes to choose a song and create an arrangement. Then you get up and play the song - no rehearsal, no nothing. It was fun, but not terrribly useful. Here you can see me on the electric and "our bassist" Katie behind me on bass. The guy with the bokkie sitting just behind me is the Bethel bassist, Brandon. We did "The Revelation Song". It went pretty well considering!

After that, a guy called Jeffrey came to share. He is the guy that worked with Dano to create those sound experiments that Dano showed at our Supernatural Lifestyle Week earlier this year. It was amazing to hear and see all his experiments and research again. Only 3 days left - ah, boo!

Prophetic Drawing

Here is the picture that was drawn for me yesterday by a lady called Christina. The word was very accurate for me, but I feel this is a word for His People in East London too! Read Psalm 130 - and hear the phrase, "out of the depths..."

Here is the prophetic interpretation:

"I drew a well - this is what God has done in you. It is very deep. It is purple - purple represents the Royalty of God. The water in the well is deep, but God is stirring it up and it is just below the top of the well. There is the Glory of God (the yellow at the top) and the Glory is revealed as He brings your water - the deep things that God has built in you - out to the surface. He sees you as a gem - precious and shining, reflecting His glory."

Now read this over yourself and believe that this is what God is going to release in you and through our church. Interestingly one of the words that God gave His People East London for 2009 was that we are a well for the refreshing of others... hmmmm... also, the water in the well is blue - blue often represents revelation.

Monday Rocked!

Today after dropping off the rental car, we went to my favorite place in the whole world - no, not church - Starbucks! I was in heaven... oh why, oh why are there no Starbucks in South Africa? Sigh...


After grabbing some beans (and a cool mug!), a coffee-of-the-day and a latte, we headed to Bethel for school. Kristene Mueller led worship - she has been my favorite worship leader the whole time we've been here! She was amazing and the presence of God was intense.

Jenn Johnson then shared her testimony and some thoughts - she is very intense and I was quite exhausted afterwards! During lunch Andrew Sevright spoke about starting an internet marketing campaign for musicians - I got some great ideas, so watch this space!

After lunch I went to the photography class. Heather Armstrong had brought in all her studio equipment and her kids (for models) as well as Paul Manwaring's daughter in law and a senior (translation: "matriculant") for modelling. It was great to use some proper studio equipment (AlienBees lights and massive diffusers). I can't show any of the photos online until I have consent from Heather and the models, but hopefully I can post a couple soon.

In the afternoon session Kathy took Trisha's class (Trisha was sick) and she read Ps 130 and then did 3 exercises: get a phrase from the psalm. Then ask the Lord why He is highlighting that phrase. Then paint in watercolour. I haven't painted since I was in primary school, so it was far out of my comfort zone. I painted an idea I had and the picture just ended up looking like a funny carrot. I was really discouraged! Then I started messing around and just dipped my brush into water and started "smudging" all the colours and this amazing swirl appeared - when the picture dried it was actually not too bad! We then paired up and had to get a prophecy for our partner (specifically about the future) and sketch it for the person using pencils or pastels. That was fun! We're going to do some of this in cell. My drawing wasn't too bad - I have been sketching in my journal over the last couple of weeks and some of my sketches are getting quite good!

In the evening we headed to the studio to hear the final mix of the song that we have been tracking for the Recording class. We took a detour via Taco Bell for dinner. The song is sounding amazing and it was great to hear the evolution from the initial idea to the finished product.

My Last Day in Vacaville (Part 2)

Melody came into the studio again - with her husband Chris. Chris is an actor and model and is going to be in a movie called "Singularity" later this year (I'm just dropping names of all the famous people I am meeting :-)

Zack joined us again to help with engineering. We got Melody to finish off some backing vocals for the English songs, and then had her singing in Xhosa, chiBemba and Shona! She did an amazing job and was dripping honey all over again - we were really priveledged to have her on the project.

At one stage she was doing backing for Sweet - the line is "... with your sweet water" and I was joking with her saying that in South Africa, we speak English (as opposed to American) and that it should be pronounced "wor-ter" not "wah-der". Everyone was cracking up and I got a pic of Melody doing her "wor-ter" face!

We left the studio at 5:45 or so and went to Dano's place to put some marimbas onto one track (Nigel, you'll have to guess which one when you hear the CD!) and then after grabbing my gear at Rob's place I drove back through to Redding. One week to go (ah, boo).

The project is now almost completely tracked - Rob needs to add a couple of bass lines, but my work is done. Then there's just mixing and mastering and it'll be finished! I am going to have to think about how to distribute the CD's - will do when I get home.

My Last Day in Vacaville (Part 1)

This morning I went with Rob to the Mission at around 8:30 - he was playing bass in the band. I ended up playing percussion during practice and worship - I had such fun!

Dano had done a rough mix of "Jika" without lead vocals so that I could sing it at church. During the offering I did just that (with Rob helping me on vocals). I was jumping and spinning around and everyone had such a great time - I had so many people ask me when the CD was coming out so that they could buy one! That's a great sign!

We then went to a restaurant for lunch - I ordered a pizza (pepperoni, italian sausage, peppers, mushrooms - oooo, yum!) and I couldn't even get half way through! At 2, it was time to hit the studio again (we were going in to meet Melody for some more backing vocals).

4th of July - in the Studio (again)

Saturday was the 4th of July - Independence Day. We were holed up in the studio again though - the project is AMAZING! I know you guys are all going to love it. Dano has said that he would listen to this - and considering how many project he works on where that is NOT true, that's an amazing compliment!

We were treated to a barbeque at Dano's house that Dano's wife, Regina, cooked for us. Michele also added some salad and bratwurst (she is Swiss, after all) and Regina's home-made apple pie topped it all off. Yummy!

We finished at the studio around 1o and got to see some fireworks. I then went with Dano to his place again to do some tuning on the project (learning all the time!) and got back to Rob's place at around 12. Not too bad, considering how much work we did! We have 13 tracks for the project.

Friday in Vacaville in the Studio

On Friday morning I took Tanya, Nia and Pat to a rental place where they could rent a car for the weekend since I was taking the truck (Rob's Mighty Whitey) back to Vacaville. The girls decided to stay and chill out in Redding while I was recording in Vacaville.

I got into Vacaville at around 12 and after some lunch and a short rest we hit the studio at Father's House again. We did more lead vocals and some guitar. We then had steak rolls for supper and headed back to the studio. More lead vocals and harmonies (by me and Rob - he was born African, I am sure!). I also got to do some mandolin - yay, yay, yay! We finished at around 11 and after chilling in front of the TV with Rob till 12 before hitting the sack.

We needed a backing vocalist for a lot of the tracks and God was so faithful - Dano went into reception and happened to see a girl called Melody (!) who is on staff at Father's House. He knew she has a great voice, so he asked her if she would be willing to do some backing vocals on my project (she doesn't even normally work Fridays, so it was a God moment!). She agreed - and from the first note, in Dano's words, she "poured honey all over the songs"!

Thursday - Prophetic Photography

For those of you wondering if my hands have broken off, don't worry! I haven't been able to post for a couple of days - but I'll catch up now!

Joseph and Tosha from Father's House led worship again in the morning and Joseph shared again - I bought his book "Lessons for the Worship Team" to go through with our bands - he had such practical advice!

There were artists doing some prophetic art during worship, and when Tanya asked me to take some pictures of Ralph while he did some flagging, I thought, "Hey, if they are doing prophetic art, then I can do prophetic photography!" It was fun, but I only realised half way through that my lens was on manual focus (instead of automatic) so I didn't get too many decent shots. Here is on that did come out rather well though.

On Thursday evening I went into the Soundhouse again. Jeremy had made some amazing suggestions to the song we were tracking, but Kyle needed some more lyrics. However, they recorded the final drum and bass tracks. On Friday night they did keys, electric guitar and vocals and on Monday night we'll see them mix the song.

So after that late night, I didn't get a chance to post!

Wednesday was amazing!

This morning Joseph and Tash Zwanziger from Father's House in Vacaville came to lead worship and chat during the main session. They lead worship at their church (it was their studio that we were using this weekend for my project). Joseph was selling their latest album, but decided that most of us didn't know him that he would give every student a free CD (Eternity's King). What an amazing gesture!

Joseph co-wrote a book called "Lessons for the Worship Team" which I purchased after his session. I am looking forward to working through it with our bands.

In the afternoon I went to the photography class - there were only 4 of us and Paul Manwaring came to share a brilliant message called "Beauty and Glory". I was really inspired and challenged and am glad I went even though I didn't get to take any photos! I am trying to switch with someone next week Monday for the band session so that I can go to the shoot on Monday - we're going to be doing a studio shoot with Paul Manwaring's daughter-in-law as the subject.

After school Tanya went back home and I stayed at church. A group of us who signed up for the Recording Class waited till we had car-pooled to get to a studio in town. Adam is the sound engineer for Bethel and he works half his time at the Bethel Studio and half his time at Jeremy's studio (The Soundhouse).

We got to set up the studio (including 15 mics for the drums alone!) and then do a rough recording of a song that is going to be recorded. It was an amazing space and really inspired me to pursue sound engineering a little more - I have the musical background and technical inclination to be a good engineer (well, I think so anyway).

The pics below show the drum setup as well as the control booth (Adam on the left, Jeremy on the right). If you go to the Soundhouse website (link above) you can see the video that was filmed in the Studio with Third Day recording a Rick Mullins song (click the "Featured Project" link on the home page). Amazing! Also check out the video for Myriad (that's Jeremy's band) for an awesome song and video combo!

Brian Johnson teaches an acoustic class

(This is Brian Johnson teaching the acoustic guitar class).

There were so many guitarists at Jeff's electric guitar class last week Tuesday that they decided to let Brian do an acoustic class. Still it was a big class - about 40 people. Brian just talked about his tone (he has a custom micing system in his guitar) and the effects that he runs through to get his live guitar to sound good. The other stuff he spoke about was very basic guitar stuff. He's going to do a basic course on Thursday for beginners, so I am going to try to catch Marc Cooper's electric class.

I am going to go to the photography class tomorrow instead of voice just to see what there is to see and to do something different.

In the main session this morning Kris Vallotton spoke - it was an amazing word, and key for the musicians and worship leaders at the school - but for anyone in general too! He shared that he had mentored this group of 11 people - poured his life into them - and today only 5 still serve the Lord. He has been grieving over the others and asking the Lord what the difference is - and his answer was basically this: you need to remain teachable and flexible and be able to receive correction if you are going to still be serving the Lord in 30 or 50 years time.

Just before he started sharing, he prophesied over some people. He gave a prophecy for one girl and then asked anyone who had a tingling sensation in their right forefinger to stand. As he was asking I had that sensation so I stood up - there were about 10 of us standing. He prophesied that the Lord was releasing a prophetic voice through us and that we were like equipment keepers that can hand weapons to people. There was some other stuff too - it's in my journal.