The walls are painted red-and-blue. A pool table, air hockey table and foosball table sit atop a striped brown carpet.

Colored pencils, drawing paper and snacks lay atop a table. At one end of the room, a woman and girl play the board game “Sorry!”

The cozy, den-like atmosphere is where the Silverdale United Methodist Church is hosting its new Kitsap Youth Project.

“You can’t ever have too many safe places for kids to hang out,” said Grant Bosshardt, a towering, bald-headed man and one of three youth leaders, along with pastor’s assistant Lyndsey Rickabaugh and Brett Hall.

The Youth Project is meant to provide children in grades 6-12 with a place to gather and have fun for an hour and a half on Thursdays.

The project began on Oct. 23 and has only held a few of its gatherings so far. The group meets every Thursday from 6:30 to 8 p.m.

The time there is structured: Sessions kick off with an ice-breaker activity, followed by singing, and then a time to talk. A lesson is also taught.

At a recent meeting, youngsters Alaura Hall and Lynzie Kenny raced each other to see who could bounce the most ping pong balls across a table and into plastic buckets held by adults on the other side.

“Yeah!” exclaimed a victorious Alaura after winning two of three rounds.

Afterward they gathered to sing a song titled “Indescribable.”

“From the highest of heights to the depths of the sea, Creation’s revealing Your majesty,” they sang.

The song ended and the group began their chat time.

“It’s incredible to us and humbling that you know every star in the sky by name,” Bosshardt said.

Bosshardt’s lesson for the day was about risk and reward.

He and his wife recently purchased a Harley Davidson motorcycle, he said. It was a high-risk purchase for him since he wasn’t even sure he would like riding motorcycles. But as it turned out, he enjoyed it.

Likewise, he said, people risk their own valuable time if they decide to help someone in need — someone who was hungry or who needed help paying their utility bills, for example.

The biggest risk, he said, would be that if one didn’t help others then no one else might not help either.

Bosshardt used a passage from the Bible to illustrate the lesson: “Do not withhold good from those who deserve it when it is within your power to help them.”

“When we give we get to understand why Jesus said it is better to give than receive,” Bosshardt said.

To learn more about the Kitsap Youth Project, contact pastor’s assistant Lyndsey Rickabaugh at 360-692-9813 or by email at lyndseyr@silverdale-umc.org. The church has a web page for the project at www.silverdale-umc.org.