We Prayed and It Rained!

The past two weeks have been absolutely amazing! God has been so good in my life these past few weeks. Two weeks ago I had the privilege to serve a family with four year old triplets and a 2 year old. It was a busy week but I really learned a lot through the week. The family was such a blessing to watch as they talked over meals with each. Even watching the parents lovingly discipline their children was a learning experience. I will definitely miss that family. One of my favorite memories of this week was when the blondie in the picture had to you the potty. I took him and the next thing I hear is, "Hey bud you need to stay in your stall!" He poked his head to see the person next to him. Then while going potty I heard grunts. The person in the stall next to him came out and said, "I think he's pooping! Just a hint!" I also got to stay up at Lakeside during this week. Although it was an inconvenience at times it was great being away from the rest of camp in the silence of the woods.

One of the triplets!

This past week was incredibly awesome. I don't even know where to begin. So I'll start with the beginning. It was young teen camp. Not one of my favorite camps but nonetheless it was a great week. I had 6 girls in my cabin who I feel more and more in love with as the week went on. My heart breaks for their broken lives and the pain that these girls should not have to go through. Another part of this week that was unique was that my cousin Christina came to camp to serve as the camp nurse. It was so great to be able to experience camp together again but in ways that we had never experienced as kids. This week I didn't go on the internet from Saturday until Thursday. So on Thursday you can bet that I had a lot of emails and facebook messages to catch up on. While checking my email I came across an email from Taylor Lighthouse. Here's the jist of what it said, "YOU'RE GOING TO PERU!" I was totally speechless. I'm so excited! You have no idea! I almost peed my pants when I read the email.

Finally, down in the Valley we have been in need of rain. We have had to start feeding our horses the winter hay. After weeks of praying for rain we finally got 2 rather large rainstorms! So on friday many of us were sporting our Pray! shirts and rainboots!

You Are Special

Junior Camp 2 is finished! This week was such a blessing. Once again I'll see if I can write about my week in a top 10 list.
10. My Mom and Nanny came up for the weekend. We spent last Saturday night at Decorah. Nanny cold watered me in the shower and I got a super LEGIT cookie dough shake from the Whippy Dip. It had 2 huge scoops of homemade cookie dough in it.
9. I had a the wonderful privilege to have my Uncle Doug speak at the morning chapels for the week. He told the story of Moses through a made up 10 year old boy named Seth. It was great being able to see him speak in a camp environment and watch him interact with kids.
8. I had 2 sisters in my cabin this week. One was very homesick and the other was fine. They like most sisters at 9 and 10 did not get along with each other. At the beginning of the week it took all the patience that I had to handle the homesick camper. Then I would say a miracle happened. Come Thursday morning I saw a completely new camper. She was very happy and excited to do everything. This was very different in comparison to the way she acted earlier in the week.
7. I attempted to camp out at the hammock village with my campers this week. We hiked all the way up there and I had just helped the last camper get into her hammock and then 2 of them came to me in tears. They were scared. So my co-counselor Autumn stayed with the other girls and I walked back with 3 of them. We sang, "My God is so big so strong and so mighty there is nothing my God cannot do for you!" This helped them and reassured them that God is always there with them.
6. On the last night of camp I played Bible Skittles with my girls. Each turn a girl is given a skittle at random. Depending on the color they have answer a certain question. For example, red is something that you love about God, green was your favorite Bible story and so on. They really enjoyed it.
5. My mom donated lots of different things to the craft room. When I walked into the craft room to give Lindsay the new treasures for the craft room she squealed with excitement. It was so great to see the joy in her eyes because she loves what she does so much and wants the best for the craft room.
4. I really loved this weeks campers. This is the first group of campers that I have had that I teared up when I said good bye to them. They were so precious. I can truly say that I will remember the impact that these girls made on me.
3. At the beginning of the week when I took my time off I made the conscious decision that I was not going to go up the staff lounge for the week. So during my time off I would sit out the the Lodge lawn and read or journal. It was great just taking in God's beautiful creation.
2. I had a camper in my cabin this week who was adopted from South Korea. If I were going to pick a favorite it would definitely be her. Watching her all week I was constantly reminded to pray for the people in my life who have been adopted. Every time I looked at her I was compelled that one day I will have the opportunity to adopt a child of my own.
1. On Thursday night we always have a large bonfire where kids share things that they have learned about God during their time at camp. After the bonfire I had cabin devotions with my cabin. My girls shared that when at school that people made fun of them and called them names that are not very kind. This tied in perfectly with my plans for that night. I read to them the book, You Are Special by Max Lucado. When I finished reading the story my girls thanked me for sharing the story with them.  This was definitely God moving in my cabin that night.

Chapel Planning and Kayaking

This past week at camp we had a church student ministries program rent out the camp. So everyone did projects around camp all week long. There were times during the week when I worked at the Archery range and times when I scrubbed down some dishes and I also scrubbed down plenty of toilets this week too. But my favorite project from this past week was planning the lessons for the 4-12 year olds at family camp. I was able to use plenty of things that I have learned in my ministry classes. I have thoroughly enjoyed working on the lessons. I found plenty of fun games to play and crafts and also found a fun song called Puttin' On My Armor. I have been blessed this week to use the gifts and talents that God has given me to work and glorify Him. This past week I have been able to live in the cabins which are on the outskirts of a hayfield. This makes for beautiful walks back to the cabin at night with wonderful stars. Today I had to opportunity to go on a kayak trip down the Mississippi River. It was so much fun! I had a blast drenching my partner Lindsay in the process of moving down the river. I also have a very distinct Chaco tan lines now. This coming week will be Senior High week. I will be living a Heckman House 8, or better known as "the cave". My cabin consists of all high school camp staff workers. This could mean that it will be a great week or it could be a very tough week.
Prayer requests for this next week: That gossip would be minimal. In a cabin of camp staff this could very easily happen. Also for energy. During Senior High week the nights get later and later and the mornings stay the same.

Week One: Done!

The first full week of campers comes to a close tomorrow. This week has been a great week. For this blog I have decided to bring back the top 10 list of things that have happened this week.
10. This morning I went to wake up my 8 year old to find that she was completely underneath her fitted sheet. I mean she was sleeping in her bed with the fitted sheet tucked into the mattress with her inside. Neither of us are quite sure how she got there.
9. For the first time in my 20 years of life I have encountered leeches. I HATE LEECHES!!! GROSS!!!
8. I have played Apples to Apples Disney everyday for the past 5 days.
7. I have hot glued 240 popsicle sticks together for a total of 30 catapults assembled this week.
6. I have bagged up a broken arm more times than I can count.
5. I have tickled and scared girls multiple times a day.
4. Our cabin has had meaningful cabin devotions every night this week.
3. I've gotten more sleep this past week than I do during a month of college.
2. I jousted another counselor with a noodle weapon and won by a vote of 2 out of 3 because it was a draw.
1. I got to dress up in my knight costume and be filmed for a camp video chasing a maiden.

That is week one in a nutshell. More to come later on.

Catapult Building and Junior Campers and Leeches

Yesterday was the first full day of Junior camp 1. I have a cabin with 6 kids from ages 8 to 11. During rotations this week I am teaching catapult building. It's one of those things where I am crowd control because I i have knowledge about building catapults whatsoever. Yesterday afternoon I helped out with archery during free-time until I had Kieffer who works at the lake come to me with my 8 year old who was in tears. So I took the girl back to the cabin and Kieffer took my place at archery. My little girl just wanted some hugs and love pats so I sat on the couch and just gave her some love. Then it was time for instruction hours. Which is when I have my time off. I'm grateful for this time off to spend replenishing myself and rejuvenating. Please pray for the rest of this week that I would be able to minister to these girls and show them God's amazing love. I also have a camper with a broken arm. Pray that she would be able to have fun even though she has broken arm.

Today I had catapult building during rotations again. Then this afternoon I went creek stomping with my cabin during free-time. I had the lovely pleasure of picking 2 leeches off of my campers feet. We caught 6 minnows and 2 crawdads. It was super fun. I'm looking forward to tonight when we have our cookout. These girls have been super fun so far and I'm really looking forward to everything that will happen this week!

7 Dippy Dips

Hard to believe that tomorrow will mark the first full week of camp. The past few days have been wonderful. Yesterday we had a day of prayer and fasting. We had a morning session taught by Tim Blackburn where we then went out for an hour on our own and asked ourselves the question. "Where am I?" We asked this question through relational, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of life. Then for each outbreak of prayer after that we went through the ACTS prayer model. It was wonderful to just spend a day in the presence of our Lord and Savior. Today I was re-certified in CPR. We went our variety show acts. I will be in a group seeing the "Stand" song from VeggieTales. I'll be dressed in my knight costume. The variety show will be medieval themed. Then today I learned a new children's song titled the 7 Dippy Dips. It was pretty humorous. I discovered that I will be a counselor for junior campers next week. I'm very excited to see what this next week will entail. I will greatly appreciate any and all prayers for this first and crucial week of camp.

Friends, Farts, and Fears

I just arrived at Village Creek Bible Camp yesterday which will be my home for the next 10 weeks. It has been so wonderful catching up with my FRIENDS from last summer and then starting to make some new friendships as well. I have learned that the friendships at camp are unlike any other friendship I have ever encountered before. These friendships form like rapid fire. They start as small talk and before you know it you are sharing life's biggest secret with them.

As close friends we also share stories about FARTS. Yes, farts. I have two friends in-particular that tend to bring farts up on a regular basis. Example, tonight we had Mexican casserole. Enough said.

On a more serious note while on my 5 hour drive to camp yesterday I had plenty of time to think and process about life. There came a point on the drive where I was overcome by FEAR. I started thinking about everything bad that could possibly come out of being at camp this summer. I soon realized that this was the Devil already trying to keep me from serving the Lord to the best of my ability.

I have so enjoyed being back at this wonderful valley. I cannot even imagine my life without the place. I am so thankful for the work that God is doing and will continue to do in the weeks to come. 

My prayer requests this week would be for patience. Getting back into the constant people routine is hard work for an introvert. I would also ask for prayer to be open and willing to reach out to new staffers. There are A LOT of new staff and not a lot of returning staff.