First Chance Camp

Ella and her counselor Melissa


Michael's group~his counselor is Pastor Mike

What happens at camp stays at camp

Last night we dropped Michael and Ella off for their first overnight church camp experience. Now if you know Ella, you understand that this is a huge step of faith for her. Ella is honestly terrified of bugs; specifically lady bugs and Japanese beetles-both of which are in abundance right now. She also does not like lake water, sweating, being hot-generally there is not a lot of love for the outdoors. What began as a confident, "yes I'll go", quickly vaporized into the chant, "I'm not nervous..I'm not nervous!". Thankfully there are a lot of very supportive and understanding leaders who quickly diverted her attention to the cool t-shirts (a fashion statement) and air conditioned bunkhouses. After a picture with Melissa her counselor, Ella was ready to head down to the beach. To my surprise, Ella was splashing in the lake water and building sand castles with her new friends.

What about Michael you ask? That kid couldn't get away from us fast enough! He didn't want us to walk him over to his meeting spot, didn't want us to meet his adult counselor (do I even need to mention that it just so happens to be our head pastor-eek), didn't want me to help him with his stuff, and didn't want us to even begin to approach him for a good bye hug. I also made the grevious error of bringing him his towel after dropping off his belongings in the boy bunk area. He looked at me like, "Mom you are seriously crazy bringing me this towel in front of the other dudes!". Michael had NO problem jumping in that lake water and before I left Pastor Mike informed me that he and Michael had a talk about mooning the other campers. It seems that Michael was unaware (this I do not doubt) that his swim trunks were sitting very low on his tushie. Sigh. Thank goodness Pastor Mike started out his ministry as a youth Pastor. He will certainly need some vacation time after this experience!! I am sure that Michael talked his ear off!!!! We go back to pick them up this evening at 5:30, and I am hoping that it was a wonderful experience for both of them. I want them to learn that learning about God is really fun and that being a Christian is also truly fun. I want them to grab on to God now so that we can build on that in the tween and teen years. I know that building a foundation now is so important-I'm really excited for them and know that it will be a great memory!!

Thank you to every person who volunteers their time to make this so special. You are for sure making Jesus smile!