Teen Camp 3

This past week was our 3rd and last teen camp. I think there ended up being 80-90 campers. The speakers preached more topical messages about TV and things like that than other weeks, which was nice. Sadly, as a whole, the campers were unresponsive. A few got saved and several made decisions, but after some messages when we were sure there would be a big response, few to none would make a move. I think there was a lot of apathy or inward rebellion in these teens. Throughout the week during cabin cheers in the dining hall, there was just much less enthusiasm than the past teen weeks, and the cheering during games and participation during skit time was less as well. There was much more interaction and problems between the guys and girls, though, as well as craziness in the hallways, etc. It was a different group of teens than before, all right. :) The Lord has continued to work in my heart this week- the first morning service that I was able to go to (see below) was exactly what I needed! It was about thankfulness and how anything besides hell is better than what we deserve. During another service, one of the speakers went through all that Jesus had to endure when on the cross. It was such an eye-opener and challenge that He went through so much for me. I have nothing to complain about... a much needed reminder. :)

As for what I did this week... long story... :) Julie, Charity, and I weren't counseling this week, so on Sunday afternoon, the "dean of girl counselors", Ms. Case, asked us to paint the lake bath houses this week. We started this project back during the first family camp! During the family camp, me, a few counselor girls, and several housekeeping girls all cleaned the place and started putting primer on the walls. But that only lasted about halfway through the week because we all got busy with camp stuff. Ms. Case told us Sunday that the walls didn't actually need primer, so we could just start with the painting. So Monday morning, away we went. :) Now... we had to paint the girls' side and the boy's side, but the guys' only bathroom during the day (unless they go all the way back to their cabins) is the bath house. So we could only work in there during girls' lakefront, when they guys aren't allowed to be down there. Monday morning, we didn't go the the morning service and we started painting. We actually got a fair amount done! Then in the afternoon, I worked lakefront, and Charity and Julie did some painting in the guys' bath house. That night, one of the op staff guys told us that the walls were dripping, there was paint on the floor on the guys' side, and we needed to clean it up. Well, we were in for a big shock! The floors were covered in paint because we had accidentally flipped the drop cloths so that the wet side was on the floor. Then, the guys had taken showers before we painted, so the room was so humid that the paint just ran and the walls were drying with drips. FIASCO!! We cleaned it up. Tuesday morning, we were continuing to paint the girls' side when Mr. Scott came in and told us that a professional painter was coming Friday, and that we should stop painting and deep clean both sides. Ok? :) So until Friday, during every morning service, lakefront, and pretty much any other free time we had, we were cleaning the bath house... which included sanding the walls and benches, scrubbing the floors, cleaning under the sinks, getting spiders off the walls (and believe me, there were a lot of them-alive!), cleaning the toilets, sinks, and showers, and...last but certainly not the least of all our jobs...getting the tape from like 5 WEEKS AGO off the floor. This was not painting tape. It was masking tape! We spent literally like 2 days getting all the tape off the floor. And the tape near the bathroom stalls and showers was moldy because it had gotten wet so much. It was disgusting! We had gloves on for sure! If I ever see masking tape on the floor again, I will probably pass out. Or scream and run away. :) On Thursday morning, Ms. Case told us that we could go to the morning service, which is the one I was talking about above. By Friday afternoon, we had finally finished cleaning, so Julie and I were able to go into town for a few hours. It was lovely. :)
Needless to say, it's been an adventure-some week. I must say... I'll forever have memories of cleaning the bath house. :)

I managed to take a ton of videos this week, along with a fair amount of pictures :), but I can't put videos on here... :( You can see all the pictures, though!

Clara and Bethany: toilet paper brides :)

Ashley and me

Me and Margaret- who is sort of squatting in this picture!

Ashley, me, and Margaret

Margaret at her full 6 feet and me at my full 5 feet, 3 3/4 inches. :) 

Ashley and Allison...the crazy two-some. :)

Andrea and I (Andrea works in the kitchen)

Bethany making fun of how short I am! She's like 5'10"... all the girls here are so tall! :(

She's slightly squatting and I'm on my tiptoes. (I shouldn't have said anything and you guys would think I'd grown! :))

Oh Hiawatha... :) This is the skit I play piano for. 

During the facebook skit

And this is the infamous moldy tape that we had to scrape up. Ewwww!!!

Just one of the instruments I used to scrape it up with. It was stuck on! I also used some other knives throughout the week. :)

Wow, Abby! :)

Ashley and I matched unintentionally! I didn't even notice until we stood beside each other when the choir was getting ready to sing! 

(Bad lighting) Julie and I- so happy that we were finally done! 

Had to get pictures after the fact. :) The toilet is clean, just so you know. :)

Julie with the orbital sander

Check out the tapeless floor! Fiiiiinally.

All the counselor girls... 2 of them are leaving tomorrow! :( 

(Ms. Case is the lady in the back) 

Mark's cabin got messiest cabin from surprise cabin inspection and had to sing "Old McDonald had a pig" 

And today- 3 men/guys got pies in their faces! Mr. Scott (above) said that whichever guy's cabin said the most verses could throw a pie in his face. Dan got him.

I don't know what the challenges were behind the other guys, but this is Micheal. Nathan also got a pie in his face, but he pretty much ran away as soon as it happened. :) Ashley was also supposed to get one, but she lucked out and the kitchen ran out of whipped cream! 

It's been a fun week! I'm so ready to come home, but I'm sad that we only have a week left... mixed emotions. :( Next week is our final week, and it will be Juniors and Primaries. I am going to be on the red team again, counseling primaries, who will be 6-8 years old. Please pray for me! :) If given the choice, I would've chosen to counsel juniors, which is probably why the Lord decided I should counsel primaries. :) I'm sure it'll be a trying week, but God can provide the strength and wisdom. I'm learning more and more that I can do nothing by myself! Please pray for me, the other counselors, and the campers. I think the campers are supposed to be a little "better" this week, but I'm sure there will be many needs in their lives, as well as many who need to be saved. I'm excited to see what God will do! 

Teen Camp 2

This has been an interesting week. I don't know how the weather was at home or other places, but up here, it was over 100 one or more days and extremely hot and humid! It was pretty miserable... I actually got in the water during lakefront time two days because it was just too hot to sit on the docks. But besides the weather, it was a very good week. :) First... there were many campers saved this week! We were able to see some staff kids saved even! There were some who were saved that we would have never guessed that to be the case, which taught us to be really careful and look for fruits of salvation. We also saw some saved who come from really bad backgrounds and we knew needed to be saved. I know a lot of campers made decisions this week. The Lord has also been teaching me a lot and working in my heart this week- the main thing being that He is the One in control. Even if I have no idea why things go one way and not another (which is also me wanting my way over God's way), He knows exactly why and has a perfect purpose for everything. I've been able to give some things over to Him, and He's already answered prayers and shown me things! 

And ... Jacquelyn came up here this week to work as the nurse! It was fun to see someone from home and get to spend time with her. I was able to stay with her two nights, which means I got to experience A/C and a super comfortable bed! :) The Lord also used her in my life this week, which was really encouraging. 

I don't have a lot of great pictures this week since I wasn't counseling, but I'll show you what I have! :)

Counselor/program staff choir on Sunday night. 

Me at the top of the rope swing. That and boating (dragging canoes out for people) are seriously the hardest jobs at lakefront. And since I can't swim, I get assigned to them a lot! :) Whoever is at the top of the rope swing has to hold the hook things and catch the rope every time someone swings off of the rope and the rope comes back toward me. Only sometimes it doesn't come all the way back, or I can't reach it, so the person in the water has to throw it back to me. :) But the hook is really heavy and so is the rope (especially when it's wet), so I've almost fallen over several times! :) 

Someone coming to a crashing stop at the end of the sky glide as Micheal tries to grab him to keep him from dragging on the ground. Someone else is working the break and tries to stop them before they drag the ground, but it doesn't always work. :) I was working harnesses this day, so I enjoyed watching the different landings and I got to ride it for the 3rd time this summer. :)

Clara, me, and Ashley before the service Friday night.

Me and Ashley

The Op Staff choir singing on Friday night.

The blue team counselors waiting nervously as Mr. Stephen read off the scores for surprise cabin inspection scores. :)

And the red team counselors

Jacquelyn and me

Tizzy and some of her siblings were here this week as well- this is Tizzy, me, Mary, and Jacquelyn

Jacquelyn and Sarah

Look at those faces! :) The guy on the left and the two girls were getting ready to get pies thrown in their faces. :)

Tyler

Ashley

Kaylee

And the three of them. :)

Me and Sarah

Tonight, we ate supper at Mr. Todd's house. Julie and Caris enjoyed sitting on the trampoline (we weren't allowed to jump on it) :)

Some of the staff playing volleyball. I took a ton of pictures trying to get good action shots, but I was only able to get a few good ones. :/ They aren't blog-worthy though. :)  

Camp starts right back up tomorrow afternoon with another teen camp. I'm not counseling, so I'll see what different jobs I can find for myself to do. :) Hopefully I'll be able to get to know the campers and counsel some after the services. This week there were more campers that went forward instead of going back, but every week is different in terms of responsiveness. I'm looking forward to what the Lord's going to do, and I appreciate your prayers!

Junior Camp pictures!

Well, I know you've all been dying to see pictures from last week. This is the 5th time I've tried to upload them! I kept doing dumb things that ended up stopping the uploading process. But here they are...finally! :)

Olivia, Juoleanne, Elisa, and Caroline waiting to ride the horse.

Samantha 

Scoring game after the evening services-the campers spin a wheel that has 1 through 6, -2, -3, and -4. Then they try to get the ships around the world behind the people in the above picture, and the first team to get their ship around wins the game and gets to fly their team flag the next morning. These are two guy counselors from opposing teams: one wanting a 6, and one wanting a -4. 

Every morning during chapel, the kids would do a penny parade. They could choose how many packs of pennies they wanted to give and each kid put their pennies in the buckets. Then, Mr. Scott let go to see which team won. All the money went towards a camp in Africa.

Flute quartet: Rachel, Clara, Ashley, and Bethany. I play the piano for this- I Sing the Mighty Power of God.

Bethany and I played a duet and decided to match. :)

Here we are :)

All my campers... from back to front: Samantha, Danielle, Caroline, Elisa, Olivia, Juoleanne, Celeste, Madison, and Jackie.

Caris was really hungry that day... :) Just kidding! She asked the snack shop girls to split one flurry into three and shared with Clara and I. :)

We were all pleasantly (?) surprised on Thursday night when we had to eat with crazy utensils! This was the first time this had happened the whole summer! So of course I had to go around and take pictures of every single counselor. :)

I poked myself in the forehead like every time I tried to take a bite. And I had to hold those things open! :)

Bethany

Kaylee (she had a coffee pot to drink out of)

Nathan (I have no idea how he ate with a potato masher? I don't think he did either!)

Poor Nick...nice baby bottle! :)

Caris

Allison (the one with the blue lid was for drinking out of)

Clara

Ashley (now I really wouldn't want to try eating with that!)

Charity

Jeremy (those huge bucket things are what we always put trash and dirty dishes in after the meals! :))

Dan... he wouldn't keep his tongue in for the pictures (rolls eyes) :) I think he had an ice cream scoop to eat with.

Micheal got a baby bottle too...

Jonathon (he had to drink out of the glass dish)

And Mark - he had to stand up to eat out of that thing! And they did crazy utensils again this past week (I didn't get pictures), and he ended up with a really really tiny cup to eat out of and a styrofoam cup to drink out of. They went from huge to tiny with him! :) 

Bethany and Clara did a toilet paper bride contest. I think Clara won. :)

My campers during God-and-I time one morning.

The Camp Joy Quartet

My girls (my troublemakers weren't paying attention :)) at the end of fun time. L to R: Juoleanne, Celeste, Madison, Jackie, Olivia, and Elisa.

Annnnnnd... after the campers left. This is Clara, Ashley, Bethany, and I. We were taking a moment to relax and enjoy the company of people over the age of 12 before we got started on our Saturday jobs. :)

Hope you enjoyed the pictures! It kind of gives you an idea of the campers I was talking about last week. Look out for another post! :)