Pre-Teen Camp

What a fun weekend. I loved this age group, as did a lot of the staff. There were lots of good questions, attentiveness in chapel and also fun at all the activities. I mentioned in the last email about need for male leaders, God supplied J! On the day camp started we got two more, just the right number. We are thankful that this week God has supplied all the leaders needed already for the fourth and last camp, we have at least 40campers coming.

The week started with a super smoky evening due to a fire north of us. In the cabin at night we prayed that the smoke would go away and I am certainly thankful that it did all go and we had clear air. The sunshine did not last for every day. One night we had a thunder and lightning storm which was cool and loud from in the cabins. Our girls rearranged the mattreses so we were closer to them.  However, as with every night, Tetley and I were blessed to have our girls go to sleep straight after we said Amen each night.

This week I was just on one activity, the mountain bikes. We rode around the tracks in the bush around camp for about 30mins then we pulled up at a camp fire spot and I would tell them a story about being lost and it getting dark and they would have to build themselves a hut for the night. It was lots of fun and some cool huts were made before riding back to camp.

We went for a walk to the river the back way one afternoon. My job was to walk at the back which gave me lots of time to have some amazing conversation with some of the slower walkers. We got to talk about creation and about how amazing God is.

On a different afternoon we walked down to the river via road for a swim. I had not intended to swim but decided to paddle. I ended up getting my shorts wet then one of the boys offered Tetley and I a ride on the tube, well that went good till near the end when a whole bunch of kids decided to join us and I ended up swimming. First swim for the summer!

Talking to the girls in our cabin was such a joy. 4 out of the 6 have Christian backgrounds and the other two had some exposure but knew very little. I was thankful that I got sometime during the week to spend just chatting in free times and after camp fire one night. I saw God answer my “Nehemiah prayer” when starting a conversation that went out of my depth. Each week I see more of God working as I depend more on him.

This has gotten long, there is so much to tell about the fun week of camp so I will finish with our skit night.

Each cabin was given a passage and a box of costumes. Ours was Daniel in the Lions Den and our costumes were animals. So the skit went like this…. Darius was Doris the Zoo Keeper, Daniel was Danielle a horse and the others were animals in the Zoo who didn’t like that Danielle got to walk around and be put in charge. So they came up with a plan that if anyone feed any stray animals they would be thrown in the Lions cage, this was to save money of course. Danielle feed a stray sick frog and was thrown in. The girls came up with their own lines and did an excellent job. I was the lion in the corner and just had to prowl and roar whenever someone mentioned lion or came near. The whole evening was a lot of fun.

Today is the day of rest and preparation before the next camp comes in tomorrow. Please pray for strength and unity in the staff as we go through our last week of camp with lots of campers and quite a few new staff.