Joy.

This week has been one of, if not the best, weeks of my summer. All the kids. That's right. ALL of them, continually showed me a love, compassion, and joy that could only have come from Christ. Every morning I was greeted with hugs, multiple hugs, from my campers. Every activity, regardless of what it was, was met with giant smiles from all of the campers and they were filled with excitement. This joy, regardless of the situation, was especially important this week because it rained for two of the days and we were not able to do outside activities. But the kids made the best of it, and I absolutely enjoyed it, even after the twentieth game of Gaga ball and seventeenth time that I hit the ball out of nine square.

On top of all this constant joy, at least four of our kids came to Christ this week! I had the joy of explaining to the kids what that meant and they wanted that to be a part of their lives so badly! So, I got to pray with some of them and it was incredible! Even when there was thunder and lightning and chaos outside, there was a peace and love just abounding inside at camp.

I was completely in awe of God's love this week as it was poured out on me through his children.

Also, this week we had a talent show where me and my friend Melody sang a mash-up of Beautiful Things by Gungor and What Makes You Beautiful by One Direction. The other acts even consisted of one where they did Scene 6 of the skit we have for the kids each morning. But instead of Michigan Smith being as child-like as normal, there were lots of Soap Opera-esque themes presented. So, it's implied that I was dying of laughter all night.

Only one more week of this. Bittersweet.

I love my life.

Don't you look my monkey in the eye.

This week was the last of our weeks at Oakpointe, the three largest weeks of the entire summer. It was a great week, filled with many moments that I would hate to forget. One boy that was a cause of most of those moments was a little German boy named Henri. He was a six year old amongst my group of ten year olds, but you would never have guessed it based on his maturity level and his very low voice. It was like talking to a tiny adult. So, in normal Heather fashion, I found this completely adorable. One day, Henri, in all his adorableness, with his low bellowing voice, comes up to me out of nowhere and says: "Heather, don't give me a hug. I don't want one." So, of course, I give him a hug. His response: "You love me too much." Now, read that again. But in a really low voice and imagine it coming out of the mouth of a small blonde six year old. I could not stop laughing. Another Henri one-liner occurred while he had a small green monkey hung around his neck. Henri furrowed his brow and stared up at me as I looked down at his monkey. "Don't you look my monkey in the eye!" he said in his bellowing voice. I lost it again.

But the greatest Henri moment was that in which he overcame fears that his mother had informed me about. Our activity was the eurobungie, in which you are hooked into a harness attached to bungies and are lifted above a trampoline. The bungies make you jump super high and give you the ability to flip mid-air. Basically, a dream for any young child. But not for Henri. "I'm not doing it!" he insisted. I asked again and again and assured him of the safety and how much fun it would be, but he was not having it. To keep his trust, I did not force it and told him if he wanted to tomorrow I would take him on it. The next day, his mother comes up to me and explains that he was embarrassed and scared to go on it in front of people. So, we are at the rockwall later that day (the eurobungie is a part of the same unit) and I ask him if he wants to do it again- as most of the kids are already inside at lunch so he won't have to be embarrassed. "No, I don't want to." So, I didn't force it. A few moments later he taps me on the shoulder and I turn around. "Can I tell you a secret? Come over here." he insists as he walks away from the group. I follow him and lean in to hear him. He whispers to me, "Okay, I'll do it." So, he does it. He overcomes his fear and does it. Later on, his mother and I have a good ten minute conversation about he has so many fears and how proud she is of him! She thanks me over and over (in her adorable German accent) and assures me that he'll be at camp next year!

Ich liebe mein Leben.

Wisdom from a ten year old.

"If you don't trust God you could miss out on... the rest of your life."

To God we're that camper that keeps asking his counselor: "Where are we going next?" and he just smiles and says: 
"You'll see, but it's going to be incredible.
Just you wait."

The treasure in our hearts.

Hey blog type people. Or the two people that read this blog. My cat and my mom. Also, the only two people in my phone. Jokes. My cat doesn't have a phone..

Anyway. This week was hard, as the bigger weeks usually are. I had a boy to girl ratio of 14 to 3. It was.. interesting to say the least. But it was only by the grace of God and the strength that he gave me that I made it through the week with nothing but a sore throat and a couple bruises. It's weeks like these that make the little things kids say or do the most prevalent and earth shattering stuff. One of those instances was during large group watching the adventures of Michigan Smith as we do every morning with intent eyes and yawning faces. It was the final day in Mr. Smith's search for the treasure, and we had just found out that the treasure was in our hearts. A little boy looks up from the bible he carries around with him always, turns around and stares right at me. "I knew it!" he exclaimed with the most sincere of words "I knew that the treasure would end up being the Holy Spirit!" And I proceeded to melt as I do at many camp related events. He went on to say as he skimmed through a few pages in Matthew and ran his fingers over the words: "I know how to pray! The Bible has taught me how! It's like my cheat sheet!"

Isn't it cool how even in the darkest or most stressful or exhausting of times, God still shows up and smacks you in the face with his presence? He is so good. So much more beautiful than we will ever know, but just those small glimpses make it all worth it.

I love love love my God and 


I love my life.

Elbows.

So here's a quick rundown of why this blog has been empty from my presence for the past couple weeks.

I took the week off after Hartland week (the week discussed in the previous post.)
And the following week was one that I spent half of the week not working because I was so sick. However, God was working as he always is and one of the boys committed his life to Christ! I jumped up with joy as my slightly nauseous stomach still continued to settle. God is still working in the madness. Why did I ever doubt that?

And so I guess that brings us to this week. The first week of a three week stint at the same church in Novi. This week was overwhelming, a week that we have the most campers in day camp history (the number will get bigger in the next two weeks- God is so good!). And yet, it was an incredibly fun and enjoyable week filled with God's love overflowing.

I had two campers commit their lives to Christ! One of them, a boy who had often given me trouble, surprised me as he slowly raised his hand when I asked all the shut-eyed campers which one of them would like to start relationships with our God. Then later on, as the kids were playing a game of Gaga ball, I pulled him into the corner of the gym and we prayed. I stood up after the prayer and just stared at the ceiling, enthralled with the goodness of our God. A big dopey smile covered my face as I walked back over to the rest of the children with him at my side. This boy even offered to pray after small group and as we all sat there, with our spaghetti fingers interlocked, he prayed for the health of his mother and sister who had gotten into a car accident. So quick was I to judge this boy for not listening all the time when he was really going through some difficult stuff. God was moving in my heart as well as his.

And on a very random note, all week we played a game with the counselors where we tried to lick each other's elbows without the other person noticing.

One of my friends even tried to lick a child's elbow.

I love my life.

Grace enough for us.

Today marks the last day of week 3 in Hartland, Michigan. This week I had the babies. No, not infants. But in Day Camp world the babies means the youngest age group, the 5 and 6 year olds. They are a handful, but never short of adorableness. The week was filled with squeals from me (and some jokingly disappointed looks from my lead, Phil) as I drowned in puddles of cuteness. One boy, Drew, who is in the picture above became my best friend. He cried when he was brought down from the rock wall, saying that it was terrifying and he was scared that he would have a bad dream. We prayed together against the nightmares and he looked up at me, smiled, and insisted that we hold hands on the way to our next activity. Soon we were holding hands every where and I was overdosing on the adorableness of the situation, but it didn't stop there. Two of my campers, Carlos and Rylie started to show signs of having what a 5 year old might call a "crush" on one another. They ate lunch together and Carlos insisted that they hold hands when they were walking. And finally, one of the most adorable moments of all was when we were all going around praying and each kid said what they were thankful for. Many of the kids said things like: "Thank you for my family." and "Thanks for letting us come to camp." They were all typical 5 year old answers, but it got around to one boy and he thought a little about it and said:

"Thank you God for giving us grace."

I love my life. 

Dirty socks.

So today. Was stressful. And exhausting. And my kids did not listen all day. I had to give them a lecture about respect multiple times and strict Heather (who I do not like very much) was basically with me all day. But in the midst of the madness, God was working.
Every Wednesday the counselors share their testimonies with the campers. So, today was like any other Wednesday in that I shared the story of my Father's health issues and my Aunt's death as a child that made me see the strength and joy that faith can give me. So, the children listened intently and asked a couple questions about kidneys (which made me giggle) and that is when the Holy Spirit started to move.
It started with a couple questions and then more and more questions. And soon kids were asking me about where God came from and why would God want to save us, which lead to incredible discussion about how God loved us so much that he sent Jesus.

One of my campers put it like this: "We were once a dirty sock, but then we were put in the washer of the Holy Spirit and came out a clean sock."

I love my life.

Chi-town.

Today was our first day off since training and since we have another week in Indiana, many people just stayed around here for the weekend. This morning at 9:50 AM me and around 10 people from the team got on the train from Chesterton to spend the day in Chicago. It's about an hour ride. We sat in the seats that faced backwards. My body didn't enjoy that. But I didn't look out the window and just made jokes about Seinfeld and how I could think of countless train puns. Finally, we got there. And I traveled forwards as we made our way to Millennium park and that big giant reflective legume. Also, there's a giant fountain where giant faces squirt water on my Chacos and little children run around and splash water at me. It was really hot, so I gladly got splashed as the happy children ran by. Basically, the rest of the day we spent walking and eating and walking and eating again and walking while eating and eating while walking. We had amazing Chicago hot dogs- with pickles! And we went on the Ferris wheel at navy pier. I tried to spit on people as they walked by but the wind just picked up my saliva and it flew out into the bay. Also, did I mention that everyone was instagram-ing everything? Like "Hey let's go get Fro-yo!" "Hold on, I gotta instagram this upside down sepia toned picture of this crack in the sidewalk." But the whole day was hilarious. And my stomach hurt from laughing. And probably also because we ate everything from pickles to cheese and caramel popcorn. Also, the train station was full of people dressed as zombies.

So I guess you could say that place was pretty dead.

I love my life.

Haha.

One of the characters in the play that we do for the kids is named Blacktooth. The guy who plays him is named Steve. Steve walks by.

One of the campers: 

"Oh hey! There's goes that blackdude!"

Dominick.

Today marks the last day of our first week of day camps. I cried when my campers left. Honestly, I did. I hid my head behind my clipboard and tears fell out of my eyeballs. "I'm going to miss not having you around," is what one of my campers said to me as he hugged me and walked away. I melted. "I love my life!" I screamed as soon as all the campers had left. Because the joy of the week was just exploding out of me. I kicked my bruised toe against the wall as I just reveled in the love of my campers.

This week, two children joined God's kingdom. This little boy named Dominick was the first to, as my boss put it, get me some salvation points. But I just shrugged and pointed upwards when he said that. "I don't get the points. The big guy up there does." The story of Dominick's "salvation points" is one that caused me to have a huge across my face as I ran across the lawn of the front yard of the church. I sat with him on the hot cement at the corner of the church parking lot as he repeated after me a version of the sinner's prayer. He looked up at me as we finished praying. "I just feel so invincible!" he screamed. I melted. This melting thing is quite commonplace for me at camp.

I love my life.