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.