camp-ishness

I wrote this blog post last year when I returned home from Kids Camp. Somehow I must have never punched 'publish' because here it sits. I didn't go to camp this year - I am staying close to home these days. But camp happened anyway because so many amazing people stepped in and up to love and lead....so this blog post is a tribute to them. 


I appreciate you all so much - Song Han, Emily Devereaux, Rob, Carson and Jennifer Woodring, Brian Cotsworth, Russell Blackstone, Mark Wolf, Roger Edgar, Crystal Ecton, Lori Newell, Suzanne Van Hoorn and the amazing 9-year veteran leaders Clark and Natalie Zaunbrecher and their team of musicians - Mike Cook, Ben Cook, Shaun McCormick, with Jamie McCormick and Susie Brooks as creative and practical inspiration and Z boy fun. 


Kids Camp - Summer of 2011


I went to camp last week. 
With about 250 little kids. About 70 adults and some babies. 
I pretty much love camp - so much that I do this every year with two friends and their church kids and mine. We sing and play and do skits and crafts and swim. We eat camp food and wear camp t-shirts and do camp cheers. We get really hot and exhausted and usually a few people throw up. 

We figure out how to get along when we are hot and tired and not in our own beds at night. Sometimes the toothbrushes don't ever get used. We loose our socks and towels and end up with friends hairbrushes and underwear when we get home. We compromise on who gets the top bunk and sometimes everybody ends up in the top bunk. Somebody tells us Bible stories and life stories, we think and we pray and we are inspired to love well and we are loved well.
Misfits fit, sad people start to smile, people who wouldn't ordinarily hold hands, do.

I am always the oldest person at camp. But I think I learn the most. Here are some things I've put to memory....


- an amazing amount of freedom is discovered when you just choose to say 'yes' more than you say 'no'
- it's best to be flexible all the time
- it doesn't really matter which 8 year old wears which bathing suit top as long as everyone has one on
- bacon bits and banana pudding can be a whole meal for some people
- small children are sometimes very wise
- small children are sometimes unfathomable 
- if you listen closely at prayer time you do, without a doubt, hear the heart of God
- parents are amazing
- one good dancer can bring more joy to a room than free ice cream
- short sentences are best
- adult campers experience a refreshing child-like-ness 
- often people who don't appear to be listening are listening
- take the elevator, the golf cart and an extra water bottle whenever you can
- there's more freedom in saying it, doing it, being it when you get home than before you left for camp...just because you've been to camp