i'm still alive!!

just wanted to post and let you all know that i'm still alive!! and, i wanted to request that you all pray for me, because i'm going to "real" school this year! *gasp!* so, today there's a retreat for my grade, all this week is preseason for soccer, and school actually starts the 4th! so, if everyone could pray for me, it's all really new!! and, i probably won't be posting as much, but i'll try to post whenever i can!!

camp's staff rocks!!

how do you all like it?? i just finished it...




btw, i hope to finish the post about friday @ camp soon...

Jesus rocks my face off!!

so, friday (july 27th) was our last day. :( it started out really cool at 6am, though! :) with, drum roll please, the black band!! :) the black band, for all of you who don't know, is a swimming band, where you have to swim across the lake. it's basically bragging rights! ;) so, they had a lot of girls doing it this year. the way they do it is, you wake up at something like 5, they tell you stuff, boat you across the lake, then you swim back! it's really fun to watch and cheer for everyone, even though you stand on the dock for a while between when they boat them across and when you can actually see people. a bunch of staff kayak and canoe across with the girls, and they're probably the best part! they're awesome, they're always singing some crazy song at the top of their lungs. they're great! :) i guess zach decided to show us his mad talent this year! he was standing up in the canoe, paddling and singing "I'll Be" all at the same song (he has a really good voice, too!)!! it was awesome! :) so, a lot of girls from ashlee's cabin did the black band, but only kaeleigh in my cabin didn't. :( she did an awesome job, and she tried really hard, but she said she started swallowing water and choking, so they threw her a life vest. :( sophie said she's going to do it with kaeleigh next year. everyone did an amazing job, i know i would never be able to swim the black band! so, a round of applause for everyone who at least tried!
so, after the black band, it was only 7:30, so we had breakfast after! yeay! god breakfast! :) it was waffles and it was really yummy! :)
after breakfast, jodi talked about being full of/drenched/overwhelmed with Jesus! that, my friends is the best way to witness to your friends. we need to get full of Jesus' love! overwhelmed means to be buried or submerged. we need to be overwhelmed with Jesus' love! people need to taste the pudding before they want to know what's in the recipe, a.k.a., you need to show them Jesus' love before they will want to know about it! :) get to know and love Jesus, then share Him! one of the verses we talked about was john 15:8, "this is to My Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be My disciples." we need to prove to others that we are Jesus' disciples by abiding in Jesus. ways to abide in Jesus-- by having a desire, praying, spending time with God, reading the Bible, etc....
for quest today, we had waterfront for both quest times. at the beginning, we had a obstacle course/race thing. i think we got 3rd place. after that, we had free swim, and meghan and i went kayaking! yeay! that was a lot of fun!
after water front, we had tacos for lunch!
during free time, i played soccer with caitlin (my former jc, who is now a counselor! yeay!). she had challenged me to a game a while ago (i think it was last spring), and so we were able to play! :) it wasn't really a game, we just kinda kicked the ball around, but it was a lot of fun! :) after that, maryann, madison, kealeigh, meghan, rachel and i went kayaking! that was a lot of fun, too! :) i love my cabin!
for dinner, there was a cookout at the bbq pit with hamburgers and hot dogs. patti, lacey and i were able to take a picture of our rings together, and the pictures came out really cool!! when we first began learning the verse at the beginning of the week, jodi said that if every single cabin came up to her and performed the verse for her, the counselors, jodi, patti, lacey, kelsey and the band would go in the lake with their clothes on!! well, the deadline was dinner today, and *drum roll please* every single cabin in camp did the verse! it was the first time ever that that happened!! go girl's camp!! :) and our cabin were the first ones to do it! :) woop!
so, after dinner, we had chapel. the singing and awards were in the gym, and then we went up to the amphitheater for jodi's message. the amphitheater rocks! :) jodi talked about how we can't do anything apart from Jesus. how God wants us to do great things. She talked about how Jesus didn't go to the talented, popular people to be His disciples, but He went to the rejects. if Jesus tells us to do something, He'll give us the power and everything we need to accomplish it. it doesn't matter how huge, insane or crazy it is!! the disciples needed to learn that they couldn't do anything by themselves, without Jesus. she talked about how we can't do anything without Jesus. it's NOT US!! it's ALL GOD!! we have to keep going back to Jesus for everything we need. He gives it to us to give to others. even though it may not seem like it, Jesus always provides. it's always God working through us, not us. God can use ME to do amazing things for Him!! :) but i need to be doing it with Him, because i can't do ANYTHING apart from Him!! if we believe Jesus can do amazing things, He will do it!! we can turn this world upside down for Christ!!
after chapel, we had a "sleepover" in the gym (where we all hang out in our pjs in the gym and dance and do sleepover thing [a.k.a. hair and nails])! those are always fun!! they played high school musical songs, and it was insane!! everyone knew all the words, and everyone was just going insane!! kelsey and lacey went up and did a dance with a bunch of other girls!! it was so much fun! :)
because the whole camp said the memory verse (it was the 1st time that had happened!!), jodi, patty, the band and counselors jumped in the lake after the sleepover!! it was awesome!! :)
i miss camp, but i had an awesome time!! :)
sorry i don't have pictures, i can't find them!! once i do, i'll post them!!

goose girl and ender's game

meghan told me to read the book "goose girl" because apparently it's a really good book! i thought it was o.k. (kinda weird at times)....it was kinda boring at the beginning and for most of the middle, except for little splatterings (how do you like that word?? lol!) of action here and there. but the end is really good!! or at least that's the part that i liked the most!! :) the author, Shannon Hart did a really good job on the end! now i have to go request "enna burning" because my library doesn't have it....

i have to read "ender's game" for school (*gasp!*). well, i don't have to, but i thought it would be interesting. it most definately is interesting (like in kinda strange). it is a really weird book. i'm only about 1/3 through it, but it's been really strange.

icons...

last friday to saturday, ashlee had her birthday party, and some of her friends slept over. it was really fun! we watch the really old Disney movie "B.R.A.T. Patrol" and stayed up talking about the usual things (boys, random stories....interupting random stories with random comments, you know! ;)) until around 2:30 or sometime around there! lol! :) it was a lot of fun! thanks for inviting me ashlee, that was very nice of you! :) we had to wake up pretty early for our paper route which kinda stunk, but oh well! so, before breakfast, meghan, sophie, emmaline and i (with others checking in occasionally) made a bunch of icons! it was a lot of fun, meghan had a bunch of great ideas! here they are (i think they came out pretty cool!)--










and another one i won't put unless a certian person (*coughhinttreecough*) allows me to! :) i thought they all came out o.k., all were meghan's ideas, except for the "fine be that way" one which was emmaline's idea! :)

btw, i'm gonna try to post about friday at camp soon...just have to find that valuable thing called time...

i wonder...

does cake still taste good if you forget the eggs??




whoopsie!

power and priviledge

the lake looked like a winter wonderland thursday morning (july 26). it was really cool!! :) for breakfast, there was scrambled eggs, sausages and muffins.
thursday morning, jodi did the message instead of kelsey. she talked about something she had talked about 2 years ago. i am a hose, you are a hose! :) she talked about how we all are hoses. we are either a spiritually dead hose (not connected to the power source), a spiritually just alive hose (connected to the power source, but no water flowing through), or a spiritually living hose (a connected and pumped on!). we were created to know God (knowing His love, and having it flow through you). how to get cranked on-- believe God (we have to believe God can use us), and let go and say yes to God!! it's not about us. God's love flowing through us is meant for others. get them wet!! are we spiritually dead, just alive, or alive and pumped on?? we need to reach out to others outside our comfort zone, and soak them with Jesus' love!! the verses we talked about were, john 15:15 (vine and branches, if we aren't abiding in Jesus, we can't do anything), john 5:19 (Jesus can't do anything apart from the Father), philippians 2:8 (Jesus humbled Himself and became obedient to the Father to the point of death) and hebrews 5:7-9 (Jesus is the source of eternal salvation).
for quests, we had challenge course (yeay!) and field activity again. i love the challenge course!! it was a lot of fun!! it's kinda hard to explain the game we played, but we completed it! :) for field activity, we just kinda hung out in the gym and played mafia and the winking game. it was pretty fun, but i kina wanted to play kickball...oh well! :)
we had lunch on the beach, and you could go swimming!! it was pretty cool, even though we had really warm chili and chicken....lol!
oh, thursday's chill time was awesome!! kelsey, jodi, patti, zach and a couple of other people were out on the orbit, and we watched them for the whole chill time from our way awesome porch!! it was awesome! they were doing flips and pushing people off and trying to do the moon walk. zach got almost to the end before he fell off. jodi and kelsey didn't do as well, though!! lol!! we were cheering for them and disrupting chill time!! lol! :) it was really funny!! :)
during free time, i did archery, made a duct tape flower for my secret sister and kinda walked around! lol! :)
after dinner (which was grilled cheese, really good!), we had staff vs camper games!! it was soooooooo much fun!!!! they had volley ball, soccer and another game. guess which one i played...hmm hard one there. lol!! :) it was sooo much fun!! :) there were something like 50 campers against 20 staff. the soccer field was waaayyy too crowded!! oh well, it was fun. did you know that dex and zach are really tall?? i noticed that for the first time when we played against them. the campers lost, something like 3-0, but it was fun!! :) one time, dan was going to kick the ball (like a hard kick not a pass), and i stuck my foot in front of the ball, and he kicked it really hard, and my leg had the imprint of a soccer ball on it for most of the night!! that was pretty cool! (according to ashlee, i have built in shin pads) one girl told me she thinks i'm gonna go pro. she said it would be cool that she could say she went to camp with someone who went pro!! :) i was really amazed by that!! i was just like, uumm, thanks!? lol! so, yea, the soccer game was really fun!! and certain people didn't play, they just watched and used their cameras because a certain person was playing for staff. :P
chapel was awesome! :) at the beginning, we played a game called "prove it!". way fun! jodi said something, and if you though you could do it, and if you were chosen, you went on stage and proved it! john d (he's on staff) said he could do the verse with all the motions, so he "proved it!" it was absolutely hilarious!! :) pictures below! :D
we sang "all in all" and it was soo pretty. the last chorus we did with just voices and it was amazing. staff was there for that chapel, and you could hear all the girls' voices, and the men's voices in the back. it was just so cool!!
the reason why we played "prove it!" was to go with the lesson. how do we prove our love for Jesus?? by loving God and loving others! (john 13:34-35, john 14:15 and ephesians 5:1-2) jodi talked about peter, and how he was always trying to prove his love for Jesus by what he did. but he was missing one thing, his love for others. we prove our love for God by loving others. we need to love each other so that other people want Jesus' love when they see us. God Almighty's my Daddy!! :) this was her challenge: let's love God and others so much that the world doesn't know what hit it!! she asked us what would happen if 200 blasting fire hoses were lined up shoulder to shoulder?? there would be a FLOOD!!
here are pictures-

the winter wonderland lake
sophie, jaina and erika at breakfast
jodi and a fire hose
looking out the gym window
sophie
jaina
zach doing flips
jodi doing a flip
zach carrying kelsey off the orbit
girls singing during chapel
prove it!
dudududu 30, 19 and 20!
so that you may LIVE!!
...by holding fast (this is so not camp appropriate!)...
spider (not the best pic)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR DAD!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!

hope you have an awesome birthday!! i love you a lot, and you're the best daddy in the whole world! :)

victim and victor

wednesday morning (july 25), i woke up at 4:40 again, took a few pictures, and then went back to sleep again! :) for breakfast, there was coffee cake, which is really yummy!! :)
kelsey's message today was about how Jesus sacrificed Himself willingly for us on the cross. our sins held Him to the cross. He went willingly because dying didn't hurt Him as much as watching us dying in our sins did. we need to be willing to live our lives for the Lord, because He gave up everything for us. kelsey's illustration was she went out on the dock with a chair, and her brother zach sat willingly in it. kelsey taped him to the chair, and he tipped back into the water by himself. after we had counted down, 3, 2, 1, he started jumping on the orbit. it was like how our sins (the duct tape) bound Jesus (zach) to the cross (the chair); Jesus died willingly and no one had to force Him to sacrifice Himself for you (zach tipping himself into the water). but death could not hold Him for long, Jesus conquered death and saved us!! (zach jumping on the orbit after we had counted down.) the verses we talked about was 1 corinthians 15:54b-58 (victory over death), philippians 2:5-8 (how our attitudes should be the same as Jesus'), and matthew 16:24-25 (if we loose our lives for Christ, we actually save it).
counselor), for our quests, we had rock wall and field activity. the rock wall is really a rock tower, and it's pretty cool! :) even though i didn't do it, i got a bunch of pretty cool pictures!! for field activity, we were supposed to play a game on the baseball field or on the soccer field. we wanted to play kickball, but the cabin we did quests with didn't, so maryann, erika, rachel, kaela (ashlee'sjulia and i went and ran the hiking path. (maryann is a runner, so that was pretty cool!) it was awesome to do that, i wasn't sure if i'd do anything, but i did!! :) yeay! it felt sooo good to run, even though i was sweaty and stinky and gross after! :)
for lunch we had tacos, it was pretty good. :)
during free time, i had one on one with maryann. and we had the 2nd round of dodge ball!! woop!! go sidekickers!! (this time rachel played) the first round we lost, but the last 2 we won!! :) yeay! even though we didn't make it to the semi-finals, it was a lot of fun! :) go sidekickers!!
for dinner, we had breakfast for dinner, which was french toast, which was really good!! :)
during chapel, jodi talked about how the red sox paid some ridiculous amount of money to just talk to dice-k without him talking to any other team. Jesus paid with His life for the exclusive right to be in a relationship with us asked us were- what to we hold fast to/value most?? if Jesus asked you to lay down your most valuable things down for Him, what would you say?? when God calls us to do something for Him, we should give Him everything we have. we should ask Him what He wants us to do daily, and we should be excited about serving a savior who gave everything for us!! oh, !! exclusive means- concentrated upon only one individual, or one thing. our memory verse for the week was deuteronomy 30:19-20- "I call Heaven and earth to witness against you that I have set before you life and death, the blessings and the curse. So choose life in oder that you may live, you and your descendants; by loving the Lord your God, by obeying His voice and by holding fast to Him. For this is your life!" the verse says that we choose life by loving God, obeying Him, and holding fast to Him; not just saying a prayer. a marriage relationship and a relationship with Jesus should be exclusive. we should only love Jesus. a hug is a picture of a close relationship. john 15:10-11 (if we obey Jesus' commandments, we'll remain in Jesus' love) abiding in Jesus' love=hug. the greatest commandment is to love God, and we love God by keeping His commandments!! :) when we're holding onto God, we can hear His voice the clearest. Jesus never lets go of us, and He always loves us. the illustration jodi did for this was she hugged a girl, which showed what our relationship with Jesus should be like. then she got things like money, music, clothes and friends that got in between her and Jesus. if we value things more than Jesus, our relationship won't be the best it can be and what Jesus wants it to be. we shouldn't love anything more than Jesus. He wants us to be excited about Him all the time. Satan wants us to hold onto things other than Jesus (like money, clothes, music, friends, etc.). Jesus was willing to give up everything for us, we should be willing to to let everything go if that's what Jesus wants us to do. the questions jodijodi and anoli switched places for the beginning of chapel. it was really funny!! :)
after dinner we went over to granny's house for milk, cookies and stories. basically, we had cookies and milk in the dining hall while the staff did really funny skits!! it was really really funny, and the staff were awesome! :) they are all really talented! :) all the skits were hilarious! zach was a really funny timmy, his pony tail was funny!! lol!!
here are some pictures!! :)

4:39 wednesday morning
someone doing their devos
taping zach to a chair
into the water
the chair is empty!
kelsey
3...2...1!
yeay!
our bottle collection is growing! :)
hi erika!!
the a-frame chapel
climbing
2 sides of the tower
deuteronomy
jodi/anoli and anoli/jodi
things getting in the way
isaac revealing his secret identity
the lovely spiders that lived on our porch
skits at granny's! ;)
let's get the guy in the tent this time/from the north, south, east and west!!
the many uses of fluff--hair gel, deodorant, foot cream, shaving cream...
and eating! :D
poor zach! lol!
the lifeguard's beat

hero and helper

tuesday (july 24), i didn't wake up quite as early as monday morning (i woke up around 6:30). the lake was beautiful, as always. for breakfast we had sausages and eggs. :P that's o.k., though... today's was my favorite one of kelsey's messages. it was about how we need a hero and a helper. the way she illustrated it was she was eating fruit and she sat down in a chair. then 2 lifeguards (caleb and dex, just in case anyone wanted to know) ran down the beach and taped her to a chair with duct tape. after they were done, they carried her into the water and left her where the water was almost over her head. then she went under. she was only under for about 10 seconds, but it felt like a whole lot longer! then her brother zach came running down the beach (he was really really fast!!) and carried kelsey out of the water and took the tape off of her. it showed how when adam and eve ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, sin came and basically tied them up, and we are drowning and dying in our sins. we need a hero to come and save us from our sins (a.k.a. Jesus). one cool thing that jodi told us later was that when she was under, kelsey had actually called for help, even though no one could hear her. it's like how sometimes when we call for help, Jesus hears us no matter how quietly we say it. i thought that was really awesome (there are pictures from it below!)!! the verses she talked about was acts 4:12 (how salvation is found in only Jesus, and no one else can save us from our sins), and john 14:6 (how Jesus is the only way, the only truth and the only light).
for quests, we had a hike and crafts shack. the hike was pretty fun, a lot of bugs though. and craft shack was fun, too!! we made bandanna pillows, and i made a white and blue one! :)
lunch was cold cuts (you guys probably don't want to know what we ate everyday, but oh well!).
during chill time, i noticed how many bottles we had around the cabin. i ended up finding 16! so, i took pictures of all of them (though i won't post them, because you all will be bored to death!!). so, we ended up collecting them for the rest of the week. :)
for freetime i did archery, went to the craft shack and just kinda walked around until....our dodge ball game!!! yeay!! they had a dodge ball tournament, so we made a team!! we were the sidekicks, and it was me, kaeleigh, sophie, rachel and jodi on our team!! :) although, meghan subbed for rachel during this game. the way they did it was they had 3 rounds and whoever won the most rounds won! well, we only won 1 and lost the other 2, we lost. :( that's o.k., though, it was a lot of fun!! :)
for dinner, we had shepherd's pie, which by the way, is really yummy!! :)
during chapel, jodi talked about superheros and dumb sheep. :) jodi asked what the girls thought a superhero was, and this is what we came up with- a superhero is: someone who saves people from danger, a helper, someone who got their powers mysteriously, or someone who defeats evil. the actual definition of hero is- "one who is willing to risk or sacrifice their life for another. she talked about how in john 10:11-15, the good shepherd is a superhero. and how Jesus is really the only real superhero. He sees everything and everyone, and He knows everything. He can hear us when we're crying out and no one else can hear us. it kills Him to watch us live on our own, dying in our sin, and He wants us to cry out to Him for help. He is the only one who can heal our broken hearts. Jesus can help us everyday if we ask Him to. and, i am a sheep and you are a sheep!! lol!
after chapel, we had a night swim!! it was a lot of fun, even though i didn't swim. jaina and i hung out with the bugs. we also talked for a while to jodi, patti, lacey and anoli. it was a lot of fun!! we talked to jodi and patti about rings, and i found out that patti, lacey and i all have the same "fear not" rings!! that was really cool!! we took a picture of all of them together on friday. oh, and another thing, jodi and anoli were telling us how people sometimes mistake them for each other, so they decided to switch identities for the next night's chapel!! :D that was really hilarious! it was a lot of fun!! :) i love camp!!
here are some pictures--

the spot of sunlight on the lake
kelsey teaching us! :)
being taped up by sin/dex and caleb
being carried into the water
being left all alone
here zach comes to save the day!!
GO ZACH!!! WOOP!!
choose life...or death
kaeleigh and jaina
hiking
sophie at the craft shack
meghan on our way awesome porch
the bat cave dumdumduuuummmm....
the start of our bottle collection
jodi being a dumb sheep

during night swim; hanging out with ashlee, meghan and jaina
jodi/anoli and anoli/jodi
yeay for camp! :)