Winding down 9/5/06

Winding down  9/5/06

 Everyone asks me at this time of year, "Is summer winding down for you?" Well, yes it is....it feels a bit like fall already. The leaves are changing, and there is a chill in the air in the evenings.

The summer actually peaked for me pretty early. We started with a "break" week in May for college-age young people....great Bible study times with Jon Brower, swimming hole hikes, a day on the lake, a day on the rock. It sort of gets us in gear for June and July.

My busiest time was from that week on until camp started....prepping for summer camp....signing up campers and counselors, ordering materials.

This "prep period" peaks the second week of June, when the collegiate staff gather for 10 days of training and team-building. We start with a two-day backpacking trip (we canoed down the Chatooga this year), sort of a purging time, hour-long solos, campfire worship, prayer, Bible study.
Collegiate Week continues with training at the tower, the pool, the target ranges. Kitchen policies. First Aid. How to handle problems like homesick children, How to lead a child to Christ. Later the collegiates teach these all this to the CITers, so we have to get it right.

Once Teen Camp starts, the whole thing should be steering itself. This June I didn't get much of a break though ....I was still looking for one-week cooks and counselors all thru teen camps....and I came up short Teen Two, so guess who ended up as chief cook?!! But it was wonderful how God supplied help at every meal that week, and counselors for every camper, all summer long. It is all God, none Joel.

July started with CIT week (first time we did it that way, and it worked) and then three weeks of Junior Camps. Other than the 24 hours we spent cleaning up the toilet spill in room three, it all went smoothly. And August was good, TOO HOT but there is lots of water around here and a breeze up on the ridges.

Labor Day weekend was the final "winding-down", two more days in the wilderness, this time with a couple of my back-packing buddies. God is good!!

Joel