chavaralife

my resolution for 2011 is “one frame a day” … trying to capture LIFEs little moments and such instead of just events. i’m doing this by taking pictures and writing a bit about each one… then at the end of the year, ill put them together in an album for us to keep. the blog is just a place to keep it all filed away until the book is made.

feel free to follow that blog instead of this one…

www.chavaralife.tumblr.com

goodwill hunting.

on sunday, my mom + mike were in town to move all mike’s stuff into his new place… the dorm.

being there brought back such fun memories from my dorm experience (it didn’t hurt that my “potluck” roommate, katie, who i lived with for 5 years- was coming to tallahassee for the night on monday). i was telling mike stories of will the thrill, being best friends with your RA, all the wonderful things that came with my freshman year. southgate 410. oh the love. it was awesome.

anyway, enough reminiscing. we went to goodwill to hunt for a desk chair for mike. of course they didn’t find it OR anything that mike needed for that matter. and me, well i found a lamp. it was only $5 to start with, but it was in the 50% off bin… couldn’t beat it.

you see, i recently got the itch to repaint our downstairs living area. the reality of having to get paint, actually paint, and then clean set in pretty fast… but that didn’t help the itch for something new in our living area. so i’ve kept my eyes open all week for good deals and cheap + easy fixes on DIY blogs this week. in hopes of finding some fun ways to change the look of our house without too much cash money without painting.

so the lamp was step 2 (step one was painting some old frames putting together some flowers in a tin canister i punched our monogram into at trail west and arranging them in a cute corner). it was obviously only $5 and in the 50% off bin for a reason, but i thought with a coat of paint, it might be just right.

wease wanted to help pull off the protective painting tape.

so i got some spray paint the same color as our awesome red couch (shout out to erin bushey for that lovely+comfortable addition) and went to spray painting town.

here’s the lamp in it’s new functional home.

i’m a fan. it is helping to have some red in other places downstairs instead of just on the couch. and i think it’s starting to satisfy my need for downstairs change. i have another item that is in the works as we speak. details on that probably tomorrow.

for now, i leave you with a picture of the wease… back where he likes to be too

whirlwind.

sometimes i really do feel like i never quite get my feet under me… not necessarily in a negative way, i just feel like i am constantly moving. back in the spring, i was in tallahassee for 3 weekends… one in february, one in march, and one in may (although the may one, jason was in NC- so it was just me & i undertook a major bathroom/laundry room renovation). all spring, we kept talking about how we couldnt wait for summer. ahh, mystical summer. the season in younglife when things “slow down” – aka- weekly meetings cease while leaders & kids are on vacation.

somehow, summer has come and gone in the blink of an eye.

we had an incredible month in colorado. what a privilege it was to love on those amazing college aged girls and families who were guests at trail west.

jason then got to go to capernaum camp, where he had one of the best week’s of his life. followed by 2 GLORIOUS weeks in tallahassee and my favorite week of the year- family garden city beach vacation.

and last week, we were so blessed to be a part of tallahassee young life’s camp trip to sharp top cove. oh wow. picture this, 74 teenagers, 15 leaders, 7 days of non stop fun. kids getting the chance to be kids. leaving behind things that teenagers should never have to see. they got to experience the Love of the Lord in every moment, whether they realized it or not. and I, casey, got to be a part of it. i am still blown away that the Lord is using me in the lives of teenagers. i feel so inadequate, and yet there He is- calling me to walk beside them and love them all the more.

i LOVE weeklong younglife camp. i LOVE that we get to bring teenagers that we have been pursuing all year to what we guarantee will be the best week of their lives. i LOVE that younglife camps stand up to that claim. i LOVE that kids who are angry getting off the bus on day one wishing they never came are the same kids who are laughing and smiling on day 7, never wanting to leave. i LOVE that real transformation happens when we begin to understand the depth of REAL LOVE… the LOVE of Christ.

as my teenage friends came home this week, many of them choosing to live in the reality of Christ’s love for them for the first time. they have a new sense of their value and identity- no longer trapping that in who they used to be, but surrounding it in the promise God makes to us in 2 corinthians 5:17- that the old is gone and the new is here. we are new creations. when one chooses to live in the reality of LOVE, it changes everything. it sends everything into a whirlwind… causing radical change. in the best way.

i hope and pray that if you’re reading this, that you might know deeply right now that you too are LOVED DEEPLY and immeasurably. no matter what. no matter who you think you are, what you’ve done, where you think you’re going. HE LOVES YOU. “you [insert name here] are my BELOVED, with you i am well pleased.”

i leave you with 6 snapshots into the lives of my friends and their week’s at sharp top.

garden city beach.

i love the fact that my family has taught us to value family.

i consider it an incredible blessing to know my cousins deeply and enjoy spending time with them at least twice a year as a group.

currently feeling bittersweet as we all separate and go our separate ways. this year goes into the books as one with incredible sunsets, lots of laughter of little kids, many a nertz game without keeping score, quality relaxing, and priceless conversations.

capernaum camp.

jason got back from capernaum camp last weekend. he had the gift of spending 5 days at southwind with 4 special needs campers, one special needs leader in training, 2 high school leaders and his partner in crime- charlene. the 9 of them had THE BEST WEEK EVER.

im not sure if you can see this without being logged into facebook, but let’s see.

here is a video slideshow of the week that jason made. check it out.

drew, one of the most photogenic + happy people i’ve ever met, wrote this letter to God at camp. what a sweet picture of our ability to love the Lord back… ” I love you too…. You’re my boy.” I LOVE THIS.

hope you know today too that YOU ARE LOVED!

celebration week.

in younglife camping there is a saying that your 3rd week on assignment is “week only.” it’s the week when things start getting repetitive and it becomes easy to think that we know what we’re doing, and therefore things start slipping from excellence to mediocrity.

i must say, our summer staff, work crew, and assigned team took the “week only” mentality seriously and treated last week as if it were our only week here… because for our guests, it was there only week.

now, here we are at the celebration week. our 4th week. a week to celebrate what the Lord has done this month not only in the lives of our guests, but us as well. it’s getting bittersweet as we do our welcome for the last time, eat sunday night thanksgiving dinner one last time, and so many more lasts.

pray if you feel led, for our time as it comes to a close. pray that we would finish strong and close things well with our summer staff kiddos. going home to what our culture considers “real life” is so hard… because really, what we’ve experienced this month is more REAL than most things we know. people LOVE WELL, are intentional, are purposeful about our calling as believers to love the Lord and love people with all we’ve got. as we head home, the world comes crashing in. pray for us as we prepare along with our 22 college students to re-enter that world.

last week, jason signed us up for trail west’s signature ride… wrangler breakfast. you wake up earrrrly, get to rancho cabello by 615, hop aboard a horse and follow a trail ride to breakfast awaiting you in the woods. jason was on a horse named joe, and i was on willie. ironic because jason’s dad (joe) has a brother named willie. we thought it was too funny that out of all of the horses available, those are the 2 we get assigned.

at wrangler breakfast, you stand on a rock with a plate covered in “stick-em butter” (syrup) and matt, our wrangler breakfast summer staff cook, tosses french toast to you. you hang out on the rock until you catch the toast. it’s too fun. below is daniel (my summer staff male cohort) and his son, nathan, catching french toast.

cute decor at wrangler breakfast.

thursday night is when the culmination of our programatic story comes into play… younglife calls it the OPERA. in our story, it turns out that the i dont care bear was left a long time ago at a river by his owner, blogun (pictured far right). blogun saves the day by “finding” the i don’t care bear and making him remember who he really is… frances, his toy bear. the i don’t care bear becomes the i DO care bear and redemption is everywhere!

friday, AJ, jamie, and jason (dressed in character) sign the picture below for the kiddos to take home and remember the week. these guys really are celebrities around here.

last week, there was one 4 year old girl named myers who had it out for the IDCbear. she spent her days trying to figure out who it was. myers took an egg from the rodeo last monday to hit the IDCbear with it. she would break sticks in half and say that is what she wanted to do to the IDCbears’s arms. she was intense. she was passionate. she did not like that he didn’t care.

as soon as the opera finished, she ran up to jason and said how much she LOVED the i DO care bear and was his biggest fan for the rest of the week. i love how passionate she was. her emotions so easily switched and she didn’t hold a grudge at all about the IDCBear. she just LOVED him after he was “found.” don’t i wish that we all were so easy to move past things and love people well.

lastly, we took our summer staff picture on sunday. aren’t those people just wonderful looking! trust me, they are and i love them very much and am thankful for each and every one of their stories and willingness to serve and be my friend.

the continental divide.

this morning jason+i (along with the rest of camp) drove the 30 minutes to the continental divide. the day was covered in the bluest skies you’ve ever seen, coupled with chilly air and sweet friends.

80s dance + snow

weekends at trail west are filled with lots of cleaning and then some more cleaning. as soon as guests leave saturday morning, we start to turn over the lodge and get things ready for the next group of families (they will be arriving in about an hour and a half!) who come on sunday afternoon. in the midst of lots of work, saturday nights always promise to be filled with fun.

last night we had an 80s dance after dinner + our all camp meeting.

oh wow. check out all of those lovely summer staff faces. ridiculous.

also ridiculous, our very own AJ as DJ DEXTER and his lovely bride erin as they sing a duet.

meanwhile, it rained & stormed all day yesterday. the snow had almost completely melted off of mt princeton… and then when we woke up this morning, this was the beautiful sight to behold…

military week.

welcome to week 2 at trail west… military week.

this week, all of the families at camp are military families. there is a group of incredibly generous donors who raise hundreds of thousands of dollars so that 35-40 families can experience a true, real vacation. so for 2 weeks every summer at trail west, it is an entire week of military families.

the stories from these families are incredible. there are 3 moms here with their 4-8 kids each while their spouse is deployed. there are families here who have just been reunited from being apart due to deployment for up to 16 months. there are families here where one of the parents will be deploying in july, and this is their last time together as a family with freedom for who knows how long. the stories are heartbreaking and heartwarming. most of these families don’t know anything about younglife. it’s such a gift, blessing, JOY to be able to serve them this week as they serve our country day in and day out sacrificing so much.

here are some pictures from the last couple of days…

the rap.

for your viewing pleasure, a snippet from last night’s meal.

here you will find mac & merle mustang… extreme adventure wranglers- wranglin’ up fun for everyone. like life in a bottle, they live life full throttle.

and you will find the i dont care bear interrupting them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgN4x8W9iwc

enjoy