celebration week.
June 22, 2010
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.
