WHITE LAKE! Kids/Teen Camp

I spent a little over two weeks at White Lake Covenanter Camp, serving as the team leader for the RP Missions team. This was seriously the best mission team/counselor team I have ever served with! My teammates were Stasia Finch, Debbie Shafer, Evelyn Ashleigh, Kayla Milroy, Jackie Werts, Sidney Camery, Gabi Chamberlain, David Pinkerton, James Allmond, Nate Oliveiri, Quinn Coulton, David Donath, Josh Donath, Peter Merkel, and Connor McCracken.

Never before has a team of counselors gotten along as well as we did. Nobody was an outsider, nobody was badly behaved or causing trouble. There were no schisms or cliques. We all got along GREAT. We laughed, sang, danced, teased and played our way through everything. Not to say it was always easy. We tackled a lot of jobs during prep week, including gathering TONS of firewood from the woods, cleaning most of the buildings from top to bottom, and planning all the kids camp lessons. Thankfully, with such a big group of counselors, we were able to check jobs off the list very quickly. We also spent time during prep week sharing our testimonies with each other. This was a great way to learn about each other, recognize where everyone was coming from, and, as a team leader, notice how I could encourage and support my teammates in particular ways.

Kids and Teen Camp went so well. We had about 50 campers altogether, which meant that with such a huge staff keeping track of the kids wasn't too difficult. Pastor Micah Ramsey was the teen camp speaker and he was very well-received by the kids. He spoke on the person and work of Christ. The kids camp counselors taught on various miracles and parables of Jesus, and did lots of fun activities and crafts. In the evenings we played Humans vs. Zombies (a big hit!), had a dress-up the counselor night (I was a pirate -- I'll post pictures soon!), and had a carnival one night run by Mike Tabon. Another night everyone was so relaxed and having fun that we ditched the evening activity altogether! Several counselors and campers pulled out instruments they'd brought (a banjo, violin, ukulele, and guitar) and we spent the evening just sitting around listening to them having an impromptu jam session, while others played volleyball, basketball, and ping pong, or just sat and talked. It was such a relaxing night and I think it speaks volumes for the counselors that the kids were happy to just spend time with their counselors and friends.