Visit to Maryland

Once upon a time, it was almost Labor Day weekend. And I suddenly had an epiphany which involved me realizing that Labor Day weekends involve an extended weekend for college students, i.e. Jessica and me. So I promptly decided that a visit to Maryland should be in order. Details were worked out, and Friday afternoon saw me zipping home from college, loading up the car, and leaving with my mom, Annetta, and Lydia. We had a fairly uneventful trip down...it's like 6 or 7 hours away, so it's not too bad.

 Anyhow, I took a bunch of pictures, so here they are.

First, a picture of their house.

And this is me, sacked out on my air mattress. The girls were so sweet and let us use their room while they stayed at their grandma's home (which is basically in their back yard).


 We went on a walk and got some cool pics...

 ...all the girls






Kevin gave us a 4-wheeler ride, which was fun and I didn't even fall off, which was good.


















 This butterfly was being photogenic.

And of course I snapped some pics of Jess and Kevin...

 And yes, for the astute among you, the above and below picture is the same one...I edited it two ways and couldn't decide which I liked better.

The next 4 pictures are a series of attempts to make grass mustaches. Apparently harder than it looks ;)

 And then Monday afternoon we loaded ourselves back up and headed home!

And a summer went by...

Well technically, there's still summer left. It's not over. Definitely not. But still, a lot of it has gone by, as evidenced by the people who are flocking to college, the cooling weather, the pretty leaves beginning to appear on deciduous trees, and in fact, the calendar. I hope you guys had a great summer. Mine, as you've seen rather sporadically, was also great. Busy, but great.

My last week of camp went well. I was particularly excited because Sunday evening before the family campers arrived, I was informed that some friends of ours would be camping that week (for those of you in the homeschool circle, this would be Cheyenne Ada's family, minus [sadly] Cheyenne Ada herself, but including her eldest sister + husband). It was the first week that I had actually previously known campers, so I was excited to have some familiar faces to talk to!

During this last camp week, I actually wrote down like a page in the back of my devos book, with the intent of using said scribbles as material for a blog post. Here they are, with my after-the-fact explanations in brackets:

-Monday night, serenading Strawberry Hill with Moose on the Loose [a camp song. It's about a moose. He drinks juice.]
-Considering after said serenading that it probably would be considered a distraction. [Distractions here being the ultimate offense. Not penultimate, but ultimate. For real.] Oh well. One cannot live one's life under the shadow of "what if Joel had been there?!"
-Chris, Hannah, and I did two wagon rides [i.e. led the silly songs during the 20 minute wagon ride]. Lots of fun. Nathanael [tractor driver] even joined in, singing and doing the motions (while driving)-- including putting his hands up on the roller coaster [a small hill. It's BC's version of a roller coaster.]. We all screamed at him. I later saw a couple people who said they'd been on my wagon, and they indicated that it had been fun.
-Capture the Flag: scrapes and bruises. Stupid road. And we didn't even get first place.  [Internally wincing here. Ouch.]
-Plumbing leak: still under investigation. Getting very close to solving.
-that awkward moment when you get an encouragement note and you can't decipher the handwriting...
-Sunday night craziness: "Doin' him well...delish!" Next morning: "Last night's conversation is starting to set in..." I'm here for you, friend...
-Jo [roommate] talking in her sleep, sitting up in her sleep: "Okay, I'm done talking in my scary voice now!"
-changing messy diapers-- Carson :( [Thankfully he was wearing a one-piece outfit the day his diaper got so full it fell off, otherwise it would have been worse than it was. And that was pretty bad.]

That last item leads nicely into my next topic: nursery. Vanessa, Emily, and I were the chosen ones. Chosen nursery ones, that is. See, when we have family camps, we offer a nursery for the smallest munchkins so that their parents can enjoy chapel, the other adults can enjoy chapel, and the speaker can enjoy chapel. The first week, we just like had one child, and he was cute and angelic and good. And I even got moved out of nursery into the 2-5 year old chapel because at Bethany Camp, we don't need 3 staffers to one child. The second week we had 3 kiddos, I think. We had a little girl who sat on my lap for most of it, but she was good and didn't cry. And we had two boys, one who was very big and liked to throw things, but they were good and played well together. And the last week (week 4) we had like 3 kids who seemed to take turns coming, and they were good and only cried some of the times. Buuut, the third week. Oh, the third week. My goodness...week three.

So, like, Monday night, week 3, we set up the nursery for the first chapel. And I use "we" in the sense of "the maintenance boys." It was their job to set it up for us twice a day. So they set it up, and we were like all excited to meet the new children, cause we'd seen some of them move in and they looked small and cute and bursting with infant goodness. Enter child 1. And child 2. And a screaming child 3. And suddenly child 1 and 2 are screaming also, and as children 4, 5, and 6 are handed in, they likewise join the cacophony. Except the littlest one was only 7 months old, so he didn't really cry, but he did need to be held, or watched if he was sitting up, because he had this nasty habit of face planting at the most unexpected times. And then he cried.

 I don't think they stopped crying at all that evening. We sorta had a constant roar for the hour and 10 minutes of chapel. And the kitchen staff and maintenance staff and media staff were moved with compassion and pity and came and offered words of encouragement to us as we soothed unsoothable babies, and then they were moved with a sense of becoming deaf and moved away. In fact, on Tuesday, after the morning chapel, the maintenance team gave the nursery workers a gift. Really, I think it was the best gift I have ever received. Here, let me show you a picture.



 Now, if you're anything like me, you're staring at this small yellow packet and wondering what in the world it is. But if you turn it over and read the directions on the back...


...it all makes sense.

I am happy to say that by the end of the week, we had minimal crying. They would cry a bit when they were dropped off (possibly for old time's sake), and then would get distracted by toys, windows, flies, or other objects such that they could play until they got picked up. It was a challenge, but please understand I'm not complaining. I hope you see the humor in it (as I'm starting to)! It was one way we could serve the families throughout the week, and even though it had its moments, we were glad to do it.

To give you a slightly better idea of what a family camp week day looks like, I took a picture of Thursday's schedule.

As you can see, we have various activities in the morning that we sign up for at our 8 am counselors meeting. Babysitting is a big part of family camps, and the afternoon activities are listed too. Thursday evenings are a little different than normal, because the adults have a special dinner while the kids have a picnic (and teens eat in the bistro). Then they have an auction, where they sell items that families donate, and the proceeds go directly to a specific camp fund. 

To close, here is the link to my Summer 2012 facebook photo album: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.512283412118855.133151.100000116021992&type=3&l=c12c80a973

Have a great week, everyone!

Well, hello there!

So...kind of a lot of stuff has happened since last post:
-second youth camp week
-encampment
-family camp 2
-Jordan's graduation party (and getting to see Arielle for the first time since her wedding back in December)
-family camp 3

-Jessica heading back to college

So let's take this topic by topic and just do a basic rundown type thing, starting with...

...Second Youth Camp Week
Oh my goodness. So the first week I had five little angelic girls. Sure, we had our moments, but they were good little campers. For the second youth camp, I had 9 kiddos, and we had our issues. It was a lot of fun, but let's just say that communication, being kind with our words, not crying, not missing our mommies, and being encouraging were some main themes. It was honestly rather overwhelming, especially that one night I was trying to do one-on-ones with them and we kept on getting interrupted with medical issues, homesickness, and fighting. I am so thankful for Vanessa, the counselor in the other room n our cabin. She's pretty cool :) And Wednesday afternoon, LauraBeth came back to camp after a missions trip, and she co-counseled with me until I left Friday morning for encampment. She's pretty cool too, and a lot more experienced than I am, so it was great to have a second person there. Coincidentally, I think I got the closest to this cabin of girls (as opposed to youth camp one)...we had great conversations and games and activities. Okay...let's move right on to...

...Encampment!
I left camp Friday morning, and Maj M and I drove out to Scotia. We arrived sometime around 2 pm, and I sorta moved my stuff in, met the two other cadet med staffers, had dinner, listened to a presentation on handling conflict, and hung out and rested. Saturday, the inflights arrived! For inprocessing, we pretty much stood at our little station and asked the cadets about their medical information. We had paperwork for all of them, but we still wanted to be able to put a face to a name and double check everything.

For the rest of the week, we pretty much did your standard encampment schedule: classes, drill, tours, mealtimes, drill and general knowledge inspections, sleeping, showering, etc. The med staff pretty much took care of sick people, and followed flights around to be on hand should the need for a medic arise.  We did have some legit sick people, but a lot of it was heat related (passing out, headaches, dehydration, nausea-- those symptoms mean you need to drink more water, rest, and get in  a cool place, folks!) The rest of the encampment staff was great. I was impressed with how flexible the flight staff was with us-- "Hey flight commander, this cadet is going to lay down...be back later!" "Okay, sounds good!" And they made definite efforts to hydrate their cadets and keep them cool. And they were concerned for their cadets and would check up on them during their off time and stuff, which was sweet of them.

Probably the most interesting happening was the epic thunderstorm. It had to happen Tuesday night (I think it was Tuesday), because that was the night I was wiped out, exhausted, and crashing. "Evacuate...we're going to the dining hall!" Oh great. So we evacuated our tents and cabins and were transported down to the dining hall where we stood around getting organized for a couple hours, and then slept (with sleep being a general term here). But hey, you know, it was interesting experience, and I didn't die and (bonus points) nobody else did either!

It was really cool having Hosanna there too. I mean, we've gone to a couple CAP activities together, but it was just really nice having her there for a long activity with me. It was just cool to share it with her. And speaking of her...she has the distinction of being the encampment honor cadet, out of 210 inlight cadets!

Moving right along, we shall next explore (*scrolls up to see what it is I'm talking about next*) aha, family camp 2! Yep, the families came, had a good time, and left. (I'm getting good with being concise, yes?)

Jordan's grad party was awesome...food, volleyball, friends...good times! The reason this paragraph is short is cause I have picture that should go in here, but seeing as I'm excessively lazy this afternoon, I shall create another post in the near future with photographs and so forth.

Family Camp 3 was last week. It was during this week that I began to ponder the deep issues. Being at camp does that to ya...you start thinking and wondering about the important stuff. You know, you see or hear something that gets the ol' noggin humming, and you think about it and ponder it. Let me explain by asking you the question I've been churning over: why is it that mothers talk to their small children in third person? Consider this sentence, overheard at the pond: "Mommy's not going to take you on the boat because Mommy's afraid the boat will tip over!" And I'm standing there thinking, why? Why the third person? Does Mommy think her child will forget who she is halfway through the sentence and sit there going, "who in the world is this woman talking to me??" And then it gets worse when Mommy starts using the child's name too: "Mommy doesn't want to take Austin on the boat, because Mommy's afraid the boat will tip over...does Austin want to go swimming instead?" Because you know, children can't understand personal pronouns! 

And then there's volleyball: "Hit the ball! Yeah...hit it! Hit it!!" Like...what do they think I'm planning to do with it? Eat it? Yeah, I eat volleyballs all the time and have to be reminded to hit them. Am I overthinking this?

This week is our last family camp, and the end of the summer camp season. We have a staff outing to Darien Lake this weekend, which Annetta and I might be attending. Jessica left this morning to head back to college. Daddy and Josh are driving her down. They're stopping at Kevin's home for a couple days and then Daddy and Josh are coming back.

There. Whew. Life update! With no pictures at all! I told you I was lazy this afternoon. Wait...I have one picture for you. This is me with Vanessa (on the left) and Joanna. The three of us are roommates for family camp (cause we obviously don't sleep in the cabins with the families), and they're great...I'm going to miss them! https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-snc7/s720x720/309077_396072157126879_2042847328_n.jpg

On that happy note, I hope that everyone is having a great summer! The End.

Family Camp 1 and Youth Camp 1

Oh hey...I should blog today before I go off and vanish for a couple weeks. And this time I will try to hyperlink the pictures for you.

So two weeks ago (like, not last week but the week before) was our first family camp. It's where a bunch of families come and basically have their family vacations at camp. Here's a quick, one-paragraph summary of that week: Our support staff kept all of their positions, and those of us who are counselors (hint: that's me) were given assignments every day. During chapel time twice a day, we were all assigned either to the nursery, the 2-5 year old chapel, or the youth chapel. That way, the parents could focus on their adult chapel without worrying about little kiddos. I spent most of my time in the 2-5 year old chapel. We played some games, sang some songs (Father Abraham, Jesus Loves Me, those kind of songs), listened to a Bible lesson, and made a craft. Then, during the activity times, we were assigned a specific activity that we would go run. Thatway the parents could split up from their little kids if they wanted to, and they could go play soccer while small munchkins made sand castles or drew chalk art on the basketball court. And during mealtimes, the counselors were interspersed amongst the families to assist where needed. So that's that.

Last week was the first youth camp. Let me explain a tad how the youth camps are run. We have two camps running concurrently, split up by age, and these two camps are on totally different schedules. The 3-5th graders are called Discoverers, and the 6-8th graders are the junior highers. So we've got our 4 little kids cabins and like 6 big kids cabins and we keep th elittle kids and big kids separated. I had a cabin of 5 Discoverer girls. They were all 8 years old except for one nine year old. Here we all are on Day 1: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p768631268/h9b083e4#h9b083e4

Here they all are, getting ready for their swim tests: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p768631268/h3c87a042#h3c87a042 In order from left to right, we have Mackenzie, Haley, Jade, McKayla, and Alicia.

So...our theme for this summer is Superheroes. Which means that each cabin makes up its own superhero at the beginning of the week, and then later on in the week, they have the kids dress up their counselor as the superhero, and then take pictures of it...and then put them online. Last week, my cabin's superhero was unfortunately Crazy Penguin. I'll let the picture say the rest :P http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p556944517/h1f450759#h1f450759 And this is all of us Discoverer counselors, portraying our superheroes, Jordan as Banana Man, Vanessa a Raunbow Woman, me as Crazy Penguin, and Luke as Oak Man: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p556944517/h1f450759#h786b77c

We had a pizza party one of the nights: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p556944517/h2703f486#h2703f486

Playing gopher ball... http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p556795851/h2997aeee#h2997aeee

This is a water game that somehow turned into "Get the staff!!" I got soaked. Completely. http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p548221800/h32849c20#h32849c20

Obstacle course: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p548221800/h20cf8dff#h20cf8dff

This is Mackenzie and me going down the water slide, snapped milliseconds before I plugged my nose. Those slides terrified me, but Mackenzie and I went down like 7 times and now I can stand at the top and jump onto the slide instead of sitting at the edge and just sliding. I am making progress :)  http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p548221800/h21a8bb82#h21a8bb82

Okay, here's a funny story. So during staff training, Joel warned us that some time during youth camp weeks, he would usually take the counselors to the little superette in Sinclairville for ice cream and a chance to relax and hang out without all the kids. That happened on Wednesday evening (actually, no clue what day it was, but I think it was Wednesday), when Joel told Jordan, Luke, Vanessa, and me to get n the van. He was just like, "Get in the van." And then he hopped in and took off going like 60 miles an hour roaring off to Sinclairville. We figured out what was going on halfway there or so, walked in, grabbed some ice cream, and made our way to the back where they have little tables set up. And because it's Sinclairville, their decorations consist of stuffed fish and deer heads mounted on the walls. The one directly above our table was white. Joel was making conversation, and he pointed out that the deer head was white. So I, being all logical and stuff wondered out loud how long that thing had been hanging there to get that white. Those of you who know more about deer that I do (like...all of you) may now start laughing as hysterically as Joel did. Apparently, there are albino deer who come into this world white. And so that one was an albino deer that got shot and stuffed and hung. So, joke of the week. Haha.

Anyhow, this week I will be doing the same thing...different girls, same schedule. Friday morning I will be heading off to encampment, so I'll be missing like the last 26 hours of camp, but it should all work out fine. As far as i know, I'll get back from encampment on Saturday, and then I'll head back to camp Sunday evening (that's two weeks from today). Hosanna will be leaving Saturday (I think?) for encamoment, and then coming home with me. So we'd appreciate prayers for all of this...me for camp and then med staff at encampment, end her, well, it's pretty tough as a basic at encampment...they keep you challenged!

And now I'm off to pack! See you all later!

Sr High Week

I took all of like one picture this week, and I don't even have it on this computer. BUT...Bethany Camp has a great PAO multimedia team (is that what they're called in the non-CAP world? It's the people who take pictures and post them online.). So I am currently going through five albums to try to find some good pics to share with you.

My week consisted of preparing food, serving food, cleaning up, and eating the food. It was a very food-oriented week, which was cool. Another thing that was cool was I found out on Friday that one of my good friends there is the niece of one of my mom's best friends in high school.

This picture is the guy who was our special speaker all week. His name is Mark Davis. http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p637081454/h2acfe8b#h2acfe8b

These slides go down into the pond. I went down once, and i got water up my nose and it hurt and then my lungs hurt and I coughed and stuff. But right before I went down again, they ended swimming time, so I was saved by the bell :P http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p806560733/h3097d949#h3097d949

This is a picture taken inside the bistro (that's a long e sound...beestro), whoch is like the snack and games shop. We had all our staff classroom training in here. And the guy in the white t shirt on the right was our other special speaker for that week. http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p806560733/h2561f694#h2561f694

You can kinda see the end of the water slides in this picture: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p806560733/h32b6c12b#h32b6c12b

This is most of the kitchen staff...I think it's just minus three of us: http://photos.bethanycamp.org/p884772576/h1d4554e8#h1d4554e8 Except the guy isn't actually on staff...he just liked to serve meals to the kids.

This week is the first family camp, so we'll have lots of families coming in. I think Joel said we'd have like 115 (or 150...not sure which) total, with 86 of them being kids. I did not dare to ask how many were under the age of 5, but my guess is that 85 will be.

And with that, I'm going to go finish packing, eat some food, relax, and head on back! How are everyone else's lives going?

Staff Training Week

So! Last week (Sunday evening through this afternoon) was a long, full week of staff training at Bethany Camp. It was a week full of class sessions, games of mafia, trying to win freezy pops, learning how to play tons of different games,  and meeting lots of cool people. Sadly, I have no pictures, so you'll just have to use your imagination.

For the most part, Monday through Thursday was split between class sessions and games. We had a staff handbook that we read through and Joel the program director added on and led class discussion and stuff. And then there was a big, long list of activities that they offer, so we had to learn how to play those. Then on Friday and this morning, we did a lot of camp clean up and other projects because we had run out of staff handbook to go over. I drove a cub cadet (no...that's not a little mini cadet person; it's like a 4 wheeler. Actually, it does have 4 wheels. I have no idea what the difference is between a cub cadet, a gator, a rhino, and a 4 wheeler. Perhaps nobody does. Perhaps it doesn't matter in the slightest.) and moved a lot of chairs. Now my arm muscles hurt.

I stayed in a cabin with all the other girls. The guys technically stayed in the same cabin, but it was totally separate sides and I didn't even know they were there till like Thursday or Friday. So no wonder we had hot water issues in the morning...so glad I shower at night :P I have to go back to camp tomorrow by 9 pm, and I'll be working in the kitchen. It's senior high week, and they don't need all the counselors, so I'll be learning the camp ropes from a slightly less stressful position.

Speaking of ropes, I really do need to get a picture of the super tall and long zip line they have, and their scary swing. Some of you know how bad I am with guesstimating (whoa, spellcheck even says that's a word) height and depth and length and stuff, so I'll just say that they were both really tall. And I screamed both times.

But it was a good time...very fun and all that. I hope to be able to write a blog post during my free time (unless I decide to, like, sleep) and then mail it home for a sibling (hello, Annetta!) to type in. And perhaps pictures will appear at some point this summer. Thanks for reading!

Summer Schedule

Howdy, folks! This blog post shall contain my estimated schedule for the summer, so that interested parties will be able to keep track of what I'll be hopefully doing. I will be working at Bethany Camp, besides heading off to the NYWG encampment for a week and a half. While at both, I don't anticipate having any computer or cell phone access. I imagine I'll be able to send and receive letters (at least at camp), so I'm sorta hoping that I can write a blog post every now and then and just mail it to Annetta and have her type it in. (Oh yeah...because I won't be needing my phone, I may lend it out to people in need so that I don't have to pay my uncle $22/month for nothing, so if you call or text me, be aware that although I'd love to talk to you, I might not answer or respond.) I'd love your prayers as this will be an interesting summer :) and I will be praying for all you as well, hoping that you have a successful summer!

Ok, the dates.
17 June- 23 June: This Sunday through the next Saturday is staff training week.
24-30 June: first week of camp. I have to be at camp by like 9 or 10 Sunday night, and I'm done around 2 on Saturday. And repeat all summer :)
1-7 July: second camp week (family camp)
8-14 July: third camp week, also the first official youth week. I will be responsible for munchkins...eek! :P
19-28 July: Encampment staff dates. The 19th is a Thursday, and I don't know if I will be trying to work like in the kitchen for Mon, Tues, and Wed of that week, or if I'll just take that off. But if I have time off this summer, that'll be when.
29 July-4 August: family camp again
5-11 Aug: third family camp
12-18 Aug: fourth family camp

If I manage to get myself accepted to SUNY Fredonia, classes will be starting (I think) on the 27th, so I will have a little over a week to crash :)

Ok, so for what it's worth, there it is!

Home Life Update

Life continues to happen, here at our house (and presumably at yours too, although there is little blog activity to support this broad assumption of mine :) ). I shall now contrive to give a general catch up, and then move into some pictures.

Topic One: Grandpa is now living at our house. So a little timeline is on March first, he went to the hospital. He then moved to another hospital, and then was transferred to a nursing home nearby. Then on Tuesday (May 29th), he came here to our house. We have converted the second downstairs bedroom from a school room back to a bedroom, and that's where he is. So far, he has done about 90 % of the dishes for us, so we're happy, haha. An occupational therapist named Steve came today to evaluate him, and their goal is to get him back to his home, living relatively independently.

 Jessica is currently waiting for some important people someplace to decide to have her as an intern for someone important someplace. Apparently, someone important needs an intern (a paid intern) someplace nearby, and so Jessica was recommended and she applied for the job and now they just have to say yes. In a nutshell.

I'm working a few hours per week at the local library, waiting for camp to start. On June 17th, I'll be going to staff training, and then I'll be gone pretty much completely until August 18th. I was informed  not too long ago that management at the Comfort Inn had decided to let me go (cause that sounds better than fired), so I basically don't have a life. I'm excited about this upcoming week, though: on Tuesday, I'll be job shadowing an occupational therapist, on Wednesday I'll be driving Annetta to a job interview at Bethany Camp (which we're so hoping she'll get!), and then on Saturday, a good friend of ours is having a highschool graduation party which we are all looking forward to! As far as college goes for me, Patrick Henry College did accept me, but due to changes in their financial aid policies, I'm looking to attend SUNY Fredonia this fall.

Okay...moving on to the pictures! Last Sunday, Jessica, Annetta, Rachel, and I went on a beachside picnic. Except...it sorta rained for a while, so we picnicked in the car, and then strolled leisurely along the scenic beach, enjoying the beautiful view, that is the part of the view that we could see past the large clothespins clamped firmly on our noses because Lake Erie stinks. Anyhow, on the picnic, we had brownie cheesecake, and it was very delicious. I'm sure that Annetta and Rachel won't mind me sharing these pictures with you of them eating said cheesecake.

 After our picnic, Rachel's family sporadically decided to go see Avengers at the theater, and we sporadically decided to go along. So we did and it was fun!

Moving on to Monday, which we all remember was Memorial Day... We watched a parade with our relatives, and then we had a picnic with those relatives. The next 4 pictures are from the cousins beanbag toss game. Victoria and I were on one team, and Annetta and Jess were on the other.

  Observe my facial expression here, and compare it with Victoria's in the next.

 It must be the genetics. I mean, look at those identical expressions! We're obviously related.

 And then we got a shot of the cousins. Awww....look at us being all related and stuff!

 My mom celebrated the day by reading in the shade.

  So did Hosanna. Like mother like daughter. Also, Hosanna is presiding over her Memorial Day Parade loot...the kids always go prepared with large plastic bags to carry all their candy.

We now move on to Monday evening, which was Katrina's 6th birthday celebration time.

 We invited our neighbors over, especially because Reuben happens to have the same birthdate too...just 13 years apart. 

 And I think that catches us all up!Thanks for reading!

My Weekend

Edited to add: Aaaaannnnddd.....I was assigned to medical staff! So for encampment, I'll be checking cadets for blisters and making sure they all stay healthy.

******************
I had a relatively interesting Saturday. It started at 3 am and ended around 11:30 when I crashed on a cot of dubious quality.

I applied for a cadet staff position at the NY Wing encampment, which is this July. Last weekend was an encampment staff workshop. Essentially, it's where the cadet and senior staff members get together, have some classes, and the cadets get evaluated and possibly interviewed for the positions they applied for.

So Saturday morning, my alarm started going off at 3 am. And I was disciplined and actually got myself out of bed right away and didn't fall back asleep like I typically do. Plus, it would have been embarrassing to show up late for my ride (or miss my ride!) just cause I didn't get up. So I got up. And I hopped into my BDUs, grabbed my backpack and sleeping bag, and gathered up some breakfast. My mom drove me up to Buffalo, and Hosanna came along to give us company. We found the rendezvous point without difficulty, and the other cadet who was riding there too showed up as well. Maj A, our driver, overslept by five minutes (ha! so glad it wasn't me!), but he got there right around 5 am. I got to ride shotgun the whole way out to Scotia. It was roughly a 4 hour drive...one 5 minute break, and the rest was straight cruising.  All I can say about the driving is I sure hope Maj A didn't pay too much for his music CDs. I hope someone gives him new music CDs for Father's Day. Hey...a person can hope, right?

We arrived around 9 am. We signed in with the registrar and plunged into a full day of activities and people. There were classes (held in the dining hall) and group leadership projects. For the classes, I propped myself up at a random table and looked awake and cognizant. I also took notes to help appear more functional. Some of the classes were on time management, what leadership is not, and goal setting.

The group leadership projects were more hands on. I was assigned to bravo flight, and we had 10 people in our group. We would go to the assigned location where we were given an assignment. We would go about completing this assignment (example: a treasure hunt, minus a treasure at the end, but complete with the difficult to understand, rhyming clues) while being followed by senior members with clipboards. And we did rather quite well, I thought. We came together as a team, we listened to each other, and we had some people who were able to stand out as good group leaders. And there's nothing like listening to  and participating in a 45 minute long guided discussion on fairness, justice, and leadership with a group of young teens. It made me feel better about the future of America.

We switched between classes and GLPs until about 6:30 or 7 (with breaks for lunch and supper), and then we watched a movie (Remember the Titans, if anyone's interested). Then it was time to clean up the dining hall (in which I managed not to fall asleep while sweeping), shower, and go to bed. I was assigned to Cabin 2, and I found an empty cot to stash myself and my stuff, and I slept quite well. Except for the crows. You know...some people have annoying roosters that wake you up before dawn with their noise. The Stratton Air National Guard Base doesn't have roosters-- it has crows, parked conveniently in the trees surrounding the cabins we slept in. And I detest every single one of them. Who needs alarm clocks when you have crows?

Anyhow, Sunday morning was getting up, packing, eating breakfast, and going home.  I got back around 2 or 3.

Obviously, the end result of the workshop was to be selected for staff. However, until the staff positions have all been officially announced on the NYWG website, I can't say what position (if any) I got. So I'm gonna just publish this as is right now, and when it's formally announced, I'll just to an "edited to add" thingy at the top.

Maystuff

Yo...sup? It's May, and it's warm and green here. I'm listening to the Cocoanut's playlist and blogging.So anyhow...last blog post I alluded to the upcoming and eminent visit of the D family (Kevin's family). Now I shall proceed to blog the pictures that I found on my camera. I love when I plug my camera into my computer, copy them over, look through the pics, and discover lots of cool shots that I didn't take.

Jess and Kevin had a safe trip up. They got here a little after 7 Wednesday evening, a full half hour before googlemaps said they'd be here O_O Speaking of whom...here's Mr. Green Shirt himself:

 He and Josh had a very manly arm wrestling competition after the oldest kids got back from visiting Elizabeth and Reuben that evening. 

 The next day, all of us kids (minus Josh and Katrina) went shopping for groceries for the weekend. Who knew that Aldis and Walmart were so...umm...interesting? We had time to stop at The Green Tearoom for smoothies and hot drinks before heading home. Then we took a walk, went to the Civil Air Patrol open house, and came home. The rest of the family had *just* gotten there like 10 minutes before us, so we walked in and met the family. They're such sweet people, and we enjoyed getting to know them.

Here we have Mr. and Mrs. D, Catherine (the youngest), and a camera-shy Josh.

 This is Lisa, Michael, Andrew, and Stephen. We were sad that Christina (their oldest) had a prior commitment and couldn't come.    

 And wow...apparently one of my siblings was creeping on Mrs. D??

 This is Josh's Nerf gun. And yes, the only reason I knew what it was was because it is written on the side of the gun. Josh had such a blast playing with boys and guns...the boys brought some guns with them. I'd tell you what sort of gun they are, but I haven't the foggiest.

 Ah, Mr. and Mrs. D, in a candid moment.

 Delicious cookies being reserved for Friday night supper.

 A Nerf...bullet?

 Saturday morning, we all went to the Luensman (sp?) Overview Park. We admired the view and took a nature hike. This is me taking a picture and telling everyone to look casual.

 Some of us ran down to the bottom of the hill, and some of us remained on top and took pictures of those of us who ran.

 Then we started out on our hike. It was like a mile long, and it was perfect.

 In which I take a picture of someone taking a picture of someone taking a picture.

Me: "Michael! Look epic!"
Michael: *smiles*

Stephen leads Catherine, Hosanna, and Kevin on a daring venture.

Hosanna and Joanna strike stunning poses. 

Lydia tears a small tree apart and goes on a violent rampage.

 The party poses for a group picture, taken by a friendly hiker.

 Kevin bounces Katrina up and down on a branch.

 Lisa explores across a downed log.

 And we found an adorable salamander!

That evening, we had a few friends over for a picnic and kickball...sadly, I have no pictures of this. The next day, we went to church, came home, had lunch, played some games, and then bid our guests goodbye. They made it safely home around midnight. Andrew has a lot of super awesome pictures on his camera, so if he puts them online, I'll try to at least post a link.

Thanks for reading!