I spent the last week in Big Bear, CA. Snuggled with my husband? No. Swimming in the lake with my husband? No. Walking my doggies? No. Corralling 103 teenage girls? YES. I was called to be the assistant girls camp director for church. For the last 4 months, my co-pilot Deanna and I, have been planning, organizing, and preparing for the last week. I have to say, I am pretty pleased with how everything went down. We got great feedback from the girls and other leaders for our timely organization and well planned activities and speakers. It was a lot of work, but well worth it. Our theme this year was B.O.O.T camp (Build on our Testimony of Jesus Christ). Everything was army themed. Each A-frame was a different country and they were responsible for decorating their A-frame to represent the country. The older girls, in charge of helping plan were the USA. The spirit at girls camp is always so beautiful. I appreciated being able to be around so many girls that were going through so much. High school is rough and when you struggle with standing alone, it really makes life that much harder. Many of the people we had speak to the girls, spoke about testimonies, about being "all that they can be", but on so many different levels. Some spoke about being a missionary, one spoke about personal trials in their life and how trials make you stronger. One spoke about a Bee. And how hard a Bee has to work to fly because their wings are too small for their body, but they do work and they work really hard." When the world gets you down, know that with the help of Christ you can 'Bee' all that you can. It was all very wonderful! We went to the Lake one day. We had a pretty awesome Obstacle course day, which included a rock wall and team building games. One afternoon we had each cabin act out a skit which involved random items that they received in a bag. They had to either wear or involve the item in their skit. They got creative and there were some pretty funny skits! One night we had the older girls (this was their last year) do a fireside. They each had to choose a scripture hero from the Book of Mormon or the Bible. They had to talk about the war that hero fought and how they overcame that war. Also how could they relate and how did they overcome it. It was a very spiritual night and I appreciated the girls strength and courage in sharing their experiences. As a service project, each girl wrote multiple letters of strength, courage, and comfort to missionaries serving in the stake, to veterans, and to those currently deployed.
{Paris, France A-frame-this cracked me up!}
Deanna Reid and I (Pilot and Co-pilot) we had a blast!
I love camp because it allows you to look outside yourself and serve others. A friend from down the mountain, Kristen Meza, baked me these cupcakes just because. The girl below broke her foot right before coming to camp but she really wanted to come. This other girl helped her get around. Love SERVICE!
We had so much fun! And grew so much! I loved watching the girls light shine!
Camp song: Nephi's Courage (Armies of Helaman)
{side note: listening to these girls sing this song together just brought me to tears it was so powerful}
Camp Scripture: 2 Timothy 2:3
On the very last night its tradition for the older girls, whose last year it is, be taken on some late night adventure. Well the entire week some of our girls were less than involved with the camp and we just weren't sure if they quite deserved it. But we piled them in the car with one stipulation, they had to wear an item that was brought for the skits. They played along nicely. We piled in the cars and drove. There werent many fun places open at 10pm in Big Bear, CA as everything closes pretty early. They were convinced that we were going to Denny's because every group goes there. Well we drove passed Denny's searching for a gas station. We wanted the girls to think they only earned a soda from a gas station haha-evil-we stopped at a 7-eleven and got them Slurpees. Then we acted like we were heading home but actually headed to Denny's. They were so excited and were so wired I felt horrible for anyone in that restaurant. Needless to say the girls had fun and we were glad to leave them with good memories.
It was the 100th year of Girls Camp so we decided a way to honor it would be to write 100 blessings that we have received or receive from girls camp. PRICELESS LOVE!
We did it! We made it through CAMP!! We are tired and ready for a long nap! But it was an amazing experience!
