Junior Camp 2012

Last week the four of us girls went to Junior camp at Hidden Haven Christian Camp.  Abby was the camp photographer; I was a Family group leader and Sophie was a Family group leader-in-training.  I have almost no pictures of the week...I'll have to steal some of Abby's pics...

Chapel

I went to camp every year I was able to...I think from 4th grade up until the summer after high school.  I loved going to camp!  I was happy to be able to go again, we went once in Virginia but that was 6 or 7 years ago.

Sophie and Molly enjoying snack time

Hidden Haven is a small camp; a girls dorm (with two sides to it, and a large meeting room in the middle), a boys dorm (two different sleeping places), an open air chapel, a snack shack, a mini golf course (rather run down), a large playing field, and the dining hall that also houses the staff room and nurses office.  This year there is a new swimming pool that is nice.  There is a lake...if you can call it that.  No swimming in there or even boating...so what's the use?  :)   I missed the beauty of Victory Cove, the camp I went to in McCall, Idaho.

Molly on the Rhino by the mini golf course

Anyway, it was everything church camp is supposed to be...lots of spiritual stuff but lots of fun mixed in.  Fun highlights:  playing kickball and going down the slide on the hill.  Spiritual highlights:  praying with a girl who wanted to accept Jesus into her life, and helping baptize Molly.

Sophie organizing the 3-way tug-of-war

Molly on the slide

Abby and Sophie are at High School camp this week, I hope they are having a good time!

Sophie in a skit

Molly and her favorite leader, Kaitlyn

Baptizing Molly

All done

The whole camp

Numbers

It's been almost 7 months since we left Japan.

It's been one year today since we learned we would be leaving Japan earlier than expected.

 It's been two years today since we first arrived in Japan.

It is hard to explain what that country has done to me...how scared I was to go there....how much I had to grow there....how sad I was to leave...how I think about Japan every day.

Is it the country itself?  The native people there? Or just the friends I had there?  Many of them have left Japan themselves.  I'm not sure.

Does my heart just always yearn to go back instead of forward?  An old friend recently told me they thought I also longed for the place previous to where I was when I had met her, so maybe it is true.  I need to find a place of belonging...and the longing for the past is greater until I do find my "niche" in the new place.   I haven't found my place here yet.

Independence Day 2012

Andy had a day off of work for the 4th of July, so we decided to take a day trip!

He wanted to go to Ft. Scott, KS and check out the old fort there.  I didn't get many pictures there.
 

After some lunch, we went to Gunn Park, and enjoyed walking on the trails there.  Kiki was such a happy dog, we let her off her leash since there were so few people around.  We actually didn't see anyone else on the trails!  It was hot, and in the middle of the day, so maybe that was why.  She walked right into the lake and sat down to cool off.  Now we've got a wet dog!  So we had to walk around some to give her a chance to dry off some.

We took a meandering route home...stopped at an old battlefield site but it was closed....Drove through Garnett and looked at the houses we could have bought...picked up some Sonic blasts....found a nice lake and campground near Garnett...

We got home and ate dinner, then decided to go try to see some fireworks.  Our town didn't have any, but the little town about 15 miles away from us did.  We've seen some really spectacular firework shows, so I wasn't expecting much, but I was pleasantly surprised at the show this tiny little town had.