A Week at Camp

Elijah had a BLAST being a day camper for the week. He was in cabin B1. My nephew Andrew and our friend Nicole (Coco) from Fortress were two of his counselors.


You sit with your cabin at mealtimes - here's Elijah's cabin waiting for the food to be served.


They celebrated 4 birthdays that week just in their cabin - they wore transformers party hats when the cake was served. He had lots of cake! :-)


This is a shot of the dining hall when it's full for mealtimes. After each meal, the campers clean off the tables and the counselors put the tables away. This is where Judah and I spent our mornings - he had the whole room to run around in while I helped my mom with things. The volunteers in the kitchen had lots of fun playing with him too.


On Weds night, they have a talent show. Elijah's cabin did break dancing to some hip hop music. It was hilarious and I was really surprised that he did it. I think the little boys in his cabin must have showed him what to do - you can't see much from this picture but I had to try to capture the moment!


For the week, each camper picks 4 special interest classes to do - one for each day Tues - Fri. Elijah chose soccer, kickball, canoeing and fishing. Here he is at canoe time. The girl in the red shirt is Lauren - she is a camp assistant for the summer and helped Elijah out during the day since he was a lot younger than most campers. She was really sweet and he enjoyed her.






Judah's "assistant" was Abby - she is a volunteer for the whole summer as well and she LOVED my Judebug. She was such a big help with him.


Elijah's favorite time of the day was swim time from 2-4. This is the swimming hole:


He spent most of his time playing on this waterfall.




After lunch every day, I would take Judah back to my mom's cabin for his nap. He always woke up around 3, so we would head down to go swimming for a little bit after he had a snack. Here he is with his cousin Katherine - can't you tell how much he LOVED swimming??? :-)


He's saying "Get me outta here!!!"


Mealtimes were a bust with Mr. J! He got really picky while we were there because he figured out what kind of pans the bread and dessert came in, and he would literally refuse everything else until he saw what he wanted. It was so frustrating! He is getting better but is still being a little stinker at home!


Every afternoon, the campers would have CKC. Chillin' and kickin' it in the cool air, up at the dining hall. Elijah enjoyed coloring with some of his friends.




I don't have any pictures of Thursday night because Judah was tired and it was past his bedtime so I didn't get to go. But on Thurs nights they have a Crucifixion reenactment. They also did that when I was Jason and I were counselors out there. The counselors are the ones that act it out - it is always really powerful and moving. The campers and audience participate in a way, and the counselor that plays Jesus really gets beat up a little bit. People come from all over to see this every Thurs night - it is a real turning point with a lot of campers and is one of the many things that make Camp of the Hills really unique and special.

On Friday night is the banquet and awards ceremony. The dining hall is always completely decked out and the campers love to dress up for it. Remember that most of these kids are from the inner-city and come from a rough home life so they love dressing up, being escorted in and having a fancy dinner. It makes them feel really special.

This particular Fri night was the night before July 4th, so the dining hall was decked out in celebration of Independence Day!


Elijah's cabin:


After dinner is the awards ceremony. All of the kids get two unique awards and then go through a hug line of every single counselor. This was always one of my favorite activities of the week. The counselors go crazy clapping & yelling for each kid and then that kid gets lots and lots of hugs.


Elijah received the "Happy Camper" award and the "Good Listener" award. I was so proud and a little emotional. It was really strange watching my own child go through the hug line. I remember doing that for other people's children when I was there, and to watch my own son was a full circle moment for me.


Here he is with his certificate of merit from camp with two of his cabin friends. We found out that the one on the right, Dorian, was being adopted the next day and was really excited about it.


That was our week at camp in a nutshell. Elijah can't wait to go back and do it again next year! Maybe he'll be old enough to sleep in the cabin on his own. I love that he spent the week with children of a different race and socio-economic status than him. I hope that he grows up to appreciate the differences in others and the unique way that God created each one of us. When we left he told me, "Mom, camp is like heaven and I don't ever want to leave!" Amen buddy.