All our kids!

All our kids here...
(plus Don, Matt & Bella... our fearless leaders)

Well, not all of 'em.
19 of our 35 youth group kids came to camp.

It was so fun!

One of the kids' favorite things to do at Lake Bradley was run, skip, hop, and ride down the boardwalk. Up and down and up and down they'd go. And play in the sand. Coast down the ramp. Play foos-ball, pool, basketball, pingpong. They did not run out of things to explore!

It seemed that we were gonna do this fever thing TWO AT A TIME. Kev and Kennady improved by Day 2 of camp, which is when Bryson came down with 104.9 temp. And then the Mama got it, too... I was only out of commission all day on Wednesday, which took the dad out, too. Thankfully we had our own little cottage to coop up in.

I loved being there with Bry and the kids. Every one of our high schoolers helped out with our little quadratic equation. So cool. I can't wait for more big ol' family expeditions on this youth ministry journey.

Our babes did pick up some mannerisms and a few choice adjectives, so we'll have to detox the teen jargon from their sweet mouths like "uh, prob'ly not gonna happen, Dad" and "dats 'freakin' awesome." A training process for both sets of our kids... lol.

One of our girls names is Goose. And she was Kev's buddy and Kennady was her cling-on. She bribed them into sleeping one night because she said she'd never babysit them if they weren't quiet. So, guess what happened... they all three clammed up. But Kev needed his pants changed right after that and I asked him to say, "Goose," and my little man-of-few-words said, "Duck!"

Definitely a highlight of the week was being present at the Afterglow session. Thank you, Babe, for that gift. My first full session all week was that last evening session where it's just an intense atmosphere of worship. So cool. And I was able to pray with Amanda who accepted the Lord that night (totally rad!) and hear several several kids step up to the mic and share how Jesus had met them right where they were that week. I held my infant and just let the tears flow. It's so amazing to see the Spirit at work as these kids pray for each other and worship with such abandon. After Friday's session Bryan and Don baptized Amanda and then Ben. Ryan also stepped in the lake to identify with Christ. Right on! I loved it!

So, I've still got laundry to do from last week's trip, and housekeeping to catch up on tonight after the vegetative weekend we had. So worth all the preparation and all the disorganization though. Bry and I were really blessed for Christ's provision in all things. And we are so looking forward to this brand new year of ministry.

Don't stop praying for us! And thank you for faithfully doing so!