So another week is ending here at Wesley Woods and what an
amazing, love filled week it has been. New friendships have been made and the
love of Jesus has been spread to 150 campers and to 40+ staff members. I am in
constant awe of how amazing this place becomes for so many of us. There is a
draw that keeps us coming back. I’ve been trying to figure out what exactly it
is this week, but I haven’t found the answer yet. I have been to this camp as a
middle school camper, a middle
school camp nurse, and now a high school camp nurse. I feel like I have grown
so much as an adult from when I first started as the camp nurse, that is seems
like I was two different people. Seeing the younger staff members here this
week makes me realize how much my life has truly changed. Maybe it’s the baby
who has really changed me (which is probably the case) but either way, I have
grown so much over the last 8 years.
This week was different for me in that I had the baby with
me, and no back-up baby sitter. Many times when there is a baby here, there is
somebody who is here just for the baby and doesn’t have any responsibilities
for camp or campers. I didn’t have the luxury this year because nobody could
come spend a week here in the woods! I knew we would be fine because Evelyn is
pretty easy-going and really happy and we don’t have THAT MUCH responsibility
as the nurse when it comes to being places and participating in activities.
That being said, I don’t feel as though I could be apart of camp as much as I
normally am. I participated when I could and Evelyn and I joined in as often as
possible. By the end of the week, we had a pretty good routine down.
It was especially cool here this week because I got to see
some of my old middle school campers here as high schoolers. Many of them I didn’t always see in the
nurses cabin as middle schoolers, but I would see them at activities and get to
know them at meal times. I saw some familiar names on the camp list this year
and I was excited to see these campers grown up! It is really special to see
these kids growing up and enjoying camp the way that I enjoyed it. Probably the
coolest thing this year was getting to experience this place with high
schoolers that are almost adults (& some already are) and are facing real
troubles in their daily lives, and seeing the emotions and the relief &
hope this week gives them. If this one week can impact them for the better, we
did our job this week. We impact their lives by building relationships, giving
unconditional love and having a whole lot of fun.
We did a color run game one night which was so much fun! It
down-poured that night and helped make the activity even more crazy than it
already was. Imagine 150+ people in mostly white t-shirts, throwing colored
cornstarch on each other in the pouring rain in the middle of a big open field.
It was all sorts of crazy, but it was amazing. Chapel was great, as always the music was rockin’ and we had
a great time. I’m sad I didn’t get to experience firebowl here at high school camp, but I know
this isn’t my last year here and I will get to have that experience another
year. 
We had not one – but TWO dress up nights. Thursday night at
our cookout we dressed as our favorite characters from movies. I didn’t have
much time to put together an outfit, so Evelyn and I were super-nurses. Kinda
lame, but at least we had outfits! Friday night is the senior send-out night
and we dress up in nice clothes and have previous campers come back and serve
everyone our meal at dinner. Everyone looked so great in their dress clothes.
Some of the boy campers had some seriously nice suits on, and the girls had
great (camp appropriate) dresses!
One of my final memories from this week is that of the
affirmation circle. All the love and affirmation give here in this place by
people who were strangers at the beginning of the week is incredible. I didn’t
think I would be able to be apart of the circle time tonight because of
Evelyn’s sleep schedule, but by a camper with a headache, I was able to come
down and have my moments of affirmation. Four minutes of people coming up and
telling you what an amazing person you are fills you with such unending joy its
hard to put into words. We do not acknowledge all the wonderful things people
do for us in our lives enough, and it was so great to have that time tonight.
The bonds formed here are like no other. Its been an amazing week.
It was great to be experience this with Evelyn, in this place
that means so much to me, for the first year of many years to come.
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