"So you wanna play a game of pick up basketball or go have a two person songfest?"

I'm sure going to miss living with E-L-L-Y-N. And our Sunrise Spectacles. And drinking coffee together. And being best friends and Choctaw counselors.

LV counselors did a new chapel this morning. Maggie was a puppet controlled by gossip, materialism and anger. Then Christ came and cut the strings and gave her a new life. Mags then did a great wrap up about her life and what she used to be controlled by.

I LOVE watching my girls sing and laugh and clap in chapel. For so many of them this is their first year at camp and the first time they've experienced anything about faith. It's so cool to see them embrace all of this.

Bre is back this week in Shoshone and I love crossing paths with her.

We went on a nature hike in Nature Discovery clinic this morning. Once we were in the woods we dug up the dirt and flipped over logs to find worms and frogs. I was so impressed with the kids that just picked them up with no fear. Audrey was my worm carrier.

We filled up the bucket with six frogs and over thirty worms-- Keith said it was the best collection of the summer.

We made the zipper in friendship bracelet clinic and started making up the drama clinic skit about Lake Camp v River Camp. We had fish stars for lunch and Hopi celebrated Mia's birthday. I had chapel practice during rest hour for the first time of the summer.

Lake time is so fun. One of my favorite sights in the summer is the Richard G. filled with kids blobbin, paddlin, clay-searchin, slidin and rope swingin. Ellyn and I went on paddle boats with our campers and then went off the rope swing. We love the lake even when it's freezing.

The Choctaw girls were the first ones ready to go from the lake and we sang the Choctaw song all the way back. It was easily one of my favorite parts of the day.

We played Dominican Chaos in Main Field with Illinois and the Dots but a lot of the Choctaw girls couldn't take the heat and sat out with Ellyn. How precious are Paige and Ellyn here?

I love Alli Kenney and getting to hang out with her all summer. She has the biggest heart and loves this place so much. This week when everyone is so emotional about the end, she's feeling even more angst and joy and love than normal.

I went on a cookout dinner tonight with Smooney, Chrissy and their cabins. We decided to be really creative with our food and do some experiments. I cut up yellow apples and added butter, sugar and brown sugar to make a crust-less apple pie.

I used the balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing as a marinade and then put in avocado when it was all done cooking. Success! It was delicious.

I really just loved building a fire with Smooney, watching our kids experience a cookout for the first time, making food experiments, playing with Chrissy and getting to see all the girls go crazy.

Our last activity of the night was a scavenger hunt with Eel River. We made the girls run with their teams to count the tires on the black hole hill, get rocks from the CAC that looked like states, write CAMP T with sticks, get a mouth full of water and then come back and gargle, count the bunks in the old cabin, do 4 cartwheels, memorize the signs on Irving's hill and count the benches on the River Lodge porch. It was so fun to get to hang out with Chrissy and little Erin more before the day was done.

Back in Choctaw the girls wrote letters to one of their clinic counselors that they really love. Then we got to have devotions in a big circle with Hopi cabin. Smoon and I talked about how we're known by different names and how God has so many different names too. We sang "Prince of Peace" and talked about which of those names we connected with most. It was sweet to hear the girls articulate their faith like that.

"Rest hour is like warm up for devotions because you should be reflecting on the first half of your day. It's like a pre-devotion."

This week the best part of breakfast is our Sunrise Spectacles. We're really into embracing weird things this week and I think this will be a favorite. 

Also I'm stoked with our new clean up plan for the end of meals that we borrowed from Alex Allison. Each girl has been assigned a job-- cups, silverware, two on scraping, two on trash, red tray, wiping, napkins/salt/pepper-- and then they are in charge of their job at every meal every day. It works beautifully. As soon as we say go they all know exactly what they need to do.

I was originally in Cup Stacking first and Ellyn was in Nature Discovery. But Ellyn just happens to be allergic to nature so I switched spots with her. I get to teach with Nate and Zach, two of my CILT guys from 2010, and hang out with a crew of all these hilarious boys and two fun girls. Today we explored the Nature Center and even got to hold Squirt, the baby turtle.

2nd period I get to teach friendship bracelets in the CAC which is always a good time. 3rd period Ellyn and I are teaching drama together. I always took the clinic as a kid but don't think I've actually ever taught it before. We played improv games today and started brainstorming things we could base our end of the week skit off of.

One of the things I love about switching to resident camp is getting to see other counselors SO much more. Even just getting to see them for a couple minutes between clinics feels like a world of difference from the first part of the summer.

I love week 9 kids and hanging out before lunch. I'm so excited that I get to play with Erin and Alice, a camper I met last summer that I love so much and became pen pals with too.

Today we got to hang out on the Trading Post steps while we waited for the bell to ring. Girls told me stories and we looked at friendship bracelets and it was just so fun to not really do anything except be together.

We did the Choctaw cheer at lunch for the first time and then got to take our cabin picture before rest hour. This crew of young Blazer girls is hilarious and quirky and creative and loud and funny and incredibly entertaining.

We swam at the pool with Warriors this afternoon and though the water was mildly freezing we still had a great time. I got to turtle with Erin, learn how to fly like Peter Pan from Sophie and go off the spring boards with more of our friends. Choctaw was ready for pop stop long before any other cabin and we ran down the road to the Trading Post like a bunch of hooligans with Ellyn leading the way. She's really good at things like that.

Highs of the rest of the day:

Playing games in the Party Room with Choctaw and Hopi
Driving on a night off with Smooncat, Liz and Alicia
Eating dinner with Burke, Kendall, Annie, Mary, Chrissy, Evan and Alex
Getting Cold Stone with lots of LV counselors and laughing in the parking lot
Walking around Wal-Mart with Smooney while talking on the phone to Kat and Grace
Hearing that tons of YL kids back in Fishers went to Campaigners tonight

"Hey, so guess what. I've been practicing how high I can jump without bending my knees. I'm really good at it."

I'm back at Tecumseh. Week 9. Last week of the summer. Holy cow I don't know if I'm ready for this. I got back at 3:30 am on Sunday and fell asleep in my old familiar Choctaw bed in a matter of seconds. This morning I unpacked, did laundry and got psyched for one last adventure. I couldn't wait to see my counselor friends and stay over campers that have already been here for a week.

I'm back in Choctaw with Ellyn, Grace Gibbons is partners with Smooney in Hopi and we're both without Day Camp counselors. The four of us are ready to make this week one for the books.

Our first four girls to arrive brought plenty of energy and snacks. Maddie, Erin, McKenna and Zoe were hilarious right off the bat and we knew we were in for an awesome cabin. Don't you wish you could hang out with these kids?

I was beyond thrilled to see Liz Koch again after being away for a week. And I flipped out when I finally got to see Erin Williams. She and I ran to each other and then I just carried her on my hip for awhile. This girl was in my cabin for the final two weeks last summer and burrowed deep into my heart. This little bug and I got to be pen pals all year and I couldn't wait to see her again.

After dinner and the all camp picture we had to come up with a costume for Opening Campfire. Ellyn and I took our girls on a field trip to the cardboard dumpster to gather supplies. Our girls were so excited to dig in the trash and each tried to carry way more than they could hold. Who knew trash was so fun?

Ellyn actually went dumpster diving...

Back on the Longhouse porch we brought out scissors and duct tape so the girls could get creative and crafty with their costumes.

Catawba went for the classic counselor/camper switcheroo theme. Ellyn and I were pretty proud of our cardboard chic outfits. Don't forget to notice the Diet Coke crowns and woven shirts.

All of our girls were hilarious with their arm cuffs, helmets, cardboard shoes, dresses and shields.

You can say were really excited about this crew. We never had an official theme but we walked around flagpole once everyone gathered chanting, "Recycle! Recycle! Recycle now! Recycle! Recycle! Recycle wow! Tell your momma and your poppa and your grandpa too, recycling is the thing to do!"

Erin dressed up as a counselor/me for campfire with Eel River. I'm so excited about hanging out with Sophia all week in Choctaw and getting to know her better.

There are SO many fun returners here for week 9. We've got Linsey Deluga, Chrissy, Lesem, Mary Brody, Kristyn Burke, Evan Frick and Kendall Brunner.

Tom and Mike came as whale trainers to Opening Campfire tonight and led us all in the whale clap from staff training. I loved the rainbow that some of the Blazer boy cabins created. My cabin is full of first year campers so it was fun watching them experience all of this for the very first time.

Tonight I also got to go to my very first planning meeting of the summer and then have porch time with Smoon and Grace. It's good to be back here where I feel so comfortable and in my element. I can't believe we've got just one week left.

"Yeah- the score is 1 to sunburnt."

This morning our whole cabin woke up early for the new believer's walk. This is something most YL camps offer to kids who have made a decision to follow Christ this week or for kids who want to hear more about what it looks like to be a Christian back at home.

Crock and Coco took this large group to several different spots around camp. They shared about how following Christ means you're making a decision to take a new path and that your life should look different now. I feel like this has been the week of metaphors and they gave us more illustrations to better understand our faith. Each kid was also given their own bible and a bookmark guide to help them know where to start reading.

At breakfast this morning Katie gave me a note for all the girls in our cabin. She's on dining hall for work crew and was the person that brought a snack to our cabin the first and last night. We have loved getting to know her this week and seeing her all over camp. I think she is really precious and can see that God is working in her life. This note was really cool for our girls.

We all plan on following Katie on Insta and hopefully stay in touch with her. Our group also loved Charlie, our waiter at the beginning of the week,who is also pretty awesome.

Megan and Audrey declared today National Yolo day and went all out. They're intense.

Today was my last time to see Ella and Nina for a long time. I'm loved getting to hang out with them all week long and it was sad to say good-bye. I know we'll stay in touch and I'll hopefully see them in Chicago later this semester.

Our entire area gathered together for a meeting before clean up. Different kids shared how they've grown in this past week, what they've learned about God and what all of this has meant to them. It was really cool to hear them articulate what they've taken in during this trip.

A year ago we were just starting this Young Life journey with a handful of these kids. Now we've come so far and I can't imagine it stopping or slowing down any time soon. These are incredible kids and God is doing big things in their lives and in their High School. I'm lucky to get to be part of it all.

Everyone went back to their cabins to pack and clean. We were lucky to not have to put sheets on the beds since we're the last week of camp, but clean up is still really intense. Hannah and I delegated jobs to the girls while we worked alongside them and eventually we got it all clean. All of our stuff was put outside in a pile with our area and then we headed to our last Club of the week.

One last time we got to sing at the top of our lungs, laugh at a funny game from the Party Starters and hear Crock share about going back home. Club is the best. Our speaker, music and program staff all did a tremendous job this week.

Before we knew it, it was time to leave Sharp Top Cove. We piled all of our suitcases, bags and pillows onto a truck that carried them down to the bottom of the hill where we met our bus. Part of the road had been washed away in the flood a few days ago so it made leaving tricky. We loaded all of our luggage under our bus and then climbed aboard to start the long drive back to Indiana.

I'd been waiting for this week since we left Timber Wolf Lake last summer. I'm so thankful that I got to lead with Hannah a second time and that we got to have so many of the same girls in our cabin. It was crazy having a group of 16 sophomore girls at times but so, so good. I wouldn't have traded it for anything. Getting to be a Young Life leader is one of the most rewarding, purposeful, exciting, challenging and best parts of my life.