program characters

Jackson (sound intern), Clinton, Ben & Alex (program tech and one of our leaders in the Mountaineer Area)

Day 4: Water Regatta

Run On Characters: Barney, TV Show Executive (I don't think she had a name), Gary the Label Guy & Lawrence

Day 4: Lumber Jack Tableau

Day 5: Italian Dedication Dinner

Day 6: Barney & Gary in the best dress up attire

Day 1: Girls Wrestle for Guys

Day 1: Obstacle Course

Day 2: Working at the snack bar

Day 4: Flour & Water Bomb Gauntlet

Day 4: Results of the flour and water bomb gauntlet

Day 2: Volleyball Tournament

Day 4: Bro Man Challenge

Day 3: Frisbee Golf Lunch

Day 3: Rodeo

Day 3: Hillbilly

Morning run-on characters (Ben had no name and Melissa was "Hey")

michigan videos

These are random videos I've taken through out the month. Some at camp and some at the Santen's lake house.

Sophie has become quite the water bug. Just in the past couple of days she's decided that she loves going under water. She'll jump and go under, jump some more and go under. She's really not scared of anything. Ted is kind of swimming (not obvious from his attempt in the video). And he can actually do a back flip in the water. It happens about once out of every ten tries.

Ted going down the zipline with Shawna.

 

This is a spoof from a short film that has Mater in it singing the "Daggum" song. It really means nothing unless you've seen it. But it's what they sang everyday way too early in the morning

I taught my kids that they could pee in the lake. They were rather surprised that they could - I guess I thought they'd peed in pools before. It took Ted a little bit to get comfortable with the idea. But Sophie took too it no problem. Her only thing is that she walks into the water about knee deep and pees. Then I have to have her rinse herself off. We're working on being fully submerged.

 

a-team rides

The Assignment Team was able to do some of the camper rides this week. So fun. We've never really done them before but it was extra fun with the kids. Yesterday, Ben rode the tubes with Ted and Sophie. Somehow I ended up with David, one of the Work Crew Bosses. Got the ride of my life - fell off 4 times. I am hurting today. Holy crap! They showed no mercy.

Today we did the Timber Carts. Way fun!!! We rode with John, Shawna, Chris and Charlamayne and we did not follow the no bumping rule. The kids loved it and the kids especially loved the goggles they were not required to wear.  The double black car was pretty slow. So half-way through Ben and I switched cars and kids. This was so much fun and the carts are awesome! Such a great, fun ride.

 And the best part may or may not have been the family 4-wheeler ride to and from the Timber Carts.

week 4, day 3

Camp days are eternally long sometimes. Seriously, it's like 12 hours are added to the day and you don't even know it. It's so weird. We're winding down our time. We're more than ready to go home. This has been a long, hard assignment. For different reasons than we've ever experienced before. Three more days.

This is pretty much how we all feel.

The average amount of sand in our bathtub every night. Sophie is virtually sleeping in a sandbox. I've given up trying to get the sand completely out of her hair until we're gone.

No caption needed. Tired after a morning of swimming and collecting treasures from the volleyball tournament.

The fries on Night 2 are so good. After dinner you grab whatever bowls have anything left in them.

We celebrated another birthday for Buda. We've shared a lot with him. Shawna made brownies and I was in charge of the shrimp. Happy birthday, big guy!

The inside of the Club room. It's a "sawmill" as this piece of land used to be a sawmill back in the early 1900's. You can't see it clearly, but in the upper right part of the picture where the logs are, there's a pair of fake legs sticking out. Hilarious!

One day we went to Lake City with Ben & Clinton. We took the back seat out of van so we all couldn't go in it. We were waiting for Ben to pick us up in John Pap's truck.

The kids with Ben in his morning run-on costume.

McDonald's has any size drinks for $1. Please bring this to WV!

We hit up DQ on our little adventure to town. Nothing like two grown men wearing matching shirts and nametags.

Sophie takes complete advantage of every drop of ice cream she can.

We got the BEST care package from the Thomas/Cline family. Seriously, I can't remember the last time we got a care package on assignment. It included Snickers and Reese Cups (my 2 favorites), gifts for the kids, People magazine and the 2011 Big East Preview. Really, it was awesome!

milestones at yl camp

Ted had two huge milestone moments at Young Life Camp within 24 hours of each other. We are so proud.

Milestone Moment #1: Taking part in his first hoe-down! 

That's right, Ted got up on stage, dressed in his finest hillbilly attire, sat next to Ben and did the hoe-down. He did "Dum-Dum-Dadda", "Peace Like a River" and "Momma Don't Allow." The unfortunate part is that it started at 10:40 pm. He got in bed at 11:30 pm. The following day was a bit rough, so I'm not sure we'll do it again. But it was so fun that night!

                                   

Ted, Ben, Chris Buda & JT Buda
This is a "generational picture." When we first started doing assignments with the Buda's, JT was a little older than Ted is now. He just finished his freshmen year of college. I'll find that picture when we get home. This one's for you, Cyndi!

Milestone Moment #2: Ted did the zipline!!!
Yesterday he decided that he wanted to go with Ben. It's pretty quiet later in the afternoons. So away they went. Ted didn't even hesitate for a minute. He and I did it together today and then Ted went with his new friend Kylie (also 5 years old). We are here for 7 more days and he intends to do it 7 more times! The funniest thing is that Ted won't jump off the dock by The Bunkhouse b/c there's fish in the water. But he has no trouble jumping off a 6 story platform and flying down a 1/4 mile zipline into the lake.

John & Shawna (Ted's self-appointed God parents when they were still in high school) have videoed for us.

Because his weight (or lack there of) a lifeguard has to swim pretty far out to get him.