How does one sum up church camping weekend? Once a year our church travels an hour and a quarter north to a Christian Retreat nestled down a dusty, dirt road among the woods and hills of Brooksville. It is a remote area where you can leave all your stress behind and relax as you enjoy the fun and fellowship of fellow believers. We have a special spot where we all camp every year and we usually fill that spot full with tents, canopies, trailers, and rv's. This year about of a third of the normal campers couldn't go, for a variety of reasons, so some of the spots were vacant. Camp doesn't officially start until Friday but whoever wants to can go up on Thursday; so this year we joined the "Thursday group". We had a special time with a small group of campers and were all set up nicely before the "Friday and Saturday groups" came. We checked the forecast on the way up and were shocked to see that the forecast had drastically changed! We were expecting lows in the 60's and had complained about it because we like it to get a little colder so we 'need' the campfires. Suddenly the forecast was telling us to expect temps down in the mid 40's! And as the sun went down so did the temperatures. We loved our campfires as we huddled around them.
Friday all day the other campers arrived. From 9:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Our kids and some other youth kids had to work all day Friday so they were the latest arrivals. We had 12 dwellers on our site....5 in the camper, 4 guys in a tent, and 3 girls in Kyle's enclosed trailer. This year we did our meals differently. Normally each family takes care of their own meals except for Saturday evening when we all eat together. This year they divided the families up and our crew was on the Saturday breakfast crew. For breakfast we made breakfast burritos. Yummy! Burritos with choice of toppings: sausage, green peppers & onions, mushrooms, salsa, & cheese sauce made up the burrito. Then we offered apples, bananas, donuts, coffee, orange juice, and milk. We each fixed a portion of it, split the costs and our meals were taken care of for the rest of the weekend. The Saturday evening crew served bbq ribs and chicken grilled by John, luscious salads and a variety of desserts (cakes and ice creams) along with pots of coffee. (regular, decaf, or Santa's white Christmas)
Sunday morning breakfast was pancakes: regular, chocolate chip, or pumpkin, topped with options of peanut butter, syrup, and cool whip. Mmm! A tray of fresh fruit (pineapple, apples, and grapes), choices of cranberry, apple, or orange juice along pots of coffee completed the meal.
We definitely ate better than we would have had we been fixing all our own food...for a fraction of the cost!
Sunday morning breakfast was pancakes: regular, chocolate chip, or pumpkin, topped with options of peanut butter, syrup, and cool whip. Mmm! A tray of fresh fruit (pineapple, apples, and grapes), choices of cranberry, apple, or orange juice along pots of coffee completed the meal.
We definitely ate better than we would have had we been fixing all our own food...for a fraction of the cost!
Breakfast was served at 10:00 a.m. to 75 hungry campers and supper was served at 5:00 p.m. to more.
Golf, Skipbo, Scum, Last Word, Botchy Ball, Pig & Chicken, and more were enjoyed by young and old alike.
Games are normally played into the late night or
early morning hours. I know you northerners will laugh at
us whimpy southerners but us women rigged up an
electric heater under our table to keep our legs and feet
warm while we played our games!
It felt so good!
The kids enjoyed the game room while the men
rough-housed in a game of football.
Was JR happy just to watch?
Nope!
Was Dustin happy just to watch?
Nope!
Were the girls happy to just watch?
OK, two of them were, one wasn't.
Were there any injuries?!
What a question!
JR dislocated his finger, Jeremy dislocated his shoulder,
Reggie got hit in the jaw, Landon got hit in the head,
KaShondra got hit in the head (while watching),
Robin got a bloody nose, Derek and Dustin each suffered leg injuries, Erica got hit in the head with a golf club
and Melissa sported an arm injury.
After football, some of the guys were pestering some of the ladies so they took things into their own hands
and lowered their tent on them.
Sunday morning worship can be very worshipful or
very distracting when geese fly overhead honking loudly, or
when three storks curiously peer in on the service.
So hard to believe how soon it was time to begin the packing up process! How can a weekend go by so fast?
We had one last surprise when we looked over and saw a "stranger" loading her van.
Her hair had drastically 'yellowed' over the weekend.
Just call her Miss Jane!
So many good memories of
"Camping 2011"
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