Camp Meetin' Time

Sis-in-Law Christine, Courtney, Me and sister Melanie

Me, Courtney, and sis-in-law Christine (she's married to my brother Ryan)

My brother Ryan, nephew Gentry and bro-in-law Dale

My sweet sister Melanie and her husband Dale

Wow, July has zoomed by. The calendar is telling me that a week from today I will be registering my baby for high school! Where has the summer gone? And we're even having fall-like temps in keeping with the summer making its exit! I can't remember a time that we've had such mild weather in JULY!

Last week was full of fun times for us. On Wednesday evening we went to our Illinois District Campground for the evening service. Our local church choir was asked to sing for the evening service and so we prepared, got time off work and made the 3 hour drive north. Charles, Courtney and I rode up by ourselves that night. We took a wrong turn and ended up getting there right before the choir was to sing. Panic city! But all's well that ends well. It was a great service, a great message by the camp evangelist and a great time with family on the campground. Since Charles hadn't been on the campground before, my cousins Jonathan & Angie were so gracious to take us around and show Charles their room where they were staying as well as a grand tour of the camp. While we were ordering food at the concession stand, Courtney came out and told us about a little girl that was having a seizure and needed his paramedic help. He was glad to help. Once we finished eating and got on the road it was about 11 p.m. and then we had that 3 hour drive home. It was 3 a.m. before I got in my bed and then had to get up at 6:30 a.m. for work. Needless to say I went to bed pretty soon after supper on Thursday night!

On Friday, we took off and went back to camp for the final night's service. This time we took my sister's Expedition. It was Dale and Ryan in the front seats, Christine and I in the middle seats and Mel, Gentry and Courtney in the back bench seat. We talked, hooted, hollered and laughed our way up to the campground. There is no one like family who totally understand and "get" your humor!! After service we headed to Cracker Barrel in Bloomington and ate with Christine's brother and his wife from Peoria. Then it was back to Mel's house where Courtney and I spent the night so we didn't have to get back on the road at 2:30 a.m. We slept in the next morning and as I was getting packed up to go home, Dale discovered that baby bunnies had been born in the past couple of hours. So that was some kind of wonderful seeing brand new life like that. I got to hold Gentry up to see the little miracles of creation. All in all a great week.

This weekend will be full of celebrating. More on all that later...

~Blessings and peace~