So, sorry its kinda been a while. I had my own first group of campers for a trip called H2Go. It was July 23-28. I led the group/trip with my co-counselor, Matt Griffin. We had a great time. Well.. i guess i should just speak for myself. i know i had a great time; i think matt did too. our campers, which were high school age, all arrived on Sunday afternoon. i had 9 girls and matt had 4 boys… yea he had it a little easier. but a lot of the kids already knew each other from school, so that was nice, not as many awkward ice breaker types things that had to be done. we first played games with them and what not to get to know them etc. then on monday morning we left for lake dillon in frisco, co.
we car camped and kayaked there for mon and tues. it was really fun. we had mostly all good weather on monday,few very short random spurts of windiness and teeny bit of rain, but for the most part, sunny and nice. i had never kayaked except for our short 2 hr little demo in staff training only a couple of weeks before. so it was kinda funny that i was leading a trip and trying to teach kids something i barely knew myself.
but each time we went out it seemed to click a little better. and water is kinda my thing, being a lifeguard for 5 stinking years of my life and all.. except the water in co is SOOOOOO cold!!!! straight up 50 degree snow melt. yikes! no swimming here. which is really strange for me because ive always grown up with warm water that you could/would swim in.we had personal devos that each kid did on their own everyday and then every night either matt or i would lead a group devo with everyone contributing. we made delicious hobo dinners (to find out what these amazing things are look at my first blog)on monday night which everyone loved and had camp fire.it was really nice. the kids were well behaved too. matt and i had decided it would be cool to do a sunrise kayak on tues morning, but we didnt tell them anything. so we woke up at 5 am on tues morning and surprisingly non of my girls complained at all. we all got in out kayaks which had frost on them!from the night before. everyone was a wee bit chilly, but we kayaked out to a little island and had granola and gorp as we watched the sun rise over the mountains and lake dillon. it was really beautiful.
kayaking campers (carolyn in middle and matt, co-counselor to right)
here comes the sun...
We then kayaked some more and played game at camp, packed up, and had lunch etc. On Wed we went to Golden, Co and tried to roll white water kayaks in a pond at a park. You basically learn how to flip your self back up right after you’ve flipped over in the river. I kinda got it, but not completely. It was fun and the kids enjoyed it too. And there were these amazing white water Olympic kayakers practicing in the river across from us. It was so cool to watch them. THey were really good. I have videos and pics of them on my facebook. Then on Thursday we went out to Noah’s Ark white water rafting co and rafter on thurs afternoon. It was nice rafting with them b.c they basically did everything for us. We pulled off the river and camped with, and they cooked, cleaned and were kinda entertaining, too. We just sent up our tents and then that was all. The guides were really cool and Matt and I got a little time to hang with them and talk while the kids hung out and played games. The stars were amazing and it was so neat to be able to hear the river as we fell asleep. We got up and had a delicious breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon, and coffee cake… yea we were really roughing it. Then we packed up and rafted for a few more hours. We had a lot of fun; we had splash wars b/w two of our boats and one of our guides was a music theatre major so he sang lion king songs and everything. That was great. On Friday night for our devos we had everyone talk about what they had learned and how they grew etc, and then told the kids if anyone needed to talk with matt or I, we would love to talk to them. On tues night, I had shared my testimony as the devo and told how my Mom passed away in dec 07 and how that had been really hard. After that, one of the girls, Carolyn, told me she was sorry, that her Mom had passed away when she was 10. So I told her I would like to talk to her sometime hopefully during the week. Well, on Friday night, after devos, we talked for about 45 min. We cried and reminiscenced about our moms and the pain from their deaths,etc. It was a great time. At the end of the time I asked her if she had ever accepted Christ as her Savior, and she said no, and I asked if she wanted to and she said yes. It was really, really neat. My bosses wife, Annie, had just asked earlier that week what she could be praying for me about. So I just asked her to pray that I would be approachable to the kids and open and that they would feel comfortable talking to me. And she prayed that I would be able to use my story/testimony. Totally an answer to prayer. It was really encouraging to me because it kinda confirmed that I was where I was supposed to be, and that God did have a purpose in everything for my life, even the really hard and painful things, like losing my mom. I shared I Cor 1:13 with Carolyn. Its always been a meaningful scripture passage, and was really fitting for our conversation.
It says, “And praise to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is our source of every mercy and the God who comforts us. He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When others are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. You can be sure that the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us with his comfort through Christ. So when we are weighed down with troubles, it is for your benefit and salvation! For when God comforts us, it is so that we, in turn, can be an encouragment to you. Then you can patiently endure the same things we suffer. We are confident that as you share in suffering, you will also share God’s comfort.
Thanks to everyone for your prayers and support. miss and love you guys.
dominique
link to more pics and videos via facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2047792&l=e06eb&id=68602654
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2047986&l=317a3&id=68602654
wow! awesome nika….awesome! miss you =)