A Family Camp Plug

I am the camp representative for our church. What this means is that I promote our church's camp, Covenant Pines Bible Camp, and handle any questions that people might have. The job kind of fell into my lap as I worked full-time in camping ministry for almost a half-decade and spent summers working there in high school and college.

Tonight was Covenant Pines night at church. One of the staff members came and shared with the adults and the kids. Seeing the video from summer camp makes me long for the warmer months ahead--getting outside, camping, swimming, hiking.

We signed up this week for Work and Worship at camp. Nearly all of our church goes as a sort of an "all church retreat" even though it's open to people from any Covenant Church in the Twin Cities. It's a "family camp," but we're all family--it's open to everyone. We go for a day and a half of working, getting the camp ready for the summer ministry season and have a day of rest, worship, and play. Because of the work we do the cost is really affordable.

That weekend at camp is what got us into our church family. They pulled us in by the spirit of community they displayed while working, worshiping, and playing together. Our children felt it, which was important.

That weekend is often important for our family. We get time away to work and play together. The boys can work alongside other families and individuals and be encouraged to work hard and well. We get in the outdoors (which we're pretty good at, but it gives us a chance to canoe and use resources we don't always have available to us). We experience community with our church family as well as new friends from other churches.

If you get a chance--if your church's camp (if you have one) offers a similar weekend--give it a try. Not only does it provide your family with an opportunity to serve, but it gives you time together as a family and to meet other families.

Camping Alone: A Story of Solitude

I'm doing something I haven't done since college: camping alone. And back then it was for RA training. We all got dropped off in the woods (okay it was really an old cattle pasture) for a night of solitude.

My wife's been encouraging me for a while to take some time by meals for retreats since I'm with the kids all the time and she gets to do several trips for her work. I'm bad at relinquishing my duty of parenthood, but part if being a good parent is self care. 

I've been wanting to go camping this fall but it hasn't worked out to do yet. So this  weekend my wife said why don't you go camping by yourself. And I finally listened to her. 

After lunch I loaded up my backpack with a few clothes, camping pillow, mat, sleeping bag, and tent. I gathered the camping bin to extract a few supplies from and some reading material. My wig had made me a hobo dinner packet for supper and I gathered some hard boiled eggs and fruit for breakfast (though the banana apparently got left at home) and some sunflower seeds for snacking on while hiking. 

It started sprinkling about a half hour before I reached the state forest where I planned to camp. It continued for almost four more hours. 

This is not what I had in mind. I had hoped for time to hike and sit around the campsite reading, writing, and talking with God. I was able to get the tent up before it started coming down harder, but as I sat in the car seeing the drops roll down the windshield I wondered if I should just head back home before paying for a night. 

I had looked at the forecast in the morning. That 30% chance of rain was feeling more like 30% of the day. But it wasn't too heavy and it said it would let up before night so I decided to stay and go for a hike. As long as it wasn't too heavy of a rain I should be able to stay relatively dry under the forest canopy. 

I hiked for about 3 hours. I never encountered another person (though I did hear gunshots a few times). Even the wildlife was silent. I only heard birds twice. I never saw an animal--not even a squirrel. 

This was solitude. So why wasn't I hearing anything from God?  I wanted some spiritual direction, some healing, some psychological break through. I got nothing. 

I called a friend who I check in with weekly. I needed to talk. I got his voice mail. But as I left a message I realized that I was mostly struggling because my expectations weren't being met. 

Yes, the weather wasn't great but I was still getting time alone. And maybe God wasn't speaking in the way I wanted, but His creation was beautiful. I was getting some good exercise, taking some fun photographs, and breathing fresh air in deeply. God was present. 

I am sitting around the campfire now allowing myself this technological moment to type since it is too dark to read or write and my lantern didn't charge for some reason. 

Wolves or coyotes had been howling in the distance. I love the sound. But apparently I've read too many stories of Pa getting surrounded by wolves in the Little House on the Prairie books because I just got freaked out when I heard some breathing and rustling next to me. That's when I discovered that the lantern didn't charge. Once I got my phone unlocked and found my flashlight app I saw something black wandering back in the woods. Probably just a raccoon. Little bugger. 

That's one of the downsides to solitude: no one to talk you out of your irrational fears in the dark. Still, the sign about bears didn't help. At least the moon is out now. It's quite chilly though and the fire is slowly dying down so I think I'll head to my tent soon. 

Old Blue is the second tent I ever owned (the first being a pup tent my parents got with green stamps from the grocery store when I was going into 6th grade). She's just a cheap 2-person dome tent (really cheap) and she's been around since college I think, but she didn't leak any rain. She now has a set of large nails for tent pegs and most of the poles have at least one crack. Still, she held up. Thankfully my sleeping bag isn't cheap. My fingers are starting to get numb outside. Time to go bundle up and listen to the wolves howl at the moon.

It got cold overnight. I went for a hike around 8:30 or 9 and there were places with frost. As sunlight hit the trees, the leaves began dripping the melted frost.

I stayed fairly warm overnight. But the two problems of camping in the cold are: 1) having to get up and pee in the middle of the night (and with a good sleeping bag, generally you stay warmer by wearing fewer clothes, so I'm usually in my undies and a t-shirt) and 2) trying to get clothes on in the morning while staying within the confines of your sleeping bag--especially a mummy bag. Thankfully, I managed both.

I headed home wishing the time alone was more. Maybe I should have prayed more. Maybe I have more I need to confess to unblock something between me and God. Maybe I should have left my camera/phone in my pocket so I wasn't distracted by using technology and looking for pictures to take. These thoughts all crossed my mind. I had wanted to hear more from God.

I can come up with my excuses and find reasons to blame myself for the time of solitude not going the way I desired. I don't know why it wasn't the deeply spiritual experience I hoped it was. But I'm sure plenty of dessert fathers and mothers experienced that almost every day as they spent years in solitude. Sometimes it's just about obedience and taking the time away to listen.

I wonder if listening with my ears was less important than listening with my other senses. I did see God's awesomeness through the colors and sights of autumn. I breathed in the freshness of the woods, being reminded of God's provision for life each day. While reading around the campfire, I was reminded of God's crazy love for me. Maybe those things were all I needed to hear.

Hiking

We got away yesterday for a night of camping--the first time in a few months. Camping is a loaded word. Everyone has their own definition of what that means. For some it's a fully-loaded camper with cable hook-up and wi-fi. For some it's carrying everything on your back into the woods where no other human is around for miles. For us--being in our late 30s with two elementary-aged children, it's car camping. We drive to a State Park, back our car into a site where we registered to camp at in the park office, and pitch our tent. Sometimes we get a hike-in site where we walk a little ways to our site--often with a cart for our stuff. We occasionally do something more rugged. Rarely will we go to a commercialized campsite (I did it last summer with the boys on a super hot day so that we had a swimming pool).

Yesterday we went to Nerstrand Big Woods State Park just south of the Twin Cities. We were headed down that direction for an open house of some friends who moved to Northfield this summer, so it worked well to camp the night before.

As we reached the south edge of the Twin Cities for some reason I realized at that point I had forgotten to pack the tent. I have no excuse for forgetting it other than I don't do well when I have to pack everything on my own. For some reason I didn't think to have Beth help me the night before get everything ready to make sure I wasn't forgetting anything (I guess it could have been that we had an open house at school that night, so there wasn't much time).

This isn't the first time I have forgotten to pack the tent, I hate to admit. The last time we were in the market for a new one anyway, so we picked up one on sale at Wal-Mart to use for a few years. This time we did not need another tent (and we really didn't want to turn around and drive back to our house). Thankfully, our friends who were having the open house had a tent we could borrow (which ruined the surprise for the boys of seeing their friends--they didn't know about the open house).

* * * * *

I need time in nature.

I get renewed outdoors (even if I feel more tired after a long day in the sun). It is often a spiritual experience for me--it's a place I commune with God.

We all hiked yesterday as a family. Just on a short (thought rated "most difficult") trail down to the "Hidden Waterfall." Which of course, wasn't that hidden as the trail led you right to it.  The water was low, so it wasn't overly spectacular (though still pleasant) and it had a potential
risk of some bacteria, so we didn't play in the water like we thought we might since it was a hot day.

We did hike along Prairie Creek downstream and found another waterfall--which was probably more hidden that the main one. We did let the boys wade in places where the water was moving pretty well. They liked exploring, my wife loved the rock formations and strata, and I enjoyed being outside with my family. 

It was a bit cooler in the valley where the river wound. A lower elevation, the shaded canopy of the big woods, the element of moving water.

As we hiked we noticed a lot of sticks, weeds, and other natural debris wrapped around trees along the river. Apparently in July the park had seven inches of rain in three hours. I would have loved to have seen the waterfall then. It had to have been an amazing torrent. Seriously, the debris was several feet above the creek's current path.Today the creek was a small trickle in a lot of places. We walked across it back and forth as we hiked downstream.

* * * * *

This morning after breakfast was cleaned up we borrowed a GPS unit from the park office to try out one of their geocaching activities. Collectible cards with birds are hidden in each of the state parks. The boys didn't want to at first, but they discovered it was fun--even if it was on the same trail we had done the day before.

We tried out a different trail for a little ways. It was one Nils had wanted to explore the day before (probably just because it was called "Beaver Trail" and he expected that might mean seeing a beaver along it). They didn't make it too far down the trail before they wanted to turn back (I think the swings at the playground were beckoning), which was fine as I was given the opportunity to hike by myself the rest of the trail.

It wasn't too long. It wasn't too difficult. There weren't any breathtaking vistas.

But it was good. Basswood, oak, elm, maple towered overhead. Ferns and wildflowers carpeted the undercanopy. Sunshine illuminated leaves in trees. Acorns and dogwood seeds occasionally dropped to the forest floor. Rubbing branches made creaking noises.

Signposts along the path pointed out the direction of travel. It wasn't really necessary. The path was clearly marked. If another path branched off, a map was present to guide you on the desired trail.

I've wandered through woods off the path on occasion. Generally it's when I know I need to travel a certain direction or elevation change to reach a certain destination. It's not as easy going. And if I need to find my way back on the same route, I know to occasionally look behind me to get an image of the return path.

When walking a designated path (which is generally recommended--we actually couldn't go off path in parts of the forest because of a rare lily that only grows in three counties in Minnesota and no where else in the world),  there isn't much to worry about. You can just enjoy the hike. As long as you can read a map and identify if the path loops back to your starting point or not, you're generally in good shape.

If only life was so easy. If the paths were marked out. If it were clear where junctions in the path led.

You've probably heard the Bible called "life's road map" before. As if all decisions you need to make are clearly marked out. As if the direction you need to travel is clear all the time. Sometimes it is. Often it's not.

God doesn't place big, blue arrows along your path in life. That's not how He works--not always at least. I think with life it's more important to be in touch with God. The Bible helps. So does prayer. They're connection points in developing that relationship.

I still struggle. I struggle to fit in time in the Word and make it meaningful. I struggle to pray in ways that feel like I am sharing with God and hearing back from Him. I struggle with that whole relationship thing more often than I like at this point in my life.

The nice thing is, God keeps creating opportunities to get back on the right path when I'm off it. And maybe at some point I'll get that relationship thing done well enough to hear His voice when He says to "go left" or "stay the course."

I think being in the woods and hiking actually helps with that. 

Camp Fall-Out

With my nine-year old having gone off to camp for a week for the first time by himself this summer, I've addressed a bit of that journey: reasons to send your child to Bible camp, preventing homesickness, and the follow-up report on my son's experience at camp. There's one more element of going to camp for a week to address.

I don't know if this is a common occurrence, but I think it happens a bit: Camp Fall-Out. That's my name for it at least. My son, while having an extremely wonderful time at camp, comes home and has moments of grouchiness, argumentativeness, and fighting with his brother.

The frustrating part, of course, is that this happens after having spent a week getting along great with strangers and hearing messages about Jesus and living like a follower of His. It's annoying. There were brief moments when we were sorry he was home. He's not supposed to act like this, after all. Not after going off to Bible camp!

* * * * * *

One of the things going on, I believe, is a change from dependence to independence back to dependence. He had a week away without parents telling him what to do. Yes, there were camp rules and I'm sure his cabin counselor had his own rules, but parents weren't around. I think there's an adjustment phase coming back home after a week away and being (kind of) on your own.

Part of it, naturally, is tiredness. The kids are up later than normal bedtimes every night, waking up for breakfast each morning, and having a full day of activities. Tired children equal less-than-pleasant children.

Some of it is also just coming down off an intense week of spiritual highs. Yes, the kids learn about the Bible, and Jesus, and how both apply to how we live. They've likely made some spiritual decisions to follow Jesus (more or better or for the first time). They intend to come home and live out the things talked about at camp. But younger children, especially, may have a hard time with the adjustment of being in a intense, spiritual setting and coming back to their regular routines. It's a hard adjustment for adults; it's going to be hard for children.

* * * * * *

I don't know if I have advice on preventing or curtailing the Camp Fall-Out effect. But the good news is that it goes away. Within a week of parents being frustrated over the back-talk and bad attitudes, our son was back to his (mostly) pleasant self. He and his brother have (mostly) been getting along. He's been (mostly) helping out around the house. Mostly, because he's never been perfect, and we won't expect him to be.

As parents it helps to just be aware of what's going on and acknowledge it. We don't have to put up with it (we reminded him several times that his behavior was not okay), but it helps to know that it's not permanent. We tried talking through it and encouraged him to write down what was going on since he couldn't talk about it. He never did any, but we gave him the space and permission to do so, and I think that helped.

He had several people ask him about his time at camp, and I think being able to recount the lessons learned and fun times helped. It connected his present to the past week at camp.


So if your child is expressing symptoms of Camp Fall-Out, know that it will go away. And in it's place will be the benefits of having been away at camp for a week (a little more mature, a little more of a disciple, a lot of good memories). That's the hope, anyway.

Guest Blogger: Anders' Week at Camp

A few people have wanted to hear about Anders' week at camp, so I thought I'd let him share. It was the first time he got to go to camp for a whole week by himself. It was actually pretty easy to put him on the bus, knowing he'd have a great week, but we were all happy to have him back home. I'll be transcribing (and putting my own comments in italics). 

* * * * *

Camp was awesome!!!

One of my favorite things was the blob. The blob is where there's a person at the end of a big floating thing filled with air and a person who's going to jump onto the back. And when the person jumps onto the back, the other person goes flying into the water.

The things that we did every day would be chapel. We also had a day game like whip-n-strip which is a game where every person had a sock in their pants. There were four teams and each team had a cone in a circle, and the first team to get all four cones in their circle wins. There was a tricky part where if someone pulled your sock,  you had had to stand and wave your sock until someone came to save you. (Think four-way capture the flag where you can get caught at any time--it's not as lewd as the name sounds.)

One of the really fun night games was capture the duck, which was pretty much capture the flag except that it is pretty much always girls against boys. There was a girl's duck that was a yellow rubber duck and a boy's duck which was silver with a few red feathers.

Another one of my favorite things was the red shark. You had to pay one dollar at lunch, and then they had a floaty thing that looked like a long, red shark. You could put seven people on it, and it was pulled behind a motor boat, and they tried to flip you over. (He seems to have spent most of his time on the water--it was a really hot week. He passed his swim test easily.)

Cabins were usually little brown, small house-looking things. Inside were walls made of stone and bunk beds made of wood. Luckily I got to stay in one of the new cabins that had a bathroom in it; it was a lot nicer and more comfortable.

Two of my cabin mates were from my church, so all three of us felt more comfortable. Our counselor and LIT (Leader-in-Training) were really nice and fun. I became friends with all of the people in my cabin, which was really nice. I guess that also helped make me feel more comfortable. (Covenant Pines Bible Camp shared pictures and videos on their facebook page each day. It was fun to pick out Anders in activities throughout the week. When he got home, we went through them together and he talked about all his friends from the cabin. His counselors were great. One was the college student who was working there all summer. The other was a high school student who was going through the Leader in Training program so this was his week to be an assistant counselor. Anders was very impressed with him. I got to meet him at the bus pick-up stop. An all-around great guy.)

Chapel was probably different than it sounds. Instead of just sitting there reading your Bible and singing some hymns, they had some verses of the week that they would put into songs and they had some actions. That was really fun. They also had lots of other fun songs where you got to go up into the center of the chapel and jump around doing crazy actions. That was also crazy fun.

One of my two favorite songs was a song based on the music of the Power Rangers theme song. Another was in the music of the Ghostbusters theme song. The Power Rangers song was Psalm 51:10 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me"--he's been singing this one and doing the actions quite a bit).

During free time, sometimes I would go swimming with some of my friends. You had to have a buddy. Sometimes I would go up to the canteen and gift shop with my friends. You didn't' have to have a buddy there. Other choices were the climbing tower that has a big zip line at the top of it, the playground which might have a ga-ga ball game, or sometimes there could be a neucom game (at the volleyball courts). You could also go up to Fireside and play some board games or card games. There was the craft hall where you could buy material to make friendship bracelets or necklaces or stuff like that. You could also paint rocks, which was free. One of the rocks I painted was a s'more. I found a small square rock which I painted the tops brown and the inside white with little specks of black.

My cabin got to do something called "Outcamp" which is where sometime at night we would pack up and hop onto the trailer and have a hay ride to somewhere over in the forest. It was really fun looking at the stars. We got to make lots of s'mores (that weren't made out of rocks) and tell funny stories. Most of them were about wetting our pants as campers. We got to sleep in a big kind of house on stilts. It didn't have any beds. It was just the sleeping bags you would put down on the ground. It was still pretty comfortable. The cabins that got to go that night were cabin 21, which was us, and cabin 20.

* * * * * 

He's already planning on going back next year. He received several letters from different family and church friends throughout the week--I was thankful to see them in his suitcase. A few of the letters even contained some spending money. All he bought was a few snacks from the canteen and a picture of all of the campers. I believe he also gave a little to the missions project (clean water for kids in Africa), but he wished he had bought more and he wished he had bought a few things from the gift shop. It's a lesson in budgeting, calculating what things cost, and spending wisely. We honestly haven't done much work with that yet.

Unfortunately, we discovered that his shampoo, soap, toothbrush, and toothpaste were still on the bathroom counter after we dropped him off on the bus. We sent an email encouraging him to borrow some from friends and see if the gift shop had extra toothbrushes. He didn't do this, of course. So a shower was the first thing on the agenda when he came home. He did fairly well at changing his clothes--better than many of his peers at least. I washed plenty of socks and undewear, several shorts, but shirts was probably what he changed the least (there were plenty of clean ones in the suitcase). 

He said he really enjoyed the speaker in chapel, but hasn't said much about what he learned. But he had a great time, as did his friends who went with him. Thanks, Covenant Pines staff, for giving him a great week. (Also, the pictures were taken by the staff at Covenant Pines)

Fall Family Time

Yesterday morning we packed up the car, met up with friends, and drove up to Wild River State Park to enjoy the weekend. It was beautiful weather--we never put the rain fly on (though we were tempted to for keeping in the heat in the tent over night, but we all stayed warm enough, I think). After getting the last two non-electric sites available (I really hate how camping has become a reservation-needed system), we set up camp, and the we headed to the Franconia Sculpture Garden. I appreciate that the artist create interactive works--and many that the kids can climb on.

Due to taking a relaxed pace with the afternoon, we ran out of time to climb on the rocks at Glacier Gardens in nearby Interstate Park (which the boys were wanting to do) or enjoy a hearty hike back at Wild River (which I would have enjoyed). But we made supper and then partook in a naturalist's talk on owls. Of course there was some marshmallow-roasting at our campfire that night along with a little star gazing.

Today we went the the Amador Apple Festival in the small town of Almelund, Minnesota (where we recently had the serendipitous discovery of a street named Wenell Lane). It was a nice small-town, community-oriented festival: food vendors (Swedish sausage on a stick, tacos in a bag, etc.), hand-made crafts, produce, and an assortment of apple-based products for sale. They were several historical buildings on site with displays as well as hands-on opportunities to live the past (making butter from cream, twisting twin into rope, harvesting prairie seeds). Old silent movies flickered on a wall in the barn; you could wait in line for a ride in a Model T as well. The boy got to try their first carmel apples (somehow they'd missed out on those--we've had apples with carmel dip, but not carmel apples).

It wouldn't have much mattered what we did. We had planned to have the weekend together as a family. It's beautiful fall weather, and while the trees haven't started turning much, we wanted to be outside for most of it. For us that means camping--or at least I personally like it when it means camping. It is good for our boys to be outside, to be active, to be with family and friends, and to be in God's presence. He is everywhere, but for me at least, He is much more noticeable outside. And I admit that I don't always take the time to note His presence, but I know that He and His creation leave their mark on my soul when I have been their presence. I hope that happens with my children as well.

A Look at a Canoe Trip

We just returned yesterday from four days in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in northern Minnesota. We went with two other couples (one of whom we had never met before, but that's another story). It was the first time my wife and I had been in the Boundary Waters together--at least for more than a day trip. I'm thankful she initiated making arrangements for us to go.

Here's what a canoe trip looks like:

Beginning a portage

Paddle, paddle, paddle. The lake we camped on was around 5 miles long. It's not the largest by any means. I have no idea how much we paddled each day. One day we just explored the lake we were on so we did about a 10 mile trip.

Carry everything on your shoulders. To get from lake to lake, you portage. First you carry your canoe. Then you go back for your packs. Distances are measured in rods. One rod is the average canoe length: 16.5 feet. Our longest portage was 147 rods: about a half mile. But a portage is seldom flat terrain. Often you go up, then down, then up, and then down again. Possibly several more times. And there are usually pointy rocks dotting the trail. And tree roots. None of this makes carrying a canoe on your shoulders easy. Also, because of rains the previous day, the path of the long portage became a small stream--which somehow managed to flow down the front side of the hill as we climbed up it as well as down the backside as we made our way to the next lake.

Set up camp. We stayed in one place for all three nights. My last trip we kept moving. It's nice to not have to move. We were able to explore neighboring lakes and only have to portage with canoes and a food pack, which is nice.

Your toilet is in the middle of the woods. With no walls around. Just a tube, sticking up out of the ground. Ours happened to be a decent hike up a hill from our campsite. Of course, a toilet is not always needed...

Your food must be hung up in a tree every night...preferably between two trees, at least 12 feet off the ground. You do what you can to make it inaccessible to bears.

Your food is all camped over a fire (typically on a small camp stove). And all of your food you have to carry in on your back. Any campfires you desire must be made from dead wood you have found on the forest floor and brought back.

If you want to bathe, you jump in a lake. Many lakes are deep (over 100 feet). And almost all are quite cold. You may find a few spots of warm water near the shore, but generally the lakes don't get much above 60 degrees.

Our "bathroom"

Nature is your best friend--and your worst enemy. It happened to be our best friend on this trip. We hardly had any bug issues--which is rare. Normally flies and mosquitoes are a campers' bane in the North Woods. I didn't put any insect repellent on, and didn't need to. We had perfect weather--in the 70s most days, cooler at night. No rain until  the last morning when we had a few brief sprinkles. We were all hoping for the excitement of seeing a moose or a bear or some large mammal. Moose scat is the closest we got. But there were plenty of loons and several eagles. And of course wildflowers, birch trees, and evergreens galore. One of the nights was the peak of the Perseids. We laid out on one of the large boulders along the shore and star-gazed. None of us stayed up long enough to see the meteors in mass, but we saw several before turning in for the night.

It's wonderful stuff, this canoeing in the Boundary Waters. We're figuring out how to functionally be able to go with our children next time. It's feasible--it just requires some adjusting.

It is, for the most part, roughing it. I know that's not for everyone. But it is a beautiful place. Canoeing is good for the body and soul. And you will find few places as peaceful (unless there's a storm, but we didn't encounter that, so we're good).
s.

Campfire Community

When I took the boys camping earlier this week, they asked who we were going with. This is a new thing. We haven't done much camping with other people outside of our camping weekend with my family. For various reasons, we've usually gone by ourselves (often because of when we can go and the budget that necessitates our time away). So our vacation this summer with another family was something new--something enjoyable. And we do need some family camping trips as well, with just us (or just me and the boys).

This weekend we went camping with our small group (our Chapter House) from church (all but one person who was on vacation elsewhere). Because of the need for a cabin-type lodging for some of our group and not being able to find them available in most state parks, we ended up going to Covenant Park Bible Camp where a good friend of ours has been the director. It was a nice setting--we were able to set up our tents and have a campfire just a short distance from the lodging (which was nice with a group to be able to have a fridge and not worry about ice).

We did some kayaking (Anders even tried going by himself and did quite well), swimming, playing of kubb and bocce, and of course just sitting around the campfire and relaxing. And eating--I can't forget that.

Community is important to us. It is a core part of our church. Camping together was a great way to continue building that community together within our group. I'm also thankful for a group of people with whom I can build community in a deeper level.

We happened to be there the same time that a Covenant Church from Duluth was doing their church retreat. I enjoyed getting to talk with their pastor and a few of their members. They were building community, too. They even invited us to join in with them at times. I love that about our denomination (and I know others are the same way): we're a wide family. Where ever we go and run into each other--even if we don't know each other previously--we can converse like old friends. We can do that because we know our community expands beyond our tent site, our church and our neighborhood. Where ever blue sky or twinkling stars shine above us, we are in a place of community--if we allow ourselves and take the time and effort to be with one another.

Camping Up North

We finally got a weekend away to go camping as a whole family. It was much needed. Being Labor Day weekend, we didn't even bother trying to find a spot at a campground. We headed to Covenant Park Bible Camp on Park Lake where a good friend of ours is the director. He lets us pitch our tent on the camp grounds. Since it was a bit cold the first night he even let us stay in an empty cabin. But the next day, the tent went up.

We spent one day up on the North Shore, hiking around Gooseberry Falls. We got off to a rough start--frustrations over a confusing GPS unit we got at the park for geocaching, disagreements over where to go, basic poor communication. We've often had "rough spots" while camping. Ask me sometime about camping on our honeymoon.

I heard recently in a sermon a quote by some Christian psychologist, if I remember correctly (I didn't write it down, so you're going to have to hope my brain is recalling the details correctly), saying that camping is one of the best bonding activities for families. The pastor reflected on that probably being true because of all the things that tend to go wrong while camping. It's usually rain for us (which held off until we were driving home).

But every camping trip--even our honeymoon with its disasters--is a good memory for me. The issues that arise are never bigger than the fun times and the beauty of God's creation. Often those rough spots bring us together--hopefully learning to relate better, forgive and admit faults. Anyway, the time at Gooseberry Falls was good. We enjoyed the falls and time along the shore.

The boys love time in a tent--even if it was a cool weekend. Campfires, s'mores and seeing the stars come out add to the appeal of camping for the boys. So, as summer unofficially ends, I'm dreaming of camping trips next year (and maybe another one or two this fall if we can fit them in). I believe camping is a far better way to build family memories than most vacation alternatives. Even if it's not, I'll be going again.