Adventure Camp and staff conference

So last wednesday, well technically thursday morning, we returned from Adventure Camp.  It was amazing.  5 days of running around, doing activities like rock climbing, caving, biking, go karting, lazer tag, high ropes courses, and crawling around through tunnels, and spending time w/ some really cool middle schoolers and taking the opportunity to share w/ them Jesus love is my idea of a great time.  Exhausting, but definitely worth it.  My favorite events we did were rock climbing and the high ropes course. Seeing students scared out of their mind, but pushing through fears and conquering them is such a cool thing to be a part of. Talking them through rock climbing, letting them know what is coming up and good foot and hand holds, encouraging them, hearing them repeat "I can't do it" dozens of times and then watching them do it, is so much fun.

During the day we would do 2 of these activities, then at night we would have club.  We had a band from England come and lead us in music and a speaker who is a professor from Purdue.  We talked a little trash about that, as I was wearing a michigan state sweatshirt the first day.  She walked the students through the gospel, and then afterwards we had small group time and were able to delve deeper with the students.  We had some really good conversations in our teepee (we stayed in teepees, it was fun, but the beds were not near long enough, it stopped at my shin). 

One major highlight from the week was playing the "big brother" card.  As often happens when you get a couple hundred teens together, there was some flirting and interest from members of the opposite gender in each other.  I was keeping a close eye on things and decided to have some fun with it. i let the young gentlemen callers know that i was very protective of the girls from grafenwoehr, and that I was way bigger than they were and that I see everything.  I would go and sit in between students if I thought they were sitting too close.  For the most part, my girls really appreciated it. I even received requests to scare off guys they thought were getting too friendly.  It was fun to keep sharp on my intimidate guys skills, since I am not near my sisters anymore and have to do my intimidation from a distance (although sometimes this is even more effective). 

Tomorrow I am headed down to Italy.  We have a staff conference and training for the next week and a half. I am really looking forward to it. It is a great opportunity to learn more, and also to spend time w/ my peers, whom I have become very good friends with.  I will be getting back on the 7th of May.  I will let you know how it went upon my return.