Ali Ballweg

I now consider myself a seasoned veteran on Wagons, considering that I just completed my third week in four weeks.  I had another good week, though not as great as last week (but that’d be really hard to beat).  Activity wise this week was almost a mirror of last week so I’ll just share the new things we did and a few big things that stand out.

            An amazing opportunity arrived at Sugar Creek on Sunday in the form of a truck full of supplies for our very own Feed My Starving Children set-up.  If you’ve never heard of Feed My Starving Children then you should check out www.fmsc.org because it is an awesome organization that I’ve wanted to be apart of for some time.  Over the first three weeks of camp our campers donated to something we call the Hunger Jar.  We we’re sure exactly which organization it would go to but it was decided that we would use it to get involved with Kids Against Hunger.  Our village group (27 campers) watched a video about the difference FMSC is making and then split into three stations for packaging.  They only spent about 15 minutes packaging, but packaged enough meals for 620 people.  This will be going on all summer and is something that I am very excited about!

            I experience my first homesick camper this week and while it was challenging, it was also rewarding for both her and myself because we made it through the whole week and had fun in doing so.  Between dealing with that, several campers feeling sick at different points in the week, and one of my campers losing two teeth, I felt very much like a mom this week.

            I have another few fun stories with fires again this week.  I burnt three of my fingers on a Dutch oven lid that I thought had cooled long enough and had the nurse come visit me.  Thankfully the nurse this week was Phil’s mom who is amazing and I healed in no time.  On Wednesday morning I woke up to pouring rain and thought to myself, “Humm, how are we supposed to start a fire to eat breakfast?”  Turns out you can indeed start a cooking fire in rain and I can proudly report that I did so (and without the lighter fluid that Bryce offered).  However I was a nervouse wreck the whole time I was cooking the bacon and eggs because I was sure I was going to have a grease fire.  But I didn’t!  Yey!

            I also experienced something else really awesome… At Wednesday night worship we wash our campers feet as an act of service towards them and this week after I had washed all my campers feet, one of them asked if she could wash mine.  I said no because that wasn’t the point of what we were doing, but I was deeply moved by her thinking of that and asking me. 

            Well the summer with campers is now half done and I must admit that I have had a blast (as you can tell from reading and looking at pictures), I am also completely exhausted and looking forward to being on Day Camp in Onalaska this week.  I’ll actually get to sleep, not constantly have smoke in my eyes, AND get to shower!  YES!!!