Day Three Memories Made

 

As mentioned in years past, our camp mascot Kid Royale looks for Random Acts of Kindness made by our campers. These kindnesses are rewarded with a prize. Random Acts of Kindness aren't big ticket items. In fact, they are small kindnesses like sharing a toy, or some sunscreen, helping clear a table, or trading notebooks with another camper because the other camper likes the color. 

Kid Royale with a lion prize

This year’s prize is a small lion.  The interesting thing is that the campers still enjoy doing Random Acts of Kindness even after they've received their prize. You can still see them going out of their way to help out, fellow campers, buddies and staff. 

One of our staff, Pastor Sue, provides object lesson that help our campers deal with issues in a positive way. Today's object lesson has the heroes of the story, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego facing some very tough choices; follow the will of the ruler King Nebuchadnezzar or follow the will of God. Not following the king appeared to be certain death.   But God honored them and their desire to serve him and spared them from a fiery furnace.  This amazed the king so much, he too honored God with his praise.  Our campers learned to apply this lesson, which promotes our doing the right thing, even when it's not popular with our friends. 

Campers dress up and play the parts of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego

The waterfront offers a lot of activities for our campers.  They can swim, build sandcastles, or jump on a trampoline. Today, the campers had a special treat - the option of speedboat rides.  

The camp speedboat 

It was clear the campers enjoyed this special treat. You could hear them laughing as they skimmed across the lake.

It's been a tradition for a number of years to have a birthday party that celebrates all of the campers' Birthdays. Each camper is called out based on the birthday month, given a birthday bag, and then once everyone has the bag, we sing Happy Birthday, and they open their gifts. We end the party with pizza and cupcakes. 

Packages ready for the campers

Camper diving into his Birthday bag to see all of his presents

The finale of the day was the annual Give it a Go Show where campers are encouraged to display their talents.  Campers showed the bugs they caught, sang songs, shared information about dogs, did backbends & gymnastics, displayed art, demonstrated animal noises, and gave puppet shows. it warms our hearts to see and hear our campers encourage one another to "Give it a go" and "You can do it". Our Music Lady asked who had not performed in front of other people and hands were raised. It was rewarding for us to provide this safe, friendly space for them to give it a go. 

Congratulations to all of the performers for have the courage to take that big step of sharing their talents with others, even when it seems like a scary venture.