Years ago, I came up to Sky Ranch as a camper for a week of camp in the mountains. It was an awesome experience where I found a sense of belonging and support by the community. I never thought that I would be a counselor up at the same camp when I was a camper, but here I am...eight years later being a camp counselor to kids ages first through twelfth.
We started off the summer with two and a half weeks of staff training where we were Wilderness First Aid Certified, learned the bible study for the summer, built bonds with fellow staff members, went hiking and sang songs around the campfire. It sounds pretty relaxing, but in reality it was an intense two weeks of conversation and training to prep all fifty of us for the summer ahead.
A huge part of being a camp counselor is that you are on 24/7. As a future teacher, I am taking this as practice for being a teacher in the future!! Yes, sometimes camp is exhausting. It is physically and emotionally draining, but it is draining in the absolute best of ways. At camp, I would consider myself to have the best job. I get to serve others alongside friends and fellow staff. We get to work in an absolutely stunning place on earth, and talk about God. It is an absolutely amazing experience and a once in a lifetime job.So after the two weeks of staff training, we started our first week of camp. Over the past few weeks, I have been on Traveling Day Camp in Denver, had a cabin of middle school girls, and been apart of flood relief in Longmont, Colorado.
This past week on flood relief was probably one of the most powerful weeks of my life and I feel blessed to have experienced this program.
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| One of the boarded up houses, gutted from the floods |
Back in September of 2013, parts of Colorado received record amounts of rain to cause record flooding. Lyons, Estes Park, Longmont and Boulder were hit especially hard. In the past nine months, these cities as well as homeowners have tried to put their properties, homes, and lives back together. Many have poured their life savings in to this project, losing money and draining themselves physically from what often has been back-breaking work.
These people have received help from outside sources, but there is still a great deal of work to be done.
That is where Sky Ranch has come in. This summer, the camp has started up a program to work with a variety of homeowners and organizations with the goal to help rebuild. Churches and groups of people have come out to Colorado to help with this effort working with such organizations as Americorps and Habitat for Humanity to help alleviate the work for cities and homeowners.
So last week, I headed down the mountain from our awesome camp with four other counselors. All week we worked with a group of 85 high-schoolers and their adult leaders from Minnesota. The kids were fantastic, so incredibly willing to work, and brought an incredible amount of energy. Each was kind and considerate, and all five of us counselors really bonded with the groups of kids.
Each morning, we were sent out in to the community to do six hours of physical labor. As we moved debris, rocks and stones, and painted and stained, we were able to hear many of the homeowners stories.
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| The Debris we helped to move along the river (There was a hot tub in one of these piles) |
One of the most powerful stories was that of a homeowner. He had been diagnosed with eye cancer four years ago. Unable to fix his tear duct quickly, this man took a trip to Asia to think about his life. While there he was riding a motorcycle and fell on the pavement. He broke his collarbone in two places and from the scratches acquired an airborne pathogen. After being rushed to the hospital, he was diagnosed with a flesh-eating bacteria. The doctors had to slice his arm open, peel back the skin, and scrape his muscles of the bacteria. The flood this past year destroyed this man's beautiful property. Having not much muscle mass and his collarbone still broken in two places, it has been incredibly tough for this man to return his life to the way it had been before.
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| The Garden we helped to plant |
We were incredibly happy to help this man get back on his feet by planting his garden and shoveling sand to serve as a barrier in case of any future floods.
It was stories like this that filled our week. It created an incredibly powerful bond between our group and I have honestly never seen kids work as hard as I saw the group from Minnesota work.
Sadly, I have never been on a Mission Trip. It was a privilege to be apart of this group's mission trip, working to better other's lives. At the end of the week, the five of us counselors agreed that we could have easily spent a few more weeks with this group helping others out.
As a native Coloradoan, I had no idea how bad things were up in Longmont. I was amazed by the destruction done and the work that still needs to be done.
By the end of the week, we had shared in some pretty fantastic memories which also included a food truck party, whitewater rafting, and a Rockies baseball.
It was such a powerful week to see all of the ministry being done down the mountain. It was a privilege and I feel so lucky and blessed to have been apart of it.
I wasn't expecting weeks this powerful when I came to Sky Ranch this summer. It goes to show how much God has in store that is truly wonderful for my life and for so many others.
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Here are some pictures from other wonderful moments at camp!
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| Hike to Golgatha |
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| Bliss=drinking chamomile tea, reading a book, and looking at this view |
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| Cirque Meadows |
