Thursday, July 26th

Thursday was non-stop activity. Luke spent 7 1/2 hours suspended from his harness attaching climbing holds to a 30 foot tall brick wall with Mike assisting. By dinner time they had it finished and it looks great. The crowd of Russians gathered around grew in proportion to Luke's progress and height on the wall so that by the time it was done around 20 were ready to watch the first person try. Luke is very safety oriented (unlike some of our Russian brothers) and was very good about insisting on proper safe climbing procedures. After spending almost all day building the wall, he and Mike finished the day by teaching them to climb it. They were very thankful when it became too dark to climb.

While they were building the wall, the rest of us designed an obstacle course that the campers will have to navigate while carrying a 20 ft. log. They will weave it in and out of trees, lift it up to pop balloons, use it to walk across a water pit, carry teammates on it, balance a cup of water on the end, and much more. It was nice to exercise our creative juices and our muscles. We checked with Vadim, the camp director, part way through our design process. He loved it but wanted to make it harder, wetter, and dirtier. Our kind of guy.

I'm so proud of our team. They have hardly had a chance to sit down over the past couple days but they have pushed through and worked very hard. Please continue to pray that we don't get worn out. We usually have activities scheduled until late at night and haven't been able to get as much sleep as we would like. Thursday night we were around the campfire singing songs and listening to each of the 30+ camp helpers share about their expectations and hopes for the camp ahead. It was almost 1:00 a.m. before it was over and we could head to bed. We enjoyed the fellowship and were encouraged by their hearts for the campers and the Lord, but we were also very sleepy. Thankfully, God placed Macy in my life 6 months ago so I would be prepared to function on little sleep. Unfortunately the others haven't had the same blessing. Parenthood has prepared me for camp and camp will prepare them for parenthood.