Summer Part 3: Campmeeting (or is that Camp Meeting)?

We flew directly from Salt Lake City on Monday, July 2 to Boston on Southwest.  Since campmeeting started on Friday, July 6, there didn't seem to be much point to go home first and then go to my parents a few days later.  Plus, it saved money.

We also liked this plan because we wanted to be in Freeport for Fourth of July.  We had less than 24 hours at my parents and then we were in the car on Tuesday afternoon driving up.  My mom got off work early and the six of us and my parents drove up together.  We stayed at the Hampton Inn which was right along the route of the 10k race in the morning. Neither Duncan nor Shawn ran it this year but Camille did it for the first time!

Little stop at LLBean on Tuesday evening. Duncan says he doesn't want to shop here anymore though now that they changed their return policy.  

Standing outside the hotel on Wednesday morning watching the runners.  We saw Aunt Camille and some other relatives go by.  

Camille, her dad, and brothers after they all finished. 

The kids lined up to start their one mile Fun Run. 

Shawn and Acadia. Unfortunately I only got video of Camden, Aubree, and Brady running. Camden finished first and I was surprised that Aubree was so far behind him. But it turned out that she stayed back with Brady.  They both ran the whole time. 

Meanwhile, Calleigh takes after her mom. She had to walk some of it but I was proud she finished it! 

Brady wasn't feeling well afterwards and threw up a little on the sidewalk while waiting for the parade.  The very hot weather didn't help!

The girls waiting for the parade.

Glad to have this guy around because he's usually in Canada by this time.

The parade is coming!!

After the parade, it was picnic time at Winslow Park.  It was a gorgeous day in the shade.  The only downside to the day was having to get Duncan to Logan so he could catch a flight back home to go to work.  

The boys getting in some beach time before we had to leave.

We went back to my parents after dropping Duncan off at the airport and then Friday morning it was back up to Freeport for camp meeting.

Hanging out at Papa and Gigi's with Aunt Shirley and Aunt Mary.  They flew up because they were driving up to Canada with my dad.  And see! It's not my fault I like Mountain Dew.  Clearly it's in my genes.

You might be a redneck.... if you set up camping chairs in the room with the A/C and just hang out there.  

Campmeeting was a week earlier this year which meant we had a week gap between campmeeting and Nova Scotia. In years past, we left directly from campmeeting to drive to Nova Scotia.  Alas, this meant that Duncan didn't join us at all for camp meeting.  He was not heartbroken over this development.

First thing they did was have a Nature Hunters meeting.  Apparently Calleigh was in charge.

We had our usual set up.  I had two tents.  One was the play/clothes tent and the second one was for sleeping.  I had forgotten that the girls wanted separate beds this year so they were still on a queen air mattress.  Definitely need to change that for next year.  This also was the first year ever that there was no pack and play.  Kind of sad! We bought a bunk bed for the boys (the red beds in the foreground) but I was afraid Brady would roll off the top so we kept it as two separate beds.

The main meeting tent.

The first few nights it was very cold.  At least for me.  I was happy for one or both of the boys to join me in the bed.

The girls never seemed to be cold though. 

The play tent.

The big change this year was that Camille was asked to lead out in the Kindergarten division.  We hadn't been super pleased with the program the last few years so we were excited to take charge of it. Camille promptly asked me, Shannon, Alison, and Kelly to help her and it was a really great team effort.  Shawn also was assigned there for his "job" so it was a total family production.  Camille and Shawn did the music, Shawn did Bible story, Camille did crafts, I did stories and an activity, Alison and Shannon did games, and Kelly did a talk on healthy eating one of the days.  We had about 25 kids each class (more on Sabbath).  Of course, lots of them were our own kids: Brady, Colby, Acadia, Winnie, Caleb, Katelyn (in the afternoons), Finley, Griffen, Tyson (half the time), Westin, and Bode.  Sure, some of the kids were seven (ages are four to six) but they couldn't resist being with all the cousins.

The theme song was "Made For This" which was from VBS a few years ago so we were very familiar with it.  Great song!

Shawn doing Bible story time. 

One of the crafts... 

One of the games was Jump the Creek which Brady LOVED.  He was the winner on one of the rounds and Camille captured this really cool picture of him mid-jump.

The snack they got during Kelly's talk on healthy eating. 

Water fight one afternoon.  Big hit as you can imagine. 

Brady volunteered to do the prayer!

Alison and Shannon did a bit on nursing one day along with Uncle Terry. Lot of laughs! 

Watermelon craft. 

Getting some watermelon after a game.

Skittles rainbow. Always a popular activity.

Colby and Acadia were the last two kids left for "The wonder ball goes round and round." Colby ended up winning.

Brady and Mabel with their feet in "blood." We did an activity using water beads to illustrate blood.  The kids really enjoyed that one.

The last weekday we got to do the bounce house. 

Lining up to perform in the big tent on Sabbath morning.

They sang the theme song and also "Who's the King of the Jungle."

 Meanwhile, Calleigh, Aubree, and Camden had a terrific time in Juniors.  Aubree and Camden technically were still of Primary age but it's nice to have a friend teaching Juniors.  Kathy does such a great job that it's impossible to keep the kids out of her class.

Bre visited one evening to hear the girls sing.

Acadia, Aubree, and Calleigh doing special music.  Can't remember which song!

As I say every year now, my favorite thing about camp meeting is not having to cook! I am so happy to eat at the cafe for every meal.  Sometimes you get a meal that isn't the greatest but more times than not, I leave satisfied.

For lunch and supper, class would always get out about 15 minutes before the meal.  So we'd always have to race down to the cafe to get in line.  We hated to get there too late and wait in a long line.

Jonathan, Zasha, Luccia, and Uncle Kevin came up for the second Sabbath. 

Colby chomping on Caesar salad.  The vegan Caesar salad was one of my favorite things all week. 

The cafe was tough for this guy though.  Sometimes he just ate bread.

Some other random pictures from the week:

Shawn had his birthday on the first Sabbath.  Poor Gigi completely forgot until I reminded her that afternoon.  She brought in some brownies and ice cream for after the kids went to bed that night.  

One of our favorite aunts, Toni.

This guy gave kids ride on his contraption. 

Colby loves doing books.

Lemonade run with all the cousins.

Sometimes Shawn would be on a security and would have his own golf cart.

Brady had this weird rash on his back that we never figured out what it was.  Eventually it went away.

Jen brought Levi and Landon up for one day and night.  

Annual trip to McDonald's for ice cream.

It isn't really camp meeting if your feet aren't filthy dirty. 

Aubree won this giant jar of balloons by being the closest to guess how many it held.

I always like to take the kids to the ABC for a special treat.  They could either pick a dessert or a drink so you can see who picked what.

Getting in some more books. My mom was only there on the weekends. Looking forward to having her there every day next year! 

Oops.  This is what happens when you ask your brother to help clean up.

My two bros. Ricky was there until Sunday and then left for Canada. 

Two of the nights (but not in a row) we were there, Aubree got sick and threw up several times in the middle of the night.  She felt fine the next day fortunately.  The second night it happened, I stepped out the tent to clean out the bowl and I looked down about three tents away and saw this light flickering.  I walked down to it and saw that it was a citronella candle burning. The occupants of the tent had set up a zip up canopy just outside the tent and someone was sleeping with a child on an air mattress in it with the candle sitting on a table next to them.  The candle wasn't that far from the canopy.  All I could think about was the fire at Southern New England camp meeting in 1993 that happened because of a citronella candle that caught the tent on fire in the middle of the night.  A little girl died.  It was truly horrific especially since I saw her charred body.  That is all that went through my mind as I saw that candle and I knew I wouldn't be able to go back to sleep with it burning.  I went down to the security office but it was empty (even though there's supposed to be someone there 24/7). I had to wake Shawn up but he couldn't find anyone either.  Finally I went back a second time and two men were there and they came over and woke the person up and told her to blow out the candle.  Whew!

Beyond that, it was a really great week. The weather was amazing..it maybe rained for like 30 minutes the whole week.  The kids had such a fun time.  Calleigh says camp meeting is her very favorite thing even above Nova Scotia.  I loved camp meeting so much growing up and it makes me so happy to see my kids fully participating in everything and enjoying themselves so much.  Can't wait until next year!