Camp Week 2

I got to share a cabin with Olivia, another team member and we had an awesome week with our girls!

Not gonna lie, after last week I was left wondering if I am really cut out to be a camp counselor. Did the kids really deserve to have me serving for them? Was I even good enough? I don't know, but after this week I feel much better about this job. I had an amazing week with kids that I was definitely not ready to send them home. I didn't feel like I wanted to be done sharing God's love with them, but every week comes to an end and every Monday new kids will pour into camp with open minds and open hearts.

I was assigned to be on high school camp and after this past week ended I can confidently say that I work best with the older campers. As I said in my last post, I just do not seem to be gifted with the gift of working with young children and I have come to terms with that fact. Of course working with high schoolers has its own set of challenges that working with elementary school aged kids does not have; However, these challenges I feel more excited to explore and take on.

I definitely had to rely on other counselors to help me out sometimes. I am still figuring things out as I am new to team and have not had every camp yet (obviously, it is only week 2). In addition to the help of team members I had an adult volunteer, named Josh, that I co-lead a small group with. Josh is a past team member who I had known already and really helped me out teaching my first real small group. Shoutout to Josh for being an awesome A.V.! I am so thankful to have all of the help and am excited to see what week three has in store for me.

xoxo, tay

Camp Week 1

I survived my first week as a camp counselor. It was both awesome and stressful in so many ways and the support from the rest of the leadership team here and my faith is the only thing that got me through it.  

For week one, I was assigned day camp. I got many mixed responses from my fellow counselors. Some loved it, some warned me to be ready for the craziness. I have come to the conclusion that day camp isn't my thing. I tried, I really did. I just don't think I have the gift of patience with small children. Don't get me wrong, the kids were definitely cute and there was some really awesome moments with them. However, in between all of the cuteness there was a lot of chaos. I wanted to like day camp so bad, but I just can't deny that I did not enjoy the experience as much as other team members did. 

Week one was a challenge but I was so happy to be there to serve and help kids learn about there faith at such a young age. I hope that I was able to touch their lives in any little or small way. 

xoxo, tay

It's a Beautiful Day to Save Lives

Lady guards of Warren W. Willis UM Camp

I have been SO busy the last week! My guard class has been on the go every day since we got here trying to finish our lifeguard certification before orientation week. We finished the certification yesterday and today we were just hanging out, learning how to canoe and sail. I think I can speak for my entire class when I say that we are happy to have survived our certification.

I was personally pretty nervous to get through this week. I was worried that I would not be a strong enough swimmer and get sent home. So to make sure that that did not happen I did what I had to do in order to properly prepare myself and was able to successfully complete the entire course without any issues. Of course, that doesn't mean that it was easy. I had to get through prerequisite tests in order to even continue the course. Checked those off. Next up we had to pass 4 multiple choice exams in the classroom and 3 "final scenarios" in the water. It sounded scary at first but our instructors prepared us extremely well for all of us to pass all of our exams.

The final scenario's are what freaked me out the most. They were basically a physical exam of us demonstrating how we would save victims in different situations. The first two were a breeze. The last one was a different story. But I felt very prepared and knew I could do it as long as I didn't rush to much stayed calm (the way I would have too in an actual emergency). I passed without any major issues but it was not easy. My victim was a 180 lb dude that I rescued from the bottom of an 8 ft pool and was my largest, heaviest victims yet.

Becoming a certified lifeguard is a goal I have had for awhile but it was definitely a "background" goal. To clarify what I mean by that is that it is a goal that I wanted to achieve but I didn't think that I would be able too. I have grown up on the water but I was NOT in shape AT ALL any more. So that was my goal: get back in shape and become a certified lifeguard. I set my mind to it, kept my faith that God would lead me along the way, and achieved my goal. Thanks to this experience, I think I am more comfortable in the water than I have ever been before, and I loved the water before this as well. I can't wait to continue to grow this summer and not only serve on the leadership team here at camp. but watch over the campers as a guard.

"It's a beautiful day to save lives." -Dr. Derek Shepherd

xoxo, tay