Camp Life… or how I'm crazy.

Wow. I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted anything.

That'll will be changing… I have a few fun things up my sleeve.
(muah-ha-ha)

Anyway, the point of this post is to document the craziness that has been my last week.

Seriously.

This life I live.

Wow.

Don't get me wrong. We have our share of struggles, too. But, this is going to be a more uplifting post. God has blessed my week with some crazy adventures and opportunities this week and I'm so grateful. It was such an awesome mid-summer pick-me-up.

At this point of the summer at camp, most people are tired and busy and maybe even injured and we've been under enough attack that unless we're actively renewing our minds and trusting the Lord, it gets taxing. Thankfully, our staff is awesome and keeps encouraging one another. It's totally evident in the way they are open and vulnerable with our campers and we are seeing many choose to put their trust in God! So exciting!

SO, it's been an awesome week!

I'm only going to back-track as far as last Saturday.

Saturday: We ended a crazy busy week with a crazy busy weekend! Saturday morning we got up early to head 2 1/2 hours away to go to the hot springs in Ouray to celebrate the birthday of a dear friend. It was so much fun to have so many of the wranglers together to just relax and play on the weekend. They work hard all week and it was such a blessing to watch them just play.  :)  The hubby wasn't able to come because our truck is needing some repairs and he's working hard to get it usable for our family, but I had some wonderful friends and my awesome sister who took care of me and the kids so we got to go along!

Not that my town isn't, but this little town is exactly what I picture when I think of a tiny mountain town. It is tucked into a tight little valley so you are surrounded by mountains on all sides. The little street with the cute little stores and bed & breakfasts is super steep because it's built on a mountain slope. There are unique little restaurants and sweet little candy and coffee and ice cream places. There are also rental shops for your outdoor adventures. There's even a little pond where you can feed turtles. In one word: adorable.

The view from next to the hot springs. All the little shops are up the hill behind that apartment building.

From a few weeks ago

From a few weeks ago

(ps: I love instagram for this reason. I'm not going to bring my big girl camera to the hot springs unless I don't plan on swimming… but I always plan of swimming when we go there!)

We got home last Saturday evening, had the kids take baths, and fell fast asleep.

Sunday started the craziness that is a normal week here with church, bible study, lunch with the EQ department, meetings, registration, and the beginning of a new week with campers!

Monday: Some of you know that I've started doing Turbofire. It is a high intensity cardio workout that you can do in your living room. No kidding, one week in and I'm seeing results! In hindsight, I don't think I should've done it Monday morning, but I did. Later that evening, I regretted it.

Monday night I got picked up by some friends around midnight and we made our way in the dark to the Uncompaghre trailhead. I've been wanting to peak Uncom since I saw it from Redcloud Peak in the beginning of June. It just looks so cool!

We knew Monday night would be a pretty full moon and thought that would be perfect to hike by.

It was.

No headlamps or flashlights were needed and we scurried up the tallest 14er in this part of CO. Once you get to the top of Uncom you basically have to rock climb to reach the peak. Amazing.

At the top, my friends were kind enough to let me set up my tripod and experiment with taking photos in the dark. I used a very long shutter speed to capture these photos.

They even let me experiment with light painting! I hope to get more practice but here's what I got:

So fun!

Anyway, we got down off the mountain during the sunrise. It was beautiful. We met a few people starting their hike up on our way down.

I got home with just enough time to shower before the hubby left for work. By mid-afternoon I was dizzy from exhaustion, but it was so worth it.

Tuesday through Thursday: I spent these days doing all I could to fill in for our camp photographer who suddenly had to go home.

Let me just tell you, I love playing photographer.

I spent my days taking images like this:

The hubby teaching a lesson.

One of our adventure camp cabins when they did the high ropes course.

Our speaker for the week: BP (or the bald pastor)

Seriously, we get the best campers and have so much fun at Camp Redcloud!

At this point I have to give a special thank you to all my babysitters! This opportunity is so refreshing to my soul and I couldn't do it without you. Thank you for taking such great care of my kiddos!

Wednesday was awesome because I had my 1 on 1's and this week that included me getting more time to learn/practice the seven games with Ashes. If you don't remember Ashes, she's the one who did this when we were trying to trailer her in Grand Junction when she was being donated to camp:

She's spunky. She's fiesty. And, she's a little intimidating.

I don't know why, but I LOVE HER.

She kinda terrifies me, but I love her.

So, Becki is teaching me ground work so she will hopefully start to respect me more so that I can have more confidence with her. I'm VERY excited about how it's going so far. She was pretty stubborn when we started but by the end of it she was paying attention to me and moving how I was asking! Yea for tiny victories!

Then, Thursday morning, I woke pretty early to join some women out at camp for the 9 MILE RUN BACK TO TOWN.

Yes, that's crazy. I know.

I haven't been able to make it 2 miles on my own since we moved here. But, I ran all 9 miles (minus one stretch break and stopping once to remove my outer layer) thanks to the encouraging words from friends. I'm SO glad I did it. I feel very accomplished.  :) I will be doing it again… and again and again.

Friday: Our Fridays are pretty awesome. We get up and head straight to camp to see the horse show. This is a show that we put on every week when the parents come to pick up their kids so they can see how much they've grown while they were here.

And, I get to take more photos… like these:

Part of a race. They run their horses from one side of the arena to the other, dismount, bob for apples, feed it to their horse and ride back to the other side. First one back wins!

The Little Mister loves going to the show because he usually gets to ride after.

 After the show, we eat lunch with all the campers and families before they head home. It's a sweet opportunity to find out campers favorite time of the week and what they'll miss most. After that, we normally head to boss's house for our accountability time with the equestrian team. We get to check in with one another to find out how everyone did during the week: how they were/weren't trusting God this week, how their relationships are doing, etc. It's so great to hear about the awesome things God did during the week. We normally get home just in time for me to not want to cook dinner. :/ You know how it is…

Saturday: The hubby and I went up the Carson trail to the old Carson Townsite on Saturday with our JAWs (Junior Assistant Wranglers).  They stay for several weeks at a time so on the weekends they get to do fun things like an all day ride (like what we took them on), or rock climbing, etc.

I won't bore you with all the details of the trip, however, I will tell you that I'm sore from it because the horse I was on is BIG and while we were up at the townsite (it's an old abandoned mining town) we watched it SNOW on a few of the other peaks… no kidding.

 SEE?! Crazy, right?

Sunday: Yesterday was a normal, busy Sunday for us except that we also had the privilege of attending the baptisms of some of our friends. Pictured is our dear friend, Goose. We love her.  :)

And that, my friends, is a little peek into life in the mountains.

It's quite the adventure.

Hope all is well with you!
-kt