Welcome to ministry, AKA CAMP DIXIE

So three days after Adam's arrival in Virginia Beach, it was time to get to work, literally! So we were off to Camp Dixie for our first week working with our new ministry, The Atlantic Shores Middle School Waves. We took about 65 students and another 20 high school and adult leaders.

One of the first orders of business, which I took pretty seriously, was the room decorating contest. I was worried about making a good first impression with the students so I tried my best to get lots of beach paradise items together for our theme (thanks mostly to my sister's Bat-Mitvah, kind of ironic)...and guess what...yes our room won from the girls cabins!

So this was also my first summer camp experience and it was definately jam packed. After breakfast we heard devotions from Adam and Hugh, two of our church's pastors. Adam presented the students with his vision for the ministry and challenged them to think about the community he wished them to be. Then we spent the mornings playing paintball (also a first for me), riding the go-carts and alternating through in door stations that varied from creating a team commercial and lip-sync to creating camp frames.

Then after lunch and afternoon devotions, we met back together for team competitions and water events (pool and the lake).

Here are some of those fun team competitions. One was a boat building contest and another was the Blob Olympics. Adam and I were on the red team and we rocked it out!

Here's the building process followed by the boating competition itself.

Here's Adam is blobbing someone. That thing is CRAZY!

A SHOUT OUT TO THE NEW STUDENT PASTOR!

Then the nights were spent in our evening services where after warming up with some more team competitions and a great time of worship, we heard from our camp speaker who challenged the students to follow after Christ and pursue God with passion.

T.Jay was very excited to be passing the Middle School paton on to Adam as he goes on to work with the High School ministry. Every time T. Jay has seen our parents, he reminds them of how he must be their favorite person right now for bringing us home to Virginia Beach and he's right...my mom may even name a future dog after him, which in our family is a true honor!

Overall, it was a fantastic introduction to the ministry and a great way to get to know many of the students. We are so excited for what God has for this ministry.