whew!!!

man, what a day!!!  what a past couple of days!  ryan has arrived, and it's been a blast.  we ate pizza and went out to nags head thursday night (including jockey's ridge...pictures will come later, when we have a few seconds to breathe!)  yesterday started the fun!  ryan got to learn a ton of stuff, and we followed joe and michelle around on housekeeping!  then...the fun train.  mike re-did the exhaust, so it's really nice and fun to drive that thing!   we also opened the slide for the first time friday, i can't wait to go down those slides.  then last night we had a bonfire in the new fire pit with s'mores and free marshmellows!  this was the first time building a fire in the new fire pit, and the first time selling smores for 25 cents.  we had around 120 people come from 7-830.  it was absolutely, positively wonderful meeting all sorts of kids and campers and just PEOPLE!  me and ryan.  first summershine activity.  120 people.  awesome.

so time for TODAY!!!   got up this morning around 7, and started cleaning pools at 8!  scrubbed some tiles, vacuumed some dirt.  then around 915 ryan drove the fun train for a bit while i got all the beads and string and markers and crayons and paper together and organized for the craft hour, then craft hour happened.  we had about 20 kids making mother's day cards and beads, and the weather was beautiful!  we then did some water slide / fun zone duties for a few hours and proceeded to the beach at 2 for sandcastle building!  we probably had about 20 people participate, gave out some free banana bikes and some free tie-dye shirts, because everyone was making INCREDIBLE sand castles.  again, the weather was awesome!  note to self - give about 15 full minutes to yourself for rinsing off all those sand castle toys.  that takes a while!  

then we rushed over to get the tie-dye stuff ready before 4, filling up tubs and getting out shirts and getting money and rubber bands and clothes-pins prepared, and then they started piling in.  and i realized i really only know ONE DESIGN to show everybody...and that's the spiral thing.  the easiest one ever.  but, other campers knew other ones and we had a blast!  we sold probably around 40 or 50 shirts but around 60 showed up.  all this time, by the way, we've gotten to actually know a lot of the kids and families!!!  

after tie dye it got REALLY windy and cold, we had to move the movie and raffle inside, and we gave away a TON of stuff at the raffle.  60 or 70 showed up to hang out with us for a while. 

backing up a bit, directly after the tie dye i rushed to the store to rent the incredibles, the movie for tonight, and there was a sign on the door "be back in 5 minutes."  i waited like FOREVER!!!  it was God's way of saying "hey, pray.  in the middle of the day."  so i was like, "ok!"  raffle at 6 went great, then we got ready for the movie at 830...and got to know this one family that is awesome.  jonathan is 5 and jennifer is 2.5, and she broke her leg last night on the jumping pillow!!!  her and her dad were jumping and she just landed wrong!  she's the cutest thing too.  but they won 7 prizes at the raffle!  so they really loved that.  we made popcorn in the middle of the movie and handed it out, and the movie just ended and we packed up 40 something chairs and the sound systems and you name it and ran through the cold putting everything and it's brother in storage places, and ran to our houses where i am now sitting writing this blog.  

tomorrow, we are getting into the cafe at 715 to start getting ready for pancake breakfast from 8-10.  then chapel at 1030...we're gonna have like 30 minutes to do what normally takes 4 or 5 people 45 minutes.  how bout them apples?  but you know what?  looking back, God has really been on our side this weekend.  it's been amazing.  i hope God shows up and does something huge tomorrow.  it's probably gonna be cold and windy, and we might have to move the chapel service to the cafe deck...but this is SO excited!

just to think....this is what it's really all about, this whole summershine thing.  i love it.  i've done it for 2 summers...but this 3rd one seems brand new!  i just wanted to give you guys a taste of what an average day will look like as a summershiner.  packed full of meeting people, making friends, seeing God work, and smiling.