a bit late, but more to come

Much has happened since I last updated this blog. We had staff training in Gainesville, GA (northeast of Atlanta) and we just finished our first week of camp for the summer.

I'll go back to the beginning of my trip to fill y'all in on the details. Jackie, who I worked with two years ago in Mississippi with TEAMeffort, and I left early Wednesday, May 21 to drive to Nashville, TN. It was an incredibly long day of driving, but we arrived in Nashville after almost 15 hours on the road. We arrived at John and Sandy's tired, but were excited for a place to sleep for the night. John and Sandy are a couple I met last summer with Cooks United Methodist Church. I've had the privilege of working with Cooks UMC youth group each of the last two summers. Even though I didn't work the summer with TEAMeffort, I was able to go and work with Cooks again when they returned to Mississippi. I also was able to take a road trip over Christmas break to Nashville with my buddy Tim and saw them again this January.

Back to the trip. We got to John and Sandy's they greeted us with baked some potatoes and steaks. My steak was amazing and I was happy to have delicious home cooked meal heading into a summer of mass produced food and lots of fast food. When talking with them, we learned that John has been sick for quite a while and the doctors haven't really been able to figure out what is wrong. He was scheduled for surgery that week. The next morning we slept in and left for Gainesville at 10:30. We arrived at Gainesville First United Methodist Church and staff training was officially started. It was really good meeting everyone from all the different TEAMeffort camps.

On Friday, after a whole day in Gainesville, I flew back to Minneapolis so I could make it to my cousin Miriam's wedding. It was good to be able to come back and see family one more time before I headed down south for the rest of the summer. As quickly as I came back, Sunday morning my buddy Austin brought me to the airport on Sunday to fly back to Atlanta.

After getting back to staff training we had a good time getting prepared for our camps as well as getting to know the staff at the other camps. That Wednesday we drove to Mississippi to set up our camp before heading to New Orleans to help set up their camp as well.

I know this isn't a great place to stop, but if commercials can stop at suspenseful parts, I think I can too. That and it'll get you to come back and check it out. But seriously, tomorrow morning is the start of our work week and I need my beauty sleep. I'll see when I can come update my blog this week and catch y'all up to what I'm doing today.