Summer 2016, Post 4 - Riverside

Another year of Bible camp is in the books!  This year the camp saw about 180 campers during the week.  I think Robby's first year was well over 200 as was evidenced at the worship service that the parents can attend.  It was packed with people standing in any open spots.  This year had lots of empty seats but the kids were LOUD!!

Caleb was an Alpha camper this year, his first at Riverside.  The Alpha campers either camp from Sunday to Tuesday, or like Calebber, from Wednesday to Friday. This was his cabin (Aaron, on the right) complete with a basement with showers shared with the other cabin.

Robby was in the Apostles cabin which is barely visible in the photo.  It's down at the very end, towards the left side of the pic, visible only betwixt two trees.

Robby's making a grand entrance for the final worship program.

And Caleb's grand entrance.

The camp counselors sang Good, Good Father together this year.  It was beautiful!!  Robby's cabin mates had their arms around each other's shoulders and swayed back and forth thru the entire song.

Robby's cabin mates and some of the things they wrote about him. It's hard to read, but one of his counselors wrote: "What a blessing you have been to our cabin. I want to thank you for your constant attentiveness and curiosity about the Bible and God's Word".  The other counselor wrote, "You have had awesome questions this week in Bible study.  Thank you for your curiosity and starting interesting conversation. Your humor and personality have brought a lot of positive energy to Apostles cabin this week".   Can't beat that!

Caleb's cabin mates.  His counselors absolutely LOVED him and told me that he was amazing as a cabin mate as he would not let any of his mates NOT have fun!  They said they have never seen a kid who smiled constantly.  That's my boy!!

And so it goes.  When I first saw Caleb, he stressed that he was DEFINITELY going for the full 5 days next year.  He has 5 days of adoption camp coming up in about a month, so we'll see how he feels after that.  He also said he's less nervous about adoption camp after attending Riverside.

Anniversary Day!

Today is a bit of a special day for a couple of reasons.

1 year ago today, we were matched with little Chang Rong Bo, who of course, is now known as Caleb RongBo Schmitz.

That alone would be a good enough reason to celebrate, but it is also the anniversary of another "minor" event.

20 years ago today, I married my true love; Lesley Kay Bushman.

We are now old farts who look back and wonder what happened to the last 20 years...

In those 20 years, we've had 2 kids, 2 dogs, 2 houses, 2 arguments (maybe a few more, but not many) 3 apartments, 3 surgeries (depending on how you count them), 4 lawn mowers, 9 cars (my memory is fuzzy...), roughly 29,000 meals, and about that many friends, if of course, you include family.  :-)

We've also had a WHOLE LOT OF FUN!

Thank you all for being part of the last 20 years.  I look forward to the next 20+ years and hope they continue to blossom the way the last several have.

Thank you Lesley for tolerating me. I love you to the moon and back!

Take care and God Bless!
Ted

Puttin' The Boys To Work

'Tis the season...

It's time to get the gardens planted but we've been a bit busier than usual this year with the additional boy, hospital visits, a moving mama (Grandma Schmitz) and so on.  So the garden(s) have been mildly neglected.  We do have a garden of onions planted that are doing well and our potato hills look downright gorgeous, if I do say so myself!

I had tilled all of them in the fall and then once in March so the dirt is nice and loose and easy to till now. Robby wanted to help so I gave him a brief lecture on how to handle the thing  (I was behind him except for when the photo was taken) and all of the stuff you need to respect on a machine like this.

I think he kind of liked it but was a little apprehensive when I stepped away for the pic.

Caleb is getting a little antsy about giving it a try too.  Neither boy likes to be outdone by the other, at anything!

So Caleb "helped" me with the smaller gardens.  The auger is not engaged but he got a kick out of holding on to the handles and just feeling the machine vibrate.

Someday, Robby and Caleb will be able to do this all by themselves and dear ol' dad will be able to sit on the deck, cold one in hand, and supervise the proceedings...   ahhhh...  what a dream.