Educational Developments

Well, as some of you know, I have been applying to grad schools for the second time this year. I went into the process already a little discouraged after having been accepted to exactly zero schools last year. I reluctantly emptied my bank account of the money earned during my December break, revamped my personal statement, and waited.

Then I waited some more.

I got my first rejection of the year.

Then I waited some more.

I got my first acceptance! There was much rejoicing. And surprise.

The next month, I got another acceptance. Secure in the knowledge that I now had a choice of schools, Marquette University or Michigan State, I started quietly panicking about how I was going to pay for whichever school I chose. Marquette had indicated that, if they were going to offer me an assistantship, they would make the offer before April fifteenth.

On April twelfth, I still had not heard anything from either school about financials - other than MI state confirming that they would not be offering me any departmental aid. That's when I got my third acceptance letter - from Northeastern University. I began a frantic emailing of my professors asking for advice.Dithering happened. How would I ever choose between these schools?

April fourteenth. A Saturday. A day on which I normally do not come in and check my email. But I had been told by MI state that I would have my financial aid packet by the end of the week and I did want to see it, so I came into the program center. I read my email. I read one of them a few times.

Marquette University offered me an assistantship. This assistantship will cover my tuition, give me health insurance, and provide a stipend for the two years it will take to complete my Masters degree. I may have cried a little bit. With joy. Then I called my mother.

Wisconsin, here I come. There are still a lot of details to figure out, but I am amazed at the way God has led and provided through this process. I couldn't at first reconcile my acceptance rate last year with this year's, but as my mother pointed out, God must have wanted me to spend a year at Barakel.

And yes, these pictures are old. Remember, my camera is old and cranky. It didn't want to come out and play.

quick review of many events

A lot has happened during the past couple of weeks. I went home and visited my family. I went to my Auburn Hills home and visited that family. I mixed up Gaylord and Grayling in my head. I made it safely back to Camp.

We are now midway through the second week of spring cleaning here. Both weeks I have been assigned to the chapels. This means that I get to clean some of my favorite places at camp and that I have an overwhelming, and unexpected, desire to play ping-pong. I blame it on the fumes from the Murphy's Oil Soap.

This weekend was stuffed with guests and good times. Amanda, Nathan, Claire, and Zeke all made the journey up to see me. Well, me and The Hunger Games. We also went shooting early Saturday morning to celebrate Nathan's new pistol and Kevin's birthday.

Obviously, I was taking this picture very seriously.

I will leave you with a brief story. Today I was washing the East Side Chapel platform when LB came to join our crew. He looked at me, "We've been trying to get you on your knees at the front of chapel for years!"

Home for Birthdays

The last weekend retreat of the fall season was cut short by an enormous snowfall which took out the power at camp. While the Dining Halls have generators, none of the cabins have a secondary power source and the temperature was predicted to drop to nearly zero on Saturday night. The difficult decision to end early was made when the power still had not returned by three-thirty Saturday afternoon. The campers were understandably disappointed but my family seemed delighted when I walked into the house on Saturday night rather than Sunday afternoon.

Sunday afternoon we celebrated Zeke and Toby's joint birthdays. Toby enjoyed his birthday greatly - you can read more about it here. Zeke also seemed to have a good time, but he was understandably less vocal and less enthusiastic in his devouring of orange finger jello. I didn't manage to snag any pictures of Zeke - he cleverly distracted me with games - but here are some of four-year-old Toby.

He unexpectedly took a nap as part of his birthday.

He was exhausted.

When Toby woke up, he seemed rejuvenated.

Toby's energy gets transferred to his new bear - apparently it can't sit still for pictures.

Terrariums with Cherry

This afternoon, Cherry and I embarked on a terrarium-creating adventure. I embarked with a modicum of trepidation, as I am known neither for my craftiness nor my neatness. And terrariums have dirt as a main element - dirt, moss, and lizards (no reptiles were harmed in the making of these terrariums.)

Our ingredients await.

Dirt is amazing stuff. It's amazing how quickly it spreads.

We placed the dirt, more or less carefully, in the glasses.
One of us was more successful with the tidiness factor.
One of us scattered dirt across the counter.
I was the messy one.

We then took the moss and laid it gently on top of our soil.

Cherry's lizards lay peacefully on top of their moss, secure in their new homes.

My lizards tried to make a break for it.

Finally, all was completed. Pieces of springtime rest on the counter.

PG arrived home to be greeted by our terrariums.
He was intrigued, "Is this what's for dinner? Lizard pie?"

Cherry and I both, I believe, enjoyed our adventure greatly. The dirt resides within its boundaries, the lizards remain where placed, and all is well. All photo credit goes to Cherry. Read her blog post about our time at http://chirpchirpcherry.blogspot.com/2012/03/fun-with-friends.html
photo credit: Cherry

What do you do when you're home alone?

I don't really have much to say this week. It's been a fairly normal week. I cleaned, did the laundry, and said goodbye to Lydia. It was great fun having her visit for a week and very sad to see her go. Now my life looks like this:

This is me sitting all alone in my bare living room.

The Dalek and I notice an enemy in the distance . . .

Exterminate!

Ok, so my life is not quite like that, but doesn't that look fun? Living alone this season has been a little different, and often, a little too quiet. However, I do leave the house occasionally and socialize with others. And sometimes people come and stay with me on the weekends. The past two weekends have been packed with friends, fun, and very late nights. This upcoming weekend brings two friends - Claire and Clara (yeah, that won't be confusing) - so the fun continues.

There are only two winter retreats remaining, so thoughts have begun to turn to summer and summer preparations. HIS-Ability week is already completely full and Lee Brown has had me start to work on the oodles of necessary paperwork.

Staffing interviews for summer are in full swing. I believe we have over fifty applications that have been submitted. We're still praying for male counselors - we only have about eight applications - and piano players - zero applications. However, yesterday at Staff Fellowship, we were told that the need for female counselors has been met by an influx of applications and that need has about been filled at this point :)

Where on Barakel property can you spot this fellow?

As of approximately ten o'clock this morning, I am ServSafe certified. Everyone who eats my food can now rest comfortably knowing that I am aware of food safety regulations.

Also, I have been gently informed that I must blog about my birthday. Last Thursday was my birthday. My friends, Nathan and Amanda, made the trek from Auburn Hills to shower me with cake, magnets, and broken TARDIS mugs. The brokenness of the mugs, I should say, was no fault of theirs. The mugs were shipped improperly and rightly protested such rough treatment. I missed being home for my birthday and being with my family. But Nathan and Amanda are family - generous, loving family that remembers my fondness for tiramisu. It was wonderful to have them here - I am so grateful for them.

This is a delicious tiramisu cake.

I won't specify my age - that would be unlady-like. But if you pay attention to the pictures, you just might be able to figure it out.

Title

Teen retreats were a ton of fun. I split my time between the Skate Hut and the Ski Haus. The heater in the Ski Haus is broken. I was going to hope it would be fixed by this weekend, but now I am too busy hoping that there will be snow for this weekend. We are experiencing a bit of a thaw. Only a bit of one. It's basically taking away the snow and leaving behind sheets of ice.

Fun story involving ice. Today I drove to Bake Day. Many other people also drove to Bake Day. I parked my car in the parking lot. So did other people. So far, all is normal. After Bake Day, I looked out the window and saw that my car was now snuggled up to the silver car next to it. And the silver car was being quite friendly with the blue car on its other side. We have the kind of ice that parked cars slide across.

In other news, Lydia Baker cut my hair.

My apologies for the photo quality and the expression. I am unable to look unironic when taking my own picture. I tried to get pictures from different angles, but my camera firmly expressed its disinterest.

Snow and Friends

Camp's plethora of snow meant that it was the inaugural weekend for the ski trails, and the Ski Haus. I spent a busy saturday stacking skis and knotting boots back together. The morning was quiet, but the after lunch rush was insane.

If you are interested in skiing here, I would recommend renting in the morning - then you'll be set for the rest of the day and not have to wait in line with the ninety other people who decided to rent skis right after lunch. Just a friendly hint.

I really enjoyed the Ski Haus. Fortunately. I'm scheduled to spend my entire Saturday there again this weekend.

This weekend, I also enjoyed a visit from Amanda and Claire. We frolicked together in the snow. None of us had ever been snowshoing before, so Amanda and Claire convinced me that it would be a grand adventure and that we all needed to go together. They are persuasive people.

This is Claire, buckling on snowshoes for the very first time.

This is Amanda. It looks like she's putting snowshoes on but she's actually taking them off.


Claire and me not falling over.

Three snowshoes! And snow!

I can now cheerfully recommend snowshoing to any eager inquirers.
We had a great weekend together.

I can hardly wait for them to come back.

Wait.

Amanda is already back.

I have good friends.

Yes, I'm the shortest.

A couple of weeks ago, the seasonal staff was stripped of their coats and bundled into the cold outdoors. Tthe amazing BAM (check out her site http://bamphotography.zenfolio.com/) snapped her shots of our frozen smiles. PG has now passed along one of the pictures taken on that fateful day. This is it . . . the official group shot of Camp Barakel's current seasonal staff . . .

Note: we did not deliberately dress to match. We are naturally that co-ordinated.

A Friend Comes to Call

This week, I was blessed by the visit of an actual person! See her? Way down there, right by the bright spot of orange.

This is Amanda at the bottom of the Thunder Express - her very first time on it.

This is Amanda almost all the way back up that very steep hill. She was a very obedient Thunder Expresser and always remembered to ring the bell to signal that it was safe for someone else to go down. We were the only people there, but it is important to maintain standards.

Amanda arrived Sunday evening and we optimistically ventured down to the waterfront for some star-gazing. This optimism remained unfulfilled, as the clouds covered most of the sky. Still, we survived going straight down the pathless hill behind my house with no injuries. That can only be a positive. Sadly, we also did not see the bear. I don't believe I will get to see it this fall. Maybe in the spring.

Monday is my day off. We spent the morning visiting the afore-mentioned Thunder Express and wandering through the woods. We made a brief stop at Crosscut Lodge, the most recently constructed building at camp, where we discovered a beautiful pile of mushrooms. Mushrooms are not usually what I think of when I ponder beauty, but the structured fragility of this casual heap is beautiful, in a way beyond standard aesthetics.

After Crosscut, we rambled down the old railroad grade to the north end of the lake. Clouds still blanketed the sky, drowning out the sun's rays and darkening the day, but gray is a colour too. It's a colour of contentment and serenity - of acceptance and calm. Shear Lake is lovely in every colour.

Amanda also discovered the perfect hiding spot.

I enjoyed every minute of Amanda's visit. It is great to be here at Barakel, but it can be lonely as well. Friends are scarce in the isolated Northern woods, especially ones who are unafraid of bears, beavers, and beeing beaten at Boggle. In the interests of full disclosure, I should mention that I did not win a single game of Skip-bo. She is the champion.

Amanda stayed even longer than I had hoped, not leaving until Wednesday morning. She took me to town on Monday, helped me with my work on Tuesday, and always claimed to be having a good time.

Last night, PG was talking to me about Amanda, "So, she is a true friend, then?"
"Absolutely."
Thank you, Amanda, for being a true friend, for being what I have been looking for since the first time I read Anne of Green Gables - a kindred spirit.

Laundry

Every Thursday morning I rule over the laundry room with an iron whisk - although I suspect it is some other, less firm, metal, since even whipping starch into water sometimes feels as though I'm asking too much of it.


It's a peaceful place, the laundry room, full of nothing more challenging than keeping track of which cloths and aprons belong on which side of the lake. A handy Sharpie and masking tape help me with that task. I fold rags, starch aprons, and wrestle rugs in and out of machines.

The second Ladies' retreat went well. It finally stopped raining and everyone was able to enjoy wandering through the woods on Saturday and Sunday. I worked in the Trading Post most of the time. As a result, I witnessed closely the single-minded shopping rampage that flooded through the Trading Post. Ladies shop intensely when they are here. It will be interesting to see the difference in a couple of weekends when we will be having Men's retreats.

Today I found more mail from Jesus - another anonymous gift and a check with a pledge for support. This pledge brings me up to 35% of my monthly support. I am so thankful.

The sad part about being here this weekend was that I missed my mother's birthday. It sounds like they managed to have a wonderful time without me, as unbelievable as that is ;) Happy birthday, Mum!

Vans

Blue vans are a part of my Barakel life. The above van is the one that has been graciously granted to me as my "camp car." It runs, so far. But like all camp cars, it is not licensed for off-property trips.

This means that every Wednesday, when I do the mail run into town, I need to use another vehicle - the mail van. As shown below, it is blue. But it is not as blurry as that in real life.



On Wednesday, I mistakenly loaded the outgoing mail into the wrong blue van. The error, fortunately, did not cross into illegal territory. I realized something was wrong once I had hopped into the driver's seat of my camp car and tried to insert the wrong keys in the ignition. I briskly hopped back out, loaded up the correct blue van, and had an otherwise uneventful trip into Fairview.

Titles are like subject lines - I'm not good at either.

This weekend was my first officially back in Archery. It was amazing and fun - lots of friendly competition and mother/son bonding. This time was made even more exciting by a special visitor to the range.

It's Claire!

Claire and Amanda came up to be Big Sisters for the weekend. And to visit me. We went on a night-time hayride and had a wonderful story-time, enjoyed by everyone in the wagon, I hope. The stars were unspeakably beautiful. Jane Eyre was epically gothic. It was great to be able to spend time with the two of them. They stayed even longer than I had hoped for - until Monday afternoon. Because of that boon, we got to do some shooting - of pool and archery. Due to a Monday morning downpour, we skipped the Thunder Express this time. Hopefully they'll come back soon.

This past week, I also got a piece of very exciting mail.

Yes, it does say it is from Jesus.

When I opened it, I found my first financial support. God's timing never ceases to amaze me. That morning, as I cleaned Tamarack, I had been worrying that I was heading into my fourth week at Barakel and still had not received any support. Then this was waiting for me - Jesus mail - a physical reminder of God's providence.

Since then, I've received a pledge for 20% of my monthly support and an envelope from someone I've never even met. Praise be to God. I am so grateful for his care and for the people who choose to be used and choose to give.

New and Improved Blog - With Pictures!

I was told this week that I needed to incorporate pictures into my blogging. As you all may or may not be aware, cameras and I tend to have slight disagreements about the results. This relationship has been improved slightly now that I know how to adjust the white balance, but I still tend to be a rather blurry person in my photographic habits. Enjoy the pictures - however you can :)

This was my delicious and nutritious breakfast - a penguin full of canteloupe.

Many thanks to Amanda for the camera, Joel and Misti for the penguin, and Mama Betsy for the canteloupe. She is taking great care of Kathleen and I and brought us a bundle of fresh fruits and vegetables last night. Kathleen cut up the canteloupe and, with great effort, I managed to provide something for myself and actually got it from the refrigerator to the penguin. Scurvy = successfully avoided.

How was that for the first picture post? You got to see my breakfast! You lucky, lucky people.

Grandparents' camp flew by amazingly quickly. It was strange going from a crowded weekend like family camp to having so few campers. As I ran from Handcrafts to Archery to the hay ride, I felt as though I was seeing all of the same people over and over again. They thought so as well, I'm sure - they certainly knew my name by the time we had our lovely hayride together.

I can barely contain my excitement about this next weekend. West Side hosts Fathers and Daughters while East Side welcomes Mothers and Sons. I will be in East Side Archery. But that isn't even the most exciting part. Amanda and Claire are coming! They will be big sisters to the daughters and will run WS Archery and Handcrafts respectively. And they will also visit me and we will have a great time.