This summer was so much fun for all campers and staff involved. We ran 7 weeks of Day Camps which we’ve never done before, and they couldn’t have gone better! One of the highlights of the summer for me was that we had a camper who came to camp for the first time. She was very shy and reserved in the beginning but by the last day of camp she was in tears because she didn’t want it to end.

So, we invited her back for another week. This week looked the same as the week she had just done. Same games, same activities and even a lot of the same food. We thought by the end of week 2 she would be bored, but she wasn’t. It was because she loved our staff, the relationships she had formed and the love that she felt while at camp. She has been attending our Connections programming consistently and even wants to come back as a volunteer next summer!

Connections has been an awesome part of our ministry for a few years now but there has been a clear discrepancy between the number of group home kids we get at camp versus the number of group home kids we get attending our Connection events. I personally think group home workers haven’t seen the value in our programming until this year. We have multiple group homes driving kids from all over the city (and even Gibbons and Stony Plain!) for our programs this year and it has been so encouraging to hear feedback from the staff at the facilities. We even have a couple group home staff that come to our programs and stick around because they enjoy the atmosphere we create! We have had 15 different group home kids attend our programs so far this season and to me, that’s a gigantic win. Looking forward to continuing on this winter and spring and seeing what God has in store.