Camp Chetek: T.E.A.M. 2014: Week 2

The second week of T.E.A.M. was a full week of working - serving food, doing dishes, cleaning the dining hall, bathhouses, the office, lodge, and chapel. For our reward activity, we went out to Mr. Ben's and shot skeet, a few handguns, and a revolver. I don't have any pictures from that week of us actually working but I do have some from our reward activity. Enjoy!

 Mandy & I

Shooting Skeet

 Ashton & Bekah

 Hannah out-shot us all.

 Erin

 Maripossa & I

 Alex

 Erin & I

 Waiting to shoot

 Maripossa

 Erin, Mandy, & I

 The guys chillin while waitin for us girls to get done shooting.

Shooting handguns/revolver 

 Waiting to shoot

 Aaron & Terrell

 Me

 Mandy & Erin

 Hanne, Hannah, Elizabeth, & I with Peter the Photobomber

 Ashton, Bekah, Hannah, & I

Ashton & Bekah 

Funny story behind this last picture. When we went to Mr. Ben's to shoot, we all parked in the driveway. Well, us girls took the bus and the boys borrowed one of the church vans and they were parked behind us. They sent us girls to the bus while the boys cleaned up. After they were done cleaning up, the boys went to load in the van only to discover that it was locked with the keys in it. So then most of the boys jumped in the back of the pickup and went back to camp while the rest of the boys and us girls hung out in Mr. Ben's house for a while. Then eventually Miss Betsy came and rescued us girls with her suburban and took us back to camp. This is definitely a memory that I think we will all remember for a long time. Right guys! (Not just the keys getting locked in the van but all the entertainment we had when the guys were suppose to be cleaning up. ie. Peter's dancing.)

Camp Chetek: TEAM 2014: Week 1

Hi! Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I have been extremely busy and am way behind on posting. So be prepared to be bombed with lots of posts in the coming weeks.

My busy summer all started with three weeks at Camp Chetek working on T.E.A.M. I had a lot of fun and made a lot of new friends. This summer's theme was Unity - striving together for the gospel and glory of Christ. The first week was spent in intense leadership training with Pastor Scott and Dr. Matt Williams. I learned a lot from all of our sessions and I will hopefully be posting more about that soon.

Here are some pictures from the first week of training. I will be posting more pics from the other two weeks soon. Love you all and miss you all!

 

Do you love your neighbor? 

 Hanne explaining how to play "Four on a Couch" 

The Couch

Who's Fault Is It?

Yesterday I had the privilege of going to Minneapolis with the Camp Chetek staff. We went to Gospel Light Baptist Church for the morning and evening services. After we ate lunch, we all headed to downtown Minneapolis to invite kids to Inner City Outreach.

Walking around downtown Minneapolis knowing that they very streets I was walking on were streets full of alcohol, drugs, and violence was a big eye opener for me. I never really fully realized how blessed I am until then. Some of the people that we talked to, you could just sense their loss of hope. They have no hope apart from Christ. Some people in this world might never hear about the Lord Jesus Christ. And it won't be their fault. So who's fault will it be?

In Romans 10:14 it says:

"How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? 

and how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? 

and how shall they hear without a preacher?"

It will be our (us Christians) fault. Some of us (including myself) get very excited about the thought of witnessing but when God opens the door, more often than not, we walk right past it instead of entering it. That is Satan discouraging us from doing what is right. Discouraging us from fulfilling the Great Commission! 

Matthew 28:19-20 

"Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, 

baptizing them in the name of the Father, 

and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. 

Teaching them to observe all things 

whatsoever I have commanded you and, 

lo, I am with you alway, 

even unto the end of the world. 

Amen." 

The best way to start witnessing is by sharing our own testimony of how we got saved! I want to encourage us (myself included again), as believers, to enter the door to witness instead of it being wide open and walking right past it. 

Of Great Uncle Visits and Projects

This last Wednesday, my Great Uncle Bob came to visit and help Daddy with some projects. The big one was moving the silo room from behind the barn to back behind the house to use as a wood shed. We had lots of fun with Uncle Bob and can't wait until the next time he comes!

 Uncle Bob

 

Guess who had the camera...

 Daddy

 Getting it braced to cut it and let it down.

 Getting it jacked up.

 

 The "Old Man Teeter-Totter" as they called it. 

Moving it. 

I sure would've loved to hear the reactions of the mail man and the people driving down the freeway as they saw a shed being pulled around the farm. 

 This is how we spent our evenings, playing wizard.

Uncle Bob explaining how to play "Wizard".

Gluten Free Coffee/Cinnamon Muffins



Do you need a nice muffin recipe for Easter Breakfast? These muffins are extremely good and will be enjoyed by all.

Coffee/Cinnamon Muffins
Ingredients:
1 1/2 c Bob's Red Mill All Purpose Gluten Free Flour
1/2 c sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons butter or margarine, melted
2 eggs ( I added another egg to make the bean flavor from the flour less noticeable)
2 teaspoons instant coffee crystals (I put in 4 teaspoons to make the coffee taste stronger)
3/4 c buttermilk (I added another 1/4 c to make them fluffier and not so dry)
3/4 c chocolate chips

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375. Grease (or use muffin liners) 12 muffin cups.
     In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.
     In a mixing bowl, whisk the butter, eggs, and coffee crystals until smooth. Stir in half the flour mixture until just moistened. Add half the buttermilk and half the remaining flour and stir. Finish with the other half of each. Do not beat!
     Divide the batter between the muffin cups and bake 22-25 minutes.

I hope you all have a wonderful Easter!

~ Ruby James

Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Cookies



I am extremely excited about this recipe. I am doing some baking today and wanted to make chocolate chip cookies that I could eat but all the other recipes that I have tried came out with a beany after-taste to them. So I went to the Bob's Red Mill website and found this one. If I didn't make them myself, I wouldn't know that they are gluten free. They are absolutely amazing. So without futher a-due, here is the recipe.

Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Cookies
1 1/4 c Sorghum Flour
3/4 c Tapioca Flour
1 tsp Xanthan Gum
1Tbsp Corn Starch
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 c Butter, softened (or you can do 1/2 c butter and 1/2 c margarine)
3/4 c Sugar
3/4 c Brown Sugar
1 lg Egg
1 tsp gluten-free Vanilla
1 c chocolate chips (I put in 1 1/2 c so)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Measure the Sorghum Flour, Tapioca Flour, Xanthan Gum, Corn Starch, and Baking Soda and sift together, set aside.

Let butter soften and bring egg to room temperature.

Cream butter, margarine, and sugars.

Add dry ingredients about 1/2 c at a time, mixing between additions, until all ingredients are combined.

Add chocolate chips and fold them into the dough. Chill the dough for about 30 minutes.

Drop dough by tablespoonfuls onto parchment-lined cookie sheets. Leave enough space between cookies to allow them to spread. Bake 8 - 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

Sorry...

Sorry for the lack of posts. I have been extremely busy lately with my job, finishing schoolwork up for the year, playing for the musical at school, and preparing for the MACHE Homeschool Conference. I just thought I would pop over and let y'all know that I am still alive. And, since a blog post is boring if it doesn't have a picture, here is a pic from my Daddy/Daughter date a couple of weeks ago. We went to Coldstone Creamery in Hudson. I had never been there but oh their ice cream delicious!!!

 

I got dark chocolate ice cream with Reese's Peanutbutter Cups mixed in.