More CFW

So life has recently been so hectic that I never finished my week at camp. I'm going to be brief because of my horrible memory.

The rest of the week went great, Wednesday my group went to the nursing home where two of our site cordinators managed to get a resident to socialize with everyone else. This lady is quiet the kicker! She didn't come out before because she would try to make everyone laugh but they wouldn't and just made her feel not part of the group. I got to spend a lot of time with her she was so sweet! I also met a filipino lady my heart went out to her because she was so exhausted even listening was difficult for her. But she was in better spirit after lunch and when i told her bye in Tagalog she was in a better mood. I got to spend time with this one resident who has left a lasting impact on me. She litterally has no family or friends, they all have past. So she always passes out her bracelets she wins at bingo to girls so she knows she'll be remembered. She reminded me of my nana, her hair was exactly like hers.

Thursday we got to stay on home site and we painted walls. Good thing my headache was gone! It was pretty awesome though to see the bond of my group. We even had some fun with the paint.

Our messiness

Friday was baby beds we basically stacked them up and cleaned up. Then the ladies who distribute them to families in need came and we helped them load up.

As for the faith growing, Wednesday was reconsilation totally misspelled that... It's always very emotional and this year God used me to help a camper who is also a victim/survivor of being molested. It still chokes me up thinking about that.

Thursday is Circle of Love. We sit in a circle, pass around a mic and get to talk about how camp has touched us. I got a couple shout outs and I broke down crying plenty of times.

My blog doesn't do it justice... maybe next time i'll bring my laptop and just write each night.

I haven't been as active on here as I've wanted but there is plenty to write about so hopefully i'll find time to write more soon.

Love,
Aly

Day 2- Feeling wanted

    So I ended my last post camp fort worth post with me not feeling well and sleeping until the next day. Well when I woke up all the girls in my room started asking me how i felt i thought this was sweet but didn't think much of it because they were in my room. I made my way downstairs where everyone was gathering for breakfast and got asked numerous times how I was feeling. This made me feel good inside. You see, in my day to day life everyone is so use to me not feeling good that its whatever. Not many people check on me when they see I'm not feeling good or made a trip to the hospital. Or if they do its to my parents so i really don't feel noticed.
   This started to make me realize that I am noticed and that God did have me there for a reason.

     We had breakfast and went to mass and let me tell you wow was it amazing! Everyone was moved, our campers were more into mass, the people who went to daily mass were in awe how close we were and the beauty of us prasing our Lord. Mass ended and my group and I set out for Mission Arlington. Mission Arlington is a Christian based Salvation Army pretty much. Clients go through a process and before they get what they need they are prayed over. After, they have 15 mins in this store like place to grabw whatever clothing they need. All clothing is already hung on hangers and organized by gender and somewhat on size. Then, they have a few mins in another room to recieve whatever odd things they need like plates, decorations, bed stuff, etc. After, they go to where the food is and recieve food. First half of the day i worked in the store. We would remove empty hangers, add more clothes, and help the customers. The second half I spent in this huge room filled with boxes after boxes of clothes. We woould just simply go through boxes and put them on hangers. Being that it was summer if we ran into any winter clothes we would put them in a trash bag to be held in storage till it got cooler.

    As usual we headed to showers then went back to the church and hung out. Our night activity was the living rosary. Basically instead of using a rosary we made a rosary out of candles. A candle for each bead. But before that the campers get to have some quiet time with God and journal.

oops! back to the weekend!

So I failed to mention a huge chunk in my story... You see, my faith is strong but my imperfections are great. I was excited for camp but as camp got closer i started doubting if i should be there. I didn't want to be one of those people who was do as i say not as I do. I was going to remain honest to campers no matter what. It felt really awkward at first because some people there were tremendously in faith and I honestly felt like I was experiencing something new when for the most part I wasn't. I felt like I was going to mass after not being there for a month, its an overwhelming feeling. It felt as if someone pushed me into the deep end of the pool when i just barely new how to swim. Yeah... scary... I quickly learn that my hardest issue would be my potty mouth. Yes, I curse... a lot! At work I can control it and I don't use it a lot online but when it's just me and people who i know won't give me crap about it I use it. But by Sunday morning my potty mouth was very much in control.

     Like I said on the weekend post, we have some of our own faith growing activities and it was different for me in that I didn't get the indescribable feeling like I always did. Which was weird because i was pouring my heart out. I did start to feel it but it wasn't the usual suddent overwhelmingness I would get. Which made me doubt even more why I should be here. I mean they would be find without me right? Besides, yeah I knew everyone on a-team but i wasn't that close to anyone it wouldn't be like they would miss me. In fact i was sure that if i left by wednesday they wouldn't even have thought about me.

     So saturday night i started texting my boyfriend, my best friend who also attended camp the same number of years as me, and my dad. Both my best friend and boyfriend were point blank saying i should be there. My boyfriend swore I deserved to be there expecially feeling the way I did, my dad also pointed that out. My best friend told me about her camp experience this year and offered prayers. At this point I'm balling my eyes out because I'm so lost and confused. Then one of the a-team girls saw me passing by trying to wipe my tears before she could see me but i was too late, i was caught. So we went into one of the bathrooms for privacy and just talked. She made me feel like I wasn't alone but at the end I was still confused. My dad was still texting me and was reassuring me that i was there for a reason but it was my choice to stay or not.  But I needed someone else to talk to still so I called my "camp sister" I explained how I was feeling and she explained she was going through similar things and that she was there for me. But then, I got a feeling I haven't felt in about a year... I was feelng suicidal. My mind started racing even more. I've been taking my meds so its not that, yeah this situation isnt the best but why am I feeling suicidal. I told my dad and because of is sense of helplessness because he wasn;t there he kind of blew up on me but my camp sister was there to help me sort through my feelings. At this point I was drained and just decided t try and sleep with no decision made.

   I woke up Sunday not having any negative thoughts in mind and just ready to pour myself into what i was doing.

Day 1- Team JesUS

Yeah... no creative title today... So I failed to mention info about my small group. in total there are 7 of us. My adult who happened to be the seminarian, myself, 3 girls and 2 boys that were campers. All of them besides one girl were all entering sophomores and the other girl a freshman in college just like me. A typical problem at CFW is that the campers absolutely did not want to be there but we didn't have that problem... some of them were sooooo excited to be there and the rest were just chill, not excited but we didn't have to drag them around lol. My group decided to name ourselves Team JesUS because of the olympics were at the time still going on and because ya know Jesus and US as a group yeah.. self explanitory. It was pretty ironic that my first small group at cfw followed my camper year schedule except the last two days.
    Getting back on track, we woke up, got ready and headed downstairs for breakfast. We taught everyone one of our crazy fun prayers than ate. Next we had some praise and worship then had our daily skit that focused on the piece of the our father for the day. After, it was time for mass. Being a eucharstic minister i still saw people kinda going through the motions and just kinda be like yeah i'm here ok whatever i'm suppose to do this this and this. Which I don't look down on because we all have times where we aren't fully there spiritually or we just do a routine. Anyways, mass ended then we got in our small groups and headed to our site for the day.
    Our site was the Boys and Girls Club. Everyone was real excited to go. Once we got in there the site coordinators got a feel for the area, talked to us, then we all head in. For awhile I was hanging out with boys that were entereing the 2nd grade. Now this day was probably my roughest... As some of you know i have crohnic migraines/headaches well midway through I started getting one real bad. And lately, they for some reason make me so tired. So here I am playing mancala with this 8 year old girl now falling asleep like i'm some 80 year old... I felt so bad but the kids saw that I wasn't feeling good and let me be which was sweet. I did although had two little girls get attached to me which is always bittersweet becaue you feel wanted but it makes you dread the goodbye even more.Our day at our work site came to and end and we all said our goodbyes. We then headed to showers and back to the church we were staying at. Until dinner we have free time there was tons of stuff we could do. The basement was their youth area so there were pool tables, ping pong, foosball, an area just to chill at tables or couches. Plus we always had some kind of music going whether its live or someones itunes.
    Now, at camp you learn some crazy things and this years would have to be the game called pteradyctal. What you do is sit in a circle and go around saying pteradyctal, easy right? Well here's the catch, you can't show your teeth at all or you're out. You can change the direction of the circle by squawking. It sounds like a stupid game and it probably is but is tons of fun. I for one, am horrible at it because there was one camper named.. let's go with James that would always make me laugh even when we weren't playing the game. Heck, on the last day while we can can in one of our songs he kicked like rockett! I was dying of laghter at that point!
   Dinner time came and I still wasn't feeling the greatest. After dinner I remembered climbing up the stairs and all the suddent started seeing spots. I lied on my bed for a little bit and was feeling better so i just stayed in bed. I would wake up off and on but just fell back to sleep. And didn't wake up till the next day. When I realized this i felt so bad but everyone was so understanding. I was suppose to lead night prayer but one of my a-team girls had my back (thanks L.)

Pterdyactal!!!

Ok tottally screwed up the name there so yeah... anyway.. moving on
 Sunday is ALWAYS the most exciting yet grusome day for A-teamers. It feels like DAYS waiting on campers to come. You're also anxious as a small group leader, are my kids going to like me, do they want to be here, will they share... all kinds of questions run through your mind. But slowly, campers come car by car and get bombarded by a teamers being loud and crazy. We pull you out your car along with all your stuff. Yeah, sounds scary, it is to some people but my camper year it wasn't scary at all. Then again the people who attacked me i knew over half of them.
     We all gather and get to know each other till dinner. We make our name button and just hang out. Now, I have to mention this just because it's the most hillarious thing ever but... some of the a-team guys were trying to move this tower of lemonade from the carrier to a table... mega fail.. by mega i mean... the whole container fell on the floor and left this HUGEEEE puddle on the floor. Yes. It was VERY hillarious, one of those you had to be there moments.
    So we attacked pizza... i myself ate... 8... yes 8... i was hungry... I got to show off my wicked chick-fil-a skills by once they made new lemonade i was pouring them 2 at a time. Yeah buddy! lol. The evening continued and we did some praise and worship, introductions, run through of camp. We also got to meet our small groups and pick a name (Team JesUS) Then we head to bed because a long week is ahead of us.

Simba!!!

So like every year since the summer of 09 I spent an amazing week at camp fort worth. For those of you that do not know what it is it's basically a local mission trip/church camp. Every year God always help me grow in my relationship with him and tells me something I need to know. I stole this idea from Randell that I will release each week a day/part of camp. A-team retreat will be just one post most likely.
  Just some basics for those of you who don't know camp. A-team are a group of returning camp fort worth kids that are still in high school or just finished like myself. cfw is for camp fort worth.
   The camp is a group of mainly high schoolers from around the diocease along with their chaperones. Campers arrive Sunday evening. We divide into small groups and each day go to a different work site to do community service. So one day you will go to the boys and girls club, a nursing home, mission arlington- a place that helps the needy, work on baby beds for the needy in our diocease, and stay at the church we stay at and help around because they let us stay there for free. In the evening we have a faith growing acitivity. Oh, and each day is started by daily mass. I know some people are probably reading this and thinking well thats boring but I promise you it's not. You create a strong bond where you come as strangers and leave as family so of course there is a bunch of work AND play.
 So now that we got the basics done let's get started!

A-team arrives Friday afternoon so we can bond and prepare for the campers who will arrive Sunday. So we lug all our stuff to our sleeping area and set up. Now yall know my memory is pretty bad so everything might not be in order.... (oops) Friday night is always pretty relaxed, we have a movie night and we watched the Lion King. A camper insider was immediately started, ya know when rafeki rubs that red stuff on simba?? yeah, that started a whole thing of us "simba-ing" each other randomly lol. Saturday is more move in day where we unload the camp trailer and i think.... we set up all the sound stuff... if not it was sunday... anyway... We also make our awesome signs of telling people where to go. We get pretty silly and creative. Then we just have time to be with each other which who doesn't love spending time with friends you haven't seen all year because they live forever aways??? We also then attend weekend Mass
     Next we have even deeper bonding time both as a group and in our faith. We went to the Chapel and spent time with Jesus- Adoration for my noncatholic friends out there- adoration is when Jesus is exposed in the eucharist and we just get to spend time with him. A new experience I had this year was free praise. Basically we open up with a song then come to the a point where we can sing whatever we want. It is pretty amazing it's basically improv with your voice praising God. It gave me the chills. We slowly move on with our night and wash each others feet just like Jesus did to his disciples before he died. Normally our adult leaders wash all our feet (there's 3 of them so we would go to just one of them) but they changed it up this year, we would go up to get our feet washed and then after our feet were washed we become the foot washer and wash whoever came up next feet. Finally, my favorite part of A-team retreat, we split up by guys and girls and form a circle. We then take turns going into the middle of the circle and ask for whatever prayers we need. Then, we put our hands on the person in the middle and start praying out loud. It is always a moving experience.
    Sunday goes by real fast! We do last minute preperation for campers. Then, we do a guided mediation of our first camp. We also get to reflect on our overall camp experience and share some of our moments with each other.
Stay tuned for more cfw post!