Off to Camp!

Well here we go!  Today was the launch of Camp FCY, which is a simple day to start with, as Maddie met with friends at the church, got on a bus, and was off to camp up in North Carolina.  Or is it South Carolina?  The interesting thing about this camp, of course, is that it is halfway in one state and of course halfway in the other.  The state line runs right through the camp, so they sleep in one state, and walk to the other state for services and activities.  Anyway, as you can see, Maddie was there at the church with friends for a time, waiting for everyone to arrive and then load the buses.

Mom and I were there to see her and the other kids off.  You can see Mom with Pastor Lance here, and the nurse that's coming along.  Hopefully we won't need to use her services much over the course of this weekend.  Anyway, Maddie was off on the long bus ride.  She started the day at school, and I picked her up, and now she was riding a bus up to the mountains for an unforgettable weekend.

Here she is getting off the bus, and I'm grateful for these pics because of course we're not up there.  But it is great to see she's got a big smile on her face, ready to get to the cabin and ready for a big weekend!

Meanwhile, Mom and I were doing a few things.  For one, we were picking up some seasonal items, starting out with some decorations for our scarecrow.  We've got to get working on that soon, because in a few weeks, we'll need to get that to the botanical gardens.  The other thing we picked up after some looking around was a spooky gingerbread house.  We stopped at four different spots and finally found that.  But the time spent looking was fun, checking out the craft stores for scarecrow additions and looking at seasonal decorations.  Besides, we were stalling somewhat, because we had a movie time of 7pm tonight.  

Tonight's feature was the Sight and Sound live broadcast of their production of "Daniel," which told the story of the book, largely.  It was really good, and got me wanting to dive into that book once again.  But we had a nice time watching that, and we didn't realize it was live, but sure enough it was live.  The feed cut out twice, I think, but it was brief, and we were able to enjoy the entire production.  These are really great, and Mom wants to head up to one of the theaters to watch one of these productions in person.

We got home, and of course we saw the pictures of Maddie up there, safe and sound.  She's going to have a great weekend!

Oh, and speaking of which, I think I know someone else who seems to be having a great weekend...

Ah, he tried to sneak on with Maddie's luggage!

No, this is much more comfortable riding in a bus seat!

Joey sneaks in to the church to hear the leadership before everyone takes off for camp.

Nice little chair there.  Well, perhaps he'll stay in Gainesville after all.

Joey goes to Texas Roadhouse.

Found some large scale army soldiers at Hobby Lobby!

Oh, and a Gorilla Party happening!

Time to go to the movies!

Got the popcorn, and everything is set!

Almost time for the movie to start!

Before we go - for the next few days I'll post Maddie's notes for Camp FCY at the bottom of each of the following days.  She's just listing some memories of her weekend at camp in a sections we'll call...

MADDIE'S MEMORIES:  CAMP FCY 2024

◦ We walked around and talked after dropping our luggage

◦ Talked a lot in the cabins so we’d get to know each other