We picked up Kaleb at 11:30 last night from his big summer outdoor adventure with the youth group from our church. He was all smiles and giggles as it seems he had the BEST time. I’m so thankful for that, but mostly I’m thankful he just came back alive. Knowing that he was going to go river running made me have flashbacks to summer camp when I was a kid and a bunch of us got caught in a rip tide. The one kid that was with me, drowned, and there’s no explanation why I shouldn’t have as well. I think about his mom every August when the blackberries are ripe. He had told her not to make blackberry pie until he got home from camp. She hasn’t made one to this day, as he never came home.
Part of my fasting and prayer time while Kaleb was gone was praying for his safety, of course, but also praying for me that I could just let go and trust God Kaleb would be ok. He did a lot of rock climbing and repelling plus a five-hour rafting trip on a river. None of those things are meant to be safe, as the idea of the camp was to push themselves and learn to trust in themselves, each other, and God. I was also praying for unity and bonding in their group, and that seemed to have happened. Kaleb had nothing but nice things to say about everyone on the trip and no one gave him a bad time about a thing. What a contrast to last year when I sent him off to a camp through a different church and he came home in tears and said he was never going to camp again as long as he lived. I sure learned my lesson to not send him where he doesn’t belong. Our youth pastor is very sensitive to any kind of bullying so he wouldn’t have allowed it like the other place, so I’m sticking with activities from our own church, from now on.
It was hard to get Kaleb to sleep last night as he wanted to tell me all about what happened. We were up until 1:00am. Today we found photos on the internet of his big rafting trip and it certainly wasn’t something I would have encouraged as those rapids were nasty! The kids were in two different rafts and the one Kaleb was NOT in, thankfully, lost the guide in one of the big waves. There was a photographer catching it all and it was hilarious to watch the sequence of events, with the last one showing her whole head and torso in the water and her butt and legs hanging over the edge of the raft. Kaleb just howled looking at the photo, so he obviously enjoyed himself. I didn’t like the fact he was riding in the very front of the raft through the last rapids, however, but he said it was a lot of fun but he did have to hold on tight. It’s a good thing God hears a mother’s prayers because nothing about the last three days sounded like it fits within my comfort zone.
Since none of Kaleb’s friends were available today to hang out with him, he was stuck at home with us, just as I had hoped. I saved all his chores for him to do when he got back so that took some time this morning, then he got an itch to buy a new toy his friend Brayden has, so he wanted to know what he could do to earn some extra cash.
Kaleb is on a financial plan until he’s 18 that includes tithing 25% of all the money he gets, saving 25% for his first car or big purchase, investing 25% for his future in things he won’t touch until he’s at least 50, and the remaining 25% he can spend. So if he wants to buy something that costs ten dollars, he has to earn forty to get it. It frustrates him sometimes, but I told him most people who have a job and work full time don’t get to spend 25% of their paycheck on “toys,” so he’s lucky to get that much. So that meant he was a very busy guy today. He weeded for hours, then went blueberry picking with us and I paid him for what he picked. He later held a “garage sale” with me as his only customer, to get rid of some stuff. He didn’t want to go fishing with Kory, but when I told him I’d pay him five bucks if he caught a fish, he went. They were out there for an hour but didn’t catch a thing. He still made out pretty well financially, today, however. When that boy is on a mission, he is very focused and productive. I like that about him. I’m sure glad he’s back.
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