Camp Forward in the kitchen

Last night Jerry and I drove up to Camp Forward, a Christian camp situated high in the Sierra Nevada mountains (35 minutes' drive for us), to help in the kitchen for the campers' evening meal. Our church, Mother Lode Church, helps support the camp ministry. I'll explain in another post why it's called "Mother Lode" Church. The camp has had different age groups up there on different weeks; this week was for 4th through 6th-grade girls (ages 9 through 11). The camp has regular volunteer staff of older teens and adults, but they can always use more help for the food preparation for 85 people.

Last night's dinner was pizza and salad with ice cream and broken up Oreo cookies on top for dessert. They needed 11 pizzas and several were already made, so I set about rolling out pizza dough for two more pizzas. Jerry put toppings on the pizzas and later cut up pizzas into eighths.

The regular volunteer staff, fixing up the trays for the campers

Volunteer junior high boys having fun in the dishwashing room...It's worth it to them to be clean-up guys because in their free time they get to ride the zip line, climb the rock wall, swim, and do all kinds of other fun activities.

I'm setting out bowls for the ice cream and broken cookies (as a topping).

The campers (in the red "Get Smart" t-shirts) are starting to filter in for chow.

Hungry girls wait patiently in line with their blue trays for their dinner. Everyone loves pizza!

I saw several of my Good News Club girls and they were happy to see a familiar face.

Is the ice cream out yet?!!

The theme of camp this year is "Get Smart," meaning get your wisdom from God's Word, the Bible. Wnenever I have asked any child who has gone to Camp Forward if (s)he had fun, the response has been, "YES!! It was SO much fun!"

It is a wonderful ministry because not only do kids have a great time, but they also learn spiritual truths, most importantly, how they can have peace with God, eternal life and how they can live a life that is pleasing to Him and positive and beneficial for them.