May 23, 2026

Last week, before we started Orientation, Margaret and I were both on our computers in different rooms. We were plugging away on the various details that must be checked before opening camp. It was not joyous work!

Don’t get me wrong, we love every aspect of this life and anticipate each summer with delight. It is THE BEST job you can imagine… but some parts of it are better than others. We were in “serious work” mode when my focus was broken by Margaret (with a huge smile and bright eyes) dashing into the kitchen with her computer held up for me to see. “Just Look at Her!” she exclaims, and I join her in a heartfelt gasp of amazement at the camper photo beaming from the screen. It is the photo of a first-year CampMinder record. Little girl, huge smile (missing a tooth), big bow (in slightly messy hair), school uniform (slightly frumpled and definitely dirty), and joy radiating from her face.

Obviously, her mom had been filling out camp info and needed a photo to upload, and her little camper (just back from school) lit up like a Christmas tree, showing us how excited she was about camp. This picture has been repeated (with a thousand variations) in every record. Each one makes us smile, each one gives meaning to the work that is about to begin.

We love your girls and can not wait to welcome them to Greystone.

Most of the blog’s readers today will be parents of Junior Campers… and I know there will not be very many. Who has time to go to the webpage and see if there is anything new? It doesn’t matter! I am writing this blog from a place of joy. A new season, our ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTH, is about to begin. Three Hundred and Four campers (Two Hundred and Seventy brand new to Greystone) will soon arrive, and the first people they see will be a group of counselors and me, cheering like crazy people as they drive onto the field. The boisterous joy is not an act. We are SO EXCITED to have them here!

I will blog every day for the rest of the summer. This is my first entry, and I am trying to refresh my memory (I haven’t done a “write it and send it” Blog since mid-August last year… When I do a Blog in the winter, I just compose some text, and Meyers, Sarah, or Catherine does the rest. The summer Blogs are different… they are less finished, more raw, written from the heart, and convey deep feeling when done well.

My talent is not sufficient to the task today, for the moment is beyond words. I wish I could write something as beautiful as the phone portraits that fill our camper records. Something that elicits a cry of delight that makes your husband ask what you are reading. I yearn for that because camp deserves that response. It is a good thing (and the highest compliment God gives in the Bible is that something is good). Thank you for making it possible. Thank you for reading.