Pre-teen Camp Buckeye, located in North-central Ohio’s beautiful Amish Country, ran Aug.2-5. This year we had 80 campers, largest single-year increase in the past five years! With fewer than a dozen 12-year old campers, we anticipate even more campers next year. We were also blessed with a wonderful staff of 79 people who came in order to serve and make camp a success.

God blessed us with absolutely excellent weather. The very little rain that came through camp this year occurred in the overnight hours of Sunday and was gone before breakfast Monday morning, leaving the remainder of the days and evenings dry and pleasant.

The Christian living classes were “God is Love,” “Having Courage to Overcome Fears” and that God loves children and wants to have a relationship with them. The themes of Christian living were reinforced throughout the daily activities, setting the expectations for proper behavior. The children were exceptionally well behaved, extremely positive and upbeat the entire camp.

The campfire Bible skits were well prepared and performed with creative props. This year we had Bible trivia in between dorm skits, and it’s pretty amazing what even the youngest at camp remember from the scriptures. We also had a visit by Professor Puddy, who appeared in the recent Jelly video.

We plan to return to the same facility next year, when it is anticipated that a brand new state-of-the-art swimming pool with a wading area, spray-ground and splash pad as well as dual spiral tube slides will be part of camp.

Thank you to everyone who supports our pre-teen program and especially to our Heavenly Father who watched over the safety of our children and staff.