Another Summer Is History

Hello Friends!

With another summer in the books, we here at SON-Life would like to first of all say THANK-YOU! Thank you to everyone who was involved here at camp in some way, shape, or form. If you were here physically or just praying for us, you were a huge help in making this summer a success. This summer seemed to fly by and it would of been impossible without all your help.

This summer we had the honor of investing in the lives of just over 200 kids. We are very thankful for each one of those kids that came and for their parents, for allowing them to come.

Once again we just want to say a big thank-you to everyone who is involved with SON-Life Camp.

In Christ,
The SON-Life Team

Start The Countdown

Hello folks!

Well we are now into the great month of June. This is the month where the busyness begins. Retreat groups fill the place on weekends, the campground is filled with campers enjoying Gods creation, and our summer camp program begins. We want to take this time to invite you out to camp for SUMMERFEST. This year, SUMMERFEST will be taking place on June 19th. It will begin at 2pm. We have so many activities for all ages. Come bring out your family to try out the blob as well as just using our waterfront for a fun swim time. We will also have kid games and face painting. The afternoon will be capped off with a pig roast and auction with all the proceeds going towards the ministry of SON-Life Camp. Please come out and join us for this amazing family event.

God has been blessing SON-Life Camp in many ways recently. One of those ways is the chance that we have had to give a "face-lift" to a couple different buildings. As you saw in our last post, the meeting room in the retreat center as well as the bathrooms got a little makeover. Since then, our dining hall has been tiled. We have had new windows installed and the walls have been painted. There are just a couple little things that need to be finished still. The project is scheduled to be completed by June 19. We will post pictures on here of everything when its all said in done. If you would join us in giving thanks for the people who donated supplies and time to this project.

In other news, our summer staff is here and working on preparing for this summer. They are all very excited to start camp. We have had many fun memories already made as a staff during this week of training. The staff is building relationships with each other and are beginning to make friendships that will continue to grow throughout the summer. We ask that you continue to pray for our staff as they finish out this week of training. Pray that they will have clear minds as they begin this summer. Pray for safety for all of them as they do this tough job.

We want to thank you for all the support that you all have given. For the prayers, the thoughts, anything else that you guys do, we are very thankful. The harvest is full, and our staff is ready to work the fields and make the seeds grow.

In Christ,

The SON-Life Team

Summer Is Almost Here

Once again, it has been some time since we updated so we thought we'd share a little bit about what has been going on at SON-Life Camp. We have had a lot going on over the past couple months so its hard to find a place to begin. On April 7 & 8 we had the privilege to host a work group from Second Byron CRC in Byron Center. They did an amazing job renovation our retreat center meeting room as well as the bathrooms. They stripped the wallpaper off the walls and then repainted. They took out the old orange counter-tops and replaced them with new ones. They also stripped wallpaper in the bathrooms and applied paint to the walls and ceilings. Here are couple pictures of their work here.

We want to say a big thank you to all those from Second Byron CRC for spending their time from Spring Break here and making a big difference.

On Saturday April 10, we hosted a Spring Cleaning Day. We were overjoyed at the fact that almost 50 people were here at one point or another on that day. We had two groups of people working on splitting and stacking wood, another group was putting compost in the flower beds, and another group went around cleaning. There were many other small, but important projects that got done as well. We want to thank everyone for their service to help clean up camp and be ready for an amazing summer.

Speaking of summer, we have hired our summer staff and are excited or May 7-8 when they come together for the very first time for our Staff Bash. Staff Bash is a time for our staff to come together and meet each other and receive some information before coming back in June for orientation. Be in prayer for the staff as they begin this new journey.

A few other areas that you can be in prayer for are:

- Summer Camp: For kids to return to SON-Life and for new kids to be introduced to SON- Life and once again for summer staff as they teach these kids how to live a Christ-like life.

- Retreat Groups: For the retreat groups that are scheduled to come, and for groups to rent out of facilities.

- Retiree's Week: May 10-14 we have a group of retiree's that will be out here working to

help prepare camp for summer, pray for safety for all involved.

- SON-Life Camp overall: Pray that we may be a light on a hill shining for all to see and that

we may be able to impact many lives and change their lives through Christ!

Thank you all for your support

In Christ,

The SON-Life Camp Team

With A New Year Comes A New Look

2010 has come upon us and at SON-Life Camp we are very excited for what God has in store for our ministry. It has been a while since our blog was updated so why don't we do a little catching up. SON-Life Camp is excited to introduce Paul Riemersma as our new Program Director. Paul comes to us with 4 years experence as summer staff here at SLC. Paul will be working part-time during the school year as he attends Kuyper College. When the summer time comes rolling around, Paul will join us full-time during the summer months and will be in charge of the program of summer camp. As much as we are happy to have Paul on board, we also have had to say goodbye to a beloved staff memeber. Ben Gladhill has moved to the great state of Pennsylvania to be an assistant director at a camp out there. We want to wish him the best of luck has he turns the page in his life and begins a new chapter. We also have recently had a volunteer mailing day.

We had abou 15 volunteers help us with our summer camp brochure mailing. We want to thank our volunteers for the time and energy that they have put toward SON-Life and most importantly our father in heaven. Finally, the snow has been falling at SLC and that fact makes us excited for "SNOWBOUND", which is our winter retreat for kids ages 10-14. We pray that God will work in the hearts of campers and have them have a renewed relationship with Jesus Christ. Will you pray along with us now and during the event taking place Jan. 22-24. Thank you very much!

Scrapbooking Retreat November 2009

What a fun weekend all of us ladies had. We had a great time of catching up with old friends that we have made during the past 5+ years of hosting these events and meeting many new friends as well. I have to admit, this retreat has always been a highlight for me. I really love all the ladies that have come year after year, I feel like we really are family. And this fall it was even better because we were able to invite more members into our family with 11 new ladies attending for the first time.

Most people were way more productive than I was finishing anywhere from 10 – 45 pages in their scrapbooks. (I didn’t even put down one picture but I did catch-up on some calendar stuff for my kids J) But, regardless of how much we did, we all had a fun time, at a TON of delicious food (thanks Brenda), and again, continued to build friendship with fellow sisters-in-Christ! Thanks ladies for coming and being part of the many ministries happening at SON-Life Camp.

I can’t wait until our next reunion in March (12th-13th if you want the date)!
Hope

FALL FAMILY FEST 2009

We had a chilly but beautifully sunny day for Fall Family Fest October 17. This year was the first time we held this event. We had over 30 volunteers come to help for the day. We had a ton of different activities for families including: Hayrides, children’s story time, decorating pumpkins, fishing, boating, craft vendors, a live band, and snacks that everyone could enjoy.
So a special thanks to all our volunteers and families that came to spend the day with us at SON-Life Camp.

Thank you South Christian High School

Last week at this time we had a great crew from South Christian High School out here to do work project for a couple of hours. What a great crew we had! They did a large amount of work for us which we really appreciate - I didn't hear any complaining, it was a joy to meet some of the young people in the area and see them willing to serve. I know that they had to do this for school but they made the best of it while they were here. Cleaning cabins, vehicles and taking out the Blob were their main projects and it was such a huge help to Ben and I. Also, a big thanks to Paul and Kendra for coming to camp and helping lead the different groups. Another blessing for camp - more great volunteers to help get things done.

Thanks again to everyone involved - you really are a blessing to this ministry!

Hope