Women of Faith (& Fun!) Retreat

This past weekend (Friday night and all-day Saterday), we enjoyed the first annual (hopefully!) Women of Faith (& Fun!) Retreat out at Camp Connections 55km outside of Yellowknife. We couldn't have asked for better weather - God was smiling on us in solar form!! The theme was women of faith in the Bible and we had devotions around the stories of Hannah and Esther. It was also a wonderful chance for a bunch of "modern" women of faith to connect and enjoy each other and God's creation! Below is our group:

(Left to right: Annie, Debbie, Alea, Charina, Taren, Taylor, Jess, Kate, Brianne, Darla, Lorna, Jamie, Tara - Pam is taking the picture)

Friday night, Connie & Roseanne led us in worship. Pam graciously walked around waving "incense" (pic) in an attept to keep the bugs at bay... Jaimie led us into the story of Hannah, which led into a time of sharing stories of God's faithfulness, which then somehow led to the girls climbing trees until 1 in the morning at which point the caretaker came to tell us that there had been a "bear sighting," which effectively got us all into our cabins for bedtime -- probably what he intended! :-)






On Saturday, we enjoyed gorgeous 20-something degree weather as we read the story of Esther, decorated T-shirts,

paddled in the river, played capture the flag, make hemp necklaces, and went "swimming" in 2-degree water. I managed one dip, but the girls did 20 collective "water charges" in which they would begin from the top of the hill, run screaming down the beach en mass, dunk in the water, and run screaming back out up the hill.

Left is Annie decorating her shirt and below is her sister Charina . . .

Around noon we had a big game of capture the flag in the sand. Below is team "Red Rango" which had by far the best cheers and elaborate strategies but were still bested 2-5 (or maybe it was 1-5...) by the Blue no-name team. Go figure...

I think it was Tara's fault.

To the left is picture of her grabbing both of my "life-tails" simultaineously . . .

All in all, great fun was had by all and we finished the weekend off by celebrating Taylor's 13th birthday with an almost-surprise cake made by Barb. ("Well, everyone knows what dessert is except Taylor..." LOL, we love you Taren!!)