Camp Patmos

For our family vacation we went to Camp Patmos, which is located on Kelleys Island, OH in the middle of Lake Erie. For my parents and my sister it was a blast from the past, for me it was a chance to see people and things I had always heard good things about. My parents lived in Ohio for a few years, found an amazing church, and made wonderful, lifelong friends. They also went to Camp Patmos with these friends every year and had such a great time that they are still talking about those times at Camp Patmos twenty two years later! The drive was long, but fun.

On our way we stopped in Cincinnati to visit The Creation Museum, which is all about equipping you to defend your faith. It's full of facts that back up Genesis. I loved it! The exhibits were well done and overall it was simply amazing! Plus, where else can you ride a real live camel?!?!?! Apparently, where we stayed has a high crime rate because during our two night stay Jack and Stephanie's van was broken into (the robbers got some library books, coloring books, a memory game, a base ball and glove, two DVD players, and a Bible, which I hope they read.) and we witnessed another robbery in broad daylight! Needless to say we were glad to leave lol!

After that adventure we drove a little bit further and stayed with some of my parents' friends. They were so nice and hospitable! Everything was wonderful! While we were at their house we went to the church my mom and dad used to go to, met a ton of their friends, saw my parents' old house, visited with more friends, and had a great time! Thank y'all for all of your kindness and hospitality!

Finally, on July 4th we got to camp! It was non-stop fun! We rode bicycles, went swimming, kayaked, rode in the speed boats, hung onto and fell off of the banana boat float (which you can get an idea of here), rode wave runners (that was one of the scariest and most fun things!), bought fun stuff at the Pop House (like ice-cream, t-shirts, bracelets, etc.), went letterboxing (we found 16! Which brings my total of found boxes 55! YAY!), looked for beach glass and fossils, hung out with friends, went to Chapel every morning and evening, where we learned even more about Creation, evolution and God's love from Carl Kerby. Interestingly enough Carl Kerby used to work with Answers in Genesis and was instrumental in the building of The Creation Museum. His new ministry is Reasons for Hope, which you can learn more about here. After ten days of focusing on God, His Truth, family, and fun I am so pumped and ready to share about what I learned! Camp was so much fun and I loved it so much! I really hope that we can go again!

Have questions about Creation, evolution and what God says about it all? Need hope? I'd be more than happy to talk! You can comment or email me here at: myhorseandme1[at]gmail[dot]com
Love,
~Beth

More Letterboxing Fun

Thanks to the beautiful weather I was able to go letterboxing two days in a row! Day before yesterday Mom and I went to Turner Lake Park to hide a couple of my letterboxes.In my opinion, Turner Lake Park is the hidden jewel of Covington! We found two perfect spots for my letterboxes! Turner Lake Park is now the home of Robin Hood and his companion, Little John. Yesterday Mom and I went letterboxing at Stone Mountain Park. Happily, Stephanie (my sister) and her children Zhenya (16), Katya (13), Anya (12), Kristina (11), Faith (8), and Caleb (4) were able to join us! We had a blast! We started the day off by searching for a 'box near the grist mill, which was unfortunately missing. After spending some time exploring and taking pictures at the grist mill and the surrounding area we headed over to the plantation area. Everyone, even Caleb, enjoyed looking at all of the old buildings. The best part of the plantation was probably the barnyard petting zoo. After we finished our tour of the plantation we headed over to the nature garden for lunch. Once finished with lunch we hit the nature trail and began our quest for letterboxes. Thankfully, we found two boxes on the trail! Both of which were adorable carves in beautiful locations! The nature garden and trail is such a wonderful place even in the winter. Once we had hung out at the nature garden for a while we decided to head over to the song bird habitat and trail. We didn't do any letterboxing here, but we did really enjoy walking around and looking at nature. I really had an awesome time with Zhenya! I think she really enjoys letterboxing and I hope she'll carve a stamp soon! As soon as we were finished basking in the solitude of nature we went to our final letterboxing destination. We looked for and found the 'box that we wanted to find at the sports pavilion. It was awesome! What a wonderful finish to our letterboxing excursion!

The Event

No, not the T.V. show, the letterboxing event. So, I've been looking forward to this event for months! I love to letterbox and I thought it would be cool to meet other letterboxers and to make some exchanges (you swap signature stamp images with other 'boxers). Mom and I went to the event today! It was so much fun! We got there early and were a little nervous, but the host made us feel perfectly at home. We went in, logged into the event book (the book that's there to keep up with everyone that came), and stamped the event stamps into our books, fixed a plate of food, and started making exchanges. We probably met around thirty people, exchanged with about as many and that was only half the people there! Everyone was super nice. We enjoyed explaining our trail names and putting faces with the stamps and trail names that we've seen before. It was a very diverse group of people! There were little kids, teenagers, twenty-somethings all the way through senior citizens! It was a wonderful experience just getting to chat with everybody! At one time the host walks up to me and asks, "Do you know what getting cootied means?" I said yes and asked if I happened to have any cooties on me (cooties are little itty bitty stamps that travel from person to person. They can be on clothespins, hair clips, in boxes, anything. They don't have to have logbooks and usually don't. Once cootied you log them in your book and hide them on another person, in an unattended purse or coat, etc.) it turned out that I had two attached to my hoodie at the time. I logged them in my book and infected someone else with them. Before we left I checked my hoodie for more cooties and didn't find any. Well, I had only thought I had escaped! When I got home I discovered three more cooties! Two in my bag and one on my hoodie! What fun! :)

Letterboxing at Stone Mountain

Today, Mom and I set off to Stone Mountain Park for some letterboxing and other fun stuff. We started with the ambitious goal of finding seven letterboxes in one outing. We started in an area of the park that we were pretty familiar with and we were pretty confident in our ability to find the two boxes there. Both clues mentioned the same very specific landmark. Well, we found about 6 such places, but none of them were the landmark. We had been searching for over half an hour when Mom mentions that the picture in one of the clues appears to have been taken from waaaaaaay up. So, we broadened our search zone and ,finally, I spotted the landmark! There were only a few obstacles between me and success! One of those obstacles just happened to be a huge (over five foot high) "step" up. After climbing up and over the ledge, I hiked the remaining seventy-five steep yards (after the first hundred and fifty yards) up the mountain to the first letterbox. Yay! Success! But there was one more letterbox and I had come way too far and taken too much time to leave without retrieving both boxes! Well, the mountain got steeper as I breathlessly climbed the last thirty or so yards and snagged that last box! Victory was mine! Now all I had to do was try not to break my neck as I made my way back to the landmark where Mom was waiting. By this time, my knees were shaking because I was both tired and afraid. We stamped the stamps and hid the first box. Then I had to drag myself back up there and hide the second box. The hardest and scariest part was the descent because there are tons of little rocks and a few ice patches on an already steep mountainside, but thankfully Mom and I both made it down safely. At the end of our adventure I reiterated the fact that letterboxing takes you to places you would never have been otherwise-- like halfway up the backside of Stone Mountain! Haha! Don't get me wrong- the view was great (I could see the lake over the treetops and a ton of the surrounding landscape) and the boxes were cool and the adventure was fun! Plus it only took us a little over an hour and a half!

My Trip to Mississippi

I recently returned from a fun, family trip to Mississippi. My family (my mom, dad and I plus my sister, her husband and their 6 children [Zhenya, Katya, Anya, Kristina, Faith, and Caleb]) went to see my brother, Clay, sister-in-law, Paige, nephew, Cade, niece, Clair, and my newest niece, Baby Caris (insert "awwww" here). We made the journey so that we could celebrate Cade's birthday and see everybody. It was awesome! They had the party at Mitchell Farms which is a fun farm and working farm owned and operated by Paige's grandparents, The Mitchells. We had a great time doing everything there was to do at the farm including the corn maze, the pool of corn (yes, you can play in a giant pool full of corn), playing on the playground, taking the tour of the farm in the tractor-pulled wagon, seeing all of the animals in the animal barn (they have ducks, quail, a rabbit, a fox, sheep, a miniature donkey, chickens, and even a pair of peacocks!), and seeing all of the historic buildings. We also got some behind the scenes stuff like getting to ride in the vintage Jeep (it's over 50 years old and still runs) all over the 4-wheeler trails with my brother (that was one of my favorite parts). I had an awesome time! I got to travel to a state that I've never been to before, hold Baby Caris (feel free to "awwww" again), hang out with my brother and his family, have a great time at Mitchell Farms, stay at a hotel (which was really nice, had cable and an incredible free breakfast spread! Did I mention we got to stay for free thanks to Marriott points?), and letterbox in another state (found a 'box and planted one too!) So, to sum it up: Mississippi was awesome! :)

Letterboxing

I love letterboxing! If you're wondering what letterboxing is maybe this will help:

"Letterboxing is an intriguing pastime combining artistic ability with "treasure-hunts" in parks, forests, and cities around the world. Participants seek out hidden letterboxes by cracking codes and following clues. The prize: an image from a miniature piece of art known as a rubber stamp—usually a unique, hand-carved creation. Letterboxers stamp their discoveries in a personal journal, then use their own rubber stamp, called a signature stamp, by stamping it into the logbook found with the letterbox, perhaps writing a note about the weather or their adventures in finding the letterbox." Source: http://www.atlasquest.com/

So far I have 21 finds and 5 traditional plants under my belt. I love figuring out clues and finding the boxes. Plus, the clues usually take you to beautiful and unique places that you may never have found otherwise. My mom calls me a "prolific carver." It is so much fun to draw a design and then carve it out! I don't even know how many stamps I've made. Besides the traditional letterboxes there are also postals, LTC's, and hitchhikers all of which I hope to expand on later. For more information about letterboxing you can go here or here.