Big long post - Pics are Here

Skills have long been over and what and the world have I been doing all this time in Montana still? Well...
After skills we jumped right into a class called Adventure Business and Management. I thought it was going to be a breeze and similar to other management classes I have taken but boy was I wrong. Our teacher said the real class title was God what do you want me to do with my life? Adventure was the unknown outcome of anything, business was how that thing operated, and management was keeping those things in line – sort of. It was really an intense and amazing class that I learned a lot about both my life and how to run it, and also creating a vision, mission, and values for a company and how to run that. There was so many connections between the two such as who the “customers” are, and following the values that are pre set, and customer service and non of it was that lame Christian, how is this connected, kind feeling. It helped process experiences in my life this far and challenged me to examine where I am now and what lies ahead.

That next weekend we had our first practicum that we planned for every moment between skills and the time the youth group got to camp. We set up a three day camp for a youth group that came in from Washington. We were given the opportunity to plan everything from meals, to activities, to chapels, and debriefs, and everything in between. The staff was here but they became invisible unless we needed some extra helping hands. We were so sick of planning and having meetings and during the first day we thought to ourselves why in the world did we set bed times so late, we wanted to go to bed because we were beat. Man was it ever worth it. I made several connections to the kids and the events seemed to be very impact and beneficial for them. It was hard to see them leave so soon after spending all day and all night with them but Ill never forget that time.From there we had our Wilderness First Aid class which I was really looking forward to. We went through three days of intense training and scenarios to prepare us to handle a broad base of things we may encounter in the backcountry. It was a ton of fun and I learned a lot from it. The last scenario included a wrecked jeep with a fire beside it and people scattered all over with blood, burns, wounds, and hypothermia. As we went on they became more and more realistic and were very helpful to know how to react in real life.Then came practicum number two which was on the other end of the spectrum. No planning but lots of manual labor. To me and my buddy Jason delight the town of Plains Montana’s fire wood supply had been stolen and we were faced with 2 splitters, a lot of mauls and axes, an older town men with chainsaw to cut rounds for us. Two days straight of swinging all day and my muscles were tired and we were loving it. I love chopping wood but we have had no wood to chop at camp this semester so I couldn’t have asked for a better opportunity. One of the local church’s supplies wood to the people in the area and it was all stolen so we built a fence and chopped wood to replenish the supply. After it was over they needed a couple of volunteers for the next day to go logging up in the woods and so my hand went up. This was a day full of 4 wheelin through dirt and ice, felling trees, and a little more chopping. We had the chance to chop some for the pastor who looked absolutely burnt out. He explained how every year this minister just drains him because he has to chop wood for 150 people each year and then himself to. The town was just overwhelmed with our service and it was awesome to be able to give back to the town that we go to church in. We also got to go to Anaconda Montana to a juvenile center to play basketball with the guys there. It was a lot of fun and but challenging to connect with them. They were pretty shy and we had limited time. It helped making fun of ourselves sense we lost 12 to 97 or some ridiculous number like that both games.Next was our search and rescue class. We got to use a lot of our wilderness first aid skills in different searching operations that were set up for us. We even had a retired survival instructor from the air force come in and teach us for one day about surviving. Everyone was forced to make a fire that night without a lighter in the windy or snowing conditions or nobody was gonna be eatin supper. The last day was an amazing day and it started out with a search and rescue helicopter landing at camp and then a surprise rescue operation right when we sat down for dinner that lasted till one in the morning and had to 5 different people carried out on litters, broken femurs, gun shot wounds, drunk guys with guns that were hypothermic in the creek, and the plains community ambulance talking to us on the radio and waiting for the patients. It took many hours to organize and search this dense section of marshy creek woods with headlamps. At the end of it we got to ride in the ambulance and finally eat dinner at one oclock that morning – best pizza ever.The next weekend we had our orienteering challenge. We car camped out in a wilderness area and woke up at 6 to have a good Friday service around the campfire next to the river before we went out. We split up into groups of three with a compass ans a map and got clues at each checkpoint of how to navigate to the next point. It was long day of hiking that you hoped you didn’t shoot a wrong bearing or that would mean backtracking and not finding how to get back. In the end it was a ton of fun and it helped solidify the skills of orienteering for me.At the end of March we had another practicum opportunity back in Anaconda. Our group was actually able to go back and play basketball again before heading off to a roofing project. It was amazing. We were warming up and our back was turned to the door when one of the guys came up to me and tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around and he was smiling and his hand was stretched out towards mine. Man it was so awesome, my heart was tugging that day as I really got to connect more with those two groups of guys and hear the chaplain speak of how God has opened up his ministry there. As he would always pray for us “praise God and kick the devil, Amen!” The roofing was a lot of fun and hard work. It was really cold and windy there and usually started snowing for the last part of each day. It was an old Victorian house that they had turned into a kids home that couldn’t find foster parents. The roof was so steep that we roped in with climbing harnesses to finish it. Any day hangin from a chimney and shootin nail guns through shingles is a good day. We also got to stay with a local family that had a cabin out in the woods with Moose tracks in front of their house in the 3 feet of snow, 3 wood burning stoves, amazing food and conversations, and a basset hound named Harvey to wake us up. It was a good trip.We got back and its time to pack and leave for tema challenge trip. Our last horay trip of the year that the junior interns plan for us. We actually decided to hike as one big explore team which was so much fun. It was filled with incredible sometimes sunny snowshoe hikes through beautiful woods and over frozen lakes and up a peak called Baldy. Every night we set up camp with a fire pit dug into the snow. On the last night we camped beside the frozen lake and dug out a couple of feet of snow on top of the lake to have a fire on top of the frozen lake. It was amazing with beautiful stars.Its Sunday today and everyone is packing up to head back to Three Hills Canada to go back to Prairie. It’s a very confusing and intense time of leaving this beautiful place this time for good, and then getting back to Prairie for a couple weeks of an intense theology class and seeing friends that we have been missing for a long time. And then leaving all that for good. Several people are coming back for a second year but they will be gone a lot of the time. Its been an amazing year that is such an awesome gift from God that I never ever expected. This whole time I was kinda thinking I cant wait to get through this first year of bible school so I can start flying next year at Prairie, that is until I signed up for the explore program and I have made more best friends, had the best and most valuable experiences, and learned and growed more than I ever hoped for.
Yall have been an incredible support for me back home and I love it. Apparently Im not getting much better at keeping this up to date but im still workin on it. Im not sure whats in store for the summer but Im excited to see whats next.