Sigh of Relief

Little Bear is such a sweet little boy. He's also full of anxiety over lots of little things and super shy to boot. He's not very social, and crowds exhaust him. In short, he's a lot like his mama (except maybe the sweet part ;) ).

So when his first trip to cub scout camp came around this past week, I was very nervous for him. He had been to one night of a fall camp out and one night of a winter camp out, but those were pretty tame events. They were meant to introduce the boys to camp in a pretty relaxed atmosphere. But summer camp is a whole different game. They keep the boys busy from sun up to long past sun down. He would be gone from Thursday at noon until Saturday night, late.

I spent a good deal of time in prayer for him last week before he went. I knew he would be okay, and Papa Oak and I agreed they would just come home early if all went south. No point in making it a miserable experience for everyone just to say he made it.

We packed his things and waved him off Thursday afternoon. He was bouncing with excitement.

He called home that first night to say he was having a great time. And one of the other dads sent this picture so I could see for myself that he was having fun.

And then we didn't hear from them again... My husband is a man of few words, so my attempts at checking in were met with texts saying Will do. And All's well. Doesn't he know a mama needs more than four words??? I think he might have thrown in an Okay once for good measure.

He popped back in quickly Saturday morning for a swim meet, and I was so relieved to see he was still in one piece. And he was impatient to go back. He swam his race and was out of there in a flash.

Saturday night we were invited to the camp for a family dinner and a closing program. He was just beaming when we arrived. He showed us all around the camp, explained how we needed to behave in the dining hall, showed us how to clean up, and led us confidently to the campfire. He even bought presents for each of us at the little trading post. He's a thoughtful little guy.

We watched the “pirates” play a crazy game of leap frog, fight to be the new pirate king, sing piratey songs, and hand out some camp awards. The boy was actually sad to leave camp. He opted to ride home in dad's car because they had come together. He said that since they had started together, it would only be right to finish together. No joke.

He didn't say much about camp once he came home. He's also a man of few words. He said his favorite part was buying a little, brown bear in the trading post. He came home with a huge scar on his chest from a fall he had taken. Otherwise, I'll never know much about what happened out there at camp. But I guess that's part of the road to becoming a man.