Folly Beach Challenge.

On Sunday I participated in the Folly Beach Challenge, which was an adventure triathlon. I participated in a team with two other friends from Barrier Island. I started with a 3 mile kayak, then Jason biked 8.3 miles and Josh ran 3 miles to the finish line (they're twins in case you didn't notice). We had a great time, finishing in 6th place overall in the teams. I had a great time kayaking and putting it in full gear at the end. Rounding the last buoy I started to really dig in and I passed a man who yelled, "you go girl!" Our friends and family came from camp and around the area to support us and cheer us on. Triathlon #4, they get better and better every time.

Friday night we had a chance to go downtown Charleston and participate in the Moja festival. They had live reggae music at the Customs house and a man taught me how to dance, it was pretty fun! Saturday night we went downtown again and learned how to Shag dance from a local church, and of course they had free ice cream! How did they know?? Not quite as good as the Junction though. Ha!

simply blessed.

I cannot express it words how much the Lord has blessed me. I am blessed, period. I am blessed to have a family and friends who love me unconditionally and pray for me. I am blessed to have a job that I love during such a stressful economic time. I am blessed to be able to live and work and breathe in such a beautiful place. I am blessed with beautiful sunsets and countless stars. I am blessed with intellect and a mind able to reason. I am blessed with the fulfillment of my dreams and a chance to see the world. I am blessed with a great Christian community who loves the Lord and challenges me to grow deeper in my relationship with Him. I am blessed to have a roof over my head, clean water, a warm shower, and food on the table without thinking twice. I am blessed to have such great health and two working legs. I am blessed by the unconditional, unmerited love of my Lord and savior. I am blessed by His kindness, mercy, gentleness, peace, hope and joy. I am blessed to be a part of the Lord's family and to be called his friend. I am blessed every moment by the presence of the Lord. I am blessed by the rest and joy that he continually pours over me. I am blessed by the Lord and I am grateful.

beautiful skies.

These pictures are for my dear friend Kathleen. She is a missionary in Haiti right now and she loves skies. The skies have been full of God's glory here recently and I wanted to try to share them with you. The pictures don't really do justice, but they will have to do. So Kathleen, these are for you. I love you and miss you dearly.

We had a false alarm with the turtle nest last night. We thought that the nest had been sinking in from the turtles, so we sounded the alarm and got everyone out there. We sat around waiting in anticipation for hours, but nothing happened. We're not really sure where the mix up happened, but we had fun waiting, singing, playing games, etc. We ended up taking one hour turtle patrol shifts until 2:30am, until we gave up and called it a night. Lets just say, it was a rough morning. According to the official Turtle Patrol, a few of the turtles hatched on Sunday night and we missed it again, they are going in tomorrow morning to dig up the nest and do the inventory. So it looks like I'll just have to try again in the future, but I can't say I didn't try. Plus, there is a possibility of a live birth when they dig up the nest, so my hopes are still high.

We had a great time this past weekend. We played out on the water all day Saturday, starting with a morning kayak to an abandoned shrimp boat, then we went out sailing after lunch. It was great because the waves were pretty big. We sailed over to the sand bar where a sailboat had gotten stuck on the sand. The Coast Guard came in and checked it out, but everyone had already left the boat. Then we went back out kayaking to an island and walked around and did some bird watching. The island is protected for birds because it is home to so many endagered and threatened species. We saw over 1,000 pelicans!! Crazy. We also got a chance to see lots of rare birds. We walked over to the beach on the ocean side and found tons of sand dollars...whole! It was like a dream come true. We found a Bobcat on our property, and later we saw a deer chase the cat away. Oh, I also forgot to mention that I played tennis with the boys and beat them 6-0 and 6-1:). Anyway, it was a great weekend along with a great church service on Sunday.

Hope you are all well, I love and miss you!

nest excavation.

Two days ago I received a call that both of the double nests had hatched the night before. I took my nightly walk that night, but the nest looked undisturbed. These are the same nests that had Ghost Crab holes in them the previous days. I will really disappointed when I was informed that I had missed the hatching. This morning I was able to go to the nest with the Turtle Patrol and watch them dig up the rest of the nest and take an inventory on all of the eggs and unhatched turtles. Although we didn't find any live sea turtles, we did find a baby that didn't make it out.

There is still one more nest left on our beach. The Turtle Patrol told me to go when it's dark during high tide, so I'm going to wake up and check until the final nest hatches. They also said that they think that last nest will hatch this week, so hopefully we will be able to catch it.

2 down 1 to go.

So as you all know, I've been checking on the sea turtle nests daily. Well, last night I went for my nightly walk to check on them and I found that one of the nests had a ghost crab hole in it. I know the ghost crab ate some of the turtle eggs, but I don't think he could eat all of them. The other two nests were still left untouched. Then...I went out tonight and another ghost crab had gotten into one of the nests. So now there is only one nest left untouched. This is the nest that was laid at the later time, so it probably won't hatch until late this week or early next week. I am planning on calling the Turtle Patrol to see if they have any idea how many eggs the ghost crabs can eat. Since the sea turtle are so close to hatching time, I don't see how a ghost crab could have eaten the whole nest. Well, it's been a sad two days for the sea turtles, but I have hope that the last nest will make it all the way through.

dreams do come true.

After surviving the first week of classes, we were pretty ready for the weekend. Classes went well for the most part this week. There were a few ups and downs, but overall the week went well. The kids, teachers and chaperones were all great. On Friday when I was teaching the Crab class, we caught a Florida Stone Crab, about 4-5 inches wide. He gave me a showdown, but I ended up winning and grabbing his fierce-looking claws.

Today, I went to a conference at the camp and had a great time worshipping, praying and soaking in the presence of the Lord. Then, me and a few guys went out kayaking for the afternoon. It was beautiful, the sun was out, about 80 degrees. We paddled down the estuary a few miles, then found a small cove to paddle down. When we got a ways into it, we realized there was a dolphin feeding session going on right in front of us. We paddled over to catch a glimpse of the action and the dolphins didn't really seem to mind. A few of them came right up to our kayaks! We sat and watched with awe, laughter and enjoyment. God really does know how to give good gifts to His children. We paddled back and I went out sailing for a few minutes, then played in the ocean. Life is good. God is good. We had a great time last night, going out to town and visiting one of my favorite places...Cold Stone...mmmmm.

okefenoke. first day of class.

Our staff went to the Okefenoke camp ground on the Georgia Florida border for the holiday. The campground was a black water swamp, which means the water was a dark black/red color, reflecting the scenery really nicely. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference between the sky and the water. We had a great time kayaking, canoeing, resting, and playing games over the weekend. We played a few round of Euchre and fun camp fire games:) We had a great time deeping our friendships and doing a lot of laughing. The second day I went on an 18-mile kayak paddle to the top of the swamp and back with my program director. I am trying to build up my endurance for an adventure race coming up in 2 weeks. I am entering the race with 2 other guys from camp as a team. I am racing in the kayak 3 miles, and the guys are biking 3 miles, then running 3 miles. It should be lots of fun:)

I checked one more off my bucket list:) When we got back from camping on Monday I went out with two of the guys from camp and they taught me how to sail!! We sailed across the estuary to the Botany Island and went shell hunting. I sailed back for a few minutes, I think I discovered my new favorite hobby...better make room in the garage for a sailboat. There were even dolphins jumping right near our boat. It was a dream come true.

Today was my first day as a teacher. I taught the Seining class. We teach the students about fish and give them a tour of the aquarium, then we take them out to the estuary with nets and drag them in the water looking for any creatures we can find. It was a little chaotic today trying to keep the students' attention during the actual seining. I found myself getting frustrated with myself not doing as well as I had hoped, but the Lord reminded me that it will take time to be the teacher I hope to be. Right now, I just need to be content with getting through the classes and doing my best, and over time I will gain more and more knowledge and experience. I just tend to get frustrated when things aren't perfect the first day, but I need to sit back, relax and enjoy the learning experience right now.

I am on a mission. One of my goals is to see the hatching of sea turtles while I'm down here. I've been tracking a few nests in the area and they are supposed to hatch within the next 15 days, so I plan on checking the nests on a regular basis. So hopefully, I'll be able to catch a hatching soon!

Thank you all for your support and prayers, they are much appreciated. Love and miss you much.

SC aquarium

We had the chance to go the the SC aquarium yesterday for free, since we have a partnership with them. We also had the opportunity to check out the behind-the-scenes Turtle Hospital and aviary.

There were about 15 turtles that had been found and brought in to recover and heal. Everything from baby turtles to a 365lb. Loggerhead Sea Turtle. Some of them had been caught in fishers' nets or had gotten hit with a motor blade from a boat. It was so cool to see!

Yesterday, I honestly walked outside and said it felt a little chilly, which was really like 75 degrees. I think I'm getting used to the weather pretty quickly.

We've been having fun playing lots of sports and watching the US Open recently. It's fun that our staff is so athletic, I've even been testing my skills at volleyball the last few days. This weekend we are heading out to go camping on the Georgia, Florida border at Okefenoke campground. We are going to canoe, kayak and lounge for the weekend, so it should be a great bonding experience:)