Retreat recap

Last weekend, I had the opportunity to go to a ladies' retreat at The Wilds of New England. I look forward to this time every September, and am so thankful I had the chance to go once again this year! It was great to enjoy time with my mom and several other ladies from her church. Here is our bunch, standing in front of our cabin!

On the left of this picture is our rustic little cabin. We were right next to the bath house, which was pretty cool! (It's peeking out from behind our cabin in the picture.)
After a night of little sleep (as usual), Mom and I were up bright and early to get showers. And then we headed to the coffee shop, Cool Beans. Little ol' non-coffee-loving-me decided it would be a good idea to wake myself up with a salted caramel mocha. I have to say it was quite delicious! In fact, I've been looking up recipes on Pinterest to recreate it at home . . . :) (Please ignore how exhausted I look in this picture--I promise I looked a little more awake later in the day!)
Then we enjoyed hanging out by the campfire for a while! I love that they keep a fire going all day.
The speaker for this year was Mrs. Beneth Jones from BJU. It's been a long time since I've heard her (college days!) but I knew we would be in for a treat. I have fond memories from when she would speak at Northland--I always loved how real she was, and her trademark phrase, "Bless your gizzard!" (Yes, she did say that 3 or 4 times this weekend, too. :)) The verses she used for the 4 sessions were Proverbs 30:25-28. Verses about 4 little creatures that God wants us to imitate: ants, conies, locusts, spiders. It was amazing to me what she pulled out of this passage! From the ant, we learn about foresight. From the coney, protective living (hiding in the Rock). From the locust, the principle of community--believers living and cooperating in harmony with each other. From the spider, diligence. Now what was really cool, is that quite a few of the things she mentioned were things that God had been specifically working in my heart about already. Things like diligence, living with intention, and community. Good stuff. I came away challenged, with lots to pray about and think about.

Saturday after lunch was free time. I didn't take many pictures during this time, mainly because I've taken pictures there the other 2 years, and I figured I wouldn't get much that was new or terribly interesting to others! My friend Joanna and I went on a hike with some of the other ladies around the camp; that took about half an hour. Several of us attended an optional Q&A session with Mrs. Jones and Rand Hummel. I came away with lots of good stuff from that, too!! Mom and I went and got some yummy ice cream in the Sweet Shop (pictured below).
I took some pics of flowers (they landscape everything SO beautifully!!!) . . .
and some of the ladies in our group went on a hayride. I didn't end up going on it this year; I was too busy browsing in the bookstore and picking out some presents to bring home (and a shirt for me :)).
I wish I had gotten some pics of the fun time on Friday night. Alas, I forgot to bring my camera with me! Oh well. I took this picture of me with my aunt Betty before the last session. Hopefully she won't kill me for putting it on my blog :), but I thought it turned out pretty nice.

So now I am done with retreats for another year (sadness!), but it is always a bright spot to look forward to in early fall. I'm excited to look ahead to next Tuesday, when my sister and family will arrive in NH for 3 WHOLE WEEKS!!! Yay!