Day 2: "Oh my gosh! I had no idea pigs actually oinked.."

Day 2 of LeaderShape started off with a team challenge course, which we did as families.  I absolutely love team building and challenge courses and being outside at camp, so I was beyond excited for the morning's activities.  Lambda Alpha did such a great job at becoming both a team and a family through all of the challenges, and we had a great time and laughed along the way.  My favorite moments:

-  watching us improve our teamwork more and more through each challenge
-  gaining confidence after completing the height arrangement on the silent log
-  when I wasn't able to say anything during the spider web challenge since I'd done it before, and watching the rest of my family figure it out so quickly
-  "delivering" people through the spider web holes
-  mastering family communication during the dots in the square
-  getting to talk to Meg about summer and getting to know her better
-  Mack shimmying through the snake knots
-  having to say banana before and after anything I said after being bit by the sticky snake
-  being united, figuratively and literally, as we walked across the parking lot
-  always being ahead with Matt and Doug, and finally succeeding when the guys all had their eyes closed
-  never giving up as we tried a hundred different ways to fit thirteen people on top of a small box, a tiny box, and an even tinier box
-  Alyson being shoved in the middle of all of the guys on the tiny box
-  "hug it out" circles of girls in the middle of the box
-  when our family all collapsed off of the smallest box together because we were determined to conquer the last task and finish as champions

After lunch, we completed a personality/leadership assessment to figure out which of four categories most reflected ourselves.  I scored highest in the C category,which stands for conscientiousness.  When I read the description for conscientiousness, I was more and more appalled at how accurately each descriptor was an accurate explanation of myself.  Phrases like "analyzing performance critically, using a systematic approach to situations or activities, values of quality or accuracy" I immediately agreed with, and others made me think a little bit, but ultimately made me realize that the test results truly reflected my personality. After everyone finished their assessments, we separated into groups based on your highest scoring letter and had the chance to talk about the positives and negatives that our particular personality type can bring to groups, teamwork, and even how we function in our daily lives.

Although I love all of the programming that we do and our family discussions, my favorite part of today was free time when I had the chance to walk around camp with Caroline, Brandon, Ernest, Lorie, and Jordan and answer unending questions about Tecumseh.  I liked that I was able to share my love for Tecumseh with all of them and see how obsessed they all were with the mini farm animals.

That night when we were all finished, Grace McGill and I decided that a visit to Ghost Cabin would be the perfect Tecumseh adventure for a small group of us. A little bit after we started walking, Grace and I both realized that neither of us were 100% sure of how to get there, but we were totally up for the adventure.  The guys were not pleased that it took us almost half an hour to get there, and that when we did arrive, Ghost Cabin wasn't actually a cabin and the ghosts weren't there.  We let the boys lead the way back, and Grace and I quickly fell behind, turned our flashlights off, and hid behind the chimney until the guys started freaking out that we were hiding in bushes, waiting to attack them or something.  They kept moving as we hid and plotted to get back out of the woods a different and quicker way than them.  However, neither Grace nor I have great sense of direction in the woods at night, and we ended up first at south pasture, second almost down by the mud hike pit, and finally came out by the slides at the lake and still managed to sneak up the hill and scare the rest of the group.  I loved the adventure and fun of it all and running around with Grace, just being glad that we were back at Tecumseh again.