BELLAIRE • MEMORIAL • RIVER OAKS • TANGLEWOOD • WEST UNIVERSITY

Camp WaKa WaKa

By Peyton Walsh, age 10 and Madison Kalife, age 11 | December 1, 2018

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FRIENDSHIP AND FUN Peyton Walsh (at left) and Madison Kalife (right), both fifth graders at Second Baptist School, teamed up to host a summer camp for younger kids.

We met in Pre-K at Second Baptist School. Initially, we didn’t “bond” with each other, and we even used to fight over silly things. However, halfway through second grade we started throwing the football during recess together. Eventually we played soccer on the same team, and before we knew it, we had grown close. We have played on many of the same soccer, basketball and softball teams together and both love to compete.

One day we had the idea of organizing a summer camp for kids. We decided to create a camp for incoming first graders. We realized that combining sports and teaching kids about God would be a great idea. So, we set out to form “Camp WaKa WaKa,” which is a combination of the first two letters of our last names, Walsh and Kalife.

Hosting the camp, which was held at Peyton’s house, was a lot of fun because we really enjoyed interacting with the young kids. Their joy was contagious! The camp was a great learning experience for both of us. We both love sports and the Lord. By combining these two passions, we set the foundation for our camp. Some of the activities were relay races, water slides, soccer drills, making slime, basketball, making tie-dye shirts and Bible study. Bible study was one of our favorite activities of the day. We would memorize new verses every day. We also gave each camper an EvangeCube (a tool/game with pictures) in order to teach them how to share the Gospel.

CAMP WAKA WAKA These incoming first graders loved Camp WaKa Waka, hosted by counselors Peyton Walsh and Madison Kalife.

One of our favorite memories from camp was Splash Day. One of our grandmothers sponsored a waterslide, and it was a huge hit! The kids went down the slide over and over for hours, and we joined in the fun too. We can’t begin to describe how great it was to hear the kids’ laughter and see their excitement.

Through this experience we both grew closer to God and each other. We plan on doing the camp every summer because we loved seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces, and perhaps it will bring them closer to God too. We can’t wait to meet our campers for Summer 2019!

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