Cam Tipping - One in a Million Teenager

If you've visited Tuscarora during late July---during the Spriggs/Butler/Hanneman/Tipping/Gibbons week in the cabins---you might have seen Cam Tipping. Actually, it's hard to pick out Cam-- he's almost always part of the Cam-Leo-James trio. Those guys spend hours playing in the water. They can also dance a mean cupid shuffle, but honestly....James is the one that stands out there because he has the moves.

This year, Cam was the video guy for the American Heart Association. I've talked to Marla about homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia. But it was just a word. It didn't  define Cam, of CamLeoJames.   The video shows a whole different side of that family than the one that I know.  As I understand it more fully, my admiration  runs even deeper.

This  family crowd really knows how to have fun. They model a  powerful lesson about living each day with gratefulness, joy, and humor.

Here's  Bill Tipping  (sporting purple polyester with Jim Hanneman in peach) These guys can surprise me into spitting my coffee all over the deck, they're that funny.  Bill's the kind of guy that carts all the kids out in the dark at midnight to find the wolf puppies (and actually finds them).

Did you notice the tame Yahtzee game in the video? Yeah, well, this is not the Marla who plays Yahtzee at Tuscarora. Don't let the kind polite mother thing fool you: she is ruthless (and also really witty).

   This nice family spreads a lively sparkle to everyone around them --including us.  Today, I'm praying for a cure for Cam's disease. If you are so inclined to that, can I summon you also for this great kid?  

Trout Opener

I'd say staffer Andrew had a pretty successful opener.........Get a load of those brook trout

Camp Coffee by Jerry Vandiver

Well, our favorite Nashviller, Jerry Vandiver came up with a new one. Lindsay's dad Phil is in there somewhere---

The other day I was sitting in my car in a parking lot and Tim McGraw came on the radio singing one of Jerry's songs. I wanted to quick tell the all the other people in the parking lot, but I didn't know even one of  them. So I just turned it up and had my own little happy moment.  Tim McGraw is OK, but it's a better song when Jerry just sings it himself.

Jerry has already sort of committed to the Tuscarora little concert for summer of 2012...........and so we're already hoping for it---and looking forward to his new canoe album.

Gunflint Trail Magic Christmas Tree

If you drove up the Gunflint Trail this Christmas, a little beyond half way, near Birch Lake, all of a sudden you'd have seen a perfect Christmas tree, lit up in the middle of the woods.  It was as electric and out of place as a billboard, but it was also perfect.  Nobody in the car ever said "Turn those lights off, we're in the middle of the woods".  It was more like the moment when Clark Griswold found the perfect tree and the angels sang, or when the Grinch sees all the Whos in Whoville celebrating Christmas morning.   It was a .........Who got up so high to get the lights so symmetrical, and where is that electricity coming from here in the middle of  nowhere? mystery. 

You know, just plain Magic.