Twilight

The Twilight series is all the rage, and since I manage to steer clear of things that are "all the rage" (except for that Hannah Montana concert I went to last winter), the Twilight series nearly passed me by.

Then I got sucked in.

Bella Swan is a new girl to the town of Forks, Washington. At the town's tiny high school, she meets a guy and falls in love. But there's a minor problem: He's a vampire.

I've never been into vampire fiction. I've known people who are into it, and they're kinda...well, you know, weird. But, even though it concerns vampires, Twilight is a sweet love story about two teenagers who have no real hope of a future together, but fall deeply in love anyway.

So what challenges do Bella and Edward face? Let's see. He constantly fights the urge to kill her and suck all the blood out of her body. Hey, it's a vampire thing. But he also deeply loves her and does everything he can to protect her from anything that could hurt her -- including himself.

Another problem is that Edward does not age. But Bella, as a human, will. In 50 years, she'll look like an old lady who scored herself a young hot guy. It's one of the weird aspects of having a mortal/immortal relationship.

Edward does not eat, sleep or have a beating heart. But I'm telling you, I don't know when I've had such a crush on a fictional character. Stephenie Meyer's description of him makes me think having a vampire boyfriend wouldn't be so bad. (If I weren't already married. And if vampires even EXISTED.)

There are three books in the series with the fourth, "Breaking Dawn," due out on Aug.2. (Happy birthday to me!) I've just finished the second, "New Moon." Both are gripping and have unexpected twists and turns throughout. (Although "New Moon" will completely rip your heart out a couple of chapters in.)

And I'm not the only one with a crush on Edward. Some women at church my age and older are pretty much loopy over him.

If you feel silly reading about teenage vampire love, consider this conversation I had with one of our elders' wives at church tonight.

K: (Asking if I have heard of a book she had heard about somewhere, which I hadn't.)

Me: I'm too embarrassed to tell you what I'm reading right now.

K: (rolling her eyes) Oh, well, I'm reading Twilight.

Me: That's what I'm reading!

Ha ha!

On another note, ACU camps were GREAT last week. I was asked what we do with Jenna during that time. ACU camps provide excellent childcare, free of charge, for children of camp volunteers. She got to play with babysitters all day. Julia did this for years until she was old enough for the youngest camp. During Kadesh, which has a more hectic schedule than the middle-school camp we did last week, the babysitters will even bathe your kids and put them to bed for you. This is really the only summer youth group activity I can participate in 100%, and it's because ACU camps provide top-notch childcare so I don't have to worry about my kids. It's another reason we love ACU camps!

Abilene update

I don't have much computer time this week because we are busy with a week of ACU Leadership Camps. This is the first year Julia is old enough for Learning to Lead, so she is staying in a different dorm than ours for the first time. We see her in the Campus Center every once in a while and she seems to be having a great time. We usually work Kadesh, the high school camp (which we LOVE), but it's not the same week as Learning to Lead. So this week we are working MPulse, which is the middle school camp. We've been having so much fun and I'm reminded again of how much I hate that middle schoolers tend to get a bad rap, because they are actually a lot of fun to hang out with.

There's also a day camp for the younger ones called KidQuest, which Julia graduated from last summer.

Just a plug for ACU camps -- the are the most highly organized camps we've ever been a part of (and we've experienced quite a few camps). The curriculum is outstanding and the staff has such an incredible heart for teaching kids of all ages (there are camps from entering first grade to entering college) how to be like Christ. So if any of you ever wonder whe we disappear to Abilene every summer, this is why!

On another note, I bought the raved-about "Twilight" to read on the way here. Julia stole it from me and before I knew it, she was 100 pages ahead of me in the book. We've both finished it, and now she wants to read the rest of the books in the series. My question for you Twilight fans is this: Are the next two books appropriate for a 9-year-old to read? The first one got a tad scary and violent at the end, but she didn't seem bothered by it. (She's also read the Harry Potter and Inkheart series, which have a little violence in them. She says violence in fantasy books doesn't scare her because she knows it could never happen. When I tried giving her "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry" last year, however, she brought it back to me after a few days and said "No, thanks." I had forgotten about the graphic lynching scene. I still feel bad about that one.)

I'll review Twilight when we get home and I have time to think. :)

Back to ACU

Tomorrow we are leaving for a week of ACU Leadership Camps. Chad and I will be group leaders at Kadesh and Julia will be attending her last year of KidQuest. We love doing Kadesh and it's always great to be back on ACU's campus. After we get back, we're all done traveling for the summer. Which is great especially for Chad, who was only home six days in July!