CONFESSIONS OF A BEAN COUNTER: Dad's Father's Day Surprise

For about 17 years now, one week out of each summer my Dad has volunteered as a counselor at the Illinois Fire Safety Alliance's Burn Camp (now also known as Camp I Am Me). The Camp is located at the YMCA's Camp Duncan in Ingleside, IL. It is for kids ages 8 - 16 who have been severly burned in a fire. Many of the kids have absolutely heartbreaking stories. Many have very visible scarring and some also have physical handicaps as a result of their injuries. Each year, Dad prepares the woodworking projects for all of the campers for the week. He loves helping the kids build anything from memory boxes to birdhouses. Throughout the years, we've seen literally thousands of pictures that he has taken and heard tons of stories each year after his return. The Camp is definitely something close to his heart.

Every year on the Wednesday during Camp week, they host Visitor's Day. This is a chance for contributing fire departments and other organizations/individuals to come and see the Camp. I was able to go to Visitor's Day once roughly 10 years ago with one of Dad's friends. The rest of our little family, however, had never experienced Burn Camp first-hand. Some time back, I decided that for Father's Day I wanted to surprise Dad on Visitor's Day at Camp. So, this past Tuesday afternoon, Mom, Rob, Ella, and I loaded up the car for the nearly six hour drive. During our evening in Chicagoland before Visitor's Day, we couldn't pass up the local cuisine. This pizza from Giordano's was amazing.

Yesterday morning, when we got to Camp, we were able to locate Dad without him knowing that we were there. We asked another counselor to take Ella and go take her to Dad. Mom, Rob, and I were able to watch his reaction from around a corner. He looked rather confused when he saw Ella. At that point, we came out of our hiding place so he knew we were there too. He certainly was surprised to see all of us.

One of the main events during Visitor's Day is a fire truck parade. Many local fire departments bring a truck and the campers and counselors are able to go for a ride in the parade. The other visitors, including us, were the spectators. Ella loved the parade, including waving at Grandpa on a fire truck. After a bite of lunch and a little bit of time with Dad, we decided to head home. This was also Ella's first roadtrip so she was pretty tired, but overall she did great.

Here are a few other pictures from our Father's Day Surprise.