by Mikaela

In a beautiful forest called happy wood, there lived Sammi Squirrel. She had two friends named Rachel Rabbit, and Cara Chipmunk. One day in late spring Cara skittered up to Sammi squirrel.
“Sammi! Sammi!” she called.
“What is it Cara? You as excited as you were when you won that nut eating contest!” Said Sammi.
“I am! Guess what I read in the Turtle Times!”
“What?” said Sammi.
“They opened a summer camp!” exclaimed Cara.
“In the forest?” asked Sammi.
“No. Beside the lake! Lake Rainbow! The camp is 50 ruby-stones per animal.”
“Wow!” said Sammi. “What do we do there?”
“There’s soft-ball, soccer, basketball, hiking, biking, swimming, football,”
“Sounds like the Olympics!” said Sammi.
“Except for kids!” Said Cara. “We need to start saving every ruby-stone, so we have enough when the time comes.”
Spring passed and summer came. Cara, Rachel, and Sammi had enough ruby-stones to go. All the animal-kids in happy wood were going. Even the school bully, Ozzy otter, was going. Everyone had to be ready by the first Sunday in June, because they would be leaving one hour after church. And church ended at 4:00 p.m., so they would be leaving happy wood at 5:00 p.m.
On Saturday Rachel and Cara had spent the night at Sammi’s house. Meanwhile, Peter possum and Bryan Beaver were having a problem: there was no one to pull the wagon that the animal-kids were going to ride! Felix fox could do it, but he was an outlaw, and might end up eating the little animals. Willy wolf could, but he is a bigger animal and might scare some of the animals.
“Hmm, I know!” said Bryan. “The miniature pony at Farmer Tim’s farm could pull the wagon!”
“Yes!” Said Peter.
Bryan was a beaver, so he couldn’t walk all the way down to the farm. So Peter went down to the farm and asked Periwinkle pony if she would pull the wagon. She agreed, and so she would be down at happy wood by 4:30 on Sunday afternoon.
Sunday night came, and all the kids of happy wood were ready to go. Sammi and Rachel and Cara were sitting right in the middle of the wagon. They talked and sang songs all the way to camp. Cara even took a little nap, and Rachel and Sammi leaned against the side of the wagon and dosed off. (It was almost dark outside, and riding in a wagon can make you tired after a whole day of church.)
At about 7:00 they arrived at camp. Everyone went to their cabin, and Rachel and Sammi were in a cabin together. Cara was a small animal, so she went with the other small chipmunks, mice and possums. After everyone chose a bunk they all went down to the big campfire in the middle of the campgrounds. They ate supper and talked and sang songs till about 9:00 at night. Then everyone went down to their cabins and went to bed. But no one could go to sleep! Everyone was too excited to go to sleep. The girl cabins told stories, sang songs, played games like “Truth or Dare”, “Would you Rather” and “True or False”. The boy cabins were making forts with the sheets and mattresses, had pillow fights and dared each other to do stuff like “run out in the cold for ten seconds without any shoes” or “jump over a bottom bunk without hitting your head on the top one” and “run around the room blindfolded” and ……. you get the idea. At about two in the morning everyone was settled down and (or almost) asleep.
The next morning Sammi squirrel and Rachel rabbit went to the lake for some swim time. They got in one of the rowboats to go to the waterfall when all of the sudden, Rachel looked over to the dock, and someone jumped into the lake! “Who could that be?” Said Rachel.
“I don’t know.” Said Sammi. “Come on, let’s go see the waterfall.”
They got to the waterfall when all of the sudden, water started leaking into the boat!
“Quick, use the buckets!” said Sammi. They started using the buckets in the boat to pour the water out. But the water was coming in faster than they could pour it out!
“Oh, no!” said Rachel. We are sinking!”
“Look! Said Sammi. “The plug is out!” Sammi put the plug back in and they started to pour out the water. When they did, Sammi said, “How on earth did that plug come off?”
“I don’t know Sammi.” Said Rachel. “Look! There’s the rainbow!”
“Wow! “Said Sammi. “We had better get back. They will be looking for us,”
When they got back to camp Ozzie otter was shaking water off himself.
“Hey, why are you swimming during the girls swim time?” asked Rachel.
“I, uh, missed swim time with the boys so the counsellor said I could swim now.” Said Ozzy.
“But the counsellors gave strict rules at the session last night ‘boys and girl animals don’t swim together. No exceptions,’”
“Uh, well, my counsellor, Mr. Eric, wasn’t there so he didn’t know.”
“But Mr. Eric was sitting in front of us!” yelled Sammi.
“Well what I mean is that he fell asleep when the rules were being given,” said Ozzy. And Ozzy just walked away with the other boys.
“Something smells fishy,” said Sammi.
“Yeah,” answered Rachel. “Mr. Eric has been working here for five years and has probably known the rules even before camp started this year.”
They decided to confront Mr. Eric about it.
Ozzy wouldn’t do anything like that.” Said Mr. Eric “he wouldn’t sneak into the lake, pull the plug on a boat and then lie about it. You’ve got it all wrong.”
“But Ozzy is the school bully and he told us that …”
“I’ve had enough. You girls need to be nicer and not come tattle tailing on someone when they haven’t even done anything wrong,”
The next day at chapel Mr. Bryan Beaver preached on deceiving others, lying about it and never saying sorry. He also told the story about Ananias and Saphira lying to peter about the money. Ozzy otter wasn’t listening but when he started talking about lying, he was sorry and at the invitation, he asked Jesus to save him. That night he asked Mr. Eric and Rachel and Sammi forgiveness.
The next day Cara’s cabin came running to camp with bad news.
“The big snow in the mountains we had last winter is melting!” cried Cara’s counsellor, “all the melted snow is washing downriver toward the falls! When it reaches the falls, all the melted snow will rush into the lake, and flood the camp!”
“what are we going to do!?” cried Rachel.”
“I have an idea!” said Ozzy. The beavers can build a dam, and we can help! All water creatures like otters and beavers and muskrats will build the dame, and the others can collect supplies for the dame!”
Everyone thought it was a good idea, and they all got it done in 45 minutes.
“Look, the flood!” said Rachel. Everyone headed to the camp. The dame worked! The camp was safe, and everyone thanked Ozzy for such a good idea and for saving the camp.

THE END