Brigette: Echo Valley, Work Week, 2010. I was getting trained in Camp Crafts and Life-guarding. It turns out Sam was too. Sam and I became great pals, and went on to be all-summer counselors with some of the best people in the world. The summer ended and I returned to College Station, Sam to Austin.
Sam: Leaving camp in 2010, I thought I was leaving the Canyon for good, or at least until I’d hopefully bring my future kids back as campers. The rest of my college summers were filled with internships and studying abroad. I was going to miss the place a lot and the people even more. At that point, Brigette was just a good friend who went to school two hours away. I always enjoyed being around her, but never seriously considered dating at that point.
Brigette: Whatever…he totally wanted to date me. Fast-forward to Summer of 2013, and Sam was offered the internship with LLYC for the 2013-2014 school year! That meant he would be serving as a Guys Director at Echo that summer. I was offered the position of Girls Director, and just like that this old friend and I were reunited!
Sam: I was stoked to be offered the role, and hearing Brigette would be my counterpart, it made the job even sweeter. That summer I got a front row view as Brigette led and cared for Girls Staff and I was super impressed. Throw in the fact that she was cute, funny and led music at Roundup, and I was helpless. By the second half of the summer, I knew I wanted to ask her on a date. During the last week of the summer, I worked up the courage to ask her out. Unfortunately for me, she wasn’t convinced it was a good idea…
Brigette: Emphasis on “cute and funny”!!!! You got me blushin’ over here, Sam Moore. Ok ok ok…yes, Sam might have asked me on a date and I might have said no at first. I wasn’t ready to give up our easy and straightforward friendship that I only associated with LLYC for the tumultuous unknown. Welp, turns out our friendship was going to change either way. I cried alone on the tennis courts that night (call me a drama queen and I will not be your friend anymore), freaked out by Sam’s profession. We ended that summer on a sad note. Luckily I had friends (shout out to Ang Aadahl, Alex Vaio, and Mackenzie Gandy and others) who knew what was good for me….
Sam: Late Saturday night after closing day 2013, I got a text from Brigette out of the blue telling me that if I asked her on a date again, she’d say yes. My pride was shaken, but I wasn’t dumb. I asked her again and we set up a date for the next time we were in the same city. One date turned into a few, turned into becoming “official.”
Brigette: I’ll spare you the details, but I decided if I had to choose between never being friends with Sam again and going on a date with him, I’d choose the latter. Pays to be bold, ladies. From this point on, Sam and I kept dating long distance until we both moved to Austin. Fast-forward a few years and we plum got hitched. We ended our wedding with, duh, Deep in the West.
Sam: Camp is something woven intricately into our stories, first as individuals, and forever as a couple. In so many important ways, camp molded us and stretched us in some of our most formative years. We’ll never be able to shake the fun, adventure, friendships and connection to God that camp taught us, and for that I am incredibly grateful.
Brigette: I often think how happy I am that I don’t have to explain camp to Sam, because it means the same thing to him as it does to me. I think we’re much sillier people who love Jesus, each other, people, and adventure much more than we would’ve had our love story not started at camp. We also still chant girls and guys cheers sometimes at home…