Last weekend was another adventure in camping with almost a dozen girls ages 9-12. We have a good (excellent, really) parent involvement and there were five adults to ride herd on the girls.
We spent Friday and Saturday nights at a Girl Scout camp located on the coast. Saturday, we got up at 6am (after going to bed at nearly 1am) so we could be up, dressed, breakfasted and at the tide pools 35 minutes up the coast at the ideal time of 9am. One of the rules I've laid down for the girls is that they must be cheerful in the mornings even if it kills them. I tell them if they don't feel cheerful, they've got to fake it. They've not let me down yet.
So we spent about an hour at the tide pools (tons of mussels, barnacles, barnacles on mussels, anemones - some at least a foot long and six inches in diameter, small dead jellyfish, a couple of starfish, and lots of colorful seaweed and algae) and continued up the coast to the aquarium. This is the same aquarium that housed (pooled?) Keiko of "Free Willy". They turned Keiko's pool into an undersea garden passageway where you can walk inside a plexiglass tunnel and look around at the sea creatures swimming beside, above, and below you. Check it out at http://aquarium.org.
We stopped and hiked up to a lighthouse on the way back and looked out over the cliffs to the surf pounding the rocks below and the sea lions body-surfing a short way out.
The girls were pretty worn out by the time we got back to the camp but it didn't stop them from learning and playing old, fun games. I don't know what this first one's called but you measure the distance from your opponent by putting one foot in front of the other with your toe to the opponent's toe of their front foot. Bringing your front foot together with your back foot, put your hands up with elbows bent and try to knock your opponent off-balance by slapping against their hands without losing your own balance. The first person to take a step or fall into the other one loses. For some reason, the girls all wanted to take on the dad who is 6'4" and weighs 240 lbs. One of them actually caught him by surprise and knocked him off-balance. It was quite hilarious to see the girls less than 5 feet tall and weighing no more than 85 pounds match up with him. They usually ended up on their backsides.
The other game they played is called "Slap". Again, you stand facing your opponent with your hands held out in front of you. One of you puts your hands palms-up and the other's is palms-down lightly touching each other. The palms-up person then quickly tries to slap the backs of the hands above. The trick is to be fast enough to slap the other person's hands or quick enough to yank your hands away without getting slapped. The hands return to neutral (palms-up/palms-down) and the slapper tries again. If the slapper misses, they exchange positions and the slapper becomes the slappee.
We finished off the evening with a dance (each girl doing her own thing on a slippery floor and with sock feet) after a candlelight supper of spaghetti, salad, and bread since it was Valentine's Day. What could be more romantic than a candlelight supper with four good friends and eleven "daughters"?
Showing posts with label Scouts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scouts. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Monday, August 4, 2008
Camp Low Echo
Girl Scouts don't usually attend resident camps as a troop like Boy Scouts do. They usually sign up and attend as individual girls or two or three together and are sent off by themselves for the week but this little camp in the Cascades offers a weekend troop camp at the end of their season. Isn't it beautiful? There's a Boy Scout camp across the lake but they were smart enough to keep the length of the lake between the two camps.So our troop attended with fourteen girls and four adults and had a great time in spite of the latrines. You know, there has to be something bad at a camp in order for it to be remembered. Last time it was the mosquitoes and the lightning storm. This time it was the latrines.
How can I describe the magnificent odor of our latrine? Perhaps I can quote Pat McManus; "It would give an otherwise indiscriminate hyena a fit of the dry-heaves." They said they'd limed it a number of times but one dad suggested in a phone consultation that they needed to add yeast and sugar. The lime will work on the smell, but yeast was needed to break the stuff down.
The adults' tent was quite nearby but, thankfully, the odor didn't penetrate the canvas much as long as the door was kept zipped and body spray was liberally released into the air. We overheard one girl whisper to her buddy late the first night, "I'm going in....wish me luck!"
The swim area with the tip of Mt. McGloughlin in the background. They had the usual swim area divided into three sections and the obligatory canoes but they also had some leg-powered paddle-boats that the girls enjoyed immensely.
One of the crafts they did was learn to weave some gimp into a lanyard. Some of the girls already knew how and were able to help those who didn't. Here's Richelle working on hers while wearing her brand-new camp hoody that she'd bought earlier at the trading post. Another girl also bought a hoody and didn't take it off until sometime after her mom picked her up when we got back Sunday afternoon.
Hauling the luggage up to the parking lot. Neat little carts and we had no trouble getting the girls to pull them.
It was a three-hour drive each way plus time to let the restless natives out to run off energy but it's an experience I'm game to do again. As long as the latrines smell better. And the girls fall asleep before 1am, preferably before 11pm. And our little Vesuvius goes dormant - that's the fourth time and her mom's coming next time; we can't find a common denominator and are wondering if it's a mental thing. She's perfectly fine the next day, eats a hearty breakfast and participates fully in all the activities but the evening or night before she has a migraine and then throws up.
Yup. You never know what's in store when you take fourteen assorted girls camping for two nights.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
The project
I've mentioned a few time about the Eagle project I've been helping with. Well, the project is nearly done and I thought I'd post a few pictures. This young man was told that the City of Sutherlin was wanting tables for the park. Right now, they have four tables total, with only one in the pavilion. The city was wanting a minimum of six. After sitting down and working out a budget with his adviser, our Boy Scout approached different businesses in town and asked them to sponsor a table for $125. The board of our Blackberry Festival sponsored two tables and added $25/table to have them painted purple. Other businesses heard about that and added their dollars for specialized painting. The end results are thirteen very colorful tables.
I don't have a finished product picture but here's what most of the frames look like. Most of them are all one color but some of them have different colored boards bolted on. Two of the purple ones have yellow boards, one blue one has red boards, and a red one has a blue top and white benches.
Our scout had the name of the sponsoring company routered into the center board of the table. He knew Mike had cut the letters for Cameron's project, so asked him to cut his boards. Here, Mike is doing fine detailing on the logo for a local wood products company after free-handing the rest of the logo.
Our young man being shown by his adviser how to get the spacing right on the table boards. We were happy that this paint cured to a duller orange than what you see here!
He still has a couple of badges to earn before he can send in his application for Eagle rank but he's working on them right now and since his birthday isn't until February, I have no doubt he'll get it.
I don't have a finished product picture but here's what most of the frames look like. Most of them are all one color but some of them have different colored boards bolted on. Two of the purple ones have yellow boards, one blue one has red boards, and a red one has a blue top and white benches.
Our scout had the name of the sponsoring company routered into the center board of the table. He knew Mike had cut the letters for Cameron's project, so asked him to cut his boards. Here, Mike is doing fine detailing on the logo for a local wood products company after free-handing the rest of the logo.
Our young man being shown by his adviser how to get the spacing right on the table boards. We were happy that this paint cured to a duller orange than what you see here!He still has a couple of badges to earn before he can send in his application for Eagle rank but he's working on them right now and since his birthday isn't until February, I have no doubt he'll get it.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
I Survived Day Camp
This must be my, oh, fourth year being a unit leader for Girl Scouts and I've been a volunteer at Cub Scout day camp for something like twelve years but each time I get through the week, I always feel as if I've survived something. One year I was even given an "I Survived Cub Day Camp" mug as a thank-you.
I've not helped at Cub day camp since I managed to convince people three years ago that since Cameron hadn't been in Cubs for three years, I needed to focus on Girl day camp and Richelle.
Usually, I have my child in my group but this year they needed me to be the leader of seven girls, six of whom were going into first grade and one into second. Sure was odd to see my daughter across the parade grounds with another group!
These little girls were so cute and said the most hilarious things such as:
"We screamed our EARS off!!" (loud singing contest between units)
"We're going to sit on the throne of wizz" (bathroom run)
"I don't like salad on my sandwich" (looking at my lettuce)
"Rocky-moley" for guacamole
And they hear things a little differently sometimes. The first morning, at opening flags, the camp director emphasized the need to drink water and reminded the girls to save the bottles and refill them. One of my girls heard "save the bottles" and not the "drink water" and "refill" parts and proudly showed her mom her unopened bottle of water that she'd saved. She'd had a bottle of juice with lunch and I wasn't on top of things that first day monitoring their water intake.
Another time, I spilled down my shirt getting a drink of water and murmured that I must have a hole in my lip. One little girl keep shooting me looks and after about ten minutes she leaned close and said, "I think I see the hole."
They were the best little girls, too. There were no fights or arguments until the last half of the last day when one girl managed to get two others mad at her at the same time. I'd hoped they would be able to straighten things out by themselves but after about half an hour and one of them coming to me saying they'd been pushed, I had to step in. All it took were a few gentle words and suggestions and they all became good friends and exchanged phone numbers.
The older girls, grades 4-6, camped overnight Thursday and since Richelle was one of them, I stayed, too. The campfire program was one of the best I've seen, mainly because those leaders were told they had to come up with skits that have never been done before. Campfires are so boring when the same skits and songs are done year after year. Out of the seven skits performed that night, I've never seen two and that's saying a lot after watching campfire programs for about fifteen years!
It was a great evening of fun and the girls were so tired that lights went out at 10pm and nearly everyone was asleep by 11pm. Even the dump truck's arrival at 5am didn't wake anyone up for more than a few minutes.
After so many years at day camps, I have a few tricks up my sleeve. Monday evening, I picked up some glow-in-the-dark beads and large safety pins without the spring and awarded each girl with a bead every time she drank all the water in her bottle. One bead-happy girl went home Friday with about twenty on her pins.
Another thing I did was pick up some UV-activated beads. These beads are a dull white until they're touched by UV rays and the beads rapidly change color. I gave those out each time they completed their camp-wide chores. Friday, our job was to pick up litter and I told the girls I would give them a bead for the first 30 pieces they collected and another one for each ten they picked up beyond that. Little first and second graders can't figure out how much litter they need to pick up for x-number of beads but they can figure out that the more they pick up, the more beads they'll get. One of the girls earned nine beads, three more earned eight, one earned three, and two earned one. There's lots of litter to pick up at day camp with all the crafts!
Tired as I am, I still enjoy day camps.
I've not helped at Cub day camp since I managed to convince people three years ago that since Cameron hadn't been in Cubs for three years, I needed to focus on Girl day camp and Richelle.
Usually, I have my child in my group but this year they needed me to be the leader of seven girls, six of whom were going into first grade and one into second. Sure was odd to see my daughter across the parade grounds with another group!
These little girls were so cute and said the most hilarious things such as:
"We screamed our EARS off!!" (loud singing contest between units)
"We're going to sit on the throne of wizz" (bathroom run)
"I don't like salad on my sandwich" (looking at my lettuce)
"Rocky-moley" for guacamole
And they hear things a little differently sometimes. The first morning, at opening flags, the camp director emphasized the need to drink water and reminded the girls to save the bottles and refill them. One of my girls heard "save the bottles" and not the "drink water" and "refill" parts and proudly showed her mom her unopened bottle of water that she'd saved. She'd had a bottle of juice with lunch and I wasn't on top of things that first day monitoring their water intake.
Another time, I spilled down my shirt getting a drink of water and murmured that I must have a hole in my lip. One little girl keep shooting me looks and after about ten minutes she leaned close and said, "I think I see the hole."
They were the best little girls, too. There were no fights or arguments until the last half of the last day when one girl managed to get two others mad at her at the same time. I'd hoped they would be able to straighten things out by themselves but after about half an hour and one of them coming to me saying they'd been pushed, I had to step in. All it took were a few gentle words and suggestions and they all became good friends and exchanged phone numbers.
The older girls, grades 4-6, camped overnight Thursday and since Richelle was one of them, I stayed, too. The campfire program was one of the best I've seen, mainly because those leaders were told they had to come up with skits that have never been done before. Campfires are so boring when the same skits and songs are done year after year. Out of the seven skits performed that night, I've never seen two and that's saying a lot after watching campfire programs for about fifteen years!
It was a great evening of fun and the girls were so tired that lights went out at 10pm and nearly everyone was asleep by 11pm. Even the dump truck's arrival at 5am didn't wake anyone up for more than a few minutes.
After so many years at day camps, I have a few tricks up my sleeve. Monday evening, I picked up some glow-in-the-dark beads and large safety pins without the spring and awarded each girl with a bead every time she drank all the water in her bottle. One bead-happy girl went home Friday with about twenty on her pins.
Another thing I did was pick up some UV-activated beads. These beads are a dull white until they're touched by UV rays and the beads rapidly change color. I gave those out each time they completed their camp-wide chores. Friday, our job was to pick up litter and I told the girls I would give them a bead for the first 30 pieces they collected and another one for each ten they picked up beyond that. Little first and second graders can't figure out how much litter they need to pick up for x-number of beads but they can figure out that the more they pick up, the more beads they'll get. One of the girls earned nine beads, three more earned eight, one earned three, and two earned one. There's lots of litter to pick up at day camp with all the crafts!
Tired as I am, I still enjoy day camps.
Monday, June 30, 2008
A Weekend To Remember
We got back Sunday afternoon from a Girl Scout camping trip in the mountains. Eleven girls and seven parents. We always have a high girls/parents ratio in our troop. It's a fun thing to watch the girls grow and learn and gain confidence.
We drove up Friday afternoon to a lovely campsite not too far from the lake but not within sight of it. I guess you could call the campground "partially improved" because although it had paved roads, a shower house and flush toilets, there wasn't a speck of grass anywhere within the group campsite area. There was bunch grass elsewhere, but the ground at our site had nothing but dirt, pumice, and lodgepole pine cones.
And mosquitoes. We can't forget the mosquitoes. They were large and plentiful. As they say, there wasn't a single mosquito there - they were all married with several hundred children. One dad told the girls that they were hired by Red Cross for a blood drive. And you had to be ready when you unzipped your tent because they just might shove you aside and enter first. We had repellent but the only one that stood a ghost of a chance against the thirsty little buggers was the one with 98% DEET content. Yes, I know DEET isn't all that good for you, but neither is slapping yourself black and blue and scratching until you have skin under your nails. Two girls got together and counted bites and came up with about one hundred each. Note to self: Do not, under any circumstances, camp at a high mountain lake in June when there's been a long spring.
One parent was coming late Friday night so we made up a scavenger hunt for the girls and then told "Your Most Embarrassing Moment" stories around the campfire while we waited. One girl told a story on her sister and was giggling so hard we had to have her repeat some of it. I don't usually remember embarrassing moments but I did tell of when I was a Senior in High School doing work study at the local clinic and managed to pass out when I was supposed to be assisting at a mole removal. At least I didn't wet my pants when I keeled over like a felled oak.
Late Saturday morning, the girls got into an all-out water fight using water bottles with wide necks, three-gallon buckets, and plastic dishpans. It started when one girl threw water on one of the dads and it quickly escalated. One table was the "dry" zone and the adults sat there watching and cheering. The water was ice-cold coming out of the faucet so there were a lot of shocked expressions and rigid postures.
We have a couple of girls who have a problem staying hydrated so I came up with a deal that each time they finished the 1/2 liter water bottle that the troop provided, they could get a small piece of candy, also provided by the troop. I got the (large) bag of candy out and transfered them to a zippy bag while one by one the girls gathered around me. I felt like Santa Claus. One girl's parents also brought her little four-year-old brother. He found out what the candy was for and promptly left with his water bottle. A minute later, I happened to look up and watched as he poured the water out behind a tent. Smart little guy. I told him I saw him pouring it out and that he had to fill it up and drink it to get a candy. So he filled the bottle and then stood right in front of my chair. Remember I mentioned the water was ice-cold. He'd gulp four or five times, his hand coming up to his throat and his feet beginning to dance. Then he'd stop drinking, clutch his throat and dance around for a few seconds making gargling noises. Finally, he'd come to a stand-still, burp, and eye the bag of candy. A second later, up went the bottle for the next round of gulping.
The girls took turns that afternoon going out on the motor boat to earn a badge and they came back into camp that evening tired and happy. They weren't so happy a few hours later when a thunderstorm took two hours to travel east to west almost right overhead. Three of the girls were downright scared out of their wits. We all sat under the awning of the trailer and I sat next to the frightened girls, talking to them and giving encouragement and started the other girls singing. Between "Pink Pajamas", "The Quartermaster's Store" and doughnuts being fried inside the trailer and passed around, all three of the girls pulled themselves together. We were lucky that the storm started at 8:15 and only lasted two hours. I'm not sure I want to imagine what would have happened if it started after the girls had gotten to sleep!
I have no pictures because Mike took both the still and movie cameras with him to Christmas Valley. He went with Nick and Cameron, his dad, and two of his brothers to scout out their hunting prospects for their October hunting trip.
I love camping out. I love watching kids learn new skills. I love watching them build on what they learned last time camping. I could have done without the mosquitoes and thunderstorm but even those were very good learning opportunities.
We drove up Friday afternoon to a lovely campsite not too far from the lake but not within sight of it. I guess you could call the campground "partially improved" because although it had paved roads, a shower house and flush toilets, there wasn't a speck of grass anywhere within the group campsite area. There was bunch grass elsewhere, but the ground at our site had nothing but dirt, pumice, and lodgepole pine cones.
And mosquitoes. We can't forget the mosquitoes. They were large and plentiful. As they say, there wasn't a single mosquito there - they were all married with several hundred children. One dad told the girls that they were hired by Red Cross for a blood drive. And you had to be ready when you unzipped your tent because they just might shove you aside and enter first. We had repellent but the only one that stood a ghost of a chance against the thirsty little buggers was the one with 98% DEET content. Yes, I know DEET isn't all that good for you, but neither is slapping yourself black and blue and scratching until you have skin under your nails. Two girls got together and counted bites and came up with about one hundred each. Note to self: Do not, under any circumstances, camp at a high mountain lake in June when there's been a long spring.
One parent was coming late Friday night so we made up a scavenger hunt for the girls and then told "Your Most Embarrassing Moment" stories around the campfire while we waited. One girl told a story on her sister and was giggling so hard we had to have her repeat some of it. I don't usually remember embarrassing moments but I did tell of when I was a Senior in High School doing work study at the local clinic and managed to pass out when I was supposed to be assisting at a mole removal. At least I didn't wet my pants when I keeled over like a felled oak.
Late Saturday morning, the girls got into an all-out water fight using water bottles with wide necks, three-gallon buckets, and plastic dishpans. It started when one girl threw water on one of the dads and it quickly escalated. One table was the "dry" zone and the adults sat there watching and cheering. The water was ice-cold coming out of the faucet so there were a lot of shocked expressions and rigid postures.
We have a couple of girls who have a problem staying hydrated so I came up with a deal that each time they finished the 1/2 liter water bottle that the troop provided, they could get a small piece of candy, also provided by the troop. I got the (large) bag of candy out and transfered them to a zippy bag while one by one the girls gathered around me. I felt like Santa Claus. One girl's parents also brought her little four-year-old brother. He found out what the candy was for and promptly left with his water bottle. A minute later, I happened to look up and watched as he poured the water out behind a tent. Smart little guy. I told him I saw him pouring it out and that he had to fill it up and drink it to get a candy. So he filled the bottle and then stood right in front of my chair. Remember I mentioned the water was ice-cold. He'd gulp four or five times, his hand coming up to his throat and his feet beginning to dance. Then he'd stop drinking, clutch his throat and dance around for a few seconds making gargling noises. Finally, he'd come to a stand-still, burp, and eye the bag of candy. A second later, up went the bottle for the next round of gulping.
The girls took turns that afternoon going out on the motor boat to earn a badge and they came back into camp that evening tired and happy. They weren't so happy a few hours later when a thunderstorm took two hours to travel east to west almost right overhead. Three of the girls were downright scared out of their wits. We all sat under the awning of the trailer and I sat next to the frightened girls, talking to them and giving encouragement and started the other girls singing. Between "Pink Pajamas", "The Quartermaster's Store" and doughnuts being fried inside the trailer and passed around, all three of the girls pulled themselves together. We were lucky that the storm started at 8:15 and only lasted two hours. I'm not sure I want to imagine what would have happened if it started after the girls had gotten to sleep!
I have no pictures because Mike took both the still and movie cameras with him to Christmas Valley. He went with Nick and Cameron, his dad, and two of his brothers to scout out their hunting prospects for their October hunting trip.
I love camping out. I love watching kids learn new skills. I love watching them build on what they learned last time camping. I could have done without the mosquitoes and thunderstorm but even those were very good learning opportunities.
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