Wilderness Trip members leave for their ten-day adventure today, so we bid them farewell with these inspirational words, “Now I know the secret of making the best persons; It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.”- Walt Whitman.
They have completed their knife tests, practiced setting up their canvas home, and intentionally have forgotten to pack anything that makes fire!
Trips were a success with happy campers returning from fire building, trail mix, and fun-on-the-go games. On a First Lodge trip they had a Silent Meeting. Campers had been on-and-off homesick and, during the meeting, campers starting realizing camp was a new place to grow, have fun, and discover a new family! On the last night, the campers made a fire all by themselves. The Little Rock Pond trip stopped to have a Silent Meeting at a beautiful spot and campers called it sacred. The Farm Service trip had reflection time every evening. They all shared a rose, bud, and thorn from the day. Some campers got creative and shared a peach, fuzz, and pit or rock, shovel, dirt. On the last night there were NO thorns!
This week at camp, many campers learned to throw on the wheel in the Bat Cave, and other made friendship bracelets or watercolor postcards. Bookbinding apprenticeships are using silk screening to create patterned paper for their Star Book project.
In Work Projects, campers are getting excited with the planning of a sky deck. Excavation planning for a new kybo near Morning Glory cabin is also underway. We are focusing on projects that build various skills surrounding hand tools, trail maintenance, creativity, safety, and team work. We are also getting ready for Fair by making primitive crafts.
In work projects, every group had common task- building Birdhouses! We had a blast seeing the diverse birdhouses built for all the different varieties of our backyard friends. The kids also got to try out the wood burners and decorated these beautiful structures, which spurred some excellent conversations about transforming love and beauty into our hard work.
The sun has been shining in these last few days, which means lots of time in the water! Lots of new skills have been learned with canoe trip training, new swim lesson schedules, and many campers making goals for distance swims.
The pranks are in full force as we now will be able to enjoy the “MONSTER” that we took from the other side of the lake…thank you Timberlake!
