I am super excited about the coming summer!
112 days to go!

130 days until staff training! Only 80 days though until I start Spring OE...sweetness!

115 days! - going early just to be back on the shores of beautiful Crescent Lake!

Oh I know that feeling - my last 2 summers I would go to camp as early as possible Oh how I miss camp Role on 2012.

A count down... I haven't really thought about it, I'm just waiting for the last day of school.

Let's figure this out: 128 days until I should be leaving for camp (We've had four snow days!!! So that date may have to be pushed back :()

- Teenster

I don't know my official start date. I'm kind of confused when UC training will be and I don't know if I am a UC, so I have to wait to find out. However, the start of grief camp is in 140!

I think I will have to be there on the 24th or 25th for grief camp training so I just went with June 26th as the day that camp starts since I have no idea what's going on yet and my references are being horribly slow. I need to call them to see what is going on, or find some new references.

I have no idea what exactly summer holds. but I definetly made like six ticker factory count downs for summer and certain things going on this summer.
i'm excited for summer 2010.

Sounds exciting cali!

I am super excited....the one thing I know for sure about summer is I am going to build a green house out of soda bottles. I am super stoked about that!

My mother would be incredibly jealous of you for that! Cool project! I veto'd it here cos our crazy neighbour who would just view it as something else for him to have the right to destroy after all her hard work to make it! Also we dont drink much soda or have the space to store all the bottles

yeah I don't drink soda at all. so looks like part of my summer will be spent digging bottles out of recycling bins. I am super stoked about it though!

that's amazing! I'd love to see some plans for this if you have a link to a how-to?

http://www.bluerockstation.com/plastic_bottle_greenhouse.html

it is super cool. I am really excited about doing it. I can't wait.

Thanks!! :-) looks awesome!

I know right! I am so excited to build it. I've been thinking about it nonstop since october. I hope it all works out so we get to do it

I dont know if you have them over there but we have attachments that you can attach to turn soda bottles into bird feeders - if you would like a couple send me a message with your camp address and I will send you a couple!

sweet! that's awesome. I am not sure if we do have them here or not. I will look into that and let you know.

Cool!

I've seen one of those. There is a special needs school near me that has one in their grounds. Very cool idea!

cool.

hey mashnut did you happen to work at a camp in minnesota this past summer?

We have one in our garden! She worked in 2 camps in Minnesota!

I found several different types of the soda bottle greenhouses, some more detailed than others, some larger some smaller, but I think that I'm going to pitch this idea to my CD and see if this would be feasible for our camp or if it could be built and then donated elsewhere. I've really got my stoked face on about this one!

Oh that is awesome!

If either you have recycling center you might be able to get bottles from there!

By the way when I told my mother that cali was going to build the type of greenhouse she wanted to build she almost turned green!

Looking forward to some photos after the summer!

that is so awesome. i know of two camps building one this summer. and the camp i was at last year a staff member had built one.

i have read a lot about them and the many different ways to do it. i sorta want to do a modge podge idea. one thing i read a group had the 55 gallon cans attached to the back and the roof was slanted so rain water would run down into a gutter and then into the cans which would later be used to watering the plants inside. i think its great.

i have so many ideas for it! i am super excited. i wrote up a proposal and everything i'm so stoked.
let me know if you need anything!

there will be lots of pictures, its sorta a camp project doubling for school

oh and i asked about mashnut working in minnesota bc i believe we worked for the same council, and we would have been at the same training for a week in june.

In one of my eco-bio classes the professor - a true hippie from the 60s - had photos of his house. He built a greenhouse to butt up against his back door so essentially his back door just went straight into the greenhouse - it was all of recycled plexiglass from the university and wood from an old barn a tornado had gotten to - anyway, he let rain water fill 55 gallon drums for watering and then would save them all up in late fall when everything was dying and kept them in the green house - the green house would heat up from the sun, heat the water and then he could just open his back door at night and the heat from the water-filled drums would help to heat his house. come spring he had enough water to start watering plants again.

that's so cool.

my uncle built a few green houses out of old windows and such that were laying around. i always found it fun to have to figure out which window opened and how to climb thru to get into these green houses years later when he wasn't there to maintain the garden and green house.

i would love to be a hippie. i think i was born in the wrong decade

agreed. My mom still asks me, "Where did you come from!?" haha it's whatever, I enjoy it, and it works well for camp.

back to camper-build it ideas though - I think that Lashing is a pretty easy trade to pick up on and so maybe doing a bit about that and then having kids build their own teepees and camping outside of their cabins would be a great cabin-growth activity. be sure to include smores, a campfire-cooked meal if you'd like, and this would be a perfect time to talk about the Leave No Trace program

i love teaching leave no trace to campers. i get all giddy inside.

i read somewhere about a group of kids building a simple and cost effective mini course that they got to design and all.

that seems real cool

If it helps her camp name is Selkie!

we had to go by real names when we were there that week. but thanks for trying to help!

Claire is her real name!

Thanks for outing me Smudge! Yes I worked for River Valleys and was meant to be on the Lakamaga staff but got abducted by the Whispering Hills/Northwoods crowd!

Shame I won't be there this summer.

Hehe - I didnt give your whole name away! You can give my name away if you want!

haha thanks guys....i worked for singing hills. i am sure i probably saw you but ur names dont ring a bell at all.

Yea for all that training the different camps didn't mix too much. Unless you were part of the Lifeguard training.

really? our director wouldn't let us stay together! we had to mingle

100 days till I leave for camp!

the 100 day mark is always the best!

there is so much happening between then and now I hope it goes fast!

yeah i know how you feel. i'm ready to just be doing what i love

103 Days! I just counted down to staff training. I can't believe that it is so close already!

Whee for summer 2K10!

114 days if I get the job I want! It seems so close!

92 days til i move out to camp! so excited, I can't wait for this summer to get here

About 62 or so until I move out for camp. Blah....seems so far away still.

Somewhere around 128, or something. I still don't have my postion or my official start date, but I know that I will be at camp in 128 days, whether or not 8 start that day or a few days prior.

wow, it always amazes me when you have less than 100 days til camp and I still have another month after that before I leave. DTP, what are you talking about?!?! You have HALF the days left that I do. hehe Not to mention, a good 30 or more days on anyone else! awesomeness for you!

Haha yeah but still, want 60 days to be more like 2 days.

Yeah, I totally know what you mean. I want it to be 2 days as well, except for the fact that it means leaving my kids over on this side of the state at the daycare/preschool and church I work at. I love those kids and their age, and the fact that I can give them real hugs, and carry them, and put them in my lap and everything! I kiss the babies and toddlers on the top of the head too! I love being able to do that. I can also take one kid, boy or girl, down to the bathroom by myself and help them if needed. I can even go in the boys bathroom if it's only the kids in there since both my coworker and I are girls and these kids get out of control. Plus, we'd do the same thing in the girls bathroom, but this multiplies the number of toilets and sinks so we can get done sooner since 3 year olds will wash their hands forever if you let them!!

woah, sorry, ramble!! hehe I get to work from 8-5 tomorrow so I'm excited!! Love those kids!!

Somewhere around 125. I'm not really keeping up with my countdown since it's not exact anyway. I will keep better track once I get my official start date!!!

91 Days :-) whoa, I should buy my ticket..

The would be a good plan! Before the prices rise to much!

I just wish the next few months would go quickly because I cannot wait til I am at camp this summer. I am getting more excited each day!

It is RIDICULOUS how much I have thought about camp these past 6 or so months, luckily it's almost here!

I reckon that mash and I have camp conversations on MSN at least once every day - usually relating to how much we miss camp!

yeah I'd say that I still call, text, chat, and message people on facebook camp people more so than any other group of people.
by far. 'tis grand.

me too! I always text my camp friends!

and then i annoy my friends here by never shutting up about camp. my lil sis gives me a time limit when we go out to how much i can talk about camp

yep, same! My friends once counted how many camp stories/references I had in one night to try to put it into perspective, I didn't think anything of it though.. it just reminded me of a camp story when my campers counted how many times I said, "Right!?"

lol...and its crazy how many times I can tell the same story with the camp friends who were there for it and we still laugh like it happened the first time!

my friends here have a no repeat policy in place!

what's a repeat policy?

what's a repeat policy?

(haha, see what I did there? clever clever.. lol)

haha Layton!

My guess is that a no repeat policy is where she can't tell a story about camp to them more than once. If they've heard it before it can't be told to them again.

I have even found ways to relate camp/traveling stories to my adult sunday school lessons!

nice!!

124 days until the grief campers arrive!! I will find out this week when I get to be there!!!!!!! woot!!! Yay for Facebook chatting with your boss!! Too bad she couldn't just tell me now, but I know, technicalities and reference checks and whatnot. ugh!

50 days until OE starts and about 99 until staff training starts, woohoo!!!

My friends have the no repeat policy even if a similar thing happened at a new camp

My friends dont have such a policy - but then again they dont see me often cos they are all soo scattered!

79 days!

115 days!!!! Oh, and like 105 until I get to do a 4 day session of OE (normal sessions are 3 days, but one or two schools do 4 day sessions)

109!!! and in like 7 hours or so it will be 108! Well, assuming that I have to be there at 9am since I don't know. Though it's likely it will be either 9am or noon.

Counting the hours down already giggles?

haha, not quite, but I was procrastinating my homework and my countdown on facebook has a start time so I put in 9am so it told me how many hours when I looked at how many days.

I have no count down as of yet. It's so weird to think of that. I don't think my day camp from last summer will run this year due to the economy. So far, I haven't found a position for the summer yet.

Right now I'm finishing up an application for the local girl scout camp. I think all of you have finally convinced me to try it out (although I was a Girl Scout years ago, just never did camp). The person I emailed at the council office said they aren't interviewing until April.

Yay another GS convert! April is really late! I am surprised at that!

Some ppeople still get placed in March and April though, or so I've heard.

CA place people right up until the middle of June if you are guaranted status! But for starting interviews it is very late - that being said good luck flower.

Munchy I meant to say if you have any probs/questions about CA feel free to ask me cos I used them for 6 summers.

Smudge: Gotcha I actually meant to put a smiley at the end of that post. It's too early for me :P

Awww poor munchy! I dont do early mornings unless they are cos I am still up from a late night!

Yeah, I thought it was late as well. I emailed the council thinking they would have filled some positions already. Some of it might just be the way things are done in Vegas, since my day camp didn't hire new staff until March or April pretty much anyway.

Hehe - when I was in Vagas a couple of years ago I went to church and dispite what the internet said I had missed the most important part of our service because they started an hour earlier than the net said!

ouch! Silly internet.

Yeah, April seems really late to me too. oh well, at least that means that Flower has a good chance! yay! good luck!

Exactly 6 weeks until OE starts, so excited! Soon I'm gonna have to start doing my shopping which sucks because I hate shopping.

75 days!

Couldn't agree more.

haha, yeah shopping can be annoying- depending on what I'm shopping for! Book and camp shopping is awesome. Grocery shopping is a bad thing for me. I spend more money at Safeway than I do on shoes and purses combined!

However, yay OE!!!!! My camp's OE starts in exactly 1 week. Last spring we had a 14 week season. However, in the fall we only had a 7 week season (with training). This spring it's looking close to a 14 weeker, maybe like a 12 or 13, but still! I wish!! It turns out that training starts the Thursday of finals week, after I am done with classes so I could have done spring season and been at camp for soooooooo long it would have been crazy! Especially since summer starts like a week after OE ends. Anyway, I made the choice to do fall OE and it was fun, so I'm happy with that. Hopefully i will get a chance to do it again after I graduate.

Yeah, the dates are good for me at least. That's funny about the church service, Smudge. Guess that website wasn't kept the most up to date.

Hopefully a job will come of this eventually. It's different than what I was originally looking for, but there's so many great things. It's close enough to drive home in between sessions, but up on a mountain (at like 8500 ft.) so the weather will be much cooler than Vegas summers with trees and forest all around.

sometimes those are the best things- the ones you weren't looking for. Take, for instance, my summer position preferences. First on the list- littles UC/UL. 3rd on the list- counselor. I'm a counselor and I am exstatic about it!

Haha, I love grocery shopping except for the fact I spend way too much on snacks. I guess shopping for camp can somewhat be fun too because that means its close to being here but besides that, I really hate shopping.

never grocery shop when you are hungary you will buy so much stuff you don't need!

It takes all my will power not to buy lots of snacks and chocolate and goodies rather than healthy stuff! But I do try hard not to! Good thing I love strawberries and such.

During the summers its horrible, the first thing I do after leaving camp is hit up a gas station or grocery store or whatever to get a ton of snacks. I ate so much during the summer, which wasn't bad since I've been trying to put on a little weight but still unable to.

mmm, strawberries are delicious!! I spend way too much on junk food too though.

I looked at the calendar this morning... I've got three months... I'm not sure how many days that is.

- Teenster

I thinkwe might have been spoiled at chenoa cos we had a lovely (ish) staff kitchen were we could store snacks and real food - so there wasnt the same deseration for snacks when we went off camp!

We could get snacks easily on our daily 2 hour TOs. In some units we also don't have as much of a concern for critters getting our food. We could also store a little bit of stuff in the staff room though there wasn't that much room considering how many staff there are.

We had a huge shelfing unit in the kitchen Plus 2 fridges/freezers which we could "safely" put stuff in as long as it was labeled and one communal fridge where things like left over dining hall cake, birthday cake, and soda for sale was kept - anything that didnt mind people helping them selves to (or buying in the case of the soda) plus a Huge shelving rack - which people stupidly didnt put their food in plastic boxes and the critters would get at it - my friend and I shared a box and snacks - well actually she would share them with me in exchange for some of my yummy british chocolate!

Pretty much anything in the the kitchen we can help ourselves to too and then me and my co would always buy snacks and soda to keep in our cabin for us and other counselors. We keep everything in lockers and stuff, keeps critters away. But still, every off day the first thing I did was go by tons of new candy, ice cream, even pizza sometimes. It was the kid in me still....

hehe! We could raid the kitchen in the evenings - and sometimes if the chefs were in a good mood between meals they would let you have a sandwich or something! ANd we had free access during session breaks

We are welcomed to go in the kitchen whenever. Sometimes kitchen staff will even put snacks and stuff away for us to have and then we have a huge pantry of stuff that's for us to have. Pretty much, its their way of making up for us getting somewhat underpaid....they feed us well.

That is awesome!

we usually just have a large bowl of fruit, and if there were a lot of sandwiches made and leftover then those will be there too but that's about it. I'm jealous of those of you that can just go in whenever!

i missed having food when I was at main idea!

yeah, we are not allowed to go in and get whatever. In fact, we aren't allowed into the kitchen at all unless we are kitchen staff. (partially because we don't have food handler's permits and partially because it would get crazy in there with us going in and out and taking food they have planned for something else that week) In the staff room we have a regular house fridge and a pop machine, and that's about it for storage of our own food. The kitchen staff occasionally put leftovers in the fridge and they definitely stock it a bit with some sandwich stuff and maybe some other stuff over the weekends. We get some fruit and other leftovers as well but that's about it.

Yeah my camp is the same but this last summer it was really weird for me because I was aloud in the kitchen and it was part of my job to work with the kitchen staff. they were really cool and I had a lot of fun chatting with them. some times I think they had more fun in the kitchen then we had they were awesome.

We can't go into the kitchen and start preparing a full meal or anything and never touch the food that's being prepared for any of the meals or anything like that. We do have a pantry where there's tons of snacks and quick things to fix and we're always allowed to go in there. At night if we want to go into the freezer and grab a popsicle or the fridge to grab a chocolate bar or something, we're allowed to.

oh ok that makes more sense that there is a separate pantry. Yeah, I have a feeling our ice cream bars would be gone so quickly if we could go in there and take them. But I'm sure it's just because your camp orders extra so that you can do that but we don't really have that many extra. I'm sure the ad staff and kitchen people do occasionally sneak stuff like that though. And sometimes for us!

At Hoffman we had a staff fridge just inside the kitchen - where the staff were allowed to store food - chef both years i was there had a very narrow minded view of being veggie or having food allergies - it was just being fussy and he wasnt going to cater for fussy eaters - as a result 99% of veggie options were veggie burgers or veggie nuggets so they were not only allowed to store food there but they were allowed to eat it at meal times infront of the kids provided it wasnt every meal - I used store Ribena in it but I would only drink it when the bug juice machines had similar colored juice or if I had a brown rather than clear glass. The kitchen staff would put left over cake and stuff in there that we were allowed to help ourselves too

ahhh, 99 days until camp!! woohoo!!!!! Less than 100!!! Not to mention I have the awesomeness of the OE session on June 14th, like almost 2 weeks before camp starts so I guess I have like 86 until I get to do a camp session of some sort!

Around 30 or so more days for me until I'm off to camp....so pumped, I need money!

85 days.

Not only is this a count down for camp... it's also a count down for the last day of school, I'm so tired of my students (and they're tired of me).

- Teenster

I have about 115 days until I volunteer-- assuming I am accepted. I hope to volunteer for a 5 day arthritis camp for kids. That way I can still get my camp fix for the year since I know that physcially I cant do a whole summer. The Camp is in July-- I wish it was sooner

One of mine is in July and the other is in August - but I have a guide trip to London in April

I just finished all of my paperwork, and emailed it all to the HR lady. 83 days!

Yay - that is fab sarah!

Oh... I gotta do that paper work. I've got spring break, I can wait til then.

83 days.

- Teenster

I filled out most of my paperwork yesterday, but I still need one or two things. I also need to send it in, which is always the hardest part.

97 days?

62 days until i start my summer at camp, can't wait. 3 weeks of training this year(actually have to pay attention in training now)

only 65 days to go! but only a week till outdoor school after that time should fly!

I got the paperwork today for a big church conference which is happening over the summer not sure how I will have the money to pay to go but I will be going

Three weeks of staff training is tough, wow. One thing I'm really not looking forward to is all the meetings and such of staff training, they are going to be so long. They were long last year, this year they'll probably be the same meetings and pretty much I'll know just about everything already which will make it even tougher. I'll somehow get through it though, tons and tons of coffee.

Coffee is really the only way I can get throuhg some of those long pre-camp meetings. Though, this summer I've been told that I will be leading some of them, so I'm looking forward to that.

- Teenster

Should probably clarify the 3 weeks of training I have. 1 week is ropes staff training( we have our own ropes course and staff it ourselves), 1 week is program staff training and the last week is general staff training(all staff)

Ahh I see. We have our own high ropes training, lifeguard training, and leadership training too, so I understand....although for lifeguard and high ropes, they only last a weekend. I haven't brought it up and neither has it been brought up to me but I very well may end up taking the high ropes training this year. I'll be up at camp anyways at the time because of OE...

So close, so close! Only 75 days left until precamp starts!

I am way excited to be going back, but nervous about all of the planning and prep that I need to do.

Yeah, our training is about two and a half weeks... if you're on leadership, a lifeguard, horse riding staff, or adventure staff. It's kind of long, and it's also tough because it's a week longer than general staff. Recently because we have a lot of returning staff, we have cut down leadership training from about 10 days to a week... that has helped a lot.

- Teenster

I love the concept of longer staff training!

Our council is hosting staff training differently this year. All staff from the three camps will be together for 5 (or so) days to go over all of the basics that everyone has to cover. Each camp will then hold another week of staff training for its' own staff to cover in more detail some of the stuff from the first week and camp specific stuff. We did it this way last year and it seemed to work well. It can be tricky to not bore folks the second week. I have some fun tricks up my sleeve to keep folks awake and on their toes....learning by doing and playing!

Well I have a new camp this summer and I'm running it!!!
And it's going to be weird to be because it's a day camp!
But I'm going to be teaching art, and running the art summer camp in CHICAGO!!!!!!!!!!!! Every summer for the last 8 summers I've been an arts & crafts director then teaching outdoor education after camp, but now I just want to teach art!

I'm so excited, I've always lived around Chicago but never in it and I get the job that I've wanted and get to be near my boyfriend. He's a Chicago firefighter. So for once I get to see him all the time and not have to hear him say, I have to drive an hour there and back to see you. HAHA he won't be able to say that now.....

The weird thing is that at the end of the day I will be confused that I get to go home? LOL... What no campfire? teeheee. I'm still gonna sing camp songs in the art studio though...

But I'm leaving for Chicago in 3 weeks! I'm so excited!!!!

wow!! Have fun CampWoman!!


I miss camp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 76 days 'til my OE session and 89 days 'til I will be there for the summer!!!!

dont have a count down for centenary camp for fusion but mash and I now have a weekend of brownie madness in november to look forward to!

74 until OE and 87 until summer!!!!!!

21 until OE, 71 until Summer!

56 days until ad staff week starts! About half that until I start working at the barn a few days a week!

68 and 81!!!!!

oh man, I can't believe it's so close!!! Thanks to the OE session I have 2 months and 1 week 'til I will be at camp! Then I'll have to leave for a almost 2 weeks, but I can live with that! I neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed a campfix!!! ooo, and Dad/youth overnight is April 24th! So that's like 2.5 weeks away!! Yay!!

45 days: can't wait even though I have to actually pay attention in training this year

I am still waiting to hear from the camps I applied to volunteer at this summer.

Lucky for me, I can just daydream during most of the staff training!

DTP, that's how it's been the last 2 summers for me but this summer I have a new position so I 2 extra weeks of training but then during the general staff training(all staff), I'll still be able to daydream,etc

3 days!!!

I have 89 days until Caledonia 2010, and then a week after that I have fusion, then nothing until Oct when hopefully I will be helping with a Rainbow overnight and then in November Mash and I have a pack holiday with brownies!

55 'til my OE session!!!

68 'til summer!!!!!!

4 until I leave for my weekend at home/camp and 5 until I am actually at camp!!! YAY!!!!!!! I wish it would be 4 until I got to camp, but my friend has her reasons for not wanting us to run into someone who might be there Friday night. So instead we are driving over Friday to stay at my parents' house and my dad is going to make us biscuits and gravy in the morning before my friend and I are going to pick up her girlfriend from the bus station and head up to camp for Dad/youth overnight!!!! woot!!!

DTP...3 days? Wow! Have fun!

Only 41 until staff training starts! I am way excited!

38 days 'til Cedarledge starts. Woohoo!

30 days until I move in for the summer, 31 days until training begins. Can't wait, especially since each summer now may be the last one, gotta enjoy them as much as possible

Yeah its awesome, I start OE tomorrow. I won't actually move up to camp though until Mid-May. Only about 7 weeks to staff training begins, yay!

yeah, nataylor I'm kinda with you on that one. Last summer was going to be my last at my camp and i was going to find new, completely different one, but then I decided to apply for UL and got excited about that and now I'm a counselor again at my camp, and this will make my 11th summer (including as a camper of course) there. Next summer I think I'm going to go to another camp. Right now I'm all gung-ho for doing this but I know that I will miss my camp and that this summer is going to tear me apart when I do the last week especially because it will probably be my last. Though I am going to be a teacher and my camp is local so chances are I will end up doing that in the summers.

woot for OE!! I miss it!! I have 54 days until my 1 OE session!! Actually, now I think it's 53! And then 65 for DC for grief camp and then a week or so after that until staff training. OH! and 3 days until Dad/youth overnight!

Giggles, that's quite the path traveled. I'm a ways behind you since this will "only" be summer #4 for me but my camp also does weekends during the winter and this is winter #3 but my 1st 3 summers were spent as a counselor and i'm the trips coordinator this time around. I also don't have the summer flexibility as you since I won't be a teacher but I'll be working with kids year-round so I'll still have a little bit of camp in me forever

Will you get to go on the trips or just plan them?

87 days until Caledonia 2010 and then it will not be long until I can start looking for a camp for 2012 - why do I bring this up - I am really campsick the moment cos I made the mistake of watching photo slide show from one of my old camps and it has made me really campsick - I really should have known better!

52 days until I make the drive up north!

- Teenster

Smudge, I'd still get to go on the trips as well since I'll be one of the "main" drivers but I'll be covering breaks as well so that all campers have a counselor because we have a 1:1 ratio due to the fact that we are a special needs camp

1 month until training starts, can't wait

That is cool when I was at Main Idea the trip person didnt go on any of the trips cos she was soo busy getting stuff ready for the next trip etc and i felt bad for her.

that is cool, nataylor. Poor Main Idea trip person!

We only have 2-3 trip programs/weeks per summer and the kids sign up for them from the get-go. Then 2 counselors (or a lifeguard and a counselor) go with them. The kids (usually around 10-14 of them, co-ed) show up Sunday with all the other kids and do some camp stuff and prepare to leave. Then they leave by Tuesday morning and come back Friday afternoon, run straight to the lake, jump in the deep end, swim out to the floating dock that's in the deep end, sing their unit fast song, jump back in, get out, and go shower. Then they are like a normal group in that they go to banquet dinner and closing campfire, etc.

Our trip planners are the directors and they plan the trips along with the rest of the program and they are the ones to hold the before camp meeting for the kids and parents.

I leave tomorrow evening!!!!!!!!! and I will be at camp the next day so 2 DAYS!!!!!! woot!! But of course I will be leaving camp in 3, so yeah. However, I will go back in like 52 or 53 days!! and then again in 65ish days!!

I am headed up to camp on Saturday to lifeguard for a camporee. I am excited to see the place and see the changes that have been made over the winter.

oh, in case you want ot be even more campsick- read the children's book "Froggy Goes to Camp". It's a pretty excellent book. I read it last night and definitely got a little more campsick.

ahhhhhh!!!!!!! In a round-about way I'm leaving now. I have to spend 9 hours at work first, but I won't be back to my apartment before we leave so I leave now! I will be at camp within 24+8 hours!!! AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! YAY!!! Sure it's just dad youthou and i leave the next day, but it's still a camp fix!!!!

other than that, 52 and 65!!!

I start camp in 50 days! Very excited!

Just purchased my copy of "Camp"!! Sooo excited, and not getting anything else done until I've finished it haha

I couldnt put it down layton! made me camp sick though - but as giggles will tell you it doesnt take much these days!

1 month from today, I start training for the summer. can't wait cuz it's "something unpredictable but in the end it's right"

"Camp"? Is that a book?

30 days for me!!!!

Yeap - it is by micheal Eisner - former CEO of Disney! About his experience at a boys camp in Vermont! And his program to help kids from inner city areas go to camp and what they gain from their camp experiences!

Forty one days! I talked to the camp admin person yesterday, and I'm going off to a girl scout camp this summer! I'm really excited, since it will be a whole new camp experience. It's on top of a mountain just outside the city, so really beautiful and much cooler. It's in the eighties here today. She was at the camp yesterday and told me she was worried about all the snow there and it not melting as fast as she'd like...

I have my orientation on the 17th but parents night is on the 13th. I took my kids out to the nature center where day camp is being held at today for a bird watching clinic and they had a blast. it was fun im excited for camp!

30 days summer is almost here!

54 days until senior staff reports!

Precamp starts in 37 days! Camp open house is in 7 days! I am excited for that!

The book sounds good. I will have to see if I can get a copy!

48 days.

- Teenster

I got my copy from Barnes and Noble in the bargain priced section - hardcopy normally 23$$ and mine was only 5!

I got mine from Amazon - for cheap too!

I got a email from the directors about training am so excited!

44 and 57! YAY!!!!!! less than 2 months and i will be there for the summer!!!!!!!!!!

20 days until training begins, can't wait

41 days.

- Teenster

41 and 54!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!

3 weeks from today, ad staff week starts! I've been a little ambivalent about it lately, but going to the barn on the weekends has really helped me get excited about the summer.

16 days left of oe and 20 days left till I leaf for summer camp!

20 days until ad staff week!!

28 days until staff training starts! I can't believe that it will be here so soon!

I am going to be sitting down with the director next week to work out programming and ideas. Whee!

I can't believe Cedarledge has less than a month to go. Only 25 more days for me!

40 and 53! YAY!! Getting closer to 1 month! I will be home in less than 6 weeks which means classes will be done with as well!!!!!

I start the 17th

17 days until I report for ropes training. 1 more week until the semester is done and I can then start getting stuff together for the summer

25 days!! and school's already out!

18 days! I just need to get a few more things, and I'm ready!

38 and 51!!!!!! YAY!! 1 month 4 days until school is over, then a few more days until OE (38 from now) and then a few more until summer camp (51 from now!!!)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

whats oe?

41 days! I am so psyched! My camp director just emailed all of the group leaders each others' info so we could chat!

OE - is outdoor education - it is like camp but not!

Exactly what Smudge said! It's where the 5th or 6th grade classes can come for a 3 day/2 night camp with their teachers and parent chaperones. They learn things like forest, wildlife, and wetland ecology, canoeing, climbing wall, etc. We also do night hike and campfire as evening activities. At least that's how it works at my camp though every camp is at least a little different. It's a lot of fun! The parents are the "general counselors" and we are the activity instructors/teachers and lead things like meals.

That's awesome that you guys get a chance to chat before camp! Become friends, or at least aquanited and hopefully at least one of them has been to that camp and maybe even been a GL before!

OE is a lot of fun and what I like about it is, the pay is better (at least for us it is) and its less work. Most of our groups are 5th and 6th grade classes but there are occasions where the class is younger or older. We also do retreats and stuff, so we get a lot of religious groups and many other different type of groups as well.

Speaking of OE though, we're just at the beginning of our OE schedule still and early on our OE schedule is broken up a little bit. For example, my first week I had two days of work and then I got four days off. Then last week I worked 6 days and been off 3 days. I'm off until the middle of next week, and then our OE schedule picks up big time. I feel exhausted already and we haven't even gotten into the hard part of the schedule yet. Not to mention when the summer comes, the work increases a ton then. Its starting to worry me a little bit how tired I've been but maybe its just me getting back into the swing of things....

You should see me at precamp, DTP! I'm bouncing off the trees but exaughsted. I'm so excited to be there but since I don't do any exercising (mostly I just walk to class and back so that's not nearly close to summer walking) so I'm so tired and out of shape when I get to camp. I need to really start picking up my walking for this month and a half before camp.

Yeah, for me OE is less work and better pay. It's like a little more chill DC schedule with evening activities because the kids have parent counselors and a rest hour so I have staff housing and an hour off in the middle of the day. It's almost like the best combo of DC and res camp except you don't bond nearly as much. They are only there for one full day and 2 half days and they don't spend nearly as much time with you as res campers (at my camp at least) in those 3 days. I look at a pic of my favorite group last fall and honestly can't remember half of their names but most of my summer groups I can say at least half of every group this summer and still quite a few of the names from previous summers.

Thing is, I'm a pretty athletically built guy and although I'm not in amazing shape, I'm in better shape than most people. I'm a basketball coach and every day in practice I was in there mixing it up with my girls and some days I would have to practice for like 5 hours straight...so its not like I've just done completely nothing since camp. Camp just exhausts me for some reason... It only really worries me though because this year a lot more is expected of me. We have a ton of new staff and its my job to be more of a leader, set a great example for everyone else, lead my cabin, and all type of different things like that. I'm just really hoping I don't get burnt out...


And for OE, ours is a little different from yours I guess. We are in control pretty much from start to finish, only thing we don't do is sleep in the cabins with the kids at night....the parents/chaperones do. But besides that, although there are parents and teachers there, we do all the work. There's no rest hour or anything like that, so we're working all day. We just use the chaperones for extra assistance if we need some during the day. And you definitely don't get a chance to get as close to the kids as you do during the summer but still, we get a chance to interact with the kids quite a bit. Most of our school groups come for 3 days, 2 nights...but some only 2 days, 1 night.

I love OE because everything to those kids are new, its not the same skits and songs or games every year like it somewhat is during the summer. I know I have a much better time doing campfire skits with OE groups.

Oh Ok, we had something like that at Ockanickon in middle school we just called it sixth grade camp though and our counselors were our teachers (for the activities as well)
So that means I should definitely start doing those Jillian Michaels tapes then eh?
I found my first week of student teaching that I was waking up ten minutes later than I was supposed to, just barely getting to school on time, leaving at 3:30, sleeping til six, eating dinner, and then going to bed, and I was still exhausted.
Sometimes kids just take it out of you, even the good ones. My class was like a model class but just, keeping up with their thought processes and keeping an eye on everyone at all times, it just gets tiring. I am confident it will pass

oh man Jillian Michaels. Love the biggest loser and can't wait for her new show too! Nah, it's mostly just getting used to walking everywhere and a lot. Just get in a lot of walking before you go.

Yeah, kids take it out of you on the best of days! I started working at a day care from 8-6 Friday nights and thought I would be fine considering I work at camp from 7am-9pm with the kids (minues my 2 hour TO) and then I'm "on call." I've never been that tired after a day at camp. On my first Friday I went to bed at 7. I'm used to going to bed at 2am.

Whoot! 2 more days of work, and 25 days until I leave!!!

39 days... why do I feel like my camp starts really late?
P.S. none of the other group leaders took advantage of said email list... i was trying to leave time/room in case one of the people who has been doing this for like 4 years wanted to be the first person to email everyone... and now I'll just feel like an annoyance if i email people....

I hate it when that happens Heathesaurusex! (side note- is there a preference for a shortened version of your username we can use or something?!) I guess I'd just email, but at the same time I would also be really reluctant to. hmm

I've got 49 til my summer starts. Most of the people on here have camps that start a lot earlier, but they end earlier too! Also, keep in mind that half of them go to the same camp (yay Cedarledge!) Oh, and if I were just general staff (and not working the extra week before staff training) I wouldn't be starting until July 2nd for precamp.

The one session of OE I get to do is in 36 days!!!!!!!!! And summer in 49!!! Yay less than 50 days!!!! It's going to fly by as well. I swear just yesterday I was baffled that it was May and now it's basically May 8th! My goodness!

I'm going for pre-camp work but also, due to different school schedules throughout the states, most new england camps start early and end early.. being from missouri and then going to maine I actually miss a day or two of school each year..

There's ten total weeks of camp that our summer program staff work although we only have 8 weeks of summer camp. So we start the second week of June, end the last week of August...or maybe its the second to last week of August. Either way, we work a lot.

I actually find that a lot New England camps actually start later in the season compared to camps elsewhere. We have a June 20th start date for pre-camp and go through August 15th. That's because of the school schedule. My students' last day is June 21st - and I have teacher day on the 22nd. So I miss two days of pre-camp. We don't go back to school until after Labor Day though, giving me a few weeks after camp to recuperate! But it definitely all depends on where you are and what camp you are at. My staff have 44 more days till res camp pre-camp begins.

Oh! Ha, you can just call me Heather. Sorry, I'm sure i should have said that in my intro post.
I feel a bit better now though.
I figure I'll give them till like mid week next week cuz maybe they're just busy but I mean... 2 of the people who got the list were the ULs (which is one step above GLs) so I kind of would have thought they'd be all over it...

nah, don't worry about it! I wouldn't have thought about it either, and usually we just come up with our own shortening but some of them don't have as much of an obvious spot to shorten (such as Rosethorn=Rose, while your username is a bit more "nonsense words" or words combined, though it is kinda cool to say!)

Yeah, I tend to think so too, but then I find that my enthusiasm is a step or two above most peoples. Sure they love camp and are excited, but the type of people who frequent this message board (especially as often as we do) are a little more exuberant in our love of camp!

Such as on our camp Facebook page. It took a long time to get it frequented even in a little way by anyone except for me. I got in there as the 1st person to join after the directors and then proceeded to answer every little thing on there. I was probably the person who did the most on the page, including posting some pics and descriptions of camp itself.

oh and 35 and 48 days!!!!!!!!!

Yeah but I also dont want to get to camp and have everyone go 'Oh God... here comes Heather...' lol

Oh yeah, it's supposed to be like tyrranosaurusrex... like a T-Rex except its me lol.

haha, yeah I know what you mean! This year I'm going to try really hard to make it so that doesn't happen. I'm sure it did in past years though. I suppose it's a good thing that I will be there for the week before staff training so only returners and a few newbies will see me and hopefully I can chill my crazy exuberant-ness at least to a non-"oh God, Giggles is coming" level.

awesome! I like it!

So now I'm overseeing the art studio's summer camp in Chicago and directing a day camp with at risk kids as well. Camp starts in a month too and I start working on Monday. But it's going to be awesome!

whoa! that's crazy awesome, Campwoman! Busy busy!

So I start packing up for the summer tomorrow and then moving in for the summer on Wednesday. Still a little over a month until the summer staff gets in, can't wait. Until then, OE will have to hold me over.

DTP - this Outdoor Education sort of thing - I know you said it was like camp, but not - could you elaborate? (I would've made that a PM but figured others would be interested as well)

hehehehe... we could shorten it to H-Rex ;P

Yay! I've finished work an it's only 18 days before I arrive at camp!

Outdoor Education is camp except a little more educational. Most of the groups that come in are school groups, usually 5th or 6th grade classes but on occasion, the class may be older or younger. Some groups are very small, probably will bring one class with around like 30 or so kids and then there's other schools who'll bring huge groups that are like 100 kids or so.

Depending on the size of the group, that's usually how long they stay. For example, if its just a small group of like 30 kids or so, most likely they'll only come for 2 days, 1 night since its easier for them to get through everything which such a small amount of kids and plus its cheaper. If its a huge group, like between 50-100 kids or so, they usually come for 3 days, 2 nights. We have a ton of different classes that we offer, some very educational, some with a lot of team building, and then some that are just fun and depending on what the school wants, those are the activities the school gets to do. So pretty much, every schedule is different group to group.

Some of the classes we offer are; bog hike, wilderness survival, animal survival, aquatic adventure, archeological, archery, canoeing, rock climbing, initiatives, challenge course, high ropes course, horseback riding. The classes are usually about 60-90mins long, somewhere along those lines depending on the schedule for the group. Those are usually done in the morning and afternoon and then we use the evenings for fun camp activities like campfires, square dances, mock rocks, or camp games like dutch auction, predator prey, ect. We also do night hikes but so far we've yet to do any night hikes with any of the Spring groups, only the Fall groups...probably because of how late it gets dark now.

Its still a lot of work because we're working from about 7:30am until about 10-10:30pm but its easier because we're not sleeping in the cabins with the kids and we don't have to get them ready for bed and stuff like we do during the summers. Each group brings chaperones that stay in the cabins with the kids. The chaperones are also there throughout the day for extra assistance or whatever if we ever need it, which is nice to have.

We also get church groups or other different type of groups that come in on the weekends and depending on what activities they want to do, the schedule is a little more laid back for the camp staff. The staff is much smaller during OE too, we only have 5 full time OE staff members this Spring but if we get a really big group like we did last week, we'll probably have 3-4 more people come in to work the group. The most we'll ever have working a group is probably 10 at the max, so that's a lot different from summer.

Sometimes the schedule can get very tricky, we'll have a big school group in from Monday to Wednesday afternoon and then have another big school group come in Wednesday morning and stay to Friday and then have weekend group(s) come in Friday evening. That's a lot of work, especially when during the middle of the week you have one group getting ready to leave and then you have another group arriving, its crazy! But its also a lot of fun after you get past the tiring part of it. This upcoming week we have a big school group coming in from Wednesday to Friday and then we'll have three different groups in over the weekend....fun!

Working our weekend groups at my camp is an optional and extra thing. Fall we didn't really have much need for extra staff to host weekend groups but I don't know about spring. We have some weekend things that are volunteer as well (mom and dad youth overnights, etc).

My camp's OE groups usually come up as a whole grade so there's 60-90 kids ina group. Ours too are mostly 5th and 6th grade. Sometimes we have groups up for a day field trip.

We have groups Monday to wednesday afternoon and wednesday morning to Friday afternoon too. For the most part it really works perfectly well. The first group is out of the cabins by breakfast and are in the dining hall eating lunch while the new group moves into the cabins and eats a sack lunch they brought from home in the meadow.Then the old group leaves and it's all normal.

We work from 7:30 til about 9:30 but also don't have kids to care for at night. During the day we teach activities such as forest, wildlife, wetlands ecology, outdoor living skills, orienteering, canoeing, climbing wall, team building actvities, and Life and Death in the Forest, and possibly something else. On the first night there are night hikes and on the second night, a campfire.

Last fall we had 6 staff, plus our director. It varies depending on the season and how many she manages to hire, but that's a noraml amount of staff. Yeah, sometiems we have big groups and need to call in people from previous seasons for the group. That's how I get to work one session this spring! In fact, last fall we accidentally double booked groups so we had to call in like 4 more people for that and one to be our KA (he volunteered himself for single-handedly being our KA for like 150 people though we helped when we could). Every session one of us is the KA and we rotate through it.

oh, forgot to say 35 and 48 days!!!!!!!!!!!! Getting close to a month!!!!! Friday is 1 month until OE session!!! Wednesday is 1 month until I move back home!

34 days...

- Teenster

33

so you guys are going to hate me for the number of days( or lack thereof) that i have left before camp starts for the summer for me. I have a whopping 13 days until i move in, 14 days until training starts

Well, I'm packing my stuff right now currently....I move in either Tuesday night or Wednesday morning...haven't decided when I want to drive up yet.

<-- jealous

Totally! The hardest part of not being able to go to camp is watching people count down to when they leave!

and yet you still frequent the Countdown thread...!!! I know how it is though- as far as not being able to stop yourself, not the camp thing yet though I imagine the day will come.

Well I do have 68 days until: http://www.caledonia2010.org.uk/

and fuision is 2 weeks after I get home!

ahh, true. That'll be fun!

Oh my... there are a lot of unnecessary 'e's on that page lol

sounds like fun!

21 days! one week til vacationing in Mexico for a week, one week in Mexico, and then one week until I leave on a jetplane for camp! (shoutout to aerosmith right there..)

14 days!!!

wow, Indigo- 2 weeks! Lucky duck!

34 and 47! woot woot!

15 days!

I know! Less really, because I'll be working at the barn the day before, and then I plan to just stay overnight that night.

32 days! But I've got to start packing soon because I'm moving into my new house soon and I won't have a dresser in my room as of next weekend, so it's easier to just start packing into my camp bins.

20 days! I am tempted to start packing now. I love the packing for camp, but hate the unpacking when camp is over. I am planning to taking less junk I don't need/use!

yeah, I'm planning on less junk too. Problem is that even if I manage to avoid taking it in the first place it will likely end up at camp by the end of the summer considering I live 30 minutes from camp and usually go home every weekend. I'm gonna try to not go home as much though because I totally miss out on all these fun things that are part of the staff experience.

33 and 46!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In 1 month I'll be working my last shift at work and then leaving the next day !!!!!!!!!! And that day I'll be going to my soon-to-be-cousin's wedding shower. Now if only I could go to bed early enough to actually wake up to my alarm and get to class so I can pass my classes...

what kind of junk?

I'm at 20 days until my official start date, but am thinking of going up a bit early and helping with some work projects as a volunteer if I can accomplish everything on my to-do list early enough. My hometown is just so boring.

32 days.

This weekend I pulled out my camp trunk. I washed some uniform and made a list of what I needed to buy or find. It was pretty exciting.

- Teenster

About the whole camp trunk thing... Is that useful? does it take up a lot of room? I heard packing in those plastic drawers from walmart can be useful too...

4 days till graduation
35 days till camp

The plastic drawers are handy to have once you're at camp, but they're a pain in the butt to pack in. They're not really meant to be carried, so it doesn't always work so well and you have to make sure you tape the drawers shut before you try to carry it. I pack in big Rubbermaid bins like this:



They're easy to carry and are critter and water proof. Mine are bright pink and yellow, so no one ever mistakes them for their own. I have the plastic drawers, too, but I bring it to camp mostly empty and fill it up once I'm there.

what do you do with them at camp though? is there room for them?

My clothes and stuff stays in them all summer. I sleep in a canvas tent and there's a building on each site with a smaller "staff room" where the staff on that site keep their stuff. We encourage the campers to pack in the bins too, and they keep them in their tents with them. The staff who sleep in buildings put a lot of their clothes into the drawers and then put their bins into the basements of the buildigns or keep them in the room if they don't have space for everything in the drawers.

That's one of those camp dependent things. When I worked at Merriwood, those would have been a pain because we had shelves to unpack all our things on for the summer. But other places, counselors live out of them all summer so they need them.

Ugh, I just finished packing and putting my stuff downstairs by the door so tomorrow morning when I pack my car, it'll be easier. I'm glad that's over with!

See we live in cabins with the kids. I think there are drawers... and I think there are like 12 kids and 3 counselors per cabin... but I have no idea what the cabins look like. I just know the cabins were recently redone and the one picture I have seen of the inside of the cabin is clutterless so the girls must have some place to put their stuff. I was thinking about under bed bins. Since I will be on the bottom bunk... cuz you know... i'll get there first lol.

I use the plastic drawers and I pack in them as well. However, I carry it in 2 or 3 pieces. I take out the top and usually the middle drawer and carry them separate from the frame and bottom drawer. thus I don't need tape either. However, they are kinda a pain. I suppose I could pack in a bin and the take the bin home but with moving every week it wouldn't make any sense to do that every week.

I wouldn't have room in my space to store empty bins but I could in my car. There might be a place somewhere at camp where you could store the empty ones. I hate living out of bins or suitcases so it's worth it for me to have the drawers but when I'm at a new camp I won't be able to bring them and I don't know if I'll have room to put them if I bought some while there and then got rid of them at the end of the summer.

I invested in one of those big rubbermaid bins when i was at camp - so much easier than living out a back pack!

It really depends on how the cabin is set up. Most likely, you'll have cubbies for all of your clothes, and you will not need to organize in the plastic drawers. At my camp, you unpack everything and then your luggage is stored away for the summer. I pack in a trunk because it's easier to store during the winter. I would ask the camp if the staff are provided cubbies for their clothes, and then I would decide what I would pack in.

- Teenster

Teenster, is right. Ask the camp! There is no built-in storage in the cabins for staff or anywhere to store luggage for staff at my camp, but yours may be way different.

Fingers crossed everyone for no rain this weekend! Open house is this weekend and it has been postponed twice due to the crazy severe weather the south as had. I am so hoping for no rain!

31 and 44 days! ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!! one month basically! I will be probably heading up to camp about now in one month actually, since I have to be there at 8am the 14th anyway.

SO CLOSE!! 3 weeks (and finals week) until I get to go home for the summer!

I have finally started getting info through for caledonia - am starting to get excited - off to the library tomorrow to print off health forms etc.

32

7, so close I can almost touch it

wow, that's awesome nataylor!

30 and 43!! 1 month and I will be getting ready for the staff meeting before the OE kids get there!!

2 1/2 weeks!
Nataylor, I believe I speak for all of us when I say that wer'e SUPER jealous! one week!

in one month I will have just finished up with my first day of my OE session!! YAY!! and it's still 43 days til summer, but I will have been there all day by now!

I've got 25 days.

Though I'm kind of bummed because my principal told me that my Bob Ditter session could count as a teaching staff workshop... then today he told me that it couldn't... Now to make up for that day I'll be at camp and not school, I'll have to work Saturday detention this Saturday.

- Teenster

Awww that is rubbish! At least he didnt leave it until just before the summer hols started to tell you this!

26 and 39! eek! less than 40 days! yay!!

oh sadness that you have to spend Saturday at school But like Smudge said, at least oyu know now!

I can't believe I only have ten days until I leave. Holy cow, the spring went by fast.

Very nice Rosethorn, have fun

I have only 3 days until I move in

That is true, the whole knowing now thing... I guess I was just hoping that Bob Ditter could count for some much needed staff development hours. As a teacher in my district you have to log so many staff development hours each school year. I'm always looking for more exciting workshops to go to because the ones the school offers really suck! Bob Ditter in person is definitely more exciting and more interesting. Oh well, I guess I'll try and have fun spending three hours at school on Saturday morning cleaning... yipee...

- Teenster

Just 5 days!!

27 days!!
One of the GLs sent me an email today. I could tell he really sent it to everyone cuz it used very general language (Hey friend! lol) but it was CC'd I guess cuz I only saw my email. I wish he had mass mailed it cuz now I feel like if I email him back with questions it's like... a burden, whereas if i emailed everyone back it would be like oh hey, if I don't have the answers someone else will...
nevertheless I'm excited

That's so exciting!

One week till I leave!

Indigo and Nataylor- jealous that camp is so soon for you both! I hope that your summers are fabulous!

Precamp starts in 13 days! Whee! I am meeting with the director to plan out precamp next week. A little too short of notice, but that it just how it has worked out. We have our outline of what we want, now we just have to make it happen.

Woo HOO!! 24 days!
I get to go a day early now since, factoring in NYC traffic, it might take me 71/2 hours to get to camp and that has me driving up the turnpike at 4:30 am... not preferable...
I'm so excited!!

One day until ad staff week starts! Whoa! I'm moving my stuff in tonight.

20 and 33!! HOLY SMOKES!!!!! I didn't realize that it was so close since I haven't looked at my countdown recently and I've just been focued on how close it is until the end of the school year.

Heh..... I leave tomorrow. Now, I'm starting to get nervous. :P

18 days...

Tomorrow starts 11 days of final exams (yes, I said 11) and I'll also start to clean my class room!

- Teenster

20 days!!
And quite honestly the last 5 days before hand are going to include going to a baseball game and going to visit all of my college friends so I'm counting down to that too

wow, I don't even want to know how 11 days of finals works. I'm happy with my 4. Well, 4 days of finals week though I only have 2 finals during that week (maybe 3, depending on when I schedule my German one) and 2 (or 3) during the last class of the week before! I honestly don't even remember how finals was at my high school but I know we didn't have 11 days of them!! I also don't think half of my classes had finals.

Oh man oh man 19 and 32!!! Well 32 in 27 minutes, but that's just a technicality and I will be in the car by now for sure!

18 days! I'm getting very excited!

I think we had 10 days of finals in HS... which was really boring. But basically we had half days for finals and we only had 2 class period a day, one was a study period and one was a final... We basically spent all our time in the music rooms goofing around except for the half hour a day for the final...

one week from today, seven days, next tuesday, june 1st...so many ways to say it and they all sound terrific! unless I mention all the things i have to get sorted before I leave. yikes! haha

I lucked out every year in college and only had 3 days of finals, can't imagine more than five though!

Three days for me. Eek! I am sooo unprepared.

Eleven days! It's getting so close, but I have /so/ much to get done first. Especially with the end of the school year only three days before.

18 days.

I went to Wal-Mart today. I saw I bunch of "lost" international type people. As it ended up, I was behind them in line, and they were calling each other funny names. They looked at me embarrassed, and then said they were trying out camp names. I laughed, and introduced myself as Teenster.

It's so weird to think that camp has started for some people. Pre-camp for the GS camp nearby starts on Saturday! The staff I met told me they were working in the kitchen, and they were getting the dining hall all set up for the staff.

- Teenster

My countdown has basically ended. I officially start my Unit Leader training/staff training prep on Monday, but I'm going up tomorrow to cover the office for Thursday and Friday while the rest of the office staff is out of town, and then working with a retreat group over the weekend. I'm pumped.

Good luck to everyone with finals! I hope that they all go well!

5 days! June 1st! so close and yet so much to do. Why does everything seem to get left to the last minute despite the fact that I know I have been working on stuff since January?!

Beetle - you and I are right there. June 1st, still a ton to do though I've been doing a ton for the longest time! Best of luck!!

Just found out today that my final quiz (just our last quiz, not cumulative) that was scheduled on Wed June 9th is now moved up to our last class meeting of Thursday the 3rd! So not only does this mean that I will be done with 4 of my 5 classes by the end of Thursday next week, but I will also be all done with classes by the end of Monday the 7th as opposed to the 9th! woot!!!! Yeah! This would be even better news if I didn't have a job as I could drive home a whole 2 days early. However, I love my job and I work until Friday so I'm gonna be here til the 11th anyway.

Wow long rant and I hope you actually understood all the ramblingness of that! hehe Countdown to camp is 17 and 30 (aka 1 month!) AHHHHHHH!!! I will be at camp for the summer in a month! Actually a few hours less than a month, so there!! hehe

And plus, it's been pouring down rain here all day and I have a deep deep desire to puddle jump but I have stuff to do/places to go and really only one pair of shoes appropriate for the day and they are not waterproof. So alas I am not puddle jumping. But I wanna!

So, apparently it's actually not 30 days until summer camp for me. And no this isn't a silly little mess up with a date or countdown where it's 29 or 31 days. I got a message from my CD that basically says with our ULs being there for training the couple days before grief camp and session 1 of DC they don't need me for DC like i thought. I'm pretty sure the AD told me when she hired me that I was doing DC though so I'm not really sure if I just didn't hear her right or if the plans changed since then. So yeah, instead of June 27th I start camp July 2nd. I guess I'll be able to hang with Smudge and Mash and anyone else not getting much camp this summer on here a while longer then. Sure I still get to do precamp and 7 sessions of camp so I know I'm still really lucky but I was really looking forward to doing DC and also seeing my girls from last years Camp Willie. Oh, and on my contract it said July 2nd so I suppose that's one more point in favor of miscommunication. When I update my countdown I'll post my new one for summer.

Hey, at least I still have 17 days until I get to do an OE session and I have a shorter wait until summer break from school!

Aww Giggles! I'm so sorry! That's sad! At least you get to go for the rest of camp though, 7 weeks ain't bad...

16 days... 10 till I'm done at borders for the summer

Staff Training kicks off in two weeks, so excited! And also this year I believe everyone except one person will arrive on time, which is exciting because last year because of school, we had people arrive throughout different times of the week. OE has been fun and everything but I am so ready to get back into summer camp mode, can't wait until these next two weeks are up which should go quickly because our OE schedule really picks up now and time flies when your keeping busy.

Thanks and it's ok. I might get a chance to do Vacation Bible School during that week that I'm not at camp. I haven't decided because it would mean driving back over to eastern WA, which would mean 80 bucks in gas money, so who knows.

I updated my countdown, and it's 35 days until camp, which isn't really as bad as I thought it would be.

Mash and I are now planning our next pack hol for brownies and by next we mean not the one we are having in Nov but one for next year! - gives us something campy to look forward to!

Good luck planning your brownie holiday Smudge! I am sure that you and Mash will make sure that it will be awesome!

Layton- I hear you. So much to do and plans keep crowding the weekend. Yikes!

I finally sat down with the director and planned out precamp. I feel better and more prepared for precamp, but still nervous. I've never run precamp, but have sat through lots of them. I am hoping that it will be a fun one (at least part of the time!).

I have still yet to discuss pre-camp, also my first time doing that. Luckily I'm working with some awesome people so it shouldn't be too painful, but I know how much I "enjoyed" pre-camp last year so I'm still nervous that people will complain about me and my talks/activities..

no one will complain. If it's your first time doing it everyone will understand.
ANYway, just try to be original and everything will be fun. Do as little reading from the staff manual as possible and if you can figure out a way how, do none of it. That's the only part that gets boring. If you get people up and moving, playing games, or talking they will have fun

I agree! The more moving, playing, talking, the better! I don't want to read a manual to anyone and I really don't want anyone to read one to me.

Layton, you can do it! A great team of people help too!

And even if everyone else is at camp by then Giggles and I will still be about if you need an ear to bend etc!

Next Saturday! In six days I'll be loading up my car. Around noon on Wednesday, I send off my students for the summer. It's going to be a quick turn around.

I think I might have decided on a camp name as well, finally. Right now I'm leaning towards Tonks.

LOVE IT!

14 days and one hour... so I'm going to say 13 days.

I've still got 8 more school days of students. Next weekend I'll have to do my camp shopping (I know a little late) and take my car in for a "check-up." Hopefully all works out with my car! Last time I took it in, I had to get new tires and some other random stuff.

- Teenster

i worked with a Tonks one summer! It is a good name!

yup!

14 days until OE session!!!!!! and 32 until summer camp!!!

technically it's Monday for me - so I'm going to say that I go to camp.. TOMORROW!!

ugh, so jealous Layton! I have class "tomorrow" and for another 3 days (if you include finals in there) after that. Plus I just realized that there are a few more things that I need to do around here and for my program before I head out for the summer.

Have a great time and catch you on the flip side!

My first staff fly in for pre-pre-camp training on June 10th. Everyone else arrives between June 14th and June 21st for training. I, however, have school through June 22nd. So there is NO turnaround time for me. I'm moving into camp on June 18th - and have to move the turtles and the plants in before then too.

And we still have so much to do!

Sounds like you will have a hectic few days! NBs first summer at chenoa she was still in school cos of snow days so had to commute down after school to do as many hours of training as she could before going home so she could be at work in the morning.

Camp starts tomorrow! Less than 24 hours and I am at camp!

I heard from the director yesterday that 2 counselors, the nurse and the arts and crafts director quit. What is with these people?! Don't they know how hard it is to find staff, especially 2 days before staff training starts?! Needless to say, we are scrambling to cover positions. grrrr.

That really sucks - wish I could come and help you out! Camp America will prob have people waiting to be placed - on something called ready, steady, go which means they should have their bags packed and ready to go with just 2 days notice so you might be able to get staff at short notice - i think Camp Leaders and BUNAC do similar too! Good luck finidng people.

Sorry to hear that, Beetle! Best of luck! See you all on the other side! Can't wait to talk about how awesome yet another summer at camp was for everyone!!

11 days!

And I might be heading up to another camp next Wednesday to do a ropes training because we haven't been able to find anyone qualified to run the ropes course. I'm just waiting to hear back if my camp will pay for the course for me, and if so, 8 days until my summer of camp starts!

in exactly two weeks I will be eating dinner with my fellow GLs after our first day of staff training

In 12 days I will be at camp for OE! And in 30 I will be there for the summer!!!

Today I found out that my final that I thought was on Monday doesn't actually exist! So I am going to be done with all 5 of my classes by 3 this Thursday! Well, even by 2, which makes it 48 hours until I'm done for the summer! And all I have left to do is one project and studying for my 5 quizzes in the next 2 days! (1 is over half the quarter, 1 is cumulative, and the other 3 are unit tests!)

Have any of your camps been affected by the wildfires?

My camp hasn't been affected at all. I don't think there are any forest fires in Ontario? They're not too common here.

My camp might (but probably won't be) affected by G8 though! I'm leaving Toronto and avoiding the chaos that will come with G20, but G8 is being held in Huntsville, which is the nearest large-ish town to my camp. Pretty exciting!

I wasnt sure where the fires where - I dont watch the news I just know that friends in NH are having problems cos of the smoke being blown down from "canadian fires"

That will be an interesting experience!

I have badges for you but dont have your address since they moved the servers - can you PM your camp address Sarah.

I moved in yesterday, horses move in tomorrow, and the rest of staff trickle in as they can before the 13th! So excited!
All of the camps in the council (there are five) are training at my camp, it's going to be crazy teaching nature to so many of my peers!

Please PM me if you want badges, I have tons. AND STICKERS. I don't know if the ones I sent out after camp ever made it to people. So, if you sent me some last year and never got any in return, please let me know so I can throw in something extra for my poor mail skills!
If you're sending some out, let me know too so I can send you my address because I'd like some!

Thank you!
-Stormy

I have an awesome gift for rosethorn and indigo but they need to PM me cederledges address

This is not my summer for sure. Got a call from the OE director about the fact that the school that is doing OE that session that I am signed up for is bringing half the students they were originally bringing. Since I was the last one to be hired for the week I was the first one to go. So now my single countdown is 29 days.

However, she did reassure me that the mini session that I'm hired for is still going to happen. At this rate though, just give it time... hehe No, they wouldn't do that to me. Or if they did they would seriously lose some points in my book. I doubt they will though.

Another good thing is that this director came straight out and offered for me to come visit and tag along with one of the groups one of the days. One of my camp friends has already said that she would love to have me with her group!

29 days!

Oh no! that stinks... I hope everything works out for you!!
I have 11 days... and I just figured out... I think I am the oldest person working at this camp by like... 3 years at least lol. AWESOME

That's alright! I was the youngest person in OE by about 3 years. Definitely the only 21 year old. Also the only person who found it weird that the bosses were drinking beer when we went out for dinner one evening. It's not that I didn't think they should, but that it was just weird to see!

Yeah, I'll spend some time hanging out with friends and family that week I guess which will still be fun. Bye bye extra $200+. Oh well.

o man this year theres loads of internations thats are ike 25/26 . thats old

alto saying that my best friend at camo last year was 25 , but im talkin 10 people this time not liek 1 or 2

awwww poor giggles that is rubbish but at least you can visit!

Two days! I really should start packing...

I've accepted that I'll be older than most of the people I'm working with. But as a teacher who's still single, I'm not going to let that be the one thing holding me back.

Oh no dont Flower - for much of my time at camp I have been older than most of the staff and I still have an amazing time!

Yeah, but I'm actually really happy with the way that this director handled it. She called me. She can't help it that the school dropped half of their students. And almost immediately after telling me she offered for me to come up and visit for a whole day and tag along with a group that I know the leader of (so it totally wouldn't just be awkward) so I'm really happy with it. Sure I'd rather have worked the week but sometimes these things can't be helped. Plus she asked me when I go back to school in September in case they needed any help in the fall before then.

28 days! and in 5 hours I will be done with my classes except for a 10 minute extra credit thing for one of my classes.

Right there with you! I am by far the oldest, and still single. It will not hold me back!

- Teenster

Ok well then... that makes me feel better lol

Our staff ranges from 17 to 30 (not counting our much older cooks and director) And pretty much every marker in between, no reason to feel bad! Camp is for everyone.

LMAO well all the other GLs are 20 or 22 except the boys. My director swears the boys average 25 to 27 and I am 25... so we'll see...

My last summer at camp I was 31! And there were staff there who were older than me!

We've never had any older staff feel left out - everyone is at camp and thus is a camper - regardless of age.

I did once - but that was cos the majority of the staff were 17 and I was 25 AND they stuck me in day camp the entire summer so I didnt really get to know the res camp counsellors as well as i have in other years!

8 days! And I won't have to do that ropes training, which means I have a few extra days at home, which is exciting.

9 days.

Officially in the single digits! Since this week is super crazy at school, I'm going to pack this weekend! Also, I can't decide, maybe you guys can help... My camp is a nine hour drive from where I live. Should I: a) Leave the day before and spend the night somewhere. I did this my first summer, and it wasn't bad. Though at the same time paying for a hotel would be another expense. OR b) Leave REALLY early the morning of. I did this last summer, and it wasn't bad. Though I was really tired when I got there and I wasn't very social. What should I do???

- Teenster

I would go the night before. Is there a hostel you could stay at on the way - they tend to be alot cheaper than staying in a hotel - and they tend to safe especially if you are only staying one night!

Hostels are usually in big cities. I don't travel through one of those to get to camp. :(.

- Teenster

Oh that is ashame - there are some on cape cod if that is any use?

I think I would still consider a hotel - I would still rather arrive at camp with the energy to greet every one and be sociable.

An alternative would be to see if the camp would allow you to arrive the day before. That way you could drive up the day before without having to get up at stupid o'clock to make the 9 hour drive to get there for what ever time you need to be there for. I know that at Chenoa we had a few (4 at one point) staff who drove from Kansas to NH and they were allowed to arrive early!

Sorry to shoot down that idea too... though I would be allowed to come the day before, it doesn't work with my schedule. I have to help out and participate in my high school's graduation which is on the 12th. It will take most of the day, because not only do I have the ceremony which takes all morning, I'm going to a few of my students' parties. I have to be at camp on the 13th at 3:00. The parties will be over around 4:00 on the 12th, so I can leave that evening and make it about five hours or so. I guess I'm really worried about how much energy I will have to drive after working all morning and partying all afternoon... LOL. Thanks for the help, though.

- Teenster

If you have to be there at 3, I'd definitely do the stay over. Paying for a hotel isn't great, but at least you'd be more ready for staff training and not as rushed. I've done the getting up super early thing for flights to precamp before, and it's no fun how tired you are when you get there, just when you want to be full of energy getting to know everyone.

On a separate note, I leave in the morning! And suddenly today I'm nervous about this whole change of camps.

You will be fine Flower - you will find that GS camp is very different from the private camp you worked at before - but it will be awesome!

Have a great time Flower! Catch you on the flip side!

I was going to have the same problem... however, luckily, my director told me I could come up a day early... whereabouts will you be after about 5 hours of driving?

After about five hours, I should be all the way through Virginia or so. That's about where I stopped my first summer. Then I only have four hours until I get to camp. This would be so much easier if I didn't have all of that graduation stuff the day before I have to be there... but the life of a high school teacher.

I think I am going to spend the night. The big problem with that from my first summer was that I didn't judge the timing right, and I got there really early. That's not a great thing for new people, so I felt kind of weird and left out at first. Now since I'm returning, I don't think it would be that big of a deal if I got there as early.

8 days.

- Teenster

Thanks for the support y'all! I think that we have found staff to cover the arts and crafts director postion and have hired 2 more counselors. Myself and the director will be cover the nurse's job- not what I wanted to be doing, but we will make it happen!

I hope that precamp is going well for folks! For everyone else, camp is close!

Also, we have new patches for camp this summer! If anyone wants one, please PM me your address and I will send you girl scout camp patches.

Well.... I'm new and I'll be there the night before but I figure I'll just settle myself in and make a walmart trip or something... I know it's going to be really awkward but I can't leave my house at 4 am... i will literally die.
Teenster, is your camp up by philly? cuz I live outside of philly and NoVa is like 4 hours away from my house...

I think that a lot of our internationals and some of our other staff arrive the night before so at least you aren't alone in the newness. However, it does seem like it would be awkward. hmm, it should be interesting when I go to a new camp. Although it seems like they have specific times they do pick-ups or something so I'd be with a bunch of others, not just me and some returner who got signed up for airport duty, riding in her car by ourselves. Did that once on the returner side of things. It was the night of the 4th of July and she was from Spain so it was kinda cool driving through Seattle in the dark!

No, my camp is near Scranton in the Honesdale area. I take 81 up from NC. Two summers ago I stayed in Winchester, VA.

- Teenster

So I had two camps that I was going to be in charge of and now I have none. The art studio didn't have enough enrollment and the other place, she decided she couldn't afford me. UGH now I'm camp sick because I have no camp this summer. I've applied to even day camps around Chicago but noone has called me back. Because everyone else around here is fighting for the same job. I just wanna cry because this will be the first time in a long time I won't be at any camp if I don't get a job.
POOOOHHOOOO

oh no! That stinks, Campwoman! I kinda know how you feel with my 2 extra (and completely different and special) weeks disappearing, but I know that my situation is nowhere near yours.

Is there still a possibility that one of them will call back? Could you find a job even with a daycare or something to do with kids at least?

I'm trying to find something but it may just have to be day camp in the city.But noones really called back which is strange since I've had like 20 years of experience. UGH

I hope you get somewhere but if not then we can console each other over the summer!

Try calling the camps that you've applied to - they may not be calling b/c they think you're "over-qualified" - so check in personally with the ones you're most interested in to re-assure them that you're very adament about working at a camp this summer. Best of luck, CampWoman!

oo, I like that idea, Layton!

4 days.

- Teenster

I've been calling folks back but still nothing. It looks like I may just be kid sitting for two older kids but that's just the afternoon so I can still volunteer at a camp in the morning I guess. I'll just have to try again for next summer.Yes Smudge we will console each other with camp stuff.

I leave on Saturday! I'm almost completely packed, I'm going place the staff clothing order tomorrow (part of my job this year, whee!!), and then my friend is staying at my house Friday night and my mother drives up on Saturday!

Sarah can i have your camp address - as will I have more centenary badges to send you soon

23 days! Can't wait! I leave for home in 3 days!


Even though it's not camp, baby-sitting still sounds kinda fun! At least it's with kids instead of a job at the grocery store or something.

We start in 2 days, I'm so excited. The last few days staff have been arriving at camp, so that's been exciting. I came home today to handle some things at home before the summer but then come Friday I'll be back up at camp and ready to start the summer!

5 days!

I leave tomorrow! Can't wait!

have a wonderful summer sarah.

Monday is looming... I remember it being 40 days off and I was mad excited... now it's looming and I'm very nervous.

you will be fine heather - you will have a fab summer!

I just got home from staff training, and I leave tomorrow for our first real camp sessions (two short ones right together). So far I'm having a great time. I really like the other counselors, and really we move through our days laughing and singing all the time. I'm also going to get to work with tons of archery units, which I'm really excited about. I love teaching archery.

Teaching archery is one of my favourite things about camp - that and kayaking and the kids obviously

19 days until camp!!!!!!! YAY! Although I also get to go up for the day or part of it this Wednesday, so that's in 3 days!!

I'm home from school now, so that's eexciting and I leave in a week to go back for Vacation Bible School, which will be fun and kid-filled!

I'm at camp... in my bunk... with my wireless internet!

It's really hot and muggy today, I really hope it cools off soon!

- Teenster

fuun!!
I just emailed my director to see if I can bring my comp just in case... you know... school districts want to interview me. That way maybe I can Skype an interview....

33 days until caledonia 2010 - and then it about 2 weeks after that, that I have fusion, and then week and a half after a big church conference and then 2 weeks later I am off to the USA and get to visit camp and go camping

I'm so jealous of you all right

Awww huggles campwoman.

What do you think of the boards new look? Not sure about the blue myself!

OH I WISH I WAS GOING TO CAMP...

I hear you. The 2 one week ones I am going to just dont cut it i guess I have 2012 to look forward to - but that is such a long time away.

yeah, the blue just really annoys me. It doesn't work well with the whole visual thing... especially since half of it is still in the other color. I wish it would go back to the other way.

16 days!!!! And tomorrow I get to go hang with a friend up at camp while she's doing OE. I'll be there for the climbing wall, lunch, and cabin free time. excellentness!

I am glad i am not the only one who isnt a fan of the new color scheme - I def found the old color scheme easier on the eyes! Dear wonderful Moderator PLEASE can we go back?

I am jealous Giggles

I kind of like the blue...

- Teenster

i think it will take some getting used to!

12 days!!

and yeah, it might be fine once we get used to it.

Awww when you go off to camp I will be all alone here

Poor Smudge! But at least we have Facebook (which I check more often than the boards while at camp) so we can totally be Facebook pen pals/camp buddies. I promise I'm better at that than at snail mail! Of course, you've seen proof of my internet reply time so you know it to be true!

Yeah and I get to go off to guide camp soon

Yay!! In a way it's kinda cool thatyou have several smaller camp things because you get to countdown and start up more of them! After a while I feel like I'm doing the same thing Ive been doing and it becomes a way of life. Yes of course it's a great way of life, but the initial excitement has worn off. (then again, with my exuberance that might be a good thing for some people! hehe)

Shorter maybe but not smaller - we have over 500 girls coming to caledeonia, and fusion which the festival I am working/camping at is expecting in excess of 20,000 people - so it will be huge - but an awesome day!

WOW!! Yeah, even the 500 one is more than double the people we have on camp in one session. And yes, that's what I mean by smaller.

yeah - they are gonna be HUGE but we have LOTS of staff to cope with the numbers.

I wanna be at CAMP

Why WHY didn't I apply this summer?

WAAHHHHHA

I spoke to my friend and she was going to send her CD your way - I hope she remembers to do so!

oh man oh man oh man! 8 days!!!! Didn't realize it was so fast approaching. One of my friends started this morning for UL training. Suppose I should start figuring out if I need to get anything before I go.

Also, airport run Thursday night!!!!!! Not tomorrow, but the next one!!! Which means I'm actually going to be up at camp sometime in 7 days and some odd hours!! And I'm picking up one of the returners and she's cool. I picked her up last year too! Maybe I'll get to transport someone else as well! WOO!

Yay that is cool! I loved tagging along on airport runs at chenoa! Oh how i miss camp!

4 days!!!!!!!!!! Although with the airport pickup I might get to be there Thursday night instead of Friday late morning.

Ugh, i know I have no real ability to complain about not being at camp when all my friends (and some people I'm not so fond of) are there now since some of you don't have camp at all, but man do I get really campsick when I see on Facebook that another person is there, especially the ones I don't believe should be on staff because they do things like drinking on a night out (on camp) but since I've never gotten proof I can't report it.

Oh and also thinking about how I was going to be there yesterday and how DC session 1 (the one I was going to be a counselor for) started 15 minutes ago is making me really campsick. So I try to not think about it, or to think about how it made it possible for me to go back to my school-town apartment for a week and help out with Vacation Bible School and with the daycare, but sometimes it doesn't work.

Awwwww huggles giggles (I was wondering what VBS was!) I know what you mean about some people not being in staff - but dont worry one days they will get caught out - I just hope is doenst happen in the way it happened at my first camp.

ahh yay!!! In 3 days I will be in the car driving up to camp with one of my camp friends after getting her from the airport!!!!! YAY!!!!!!

yeah, or if they don't get caught they will move on with life at some point. That's the joy of real life for most people- gotta get jobs that don't have summer break. Yay for being a teacher!

muwahahahahaha!! So technically I don't start camp until Friday at noon, but I'm doing 3 airport runs and 2 of them are later at ngiht so I am going to be sleeping up at camp tonight and tomorrow night and doing an airport run tonight, tomorrow late morning, and tomorrow night so yeah! Basically i am moving up to camp tonight, at around 2am! It's a midnight pickup at an airport 1.5 hours away from camp. And I first get to go up to camp and pick-up a friend so that we've got the buddy system going for such a late pick-up! WOOT!!!!! So totally almost there!!! Gotta finish packing what i thought I had 2 full days to do until last night around 8pm when my CD called me! Oh think of the reimbursement check I'll be getting! Not to mention the excellent funness of it all!

Awww I am jealous - have a wonderful summer!

28 hours until my first camp of the summer!

Got home from Scottish Guidings Centenary camp Caledonia 2010 and have just over a week until the next camp I am working at! It was very wet but fun!

I'm glad you had fun! I'm home for the day in between sessions. I just had a great time taking a tripping group up to Utah. The highlight for me was going river rafting. It was sweet!

river rafting is fun! Where in Utah did you take them?

We were in eastern Utah. We went rafting on the Green River.

Cool - I love Utah.

In 53 hours I will be on a train to Leeds to camp and work at Fusion - a big guiding centenary festival!

Well I am back from Fusion and asside from a few grips about unimportant things I had an amazing time My next 2 camping experiences are a pow wow labour day weekend and then a GS training weekend

Ive got one more week at camp and I'm done. Actually, less than a week as I am done Friday evening.