Starting BEDA 2 Days Late

Well, it may be August 3, but I'm going to do BEDA. BEDA=Blog Every Day in August

I didn't really think about it being August because of the way my job has been. I worked in the office of an overnight summer camp until 12:15 today, and August started in the middle of a session, so I was thinking more about how to keep camp organized than the month we were on. Now that I'm realizing it's a BEDA month (people do this in April as well), I want to do it. I started this blog with a blog every day challenge, so I want to try it again, especially now that it's a time when a lot of bloggers are doing it.

So, I guess today's a good day to talk about camp. This was my 14th summer at this camp; 10 as a camper, 3 as a volunteer, and 1 on staff. I think my second wave of camper years, the ones when I was older, were definitely the best of all.

I was the administrative assistant. I worked for 8 weeks full time being in the office, organizing things, checking in campers for each session, running the store, keeping track of finances, and doing some programming. There were times when things were busy and stressful and other times when it was quiet and boring. There was one day at work when I read an entire book during my 8-hour work day (it was really good!! It's called The Alchemist and it comes out in October.

The highlight of the summer was the day the kids did a nature activity that I put together. The camp director had gathered some materials on a Survivor/Man vs. Wild challenge activity, handed me the packet, and asked me to come up with a schedule for the campers to do this activity.

I made 9 challenges: build a shelter, make a fire 4 different ways, make an oven, make a raft, purify water from the lake, make an outfit from found materials, make up a sport using found materials, navigate using a compass, and identify trees using a tree finder book.

They loved it and did so well at each of the challenges!!! My favorite was the group that made a skirt and sash out of ferns with a headband made of pinecones. It looked like something from Project Runway :)

I'm not too sad about camp ending. It's been a lot of driving for me to get out there every day, and everyone was getting very tired. It was oddly emotional saying good-bye to the counselors, but I'm very relieved to have time to sleep, swim, go to tae kwon do, see friends before they go back to school, and get ready to go back myself.

Today is awesome because I'm feeling relaxed and I'm super excited to visit speech camp tomorrow!!!!