Twilight Play is a Blast!
Dear Parents and Friends,
It is a beautiful sunset here tonight and as you can guess that made for a great day. We were supposed to get thunderstorms most of the day today but it sprinkled one time and was sunny and partly cloudy all afternoon. This afternoon several cabins went “off program” on creek hiking, lake kayaking, and hiking trips. Going off program is mostly FUN, but it also provides great opportunities to bring the cabin group closer together. Some of those going off program today will also be camping out tonight. It’s the perfect night for it with a 20% chance of rain. For those cabins who stayed in the normal program today, we ran a wide range of sign-ups including making Johnny Cakes at the mill, tree climbing, farm, dip candles, kumihimo, biking the Main Camp trail, zip & traverse line at the lake, and quite a few more.
Tonight after dinner was Twilight Play which is always a hit here at camp. You’re able to take almost any activity and it’s like a regular period during the day. Campers love it because they’ve just refueled from dinner and it’s in the cool of the evening. The lake was open for a variety of activities including the traverse line. Only about 1 in 40 campers make it across and it’s challenging. It’s a new challenge for most and it’s ok to not make it. A good many campers choose to play capture the flag tonight. I led a whiffle ball game where you only needed 2 outs to retire the side and no strikeouts. It was fast paced and many runs were scored. No one really knew the score when we ended. Each camper probably batted at least 25 times so it was action plus. There were a few double plays and lots of balls hit over the outfielders head. When you connect with a whiffle ball it can go places. There were many activities offered this evening and one is a favorite called the tower swing and it is just plain fun. You’re hooked into a harness and connected to the climbing tower by a long rope. Your friends pull you toward the top of the swing and with a small rope looped through a carabiner, you decide when you want to swing. It’s a thrill and a rush when you let go.
New experiences give our minds a fresh start by awakening the need to focus and push ourselves a bit and face some trepidations. Everything at camp is challenge by choice and campers can always opt out. When children arrive at camp they are surrounded by new people, a new place and ways to play. Counselors and new friends provide support to explore this newness, learn from it, and enjoy it. Whether it’s meeting a new friend, dealing with an obstacle on a hike, making art out of natural material, or working with their team to take on a challenge, camp has opportunities for children to exercise creativity and use their imagination. Spending time in nature at camp gives children the time, freedom, and control to play in imaginative ways and collaborate creatively with other children, like building a dam on a creek or creating the back-story of the crayfish they caught in the creek. That energizing push to explore their ideas will help campers become better problem solvers, communicators, and collaborators. And most of all, better people!
It’s been another full day here at camp and there’s so much to tell you, but of course, I’ll leave most of that to your children. There’s a lot of bonding here at camp and I feel that camp is based on building relationships through experiences that we have with each other. In most all of our cabins, children’s bodies and minds are slowing down as they think and dream about their day and imagine what tomorrow might bring. Stay tuned!
