Girls' Camp Rocked!

I had just one goal for our girls for camp: Have FUN! Our vision for this year is to unify our ward girls so this was also important for camp. I decided to ditch all plans of stressing myself out with fancy handouts, special activities planned for our girls during spare time, really pushing camp craft and not harrass or nag, in an effort to just let the girls relax, get to know each other better and just 'hang'.

I'm learning that just sometimes it is ok to let some important things fall to the wayside in pursuit of some other worthwhile goals. Take camp craft for example. I love camp craft. I believe in it. I worked very hard at it as a youth and received the box in recognition of completing all 6 levels. I loved camp because it meant I could do all those outdoor things like cook over a fire and learn firstaid. But......

It is slightly outdated. (It still teaches the heimlich manoeuvre). The camp craft program does not appeal to everyone. Stake wasn't pushing camp craft and was offering very limited camp craft activities. We weren't even encouraged to cook on the fire! So it would have taken a lot of extra time and harrassment on camp to get all girls to do their certification.

Now usually I am very opinionated and like to follow all rules, but this time I just had a feeling.

So I encouraged those who wanted to do it and about 5 girls completed their certificate. I felt that pushing the others to do it would have been unenjoyable for them and me so I left it. Did I do the right thing? Well, who knows. Maybe they'll get lost on a mountain this week and I will be sued because they didn't learn how to send a signal and orientate their way out using the stars and sun or light a fire using a magnifying glass.......

What I do know is that camp provided an opportunity to break down some of my leader-youth barriers. I got to know the girls. For us all to be a little silly. For us to laugh. For the girls to hang out in a social environment which they wouldn't usually do.

There was a lot of laughter and we got the 'unity award' at the close of camp, so I think we did alright with my goals.

And, we were the only ward to cook both dinners on the open fire. And it was DELICIOUS.

I loved being on camp with them and would love to find a way to have that feeling within our group all the time. Here's a few bad photos of our fun times.

I love that these girls even find fun in pitching the tent.

This was pretty common. Four girls to watch one actually do the task. Support team????

The huge slip 'n slide.

Clowning around waiting.... after the hard work was done.

THE game of the camp. (Which doesn't have a name)