Saturday, April 25, 2009

"It's even better than I thought it would be!"

That would be a quote from Morgan after a day full of fun and sun at Camporee today. After a fitful night of sleep (thanks to the cold -- sub 30 degree temperatures all night!! -- and one little girl who called out a couple of times), the day started early with us getting the girls up and ready (complete with their Camporee shirt and pink bandannas, and their day packs ready) for Flag Up at 7am. At Flag Up, each of the troops had a cheer or chant for their role call and our troop (32511) chanted, "Two-Five-One-One, we think camping's lots of fun!", which was a chant that some of the staff girls had helped us come up with during one of the meetings they came to to tell the girls about Camporee. After the flag ceremony, it was time for our first meal at Camporee, breakfast. They had bananas, fritatta, sausages, and even hot chocolate, which Morgan was very excited about. But what was even MORE! EXCITING! is that she got to wash her own dishes. You probably remember the deal - mesh bag with your mess kit. Wash, dunk, hang? Yeah, so apparently this is a very exciting task for a five and a half year old. Who knew? Maybe I need to pull together mess kits for everyone in the family and get Morgan to do the dishes for me.

We hiked back to the soccer fields where the girls would get lined up and would be handed over to the "Pink Beard" staff girls who would lead them around the various stations that day. They did knife safety, outdoor cooking, semaphore, skit, first aid/safety, talking like a pirate, sword fighting, treasure hunting, and a service project where they were restoring a wildlife area by pulling weeds, removing dead trees and planting new ones. They had organized the stations to have activities for all the various aged girls, to tailor it to something they could and would do. This was by far, Morgan's favorite thing. She really enjoyed hanging around with the older girls and learning knew things. They had it split into morning session and afternoon session. During the morning session, the moms took shifts helping out at the service station, digging up trees and helping older girls plant trees. We stood by as our girls came to the station and watched them pull weeds. Around lunch, it was time for the Pink Beard patrol to be returned to troops and then it was time to eat lunch. There was a sandwich bar set up for lunch and after lunch the girls got a chance for some free play time with the other Girl Scouts in the landlubbers games. Morgan spent the whole time doing the catapult, and trying to hit me with the ping pong balls. :) When the landlubbers games were over, it was time for the girls to finish their rotations, and Morgan was already exhausted! She kept asking if she was going to be taking a nap. :)

The girls were off doing their stations and the moms all had free time so we went to the cafeteria and a lot of the moms made lanyards and we all chatted a bunch, mostly about school stuff. I even managed to catch a cat nap, completely by accident. Before long, it was time to go get the girls at the soccer field and head back to camp for "troop time". We were to head to dinner (cheeseburgers, corn, and salad) shortly after and then the girls would be going campfire with their patrols. They had learned a skit at one of their stations and each patrol performed their skit for the large audience. As special guests, we had some people from the school for the blind who were camping near us and came to listen to the campfire that night. Our girls did a skit called The Invisible Bench and shortly after that, we were signaled by the staff that they were "done" and ready to go back to camp to sleep. We mixed up the sleeping arrangements a little and so Kristin and Kaitlyn, Morgan and I slept in one tent with the other moms and Daisies slept in the other tent. Although it was cold (though not as cold for as long as last night), the girls were quickly asleep again!


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