Early to Rise, Shine, and Have Fun!

It is officially our first full day of 4-H Camp at Betsy Jeff Penn and it was worth the anticipation.  We started the day the early getting up at 7 am.  For the younger campers they had time to get dressed and head to the dinning hall for breakfast.  For the older ones it mean cabin clean up, trying to prepare for cabin inspections, before heading to breakfast.  This morning's breakfast included biscuits, eggs, and bacon, which had everyone happy.  After breakfast and cleaning the cabins it was time for flag raising and then off to activities.

  For our younger campers the day was filled with arts and crafts, pool time, horseback riding, archery, kick ball, and the boulder wall.  For our older youth who are adventurers and treckkers, the day was filled with canoeing, team building, orienteering, and much much more.  Now don't think that our campers were so busy that they didn't have time to make friends.  At every turn there was something new pairing them with a partner and letting them explore the fun of this adventure together.
  During lunch break our campers enjoyed chicken strips and home fries.  There were some very happy folks with very full stomachs at the end of the meal.  After lunch campers got a chance to rest before going on to the afternoon activities.  Can you imagine the excitement for the first time archer who hit the target or the child who rode a horse for the first time?  It was definitely a day of adventures.
After all this fun it was time for dinner.  Usually Tuesday is taco night, but it was moved to Monday and our youth had a fiesta with the food.  Making their own nachos, soft tacos, hard tacos, and then there was the brownie for desert.  Yum!
After dinner there was a little time to let the meal settle before we all met at the flag pole.  There they announced the winners of the cabin inspection.  Please note that this is a highly competitive event each day and the campers do everything they can to win the golden faucet award.  Today the girls in cabin one received the award while cabin 6 walked away with the silver toilet seat for second place.
Then it was time for the event of the night...water sports.  Our younger campers got a chance to do the dizzy bat relay, water slide, pool, and lake swimming tonight.  Sure enough just enough to wear them out fully.  Our next older youth hit the boulder wall and the pioneer cabin for s'mores at campfire.  Our oldest campers spent their time working on the rock wall seeing who could make it to the top.
After all of that exercise, and fun, it was time to head back to the cabins for showers and to change.  Guaranteed our campers will get a good night's sleep after all their activity today.  Tomorrow we will introduce a couple of new activities for each group as they learn to work together to have an even better time at camp.