Bug Juice and SweatFest!!!

We are beginning Week 3 in Lesterville. My nails and my legs are showing it well...they're the first signs of camp living because they get caked with dirt, bug bites, and scratches!! My initial round of bug bites are slowly disappearing. I have a theory about the bugs...every year when I come to camp I get eaten up the first 2 weeks or so...after that they usually leave me alone. I know it sounds crazy...but it's very true...I've stopped even bringing bugspray to camp, I become one with the bugs!?!? It also helps when you don't drink the juice, full of sugar, at every meal. You let all the campers drink it, they become much sweeter targets! Hmmm...anyway...

I am really appreciating the air conditioned cabin I have this year. This is my first summer here with AC...and it is so wonderful! I did spend 2 nights in a regular cabin this past week because one of the counselors had to leave for a wedding, so Clarissa and I split days and watched her cabin! It was great to get back to Honeymoon! I have also enjoyed a much quieter summer with only 2 roommates instead of 12. Not having a cabin of campers is a big change, but one that we were all (Clarissa, Katie, and I) ready for!

The campers arrived last Sunday. It is a session of about 95, which is a little small, but it is really a nice size to work with. The staff is very small this year in comparison to previous summers too. Our first 2 1/2 days with the campers was full of rain. Like I mentioned in the previous post, it's tough to have camp in the rain. It makes it very difficult when it is the first 2 days of camp. That is the time the kids need to be kept very active to get their minds away from home. Usually by day 2 or 3 they don't even think of home anymore because they are so busy and are having so much fun, but when it rains, it leaves a lot more down time! We weren't talking just some summer showers either, we were talking down pouring BUCKETS at a time. Making creeks run through camp, washing out the gravel, flooding a cabin, the laundry room, and games room, and forcing one of the local Lesterville guys to sleep at camp because he couldn't cross the creek to get back home!

The poor campers didn't get to go on the river until FRIDAY because it was so flooded! But, we are finally on the river...it is still running much quicker than normal, which is probably a good thing, it makes pontooning much more enjoyable! Pontooning is usually dreaded by the counselors because inevitably we end up pulling the whole pontoon 3/4 of the way down the river because the current isn't strong enough to get us down to our pick up point in time! It doesn't help when you have 12 campers falling/jumping off the sides and holding on to the handles slowing down the process!

Yesterday was my first day off and it was so great! A group of us traveled into the booming town of Ironton and had lunch at Bailey Joe's BBQ. It was delicious. We stopped at the Alco for some oversized water bottles to float with and at the Town and Country for some snacks and then it was off to the river. We did a big river float from Twin Rivers down to Breakfast Hole. We made lots of stops along the way because the river was moving so quickly. We got real excited about a rope swing we found at Mill Creek, but after fighting the current to make it across the river to the swing, we sadly found out the string had broken and it was too short to actually swing from. That was way too much effort for no reward! But the float was great and it was hot and sunny the whole time! We then walked back to camp, made some grilled cheese in the kitchen for dinner and headed back down to the river with our chairs, ipod, snacks, and drinks to enjoy the night! What a perfect day off!!

I am currently in the middle of rest period on Monday, I had 2 periods of tubing and 2 periods of canoeing this morning and this afternoon I have a period in the office, a creek hike and archery. Not a bad day. After dinner every night we have sports before evening program starts. One of the counselors, Nathan, made up a dance to Lady Gaga's Poker Face and a lot of the kids (and a lot of the counselors) have really gotten in to it and we've been learning/practicing every night at sports. It would be appropriately described as fabulous and sassy! I think it's a good workout too...we are all dripping sweat each night when it's over...all though that could be largely contributed to the heat and humidity! The weather so far has felt like August heat...it's a little crazy. Our dance mix for Saturday night (every Saturday at camp is a dance for evening program on the tennis courts) was titled SweatFest 2009...and it lived up to it's title, no problem!!!

And on that note the whole family is coming up to visit next weekend to stay at the Farm before they drop all the cousins off at camp for 2nd session! Bet I'm making them excited, huh? The Farm is a family house we have that is about 4 miles further down on the same rock road that camp is located. My great grandparents bought the house in the 50's or 60's, I can't remember which, and they would be caretakers for camp in the winter and then head up to the Farm in the summers!! So we still have the house and my family likes to describe it as a step up from camping...it's very rustic and there's no telling what you're going to find in there every time you go! We'll do a big float on Saturday and then probably hang by the river all day! But there isn't really any air conditioning, so sometimes the heat can get pretty intense at the Farm...but I'm sure it will be a great weekend!!

Anyway, hope everyone is having a great summer. And Andrea, if you read this at all, I've worn sunscreen EVERY day!

Later...