We received our personalized schedule when we checked in late Friday afternoon.
Our actual room was more like two "rooms" that are connected, each with five beds (two bunks and one spare bed) and a bathroom. This year, the kids had their own room (and each had their own bunk) while the adults had our own room.
Giant walking sticks!
After dinner, the agenda for the evening was changed - last year we had had a bonfire with s'mores, but it was so hot this year that we did several science and nature games in the (indoor) education center. First up: Skins and Skulls!
The kids loved handling all of the exhibits.
Learning about Kansas wildlife. The main event for this activity was a "jeopardy" style game about Kansas wildlife. Our team totally won (I know it was supposed to be non-competitive, but try saying that to a competitive person....) ;), and were especially helped by Will and Annika's breadth of knowledge.
The next activity: CSI! We examined animal tracks to see if we could determine a chain of events. We had an animal tracking book to use as a resource - Annika LOVED this and asked if we could buy our own copy of the book to use.
Examining the three different crime scenes.
Annika, in heaven.
Saturday morning, we began the day with canoeing! Annika really wanted to go with another child and found a boy from another family who needed a partner.
She had a great time canoeing other than another canoe of boys that liked to ram into boats and declare "canoe war." Ah, camp. :)
Daniel went with Will and I and was very excited to ride in the MIDDLE.
Will and I got to paddle! Will was great at giving directions for the few times when we got a little too close to the cattails...
Next up - horseback riding! I was the only member of our family who got to rid. Only people 8 years and older could trail ride, and Annika and Will were not interested. They had corral rides available for children 7 years and younger, but Daniel opted to pass.
My horse - Don! "A Gentle Giant," according to his stall door.
All saddled up!
View in front of the trail! We were on the trail for most of the ride but got to go "off trail" and down a hill to make the ride longer.
View behind! I am not a big horse person but I think the ride was one of my favorite parts of the camp.
After lunch was an activity that filled the boys' heart with much excitement....rifle shooting.
Will stayed with Daniel but Daniel held the gun and shot it himself.
Daniel was bummed that he did not shoot as well as he wanted, but he did great shooting all by himself!
Will shot by himself too - all five bullets hit the target and three of them were in the "black."
Annika waited very patiently for archery to begin next. She loves it and was a good coach to me in explaining the instructions!
Will helped Daniel shoot in the beginning.
By the end, Daniel figured out how to shoot on his own.
Another big area of excitement....going swimming the new pool! We were the last people to swim in the old pool last September (which I think had been around since the late 1960s...).
Daniel loved the new zero-depth entry and the shallow depths at the end of the pool so he could just run around.
Another new addition - a new giant slide. It was much faster than it looks.
At the end of the pool, there are now two low-dives - the high dive where I took my first (and only) jump off of has been eliminated.
Thumbs up (in the sun).
All of the meals are included at camp and they were all very tasty. I am going to tell myself that I was not ingesting an insane amount of calories since I was always starving by the time the next meal came around. :)
Our big excitement of Saturday night was the BLANKET FORT in the kids' room that Will made.
The kids were so excited to hang out and sleep under here.
One of the best parts of the trip was discovering that some of our Bergman friends were our next-door neighbors in the cabin! Our kids loved playing with them and everyone's ages matched up really well.
Our kids' favorite part of the trip was having a SLEEPOVER together!!! Not sure how much everyone slept ;), but Will and I had a great night's sleep in our room and the kids had a blast.
After breakfast today, we headed out to trap shooting, where you can shoot clay pigeons.
Will had five shots and hit the target on all five of them!
Waiting in the wings. Interestingly, except for Annika and me (who did not shoot), every.single.person who came to this rotation was male....
Then it was Daniel's turn, and he hit the target on both of his shots!
Will helped him hold up the gun but Daniel handled the trigger all by himself. I think that this and rifle shooting put Daniel into orbit.
During our GPS game we ran into the "boys' cabins" which do not have nearly the um, amenities, as the girls' quarters...
We packed up to go home before lunch so that we could hit the road after our final meal. After fleeing from most pictures all weekend, Daniel wanted to model in his hat.
Lots of great memories at family camp this weekend....and we are all happy to have tomorrow to still relax at home before getting back to the grind!
1 comment:
What the heck? I had no idea camps like this existed...that is so cool! I'm insanely jealous. :-)
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