He Loves the Gym!

Six Flags

One of the things on our SUMMER FUN list was a day at Six Flags.  So the kids called a friend and we headed down.   It was a beautiful day, no crowd ... just lots of fun!

[ Ben and his friend kind of did their own thing and took silly pictures like this when I asked 

... really?, he just does this to torture me! ]

Always love the swing rides!

Sam really wanted to win some prizes at these ridiculous carnival games - so we tried a few, but 'surprise' he didn't score anything big!

 Cirque Dreams Splashtastic

[Sam may be performing with these guys soon ;)]

 The bigs favorite new ride!

Still a fun kiddie ride!

All in all a very FUN day!

Girls Camp Tradition

The Fish Hook Charm Necklace...

In this area there is tradition of making each girl a "Fish Hook Charm Necklace" their first year of Girls Camp.   Then throughout the years the girls collect charms and add them to their necklaces.  There is usually a camp theme charm, a level charm, and then charms for accomplishments like a getting a bullseye at the archery or rifle range, doing the polar bear swim, caper awards, and not whining about things :)

I love it!

One of the ladies up at camp with me this year had hers from when she was a girl!  It was so neat to see what a lasting and fun tradition these necklaces are.

The great thing is they are super easy and pretty inexpensive to make.

You need 2 packages of Mustad brass snap swivel hooks (ours are size 10) .  These open, kind of like a safety pin, and you just connect them all together (end to end).  Whala! you have a charm necklace.
Since they open like that it is super easy to attach the charms!

Here are some of the charms Susie got her first year at camp:
a Binkie for not whining,
bandaids for certification,
a plate for doing capers,
a peacock for their ward theme,
a beehive for her age group, etc.

Here are a few that we made for this year ...

And then a few of Susie's favorites this year:
a polar bear for the polar bear swim,
a shoe because she finished the hike with a twisted ankle,
a flag because she was a 2 level and they were in charge of all the flag ceremonies.

The options for charms are endless - there are lots and lots of sites selling them and lots of different ideas for making them yourself!

Girls Camp Crafts

When I was first called as a Stake Girls Camp Assistant Director I scoured pinterest and blogs for ideas ... it has been years since I went to girls camp!    I knew then that I wanted to try to post the ideas that worked for us for all the other camp leaders out there!

We had a craft director, so I didn't have to do any of the work on these.   She and her group of YCL's (youth camp leaders) decided on the crafts, bought supplies, prepped them, and taught them to the girls at camp.  They did an awesome job!

Here is our craft shack - where all the crafting at camp took place!

[we even got our bishopric in on a little crafting ;)]

...and here are the crafts!

 [there is a great tutorial for knitting jersey here ]

These three things were very popular, girls were wearing them all week - they caught on to it quickly and made several!  I think I will use this craft at our fall Girl Scout Camp.

These were made out of laminate samples, paper scraps and embellishments (initials, camp logo, flowers, etc.) and stuck together with modpodged 

 [Both of these ideas were originally found here]

Both of these were also very fun.  

I liked that our theme could be incorporated in the necklace using the word aim or creating an arrow.  It took a bit of patience, but lots of the girls were able to make some really cute ones - it was helpful to have lots of examples, and paper for the girls to sketch out their word or design before they started actually bending the wire.

Aim High!

I am finally feeling recovered enough to edit pictures and blog about Girls Camp.

Just like Taylor's song '22'  it was "miserable and magical in the best way!"  In fact we (the Stake Camp Leaders) welcomed the girls to camp with our own version of '22' - our version was '42' in honor of my birthday and our ages.  Yep, started off camp embarrassing Susie-Q and continued that later in the evening with our synchronized swimming skit ... lol!  Hopefully she has recovered by now!
Here is a clip of that skit ...

Here are 3 of my favorite things about camp this year...

The COPE COURSE

(COPE = challenging outdoor personal experience)

It was amazing to watch Susie and the girls tackle these elements with strength and bravery ... and to see their confidence in themselves grow and to watch them become closer as groups.   Awesome!

 Multi-vine Traverse

 Milk Crate Climbing

 The Confidence Pole

Night Zip line

This activity is reserved for the level 5 and 6 year girls - Since I was over the level 5 girls I got to get in on the action!

SCRIPTURE STUDY

Each day the entire camp gathered for 15 minutes of scripture study @ the pavilion.  We had purchased a pocket size Book of Mormon for each girl with our (the Stake Camp Leaders) testimony in it.  We also had these incredible booklets to go along with our theme each day - they were full of scripture references, quotes, pictures, and personal progress challenges - they were like a printed out pinterest board and the girls really loved them.

A copy of the book is available through the links below - it is not editable.  I am also including the clip art we used for the cover (second link) - we lost our original cover, but you can use the clip art to create your own with the current year and camp etc.  

Good luck!

click here for a pdf of book &clip art

THE GIRLS

Watching them have fun and feel the spirit made all of the work and worry worth it!

Roseville 5th Ward

Me and Susie

Friends

Our YCL's

Last week ...

Clark and his kids came up to visit.   I warned them all that it was HOT here ... like 111, 108 ... but they came anyway and we had fun swimming, boating, going to the movie and celebrating the 4th of July with them!

 These girls think they are dolphins ;)

 Master and student ... does this count as 'hot yoga'?

Boating at Camp Farr West Lake

Happy 4th of July!

 Playing with sparklers!

 Our official firework master