Monday: What Others Are Feeling

Welcome to our first full day of overnight camp!

This morning was warm and sunny, perfect weather for our very first Polar Bear Plunge! This is an ongoing tradition at camp where any willing campers and counselors jump into cold water first thing every morning in pursuit of their Silver and Golden Polar Bear badges for their braids! After that, we got ready for another amazing day.

For breakfast we had pancakes with whipped cream and strawberries, sausages, and fruit. During breakfast, our Kangaroo Court box was opened, and campers began writing ballots for crimes against camp they had seen committed by counsellors! After breakfast, we headed into our 2:6 groups and got ready to play our first Camp Wide Game: Human Tracker!  In this game, a few “trackers” try to catch all the “humans” hiding in the trees. It’s like a fun mix of hide and seek and tag!

After a quick snack we got back together to split up for our social skill of the day. Our social skill today was What Others are Feeling, where we talked about how, especially as we get older, we have to have tougher conversations like advocating for our needs, resolving conflict or calling in sick to work, and how paying attention to others' feelings can help us respectfully communicate more effectively. We also played fun games like Night at the Museum and Blindfolded Partner Puzzles!

After social skill, it was time for lunch: chicken club sandwiches and veggies! By the end of lunch, we were all super tired so we headed back to our cabins for a rest hour before our choice blocks.

For choice today, we got to choose two activities from rock climbing, archery and slime campaign, where campers make posters campaigning for counsellors to get slimed in Kangaroo Court! After choice, we had some free time where we visited the horses, played basketball and cooled down with some water games!

For dinner we had spaghetti bolognese, garlic bread and Caesar salad! Then we had our evening camp wide game: Capture the Flag! Afterwards we finished our day with Steps in the Right Direction and got ready for bed.

We can’t wait for what tomorrow brings, and we hope it’ll be just as good as today!