The Phantom Strikes!
It was just another normal day at Camp Huawni as we raised the flag this morning….or was it?? As we normally do, we invited cabins to come up at flag raising to share any special music they might have to sing for all of camp. As usual, Pine Top volunteered to sing their Birdie Song. Midway through, the epic Chicken Train rang out over the PA…and Play Day Day Day began!!! Sometimes we will use more subtle tactics to surprise the Campers, but today we just did it old school…right in the middle of Flag Raising. Campers ended up scattering all over campus, including to the gaga pit. We also had a little surprise for Boys Camp as we announced at breakfast that they would be joining in on the Playday morning events. As usual, Campers competed on 4 different teams for Playday, including the Egg Toss, Pie in the Eye (Augie H. hit a perfect 5/5 in his pie throw), Sponge Relay, and Ice Water on the counselor’s back. Here are the sights from Play Day Day Day Day Session 4!
Fishing on a Tuesday Night
Last night we hosted Campers for the famous, famous, MOST FAMOUS Fishing on a Tuesday Night. Cambodia (the secret location where we cut our cane fishing poles) was visited once again as we tied and bobbed 86 fishing lines for our Session 4 Campers! Once again Huawni Pond reaped big dividends in the water for our Campers. Mark G. caught his first Huawni fish, and Brooke F. caught multiple lunkers as the fish were biting all night. As I’ve mentioned before this summer, the fish are getting bigger and you could see it noticeably on the end of each cane pole that pulled one in. We also hosted the Counselor chubby bunny championships, as our winning staffer held 32 marshmallows! We finished Huawni Pond with another Sing Song. Here’s the setlist from last night:
- Froggie Went a Courtin
- Wicked Twisted Road
- Brothers
- Wagon Wheel
- Long Black Veil
- The Camp Song
Mid Session Letters
This morning during staff meeting our Counselors took some time to reflect on their time spent thus far with their cabin campers. They all wrote what we call Mid-Session Letters to each parent. Parents…be on the lookout for these precious memories! What are mid-session letters? A few years ago at a Camp Party in Fort Worth at the Mayfield home Cristy Cox Mayfield showed us her mid-session letters as a Camper back from the 80’s. Until this moment, I didn’t even know mid-session letters existed. Back then, Directors and Counselors would send parents an update midway through the session about how their children were doing at Camp. This sparked the idea to bring them back, and for the last few years we’ve continued this tradition. In fact, we copied the original template and tried our best to keep them as identical as possible. Kudos to Cristy and the Mayfield clan for helping bring back this tradition! We are excited for our Session 4 parents to hear from their child’s cabin Counselors and think you will be equally, if not even more, encouraged!
Huawni Uprising
The other big surprise today was that Girls Camp got to jump in on Huawni Uprising. This is generally a Boys Camp special activity, but since the boys got to do Playday events with the girls, we returned the favor. Campers are currently out at the OC/Archery area playing a massive game of Huawni Uprising. Uprising is a large game of Capture the Flag albeit in the woods. Pine cones are ammo, and medicine women and men can revive Campers once they get hit. We also have some ice-cold dinosaur eggs ready to be eaten at the halfway point of Uprising.
Homesick Update
Thus far we only have one known case of homesickness, and this one Camper is doing well. Maybe it’s due to the fact that we have nearly a 2:1 Camper to Counselor ratio this session, but all in all we are having very little issues with homesickness. Generally the first week is the hardest for our first-time sleepaway camp Campers, but so far so good!
Session 4 is rolling along smoothly…we will keep you updated!!
