July 4, 2025
Hello CR
I thought you might like to see camp and the lake behind me. And, I want to give you an update of what we have been focusing on here at camp for the first week and a half.
The overarching theme that I think camp provides for kids is this ability to do hard things, and in order to do that they need to have flexibility. We show this with a demonstration of cooked spaghetti. If we give kids (and staff!) a piece of uncooked spaghetti and we ask them to put it in a shape (a square or circle), it just breaks. That represents a temper tantrum, being angry, hurt feelings, crying…all the things that we do when we react to uncertainty, not getting what we want, or those situations that don’t go our way. Then we give them a piece of cooked spaghetti, with the same instructions, and of course it is much easier because it is flexible. That is what we want kids (and ourselves) to do - to be able to roll with the punches…while practicing the values we have at camp.
The first week we practiced empathy..and flexibility. We had three days of a heat wave, and the air conditioning in the dining hall broke! So, we had to be very flexibile - we were eating outside because it was so hot in the dining hall; kids had to be really empathetic because when you’re hot and tired, and you’re away from home, and it’s the first week of camp, and you’re missing home, and everybody is getting used to each other…and we’re forming our community…it is tough! The girls were incredibly kind - and when they were not, which happens, they were empathetic in figuring out how they could repair those relationships, and what they wanted to do, and our staff were there to help them with that.
The other thing that tested our flexibility was for those girls in the riding program. We had cases of equine flu amongst our horses. We had to quarantine horses, our staff were working round the clock caring for the horses, and the riding program was distrupted - girls maybe didn’t get to ride the horse they hoped for, or maybe didn’t get to ride at all! The girls were incredibly flexible!
We talked all week about being cooked spaghetti, and how well they were doing. They showed incredible empathy for the horses, for each other, and for the staff who were taking care of the horses. It was really impressive; you should feel really proud of your girls. Luckily, the air conditioning got fixed (just in time for the cooler weather)! And then, breakout happened…which they had a lot of fun with! Our staff put on an incredible breakout for the girls.
This week we have been focusing on respect. This morning while we were doing our power pose, which we do every morning (I like to do a power pose for two reasons: to help each individual recognize the power they have in themselves, with deep breaths and grounding into the earth, realizing that they area so capable of doing hard things. But also, doing it together - taking these 2 big deep breaths all together and collectively thinking about who we want to be…it is a powerful moment as a community that says “these are the people around me who can help me be the person I want to be.”) Like I mentioned, last we we spoke about empathy, this week we focused on respect. We just had our first trip day, and as we were talking about respect we were talking about what it means to be respectful when we are out in the community…being respectful of people using the same spaces we are using, and of the people operating those places, and of course being kind and respectful towards our counselors and each other.
It was very exciting that after trip day we got to share with our campers how many comments we got from bus drivers, and from the people who operate the places we went to, of how respectful, thoughtful and kind our girls were. So, another proud moment for me as a camp director and for you as family and friends of our CR community.