Not Back To School Camp 2011, Day 7.

YOUTUBE!

Hello! I am terribly sorry that I have been so lazy about writing. I have been....well lazy about writing. ;) And it doesn't help that FaceBook, and YouTube are SO distracting.

This is Day 7 (the last day) of Not Back To School Camp. :)

I woke up and sat in the sun while listening to Matt and Robert  talk about chess.  Jake and Galen came over and our conversation quickly changed into a conversation about food. Again. I think we were talking about a turducken at some point. And then we were talking about all the great food we have eaten while at camp. And then we talked about some of the best food we have ever eaten. Food is a very popular subject for teenagers.

The breakfast bell rang and all the talk about food had made us all very hungry. We had pancakes, sausage, oatmeal, fruit, cereal, eggs. They made Gluten-free blueberry pancakes and they were really good. I sat with Jules, Tilke, Danielle, and some other people (Sorry! I can't remember). Jules was VERY tired. Like a sleepy zombie tired. It was rather funny watching him try to keep his eyes open. At some point Tilke bumped the table and it moved a bit. Jules was very upset (not really) that Tilke had moved his elbows without his consent and grumbled about it for the rest of the morning. It was hilarious!

Singing.
by Dandy

We all went over to Uncle Dell's for a big group meeting and talked for a bit and hung out. Once we were done talking we walked over to the big fallen tree and took a huge group picture. It was lots of fun to get everyone set up. we took one of just the staff and they made loads of silly faces. Afterward we had a little bit of free time before Advisee meeting to pack. The day was warming up and I was still bundled up from the cold morning, so I walked back to my cabin and changed clothes (I changed back into the clothes that I was wearing when I got to camp.) and packed a bit.  Then we went to the last Advisee meeting. I braided my hair with my feather necklace

We did this thing, where you write your name on a piece of paper and pass it to the next person and then you get a piece of paper from the person next to you. And then you spend a few minutes writing what you like about that person and then pass it to the next person. and by the end everyone has a piece of paper with such nice lovely notes on it that you get to take home a read whenever you want. I just re-read mine and it made me feel so happy *big smile* Reading it instanly brings back all the love you feel while you camp!  I can't wait to see those people again next year!

Right as we were about to finish, Evan's group ran up and asked us if we wanted to help them capture Blake with a parachute. So we all tip-toed/ran to the back of the cabin where Blake's group was, and burst through the door and grabbed Blake and wrapped him up in the parachute. We were all laughing so hard, it was awesome. :)
After meeting I went down to the swings and talked with Matt and Galen for a bit, until I went to finish packing. It was fun to pack with all the other girls in my cabin. I didn't have TOO much to do, cause I tried to keep most of my stuff in my suitcase (though it all needed re-folding ;) ) When the bell rang, I went to Abbi's Yoga workshop and did a lot of stretching! I was still slightly sore from dancing like crazy for several hours at prom (and I was VERY sore the next day). I really like doing Yoga with Abbi. She's fun!

Everyone grouped together in front of the Lodge and we split up into groups to go clean out different parts of camp. The cabins, Uncle Dell's, bathrooms, and other buildings.  My group went to clean out the arts and crafts building which was full of GLITTER! We swept out the cabin and then, awkwardly, moved a table out of the cabin.

the Waterfall.
by Dandy

 We had Pizza that night and it was REALLY good.  I had a hilarious conversation with Ian, and Matthew.
Jake, Galen, Danielle, and I went to walk the Labyrinth after dinner, and for some reason, we all started talking with a British accent. It was so much fun, and it was amazing walking the Labyrinth. Almost magical, if you will. We walked over and listened to the river.(if I had known how loud the river was there, I would have gone over there more often during the week).

We went over to Uncle Dell's and I sat next the Ian, Jake and Danielle, and we talked and danced a little to the music that was playing while we waited for the night meeting to start.

We circled up and did a Spiral dance into Uncle Dell's and we all thanked everyone who helped make camp work this year. The Staff, Greg and Eva for the wonderful food, and everyone for adding a little something to the week. Then a few of the graduating campers gave a speech. Then we lined up with everyone facing someone and went around so that everyone got to hug everyone else. I couldn't actually hug anyone because I was sick, but I just crossed my arms and smiled at people as we went by.  Then we hung out for a bit, and a few people came over and gave me a hug anyway, which was so nice.

Jamming.
By Ellie

Right before we were about to leave, Matthew stood up and asked if his Fairy God Parent would tell them who they were so he could thank them. I jumped up with him and asked who mine was as well. Then I hoped down and Danielle stood up and said that as one last gift to her Fairy god child if everyone would speak with a funny accent to her (me!). I was very surprised and gave her a HUGE hug, and then I spent pretty much the rest of the night talking with my attempted British accent. At one point I had been talking with my fake accent for so long it was hard to stop. I freaked out for a second that I couldn't go back to normal.

I stayed up till 2:00am that night. I spent a long time talking with Matt, and Danielle. I sat by the camp fire for a bit, and played a few board games, before I was so tired Iwas almost falling asleep at the table. I lost my PJs in my suitcase and I was too tired to find them in the dark so I went to sleep in my clothes and I was asleep in less than 30 seconds.
I woke up pretty early the next morning and was one of the few people who looked somewhat rested. First thing I did after checking in on everyone else who stayed up was go to the swings and swing for a bit. Then I went and brought my suitcase and bags out, and ran back over to the swings. Talked and played until I saw Dad walking up and then I ran over and gave him a huge hug. I showed him where my suitcase was, and then we all met up in the Lodge for the goodbye meeting. It was a little sad to be leaving, but I was happy to be going home to see Mom. I gave SO many people huge hugs, and drove off with Dad waving, and yelling Goodbye!

And THAT is (finally)  one of the BEST weeks EVER! I can hardly wait for next year! I hoped you enjoyed my (very late) posts. :) I enjoyed writing them!



~Rhanna

Not Back To School Camp 2011, Day 6.

Hello! I'm back to write about day 6. The 2nd to last day of camp

hanging out at the Swings.
By Dandy.

I got up that morning to find Matt, Robert, Ian, Arden, Jake, and Galen at the swings talking about near-death experiences (such a cheery topic). So I sat in one of the chairs there and listened to them talk while I woke up a bit more. I don't really have any near-death experiences, thank goodness. I've been in one car crash, so I told them about that. I felt like a concerned mother listening to these boys talk about how many times they almost died. Lol! Though I do think we ended up talking about food again in the end...hahaha!

Jules on the Silks.
By Ellie.

Abbi came over and did some yoga then she was playing on her aerial silks and she let me, Matt, and Jules try them. I couldn't pull myself up very high but it was still fun. Jules was awesome! He got up so high and did a few tricks.  The breakfast bell rang so we all went for breakfast. I was babysitting Yared again while I ate breakfast. He was very excited to see me that morning because "we had so much fun last night." So we ate breakfast together, then walked down to Uncle Dell's for morning meeting. I don't have very many notes about this morning so I can't give too much detail. Sorry!

Went to Advisee group and after that we all met up in Uncle Dell's for the trust circle debriefing. We split up into groups, then we talked about Trust Circle a bit more. Why we made the statements that we did, or what we thought about it all and what we were feeling. It was nice I think. We all had lunch and during Siesta and I called Mom and talked to her for a bit and told her about Trust circle and what had happened since I last called her.

Picking the music for Prom.
By Ellie.

 Abbi was selling perfume that she makes. I smelled lots of them and then I bought one! I bought her Floral mix which smells lovely and I was very happy that the first perfume that I bought was from Not-Back-To-School-Camp! I was short two dollars so when I saw dad next I asked for a bit more money. And I saw that Dandy was selling his patches and he had a cool patch that said "I 'heart' 'bicycle'", but I was out of money so I traded him one of my needle-felted pumpkins for a patch, which is really cool!

Then we had workshops. I went to Abbi's aerial silks workshop and tried the silks again. Didn't get too far but it was still lots of fun.  Abbi and I walked over to Uncle Dell's for the women's meeting and I let her try one of my PB cookies, which she loved.
During women's meeting we talked about body image and why we wear make-up and how it makes us feel and stuff like that. It was very interesting, but I had to leave about halfway through to go finish up my work-trade. The day before the other work-traders had taken apart an old shed and now we just had to move the wood and stuff from the wheelbarrows into a trailer. It wasn't too hard besides watching out for nails and splinters (nobody got any splinters don't worry). It took three of us to lift up this old water pump. It was  incredibly heavy but we did it! And then there was just one thing left at the bottom of the wheelbarrow: Fiberglass. So we got a big black garbage bag and put it on the front of the wheelbarrow and dumped it all into the bag, while breathing into our arms. I like to call fiberglass the "wool of doom"

Retta painting my face.
By Elena. 

Anyway after we finished doing that I walked back over to Uncle Dell's and Danielle was having Serena paint her face, so I sat down and was waiting for her to be done so she could do mine, when Retta offered to do mine. So we sat there and had our faces painted. It was amazing sitting there with a bunch of other girls painting our faces. I swear, I could do that every single day. It was amazingly fun!

We had Pizza for dinner that night, and they made a very good GF-DF pizza. It kinda tasted like polenta with pizza topping. Interesting, but still good. I sat with Jake and Danielle and we had a lovely talk (about what though I cannot remember. Probably about prom and we might have talked about Dumbledore at some point...)

Playing Tether-ball.
By Cierra.

There was a short break after dinner but before nighttime meeting so we where hanging out at the swings, while Alex and Arden played a HILARIOUS game of tether ball. Alex and Arden were smack talking while they played and there was a good sized crowd watching them and laughing. They played for a bit more then left and the rest of the crowd was just hanging out and we were talking and laughing, when all the sudden Ben comes racing down the hill in this crazy outfit. he runs, then dives into the hammock and pulls it tight around him and Cierra and I, have our mouths hanging open going "what just happened" so we run over and try to pull the hammock off but Ben won't let us, so we let him go and he races off again. It's was strangely hilarious.

We all left to go to nighttime meeting and the last talent show. Somehow we ended up singing Frosty the Snowman, which not many people knew the words too. So it started out and everyone was singing loud and happy and then we got to the part after "Frosty the Snowman" and it trailed off and failed. It was rather funny, but fun. We had a quick break before the Talent show. Alex and Matt (I think) were playing more Tether ball. As I was walking back I heard Ellie trying to remember all the lyrics to Frosty and I sang along with her and helped her (I hope I helped her) remember. Then we had the Talent show:

Emily was MC and she did a lovely job and she had a little information about each act that was coming up which made the whole thing sound very fancy, I think.

The Magic Show

Robby had a magic show! He needed three people from the audience to help whim with his trick. He also needed blindfolds, which he forgot to bring so some people threw their sweatshirts at him. So Robby, Blake, Matt, and Emily all had sweatshirts on their heads. And of course Robby couldn't see because he had a sweatshirt tied to his head, had to have Matt S. help him turn to the audience or to the table where he was doing his card trick. And the whole time Blake, Matt, and Emily are doing goofy things and everyone in the room was laughing so hard they had tears coming down their faces, I'm sure. Robby's card trick did work, and it was amazing! He had Blake, Matt, and Emily each pick a card (with shuffling in between each time they picked one) and he had them write down what card they got. And in the end they all had the same card (I think it was a 9 of Spades). I call it the BEST magic show ever!

Elena, Joel, and Josh.

Josh, Joel, and Elena played two amazing songs on guitar, Elena's chello and they sung. It was fantastic! Then Ellie sang Frosty the Snowman, the right way. and Retta did a beautiful dance.

Body Painting.
By Elena.

Then we had 45 minutes to get dressed and ready for prom.  I thought that was a lot of time, and I thought it would take me 5 minutes to get ready. It didn't. It took me more like 30 minutes to get ready. I ran up and put my dress and cloak (I think I scared a few people with my big cloak. I mean a dark figure swooping around and running towards you in the dark. a little scary if you didn't know it was me.) and then I was talking with all the other girls while they got ready. I was going to walk down to Uncle Dell's by myself, while they went to the bathroom to do make-up, but I stepped outside and I couldn't see anything. So I walked with them to the bathroom, borrowed someone's hair brush and gave my hair a quick brush, then walked over to Uncle Dell's where a few people were already hanging out waiting for the Prom committee to open the doors. Blake (who was being D.J.) turned on some music and everybody on the porch cheered and we started dancing, though it was hard because the porch was rather crowded now. I started speaking with a British accent to Jake, Galen and Ian (and they adopted accents too) because I was so excited. Lol!

Homemade Disco lights.

I ran over to the Lodge and a few other people were still getting their faces painted and getting ready. Matt had the idea to put different colors of paint in the water pitchers and then he put them on a table in Uncle Dell's and flashed a flashlight through them so they kind of looked like diso lights. It was a cool idea.

Mr. DJ Blake

 We waited in front of Uncle Dell's for a while until they turned all the lights off and opened the doors. The committee people had little flashlights and they guided us to one side of the room, then turned off the lights and it was totally dark. The excitement was building! Then they turned on the Christmas lights on the floor which they had shaped to look like a runway and everyone, one by one walked down the runway showing off their outfits, while a few people stood in front and took everyone's picture. Then we all were on the other side of the room, taking pictures until everyone had shown off their outfit. The Mr. D.J. Blake turned the music on. It was so loud and you could FEEL the music! It was incredible! Everyone cheered and we all started dancing and laughing and smiling and a few people who knew the lyrics to the songs were singing along.

Dancing!

I have never danced so carefree in a room with so many other people before. It was awesome. Jumping, twisting, hands up in the air, it was so much fun. I quickly took my cloak off. It got pretty warm in there. They played 4 or 5 fast dance songs then a slower song that was good for dancing with someone. I partner danced with a few people. Danielle, Panda, Sage, Matt, Arden, Ellie Tilke, and Blake. We danced fast and hard for like an hour and half I think.

Lots of people know the lyrics to almost all the songs, but there was only one song that I knew all the lyrics to: Love Shack by the B 52s. That was one of the songs that I brought. When that came on I was so excited and I tried to sing a long with it even though I had lost my voice. Jake knew the lyrics too so we danced and sang Love Shack together. Pure awesomeness. It was so much fun!

At some point Matt fell asleep. I don't know how he could sleep, it was all so exciting. He reminded me of Thane. He used to fall asleep in the funnest places. I put my cloak on top of him then went back to dancing. At around 1:00am Blake said we could dance for half an hour longer then prom would be over. So he played some slower songs since everyone was getting really tired. By that time there weren't hardly as many people in there as there were when we started. I was almost falling asleep. I wrapped myself up in my cloak and was sitting in a chair listening to music and watching a few other people dance. Then at 1:30am when it was over, I went to bed a crashed.

And That was day 6 and the BEST prom/dance EVER! :D