Camp ReC

Today seemed like a whirlwind of everything.

I woke up extra early to go running. If I wait to go running on my morning break, I'm still full from breakfast and I can't run on a full stomach, so I've found that waking up early is the way to go. Then during my morning break I got to chat with the gorgeous Anna Lovisa and lovely Mariah Phillips. It's good to hear from good friends from time to time, especially when you aren't expecting it (:

The rest of most of the day was spend in the kitchen- from 11 to 7:30. Our supervisor was sick today, so we were short in the kitchen and we definitely felt it, but in the end we pulled through. It'll be nice to have him back tomorrow, though.

The carnival went very smooth tonight, and since I was in the kitchen late, I got to play paparazzi once I was done working. I love walking around and taking pictures of the campers, so I thoroughly enjoyed myself. Here's a few pictures from tonight:

Camp ReC Session Three!!!

Well, here we are. We've begun our last session of Camp ReC. Looking back to the beginning of the summer I remember thinking "There are three sessions of Camp ReC?" It felt like it would be forever before we saw the last session. But here we are, session three. And I can tell you right now, this week is going to fly by way too fast. This is a great group of counselors and campers mixed. They have a lot of returners and high, high energy. They're going to be a really fun group to work with this next week and I cannot wait!

Going back, I spent this past weekend in Reno. My friend Ali had her birthday on the 5th and we celebrated this weekend by taking a trip to Reno. We stayed the night at the Circus Circus hotel and got to see Reno a bit while we were there even though we weren't there but less than 24 hours. There was a festival going on this past weekend there for the fourth of July, so there was lots happening. There was a chicken wings competition, lots of vendors (mostly selling typical touristy things), and live music. We weren't able to listen to the live music very long but what we heard was great! It was great getting to see and hear some good, authentic local music from a bigger city (they were really pretty good). And we went out to an authentic sushi bar for dinner and I had myself a California roll which was more than fantastic- I was thoroughly pleased with my purchase.

Other than that, I'm just looking forward to this next week- it's looking to be a good one, for sure!

July 4th 2013

Happy Independence Day, everyone!!

Here at Camp Ronald, we like to celebrate just a little. We only dress up and parade around camp and a local campsite. We've got the statue of liberty, some cheerleaders, and I had the privilege of becoming Miss America for the day! Lots of red, white, and blue here. I don't think I've celebrated July 4th quite like this before; what an afternoon!

Laundry Day

Wednesdays are my laundry days here at Camp.

And boy, am I thankful for free laundry.

I definitely don't miss paying $3.00 for a single wash and dry at school, that's for sure.

In other news...here's a few pictures I've taken recently:

July is Here!

Another week has begun. I mean, it's Tuesday, so campers have been here going on three days already, but it seems like just the beginning of the week (and in some ways it is), but I can tell you already, the rest of the summer is starting to go a lot faster and sure enough, before I know it, I'll be headed back Wisconsin and the summer will come to a close. But that's still a long ways off,...

This week we're hosting a camp called Camp StarBound. It's a group of primarily girls (50 girls and 3 boys) who rehearse dancing (contemporary, jazz, ballet, hip hop), singing, and musical theater all day preparing for a showcase which they'll preform at the end of the week. It's one of our only weeks with a group without disabilities, so the schedule looks a little bit different than other weeks will. They are constantly going and playing games and activities since they're much more mobile than some other groups. But they don't stray away from the stereo type of 50 teenage girls at camp together. Lots of high-pitched screaming, cheering, and laughing.

Thankfully this is a smaller and easier week. There's less people, so that means less food to be prepared and less dishes to be washed. But next week it'll pick right back up.

Since I've been here, I can't help but be reminded of things going on back home. It's little things here that trigger thoughts of friends of family back home, such as:

-This weekend when we went into town and went past Highland Baptist Church on our detour. My Opa (German for grandpa) pastored a Baptist Church in Highland, Illinois for several years, so I was reminded of my time I spend there.

-When I went hiking the other weekend I was reminded of observatory hill and how that was the extend of my hiking in Wisconsin. Definitely a little bit smaller (or a lot bit smaller) than the mountain I hiked here in California. Observatory Hill reminded me of Megin and Joel Worsham and the Zone Staff, as Observatory Hill is an annual staff outing. They went on that outing just this last weekend, actually.

-The sand here makes me think of the sand at home. Sand here is very coarse and rocky, whereas the sand back home is way more fine and pure. There's also lots of places where there's red sand, which I find fascinating. It reminds me of Rachel Klein, since last I knew she collected sand from different places she's visited.

-In Susanville (the town nearest to Camp) has a sign out ever Saturday that says: Free dinner, 6pm, Crossroads Ministries." At first, I was hopeful that it would have to do with my friend Jenna M., who's traveling with Crossroads around the west this summer to spread the word on pro-life, but sadly it wasn't her team. Another branch of the same (or at least similar) ministry

-Lots of the counselors for Camp Rec look a lot like friends from back home, so it's been nice to be reminded of familiar faces.

-The scenery here isn't a whole lot like Wisconsin, but whenever we travel we see lots and lots and lots of pinetrees, which I thought we had a lot back home (which we do) but not compared to here. It also doesn't help that I'm in a national forest, so there are bound to be lots of pine trees.

-California has got pinecones the size of you head (almost literally). I'm in search for the largest pinecone I can find, but right now there's one about as big as my arm. We have one at home sitting on a bookshelf in our living room, so they remind me of home, strangely enough.

Needless to say, while California is much different than Wisconsin, there's still those little things that make me feel right at home. And living with some great new friends here helps that too (:

June Review

This week I've just been thinking to myself "June is almost over, where did it go?" With that, I mark my summer being more than half way over. But it sure doesn't feel like that. I still have a lot planned for this summer. I've still got a lot to do before I go back to school this fall. I still have a lot of people to catch up with, I still have a lot to do. Plain and simple. And then I realize June ends today and I can't believe we're here already. So much has happened in the last month or two, and it just doesn't seem like I'm ready for summer to move at such a fast pace. Tomorrow July begins, and I have very high hopes. It's looking to be the best month of my summer, and I hope that's certainly true.

Last week was a very busy week for us in the kitchen. It was our largest group yet, and we're just really get the hang of things. This week is our last week through our first set of rotations. In other words, I'm doing the last of my different shifts this week. Thankfully, it will be a more relaxing week. It's called Camp StarBound, a group of students 8-18 who are here to practice their dance and show choir skills. This week the campers will not have any sort of disabilities, on of the two weeks that will happen this summer.There's about fifty girl campers and three boy campers, or so I here, which I guess makes sense since it's more of a dancing camp than anything. This week is also more laid back because they're doing most of their own programing, so they require less of us. There's no morning unit times and program staff only has to help with programing in the afternoon for a few hours. It'll be a nice week to prepare for another crazy week following this. I'm really looking forward to it.

After this week we'll begin to cycle through our shifts again, but this time it'll be a little bit different, we'll get to do more like modify our menus and be able to take more control of how the food is prepared and made. And after we cycle though our shifts again, we'll be on the last week. It seems so far away, but I know it'll creep up on us. So right now I'm looking forward to a wonderful July and another month with the friends I've made here before we depart (possibly forever) in August.


OH! And also, one last thought: yesterday on our time off we went in to town and stopped at McDonalds for lunch since we had gift cards and it was the strangest thing. We cook here with a lot o the food they have at McDonalds, so it was just weird to see cups, containers, water jugs, and other food supplies there that we see and use on a regular basis. Needless to say, a trip to McDonalds will never be the same.

All you need to know.

Here's some random facts, things that I've learned, or things that have happened while I've been in California:

First off, you should note I work on Eagle lake, which is close to Susanville, so when we 'head to town' we really mean we drive to Susanville, which is the equivalent to driving to Portage, WI back home, except there's literally NOTHING in between Camp Ronald and Susanville.

-Susanville used to be called Roopville [weird, I know.]

-There are two prisons in Susanville. And I have already visited one of them. [We had to get fingerprinted the first week for background checks.]

-For every happy meal sold in the northern Cali/nevada area, one cent is donated towards Camp Ronald McDonald.

-We're at about 5000 feet in altitude, so we have to adjust our cooking to account for the altitude sometimes, which is good practice.

-California has pinecones the size of my arm. Literally. I'm bringing home/shipping back pinecones. We have one already on our bookshelf downstairs from California, but now I'll have my own.

-Eagle Lake is the third largest lake in California, or so I've been told. The third deepest is Lake Almanor, where I have boated, sailed and camped the last two weekends.

-Northern California has the strangest weather in June. At one point in time it had hailed three out of the ten days. Some days it's 41 degrees and others, like today, it's in the 90's. 

-The mountain net door looks kinda big, kind of small, But once we climbed it, we found out you can't even see a lot of it from the ground. It keeps going. And going. And going.