Fifth Year of Girls Camp - Spruces

One of my institute teachers once asked my class what kept us active in the church when we were teenagers. My first response was “girls camp.” When I was 16 I went to church every week because I wanted to help plan girls camp. I knew that if I was active in the church I would be able to give lots of input on what we did at camp and I wanted camp to be awesome. In the months leading up to my fifth year of girls camp my church attendance paid off. I was given many responsibilities and was able to make my 5th year of camp the best yet.

One reason I had so many responsibilities was that I was now one of the oldest active girls in my ward's Young Women' group. Hope, Jill, and Teresa were 3 years older than me and they had all graduated into Relief Society. Of the four girls my age I was the only one who was both active and interested in camping. Ashley and Felicia came to Wednesday night activities, but they usually didn't come on Sundays. Elizabeth was active in the church, but not interested in camping. So that left me to be the main one that helped plan camp.

My friend Teresa P was the camp director that year. She was 19 and had gone to camp every year with me. I'd known her since I was in second grade and we got along really well. She was just fine with me helping plan camp. My mom was the young women president of our ward so she was helping with camp too. The other leaders were Chris D, Peggy R, Myra W, and Brenda T. All of them had been to camp with me before.

This was the year I became a Junior Counselor, or JC. In other years all the JCs from the stake camped together in their own area. They would help with Stake activities like certification and devotionals. They always seemed to be so cool. This year the stake decided that the JCs would stay with their own wards.

The stake leaders made a lot of changes to the camp traditions. The new Stake Camp Director, Diane P, wanted everyone to focus on the basics of camp. The year before their had been 3 different themes for camp. “Stand as a Witness” was the official theme. There was a secondary theme of, “Christmas in July” - which included a Christmas Tree for each ward. And because we were at a lake there was a “Beach Luau” theme complete with paper mache pigs and palm trees. This year the only theme was “Reduce and Simplify.”

“Reduce and Simplify” meant that a lot of the camp add ons that had built up over the past several years were not going to happen this year. No one was putting together a camp song book, or camp T-shirts. There wouldn't be a 4th year overnight camp. Leaders were told to plan simple meals and simple activities.

I thought the year before had been a bit of an overkill so “Reduce and Simplify” made perfect sense to me. It was fun to plan simple things to do during camp. For example, since we weren't having a camp T-shirt we decided to make bandanas instead. My mom and I bought several yard of green material and I sewed enough bandanas for each girl. I even used the free style embroidery setting on the sewing machine to embroider each girl's name onto her bandana.

Bandanas weren't the only things I was in charge of. I somehow became in charge of the Secret Sister gift exchange list. In the weeks leading up to camp I made sure every girl had a questionnaire that asked her things like her favorite color, animal, and flower. Then I collected the questionnaire from each girl and handed them out to their secret sister. It sounds easy but it was hard to keep track of who had a questionnaire, who needed to turn one in, and who had the questionnaire for the girl they were assigned. Some how I got it all together and I was in charge of Secret Sister assignments for the next several years.

One day before camp Teresa and I sat down and made the tent assignments. It is impossible to make everyone happy when making tent assignments, but we tried. I think we allowed the girls to pick one buddy and then we assigned everyone from there. My buddy was my best friend Ashley. She'd been in my ward since the boundaries were rearranged in seventh grade, but this would be her first year of camp. I was so excited. We shared a tent with Felicia W and Mindy L.
The year before we had had a chart that listed out what members of each tent were assigned to do for preparing or cleaning up after a meal. That chart was such an improvement over prior years where we didn't have any assignments or accountability. Teresa let me make another chart for this year. Each tent was assigned a meal to help prepare and a meal to help clean up each day. A leader was also assigned to make sure the girls from that tent helped.

I really wanted this year to be a good year for everyone. I typed up a camp pledge that read: “As a member of the 5th Ward Young Women Girls Camp Group, I promise to be respectful to the leaders and other girls. I will not disrupt camp activities, be inconsiderate of people or their belongings, or knowingly break the camp rules. I promise to try my hardest to have a positive attitude and enjoy camp life. I will be a friend to everyone in our group and try to include everyone in my activities. I will work with the leaders and other girls to make this a successful camp with great memories for everyone involved.” All 17 girls signed the pledge. They also all signed a flag that I made.

Here is a story that I thought happened before my fifth year of camp. But once I started writing it I realized that it had to have happened before my third year. Since I forgot to tell it with that blog post I will tell it with this one. That summer my 3 sisters and I all shared one bedroom. We had two bunk beds that were close to each other with an aisle between them. I slept on the bottom of one and Hillary slept on the top. The night before camp we all went to sleep. Hillary woke me up by crying and pushing on my legs. She couldn't remember how she got on the floor. Her hands and legs were scratched and her head was banged up. Lindsey and I figured that she must have fallen off the bed. We tried to wake up my parents, but they though we were just goofing off and so they told us to go to sleep. Luckily, we had been practicing our First Aid Training for camp certification. We treated Hillary for shock, checked her for a concussion, and bandaged up her hands. We couldn't do anything about her eye though. She had a black eye the next day. By the time we came home from camp it was a sickly yellow.

Camp finally started on July 10th 2001 – almost exactly 10 years ago. Camp was held at the group campsite at the Spruces campground up Big Cottonwood Canyon. Two years earlier we had all been at a nearby campground. It had rained that year so we were prepared for rain this year. My first year of camp had been the year of the Great Flood so every subsequent year we brought buckets for our stuff. This year was no exception. We'd spent a weekday night before tent decorating our buckets. Mine was red this year. At camp we made sure each tent had a tart under it. One tent that we borrowed from some ward members was known to leak. So that tent had a tarp under it and over it. The girls in that tent weren't taking any chances so they even put some clear painting drop clothes under and over their sleeping bags. It looked like saran wrap. Their sleeping bags were all lined up in a neat row and they looked like pop tarts. So we nicknamed that tent the pop tart tent.

The afternoon of the first day of camp Chris D led us all through a certification activity. It was a treasure hunt. We were the Fair Maidens of Camp-o-lot. We were given a task to do like tie some knots or something. We had to do that before we could get a clue that would lead us to the next task. It was fun and it took us a while to get through the whole thing.

Chris made sure we had lots of things to do so we wouldn't get bored. She brought lots of craft supplies. Keeping with the camp-o-lot theme she decorated the canopy that the supplies were under like a castle. I think we even made cone shaped princess hats. That's not all we made though. One day we were talking about possible pranks we would do if we were allowed to do pranks. (Pranks were outlawed as part of “Reduce and Simplify.”) Someone said that it would be funny to run a bra up the flag pole. We talked about where we could get a bra without stealing one from anyone’s stuff. Someone suggested we could make a bra. That's all the encouragement my sister Lindsey needed. She can make anything out of paper and so she sat down and started making a paper bra. Soon most of the other girls were in on the fun. For some reason I didn't make a paper bra. I think I went and took a nap. I was always sneaking naps because I had mono but I didn't know I had it. Next thing I knew everyone had a paper bra. I'm not sure but I think everyone wore them to flag ceremony that night. Lindsey's bra was the best though. She even made it with adjustable straps.

Lindsey also helped with another memorable creation. She and Brittany T (who has told me for years that she never gets credit for helping with this) made a huge hammock out of all the rope that was around for knot tying certification. Everyone in the ward worked on the hammock, but it was Lindsey and Brittany that stayed with it the whole time. When it was done all 17 of us girls could squish onto it and swing. Usually only 4 or 5 girls were on it at a time. We named the little clump of trees that it was in Sleep-o-lot. It's where I would sneak off to and take my naps.

My sister Emily was also at camp this year. Unfortunately I can't remember anything specific about her being there. I just know she was. It's the same way with my mom. I know she was there, but I can't remember her being there.

I do remember the singing, and singing, and more singing. We'd had another huge group of second and third year girls go to Ockcrest. They all came back singing crazy songs. One of our favorites was the Funky Chicken Song. It went like this:

Let me see your funky chicken!
What's that you say?
I say let me see your funky chicken!
What's that you say?
I say bonk bonk bonk bonk
bonk bonk bonk bonk.

There were lots of verses with different things like Charly Brown, Cheerleader, and so on. We added our own verses for each girl. Mine was “I want to be the leader.” The only other one I remember was Stephanie D's. It was, “Where are the boys?”

We sang constantly. The 16th ward was next to us and I know we drove them crazy with our singing. A few months later our stake was split in two and the 16th ward went into the other stake. They were not sad to see us go. Another ward that was glad to be rid of us when the stake split was the 4th ward. There had been bad blood between us ever since my third year when we hid their supply tent and they retaliated by taking our flag. This year we had a little frog mascot named Bob that Lindsey P loved. Some how the 4th ward got a hold of it and brought all the bad blood back to the surface. I don't remember all the specifics of what happened (I was probably asleep) but I do know that it was good we never went to camp with the 4th ward again.

When it was time for dinner everyone did what the chart told them to. We had brought up huge totes that were full of camp gear. These gray totes had been really useful the previous year. However, this year we didn't even open them. Instead we asked Peggy for everything. She'd brought her RV and parked it right next to where we prepared dinner. If we needed a stirring spoon it was much easier to ask Peggy to go get her's than it was to root thought all the totes.

We went on a hike to Doughnut Falls on the third day of camp. The whole way there and back we sang songs. We sang the Jelly Fish Song, and Boomba Chicky Chicky Boomba, and O Helana. On the way back from the waterfall we all had to go to the bathroom really bad to we changed O Helana to O Biffy.

That night was visitors night. We played games and had a testimony meeting. At one point everyone else was off doing something else. Ashley and I were left alone sitting on a cooler. I don't know what caused it but we came down with the worst case of giggles ever! I think I was laughing so hard I fell off the cooler. It's one of my favorite memories with Ashley.

That night lots of girls decided to stay up talking in my tent. I think there were about 12 girls in one tent. I of course fell right asleep, but I remember feeling very crowded in that tent.
Camp had gone really well right up until the last day of camp. The last day was always the hardest because everyone was tired and dirty and in no mood to work. But we all had to work to take down the tents and clean up. There were a few temper flare ups and I think everyone was glad to go home. It wasn't until the next year that we figured out how to have a good last day of camp.

My 5th year of camp was my favorite year up to that point. It was a good year because I helped plan it. Besides Teresa I was the only other person in our ward that had gone to camp with the 5th ward for 5 consecutive years. (Myra and Felicia had been in the 11th ward during my first year) If I am ever in charge of camp I will make sure to ask the JC age girls for their input and help. They are the ones who know what has and has not worked in years prior.