It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… on the 23rd we began the Christmas season by drawing names for the camp-wide Will of the Wisp gift giving tradition at lunch. Christmas in July is one of the best traditions at camp. Everyone receives a Will of the Wisp, or W.O.T.W. for short, and anonymously gives gifts until the identity is revealed Christmas night. Everyone excitedly drew names and began planning and giving that very night.
On that Tuesday night, the Buffs and the Greens had a Team Sing for the evening activity. This was simultaneously to wait out the rain and so that the teams could have some extra Songfest Practice and sing some favorite team songs.
Christmas Eve was a busy day, not only did people spend the day crafting in the Beehive, singing Christmas carols to each other’s W.O.T.W.’s and preparing final gifts, it was also Picture Day and the 3rd Honor Meet! No better way to get into the Christmas spirit than to put on your whites bright and early for flag raising and spend the morning posing for photos with camp and your cabin! All of the pictures turned out so cute and it was fun to think of creative locations and poses for the cabin photos.
The 3rd Honor Meet honored Juniors Hadley Lewis and Ritchie Barnard, and Seniors Eliza Hark, Isabel Barnes, and Scarlet Tucker. The winner of the past 10 days was the Buff Team! This was the first time that the Buffs won an Honor Meet this season so Finley Haas, Buff Team Captain, carried the torch for the first time alongside the Sponsor, Sarah Nelson, and the Honor Campers.
After quickly getting through camper awards everyone ran back to their cabins to change into their christmas pajamas and went to West Lodge for the beautiful telling of the Velveteen Rabbit story. Each year the counselors read this story that describes a boy’s love for his velveteen Rabbit toy and through this the rabbit’s becoming real. It is a longstanding tradition and we closed out the night singing Christmas songs by candlelight.
Instead of waking to the bell on Christmas morning, the Junior Counselors awoke all the campers with water guns and Christmas cheer. Everyone headed to flag raising in their Christmas gear and enjoyed the traditional cinnamon rolls for breakfast in a decorated Feedbag. Throughout the day, campers finished up their final gifts, continued to give small gifts in anticipation for a reveal, and played Christmas themed games in all their activities. At night, everyone met in West Lodge for the final gift giving and cabin by cabin each person went up to reveal themselves to their W.O.T.W.. We ended in a friendship circle with the person we gave to on our right and the person who gave to us on our left. I love seeing all the small and big circles of who had each other and everyone’s final gifts were so beautiful and creative.
The day after Christmas was full of the joy of finding out who had who and what people gifted as mostly people keep their W.O.T.W. a secret. Everyone in the musical had All-Day-Play where instead of going to their classes they spent the day rehearsing in preparation for the musical performance on Saturday night. At night the teams played Junior Wiffle-ball, however due to the rain it was cut short and will be continued another day. Week five of camp was as busy as ever but the spirits are high leading into the last week of the 98th camping season!
