Leia Rose at PINE CREST DAY CAMP!!!

ORIENTATION (6/14)
On Saturday Mamma and Leia attended Pine Crest Day Camp Orientation (PCDC's Meet-Your-Counselor Day). Leia Rose was THRILLED to actually be in the auditorium experiencing a taste of the morning show!
The theme of Pine Crest this year is "The Fabulous Fifties" because Pine Crest Day Camp turns 50 years old this year! Can you believe that?!? A day camp that's FIFTY years old?!? And GUESS WHAT, Leia Rose's Auntie April painted the entire back drop!!! What an artist!
I can see why PCDC doesn't want the little kindergartners in the auditorium for the morning show each day. Even my confident Leia Rose was a bit intimidated. : ) They had the parents come up on stage to play musical chairs. (I volunteered, but wasn't chosen.) One guy even BROKE a chair! Ha!
Then it was time to meet Leia Rose's counselors! Here is Leia's senior counselor named Chloe and Leia's junior counselor named Hallie. I heard from multiple people today that Chloe was GREAT! (And I wondered if Leia was put in this cabin on purpose.) ; ) I told the counselors that there were two important things for them to know about Leia Rose. Number One: Leia lives far away and would only be at camp for a week. Number Two: That we would make sure to give them a tip for their great services, even though we're not supposed to. ; ) (Okay, that last one was probably horrible to do, but I was a counselor there for almost 10 years, and I just wish I KNEW if I would get any extra money from these kids. PCDC is a great camp, but they don't pay their counselors well enough. And that's the truth. It's kind of the same situation as Disney World. Everyone WANTS to work there, so they don't HAVE to pay well. Poor counselors!) Both of these things, I hoped, would insure that Leia would receive honor camper at the end of the week. A VERY great honor to get on the first week of camp because it means that you're the best of the bunch.
Here is Leia Rose outside of the auditorium, a PCDC landmark even when I began in fourth grade. ; )
And here is the inside of Leia Rose's cabin! A DVD player inside I see. Hmmm, . . .

And the outside of Leia's cabin. She's in KF2.
Then it was time to find Karen Dunne and give her a special Cookie Bouquet as a thank you gift. It was Karen, who was the assistant director when I was at camp and now the director when Leia was at camp, that made it possible for Leia Rose to attend for only one week (usually children have to pay for either three or four, one of the two sessions). At one point Karen said to Leia Rose, "Gosh, you are so cute! Do you even KNOW how cute you are?!?" : )
Then we had to visit the Lower Pool. Look! It's even covered now! (That's new!)
And another PCDC landmark: the lake! If you look close, you can see the zipline going across the fountain! (Leia Rose wanted to ride the zipline so badly! Oh how I wish she was scheduled for it that first week. She wasn't.) : (

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FIRST DAY OF CAMP (6/16)

Here are a couple of pictures of Leia's first day at camp. Check out her cool Lands End sneakers with breathable sides!!! I didn't want this poor kid to worry about socks, for goodness sake (and she's not allowed to wear sandals or crocs). And her bracelets have particular meanings: the orange one with yellow suns means she's a kindergartner and the green one means she goes to "62nd street pickup" and has all of her info like her name and cabin number (KF2, which just means Kindergarden Female 2nd cabin). And check out that cool camp bag from grandma! It was even personalized with "Leia Rose" on the front!!!
Here she is greeted at the car by one of the counselors (of which I had that job of opening doors too) who would soon become one of Leia's biggest fans!
And after her first day, just look at how expressive Leia was in describing everything!
And she laughed so hard when we said, "What did you have for lunch today, Leia?" "Pizza!" "Pizza?!?" "Why, what are we having for dinner tonight?" "Pizza!!!" "Ha, ha, ha!"
Today Leia Rose came home with a poodle named "ballet." : ) She had lower arts and crafts today, pool, cookie crafts, two snacks (including a new favorite item called a "chipwich" which "Mamma, was two cookies with ice cream in the middle!"), lunch, and game gazer.
Here are some other things she came home with this week: a zipper pull from going to "beads," and two key chains from going to "shrinky dinks." (I'm getting that home-made kitty one, by the way!) And Leia was VERY adamant about putting these on her camp bag. ; ) Other activities this week: capture the flag, treasure box, dance fever, morning show, assembly, etc. But Leia's FAVORITE activity of all was magic. ; ) "Because the guy was so silly. Because he told us he was silly, . . . and he even put the rubber chicken in 'time out.' Ha! And also he did a polka dot bag trick and used the wrong bag that was striped and zig-zagged. The bag went into 'time out' too. Ha!" ; )

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LEIA'S PICTURES OF PCDC (6/20)

On the last day of camp, I gave Leia Rose a disposable camera to take pictures. Leia has wanted a child's digital camera for SO long. This was a fun trial run! And I learned SO much from the pictures she took!

First, it was just so great to see pictures of the kids and counselors in the cabin! Today was "country western" day, hence the hats, bandannas, horses and things.
Hmmm, then there was the poster of Hanna Montana. Do kids this young actually watch that?
And High School Musical Two. Are they watching that as well? I suppose here is a good place to mention questionable activities that weren't quite bad enough for me to call the office, but bad enough for me to say "Hmmmmmmm" and give a disapproving look to my mom. ; ) First of all, they ALREADY started watching a movie on the first day. They began with 101 dalmatians. But by the end of the week, they were already watching a movie about a "big baby who marched around and stomped on things" later she told me it was called "Baby Genius," and one that is PG: "Home Alone"!?! Oh my gosh! I NEVER would have let her seen those yet!!! (Home Alone is really violent, . . . that kind of violence that makes Leia Rose not want to watch anymore.) AND they played "Graveyard" every day. Um, I was a counselor there for almost 10 years. I know what Graveyard is used for. It's when the counselors are sick and tired of the kids and want them to shut up, so they say, "Okay, let's play graveyard. Everyone lay on their towel and see who can be the quietest. The quietest kid wins!" Hmmmmmm. On the first DAY they're tired of them? Yikes!

Here's a funny one. "I wanted to take this just in case I ever needed to spell 'boys.'" Ha!

The counselors named their cabin "The Jitterbugs" because every cabin HAD to be named for the theme of the summer (IE the 50s). Leia had suggested "The Precious Kitties," and if she had JUST asked for "The Precious Poodles." *sigh* She was pretty disappointed when they didn't pick her idea. ; )

And since they were "The Jitterbugs" they began singing cheers in the hallway and made little "jitterbugs" to decorate their cabin.

Here are some balloons that the "magic" guy made for them. Leia was especially beholden to the flower laying on its side (for Leia "Rose"). ; )

Here is where they played "Capture the Flag."
"Oh, I just took this picture for fun."

And here is the friend we had been hearing about all week: Rose! Leia couldn't believe that there was another girl in her cabin named Rose. ; ) I'm afraid Rose cried every single day, though. : ( She missed her Mamma, I suppose.
And here are Leia's counselors from left to right: Hallie (JC Junior Counselor), Sam (CIT Counselor In Training), Mandy (CIS Camper In Service), and Chloe (SC Senior Counselor).

And here is Leia Rose's kindergarten cabin: KF2!!! The only children that Leia Rose knew the names of were Rose and Natalie (top middle). Ha!
And whoever took this picture I thank SOOOOO much!!!! Leia Rose actually got to take part in the assembly today with the whole camp watching! She played pin the tail on the cow! ; )

And, yep, Leia Rose got honor camper! Congratulations, Leia Rose! And, boy, did that ribbon look beat up by the end of the day! She loved that sucker!!! ; )

And one last funny thing, on the way home from Pine Crest on the last day, we saw a store that made us both laugh hysterically!