Back From Camp

Spark camp was Friday night. We stayed at a local museum. It's quite small, and they are really glad to work with Guiding groups.

I went to the gym on Friday morning, then went out and bought the groceries. Instead of bringing them home, I stopped by and dropped them off at the museum.

Because the girls are so young, we do a mother/daughter camp. Everyone was supposed to arrive at 6 on Friday, so one of my co-leaders and I met back at the museum at 5:30 to get organized. We had ordered pizza, and it arrived promptly at 5:45.

The museum staff had planned a program running from 6:30 - 8. They took the girls on a tour of the museum, had them draw pictures of famous Canadian women, and helped them make beaded bracelets.

Since we weren't running the program, I left shortly before 6 to go to my boxing class. If we had been organizing the program, I would have stayed, but it seemed silly to miss my class to sit around and watch.

I made it back by 8:15. When I got there, everyone was outside making ice cream (and running around). We came back in and ate our snack. By the time we got the beds up and ready, it was well after nine, so the girls went right to bed.

At that point, one of the other leaders helped me get the breakfast in the slow cooker.

We started with 1/2 a package of frozen hash browns. We cubed a pound of cooked ham and put 1/3 of it on top of the hash browns. Next, we sprinkled it with dried diced onions, then put shredded cheese on top. We repeated these layers two more times. Next, we beat a dozen eggs with a cup of milk and poured it on top of the layers, then we turned the slow cooker on low and let it do its thing. It was really tasty.

When we got up in the morning, we packed up the beds, had breakfast, and then made buildings out of boxes and jars covered in construction paper. Each girl made one or more buildings, and then we combined them to make a city.

After that, we went outside to play some games, and then we made smores over a milk carton oven.

To make a milk carton oven, you take a 1 litre milk carton (500 ml would actually work better, but I never have those), cut a slit down it lengthwise, then put in 4 charcoal briquettes and a couple of fire starters. You then cover the whole thing in foil. When you go to use it, you open the foil (and use it to protect the ground), light the fire starters, and let them light the briquettes.

The girls had a good time, but the briquettes were slow to start (as they often are), and the marshmallows kept freezing. Oh well.

The nice part is that I was home before noon on Saturday. I had time to take a nap in the afternoon, and I have all day today free.

Of course, the nap was necessary because I was tired and I was going to Guys and Dolls in Concert at the NAC last night. I enjoyed the show - I wasn't really sure what to expect, but it was basically the regular play, but some parts were read out of binders. (I think that's what it was - I haven't actually seen the musical otherwise.)

(Oh, and I put my green bin out for the first time on Friday. It was properly lined with newspaper, and didn't have a lot of wet waste, so it shouldn't be frozen - and yet it wasn't emptied.)