Monday, April 30, 2018

Session One Down, ONE Session To Go!

It's true! A few lucky campers just snagged our last available bunks for our first week of the summer, meaning that:



Meaning that our only open week of Camp for all of Summer 2018 is:



Meaning that for Session #2, we have less than one cabin of bunks for males, and one cabin of bunks for females remaining!

Of course, as you know, all that means that if you or anyone you know-at-all is still hoping to join us around the campfire in Stokes Forest in the Summer of 2018, clear your schedule for July 9th-14th and sign up now!






 




Friday, April 27, 2018

Making The Best Better: Canoe-nity Garden!

We've said it before, and we'll say it again:

We think 4-H Camp is the best!
And what do you do with the best?

You try to make it better.

And we're trying to make the entrance to Camp just a little bit better with our new:




For years one of the most popular requests for a new feature here at 4-H Camp was a gardening program, and Camp is coming through in the "campiest" way possible...with our brand-new "Canoe-nity Garden." 


We're re-purposing some of our aged,

Leaky,

No longer-lake-worthy vessels, 


And turning them into garden planters!




This new centerpiece of Camp will serve as a great welcome/farewell site near the entrance to the facility, as well as an exciting laboratory for our gardening classes, and to provide the opportunity to supply 4-H Camp-grown vegetables, fruits, and herbs to our Dining Hall kitchen. 

And here's the best part: we need your help (the whole community) to make the Canoe-nity Garden happen!

We've already got a great team working together to make this garden a reality:

-Scotts Lawn Care Company is donating all the organic soil and natural plant-feed we'll need for the whole project.
-Lowes of Newton has donated all the lumber we'll be using for the fence.

-Dreamscape Designs is once again helping with their construction and landscaping expertise.



Cause we aren't the only ones who will love the Canoe-nity Garden!



The wildlife of Stokes Forest will most likely ALSO love the Canoe-nity Garden.



And thus (with the help of Dreamscape Designs), we're building a fence!



A big ol' fence.

-The Sussex County 4-H Summer Blossoms are doing the designing and the planting, and we're getting help and guidance from the Rutgers Master Gardener Program and 4-H groups across the state.


Here's just a few of the creative...





And innovative...






Garden designs the 4-H Summer Blossoms have come up with.

- And YOU! You can help in two ways:

1) We've got a Canoe-nity Garden Work Weekend coming up! NEXT WEEKEND. Saturday, May 5th from 12pm-5pm will be a "fence" day and Sunday from 1pm-5pm we will start to place and fill the canoes! Let us know you'll be joining on our facebook event page.

2) Our Campfire Council (4-H Camp's volunteer alumni group) is running a crowd sourced, community fundraiser looking for small financial contributions to help put the finishing touches together! (If you/your business/group/whoever are looking to make a larger gift, we're also running our Cabin #9 Renovation Fundraiser.)

Visit our Campfire Council's GoFundMe Page to give! The impetus, passion, and drive for this project has come from our Camp community, so any amount, big or small, that the community has to give will help us have this Canoe-nity garden up and growing for Summer 2018!

So please, donate now! It's how we can all help to make the best better.

Tuesday, April 24, 2018

And Then There Were TWO...

Yes, there go another TWO, TWO more all done, Down another TWO, TWO more bite the dust because... 



AND


Sessions 5 and 6 are now SOLD-OUT.

And yes, your math is correct, TWO is the number of the day, because with these TWO sold-out sessions, we are down to only TWO open weeks of 4-H Camp for Summer 2018!

August and the second half of July are all filled up with campers ready for summer fun, but we still have a few bunks remaining at the beginning of the summer, so if you'd like to kick your summer vacation off right, join us in early July for...

Session #1:




Or Session #2:



The bunks for these sessions are going fast as well (and now that they're the only ones available, they're bound to go FASTER), so if you're looking to join us, join us again, or refer a new camper our way for '18, you know the drill: sign up ASAP! Get them before they accompany our other sessions red-stamped in gray scale.

And for those of you already signed up for all of our sold-out sessions: 

THANK YOU. 

A filled up week means more excitement, more fun, more new friends, and more of everything 4-H Camp. We're thrilled to have these weeks full earlier in the year than ever before, and like everything else in our Camp Community, we of course couldn't do it without you. 




Monday, April 23, 2018

There's Sunshine at Camp! There's More Staff to Meet!

Yes, the sunshine means it must be spring and spring means it soon will be summer, and if it soon will be summer then it soon will be summer camp, and if it will soon be summer camp, we better meet some more of the 4-H Camp's Summer Staff of 2018!

Staff just like our brand-new Recreation Counselor from across the ocean...



Staff like our new Waterfront Counselor from this side of the ocean...


Staff like our can't-wait-to-get-back-to-Camp returning Recreation Counselor...


And of course, staff like our ALWAYS HERE Logistics Director...


Monday, April 16, 2018

Start your week out right! Meet some more of the Staff of 2018!


We are excited to kick-off this installment with our brand-new ASSISTANT SUMMER DIRECTOR...




Proving that great minds think exactly alike, we've got our NEW Waterfront Counselor...



And proving that other great minds think DIFFERENTLY, we've got our new Recreation Counselor...



And you can spot a pattern! If in this post we already introduced Nelson, Natalie, and Noah you know that it only makes sense if...Julia is next. So finally meet this year's returning to Camp but brand-new Recreation Coordinator...









Thursday, April 12, 2018

Making the Best Better: Bathhouse Renovations!

(If you missed Part I of our Making the Best Better renovations for Summer 2018, check out the cabin renovations here! We already have a handful of bunks sponsored in our fundraiser, and if you/your group/organization/business/whatever-really would like to get involved, your help goes a LONG way. But anyway, back to this post:)

As you know, we think 4-H Camp is the best!

But the best is only the best because we work to make the best better, and right now we're working to make our beloved ol' old (that's right, two olds) Whitehouse Bathrooms better!




Yes, Joe has been toiling away all winter long to improve our rustic central Camp bathhouse in numerous ways.


Ways like...


New sinks!


And new counters!

Yes, water resistant...



Put your stuff on here...


Rustic counters.




A technological revolution for the Camp bathroom.





Ways like...


A generally new wood-lined, sturdy look!


(Some of these renovations had previously started on the girl's side, and the boy's side is catching up.) What did the boys side used to look like?


This.


It used to look like this.


And finally ways like...


Ways like...


Wait for it.


Wait for it.

All right, you've all waited long enough.

Ways like...

FOUR MORE SHOWERS.

Yes, you read that right!







FOUR. MORE. NEW. SHOWERS.



Now, instead of six showers to be utilized for a cabin of 16 campers in the evening....

We'll have TEN. TEN showers on each side of the Whitehouse. (This is not the finished product. They're still a work in progress.)

That's over 60 percent more showers!

By T-Nivi's math (the best kind of math their is) that is going to add an average of TWO MINUTES to the possible duration of each camper shower!

Let's not kid ourselves!

The Camp showers will still be quick showers in a Camp bathhouse!

But they'll be slightly less quick showers in a slightly nicer Camp bathhouse.

And that's what we call making the best better.