Our troop's weekend camping trip is now officially in the books. It was an insane amount of work, but totally worth it in the end. The girls had a fantastic time... they were very expressive of how much fun they had and the girls that I have seen at Savannah's school this week have already asked me if I will take them camping again. Does it get any better than that? I think not. Most of these girls had never gone camping before, some of them had never even been hiking or done anything outdoorsy like that. So my number one goal for this trip was to give them several different camping "traditional" camping experiences so they could see how much fun camping can be. Goal number two... for these girls to see that camping can be done without daddy or other males. The Girl Scouts theme for the 2013 year is "Girls Can Do Anything"... I am a huge believer of this sentiment. I wanted to make sure that our chaperones were moms (or other women), that the girls saw us moms setting tents up, starting fires, cooking food, leading hikes, and all that good stuff. I love that the patch they earned at the end of the trip says "Camp Like A Girl" on it. Our troop totally rocked the camping like a girl thing. We had a great time, and if I'm being honest, we looked good doing it!
The girls thought the tents were the BEST thing ever. They were immediately obsessed and excited about the idea of getting to sleep in the tent. Our entire troop (minus one girl who had to leave) successfully slept the whole night with no issues in tents. This is a huge deal for a group of six year olds who haven't spent many nights (if any) away from their parents.
My favorite activity the first day was the nature scavenger hunt that we planned for the girls. We split them up into three teams... each girl had a bag and a list of twenty things to find. They had two hours to go and explore and find the things on their list. First team to meet back at the campsite with each girls' list complete would be the winner. My little team of girls had a blast finding everything on the list. They were all so enthusiastic about each thing they found and placed in their bag.
Savannah's BFF Olivia joined our troop a few months back. Savannah and her are the sweetest little girls... they worked together on the scavenger hunt and helped each other do things. It was so awesome to see real friendship like that.
I would have to say that the girls' second favorite thing (behind the tents, of course) about our camping trip would have to be the bug catchers that I brought for them. They picked up bugs for hours and hours. At one point I had to take the bug catchers away from them just to get their attention. Who would have thought that ten little girls would be so crazy for bugs.
After we were done with the scavenger hunt we took a quick break, ate a snack, and then headed out to hear a park ranger speak about the reptiles that lived at the park we were staying at. I was so impressed with Cedar Hill State Park and the numerous FREE educational programs they offered to us. The ranger even had a snake that the girls were able to pet. Awesome.
When we got back to the campsite parents began showing up for family dinner. Since a lot of the parents were so hesitant about letting their daughter go camping without them, we offered up a time for them to come up and eat dinner with us, scope out our camping situation, and then leave. The girls roasted hotdogs over the campfire... which they thought was pretty dang cool.
Once the parents were all gone we busted out the good stuff. S'mores!! It's not camping if you don;t roast a marshmallow.
After S'mores we sat around the campfire and went around the circle telling our highs and lows of the day... then we told a few stories, read a couple camping books, and then headed off to our tents for night night.
The group shot from the weekend... me and my co-leader, our two chaperones, and our ten awesome little girls. Seriously a good day.
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