Hi Island Lake families! For all of you who joined us here at camp yesterday, I hope you had a wonderful Visiting Day with your children. I especially hope you received tons of positive feedback from your kids and their counselors while also getting to see activities that your children have been participating in all summer long.  The weather gods were working overtime so although it was hotter than usual, we all had a fantastic day with you, so thanks for coming.

Speaking of weather news, the sun was shining once again today and the temps were super warm in the mid 80’s.  Well, until around 4:15 that is.  Then I’d say we were “blessed” with rain because it’s cooling the temps off nicely. The rain didn’t last long and they were back in action shortly afterwards.

In ILC sports, our 7^th grade boys and our 9^th grade boys played in a tennis match here at home today against another Wayne County camp.  I’m excited to tell you that both teams won their matches today.  Yay!  Our ILC Open finals took place this afternoon and all of the matches are almost complete.

A reminder of the riddle from 2 days ago:  What never walks but crawls or flies, and is often killed but never dies? Answer:  Time!  Ahhhhhh, tricky, huh?  Today’s riddle:  A butcher is 5’11” tall and has a size 13 shoes.  What does he weigh?  I’m sooooo proud to announce that I immediately got this riddle correct.  It must be an easy one, huh?  That or I must have heard it in the past.

Tonight’s evening activity is a camp-wide fav:  Mr. & Ms. ILC!  This is a special one for the books.  The girls’ bunks dress up male counselors and the boys’ bunks dress up female counselors to look, act, and perform as the opposite gender.  Mr. & Ms. ILC is a light-hearted, fun pageant and quite an entertaining show for everyone involved, including our spectators.  It’s all about being in the audience to enjoy this evening activity.

Since your kids still have tons of junk in the bunk, canteen will be closed tonight.  They’ll still have the opportunity to hang out at the gym until curfew, as usual.   Don’t worry about your children’s junk food coma’s, I’m doing my best to help them eat it all in within 3 days!

Our special feature for today is actually from last night’s evening activity, Squeaky Clean.  They are a rock & roll band and they’ve been coming to Island Lake to perform for over 20 years now.  It has somehow become tradition for our campers to dress up for this show, either by dressing in a onesie or,…wait for it,…wait for it,….by dressing up in shower attire!  And by shower attire I mean bathrobes, towels, hair twirlies, etc.  I just had to grab my camera and snap some photos from this event to show you all of the silliness and fun that our campers and counselors have at this social event.  Enjoy these pics and until tomorrow, ILCUTHERE!

Happy Visiting Day everyone! We hope you all had a WONDERFUL time here at ILC today.  Lots of parents, grandparents, siblings, and friends joined us to spend the day with their campers. Today was a fantastic experience for everyone.  I loved having the opportunity to see and speak with so many of you.  It means the world to hear what a wonderful summer your children are having here at ILC.

Our annual post-Visiting Day water fight was a huge success.  This event was a great distraction for those campers who had some difficulty saying goodbye to their parents.  Hot sunny day + cold water = happy wet campers!

Tonight’s evening activity is Squeaky Clean!  They’re a rock and roll band that performs here at camp every summer on the night of Visiting Day.  Squeaky Clean covers classic rock and roll oldies but goodies such as “Stop In the Name of Love.”  We are excited to sing and dance along with them tonight in the gym.  Canteen will be closed after evening activity since there is soooooo much junk food in the bunks.   Curfews will still be at their regular time for everyone.

I just want to take a moment to thank all of you who complimented me for my blogs.  I was overwhelmed by all of your positive feedback, so thank you very much.  I’ve been attending sleep away camp since the age of 2 (I’m 25 years old in case you’re wondering,…wink wink!), so camp is truly in my blood.  I live and die for this place and I love telling you all things camp so you can feel as if you are part of the ILC family here, too.

Ok, I’ll stop getting sappy now.  I hope you all had the most fantastic, stupendous, remarkable, memorable time here at ILC today.  Until tomorrow, the start of our final week of 1st session, ILCUTHERE!

Happy “Visiting Day Eve”! We’ve been preparing for this very special day tomorrow and we anticipate that it will be fantastic for all. Please peruse yesterday’s blog for more details about tomorrow’s festivities, as well as the mass email I sent to you yesterday.

After a couple of days of rain, we’re back to sunshine and blue skies here in the 18462.  We hear many of you are experiencing a major heat wave down in the NY metropolitan area.  Although it’s definitely hotter than usual here at camp, we are not experiencing anything close to what you are.  Phew!  The forecast shows another hot day tomorrow, so keep that in mind when packing for your visit here at camp.

We had quite a few activities going on in and out of camp today.  This morning we took close to 30 campers on a tubing trip down the Delaware River.  This is always a fun trip for our water lovers.  They get to tube and chillax in the river before returning to camp later in the afternoon.  We also had a hiking trip today for our pioneering kids.  Over half a dozen campers went to Apple Grove Park, near Honesdale, PA, to go hiking and swimming in the river.  Of course this trip wouldn’t be complete without a visit to an ice cream shop before returning to camp in the late afternoon.

In ILC sports, our 9^th grade girls had a tennis match out of camp this morning.  Our 6^th  & 7^th grade boys played in a baseball game here at camp this morning, too.  We won the game 4-3.  Our ILC Open continues for tennis today as the matches prep for the semi-final and final rounds.  I’ll know very soon who the winners are and I’ll share that info with you.

Tonight’s evening activity is the amazing, fantastic, superb hypnotist, Brad Henderson!  Our campers and staff will witness Brad hypnotize about 15 of our counselors.  This is another one of our campers’ favorite evening activities. They get to watch their counselors embarrass themselves while doing hysterically funny things in front of the camp. Tonight is also ETB, Early To Bed. Once our counselors are done making fools out of themselves on stage (hardy haha!), everyone will go back to their bunks to get a good night’s rest for tomorrow’s festivities.

Today’s special feature is ROCK SHOP & FISHING!  “Rock Shop and Fishing?” you may be asking yourself.  Why would I comprise those two activities together? Simply because I happened to go to the rock shops to take photos and I saw campers fishing off of the dock down there. So hey, why not take some pictures and combine the two!?!?  I hope you can see the fish they caught, too.   Until tomorrow, when we will see many of your smiling faces here at Island Lake, ILCUTHERE!

Hi ho, hi ho, back to majors and minors we go!  Only 2 more days until Visiting Day!  Pretty wild how quickly it snuck up on us, huh?  All camp parents should have now received an email from my account regarding this Saturday’s festivities.  There will be more info about Visiting Day further below in this blog.

Today is “Dress Like Your Favorite Counselor Day”.  Our campers are having fun dressing up like their counselors, group leaders, and department heads.  It’s something exciting to do on a dreary weather day like today.

Speaking of which, on the weather front we finally received the rain that our grass has been begging for. We had misty rain all morning with temps in the 70’s and then a bit of rain on and off in the afternoon hours.

Due to the inclement weather, our inter-camp games were cancelled today.  Our 6^th  & 7^th  grade boys were supposed to play soccer out of camp and our 6^th  & 7^th  grade girls were also supposed to play soccer here at camp this afternoon.  These games will be rescheduled.  Our ILC Open tennis matches were also put on hold due to weather but do not fret, our campers still have plenty of time to play their games before the end of the session.

Saturday is approaching fast and with that comes our one and only annual Island Lake Visiting Day! (Cheers in the background…woohoo…yay!) We know you’re excited to come to camp to see your children and we’re excited to have you join us.  We will have lots of activities and exhibits going on all day, along with a huge lunch buffet.  If you prefer, you can take your children out of camp for the day.

I’m sure you’re planning to bring lots of junk food, baked goods, and sushi to shower your children with affection, so please keep in mind that we discard all of the food 2 days later. Do not bring too much that your children have to throw away lots of great homemade brownies, cookies, bagged chips, chocolate, grandma’s secret recipes, etc.  We truly hate to waste food, so don’t shlep too much up here.  We kindly ask that you do not bring anything with peanuts or tree nuts in it.

Please refrain from bringing bottled water and drinks, too.  We have amazing well water here at camp that tastes as good as bottled water. Bottled drinks will also be discarded. Do yourselves a favor and save the hassle of carrying these heavy items into camp.

Visiting Day hours are from 9:30am-3:30pm.  If you leave camp for the day, please bring your children back on time for our other annual super duper, huge, extravagant water fight!  Parents are fair game if you’re still here for the water fight so just remember, quick and speedy goodbyes are easier on your children.  We expect that some campers will be in tears so our staff will be around to help them through what’s usually just a short moment of sadness.  The water fight is a great distraction to get children through their difficult goodbyes. Please work with us and know your children are in great hands here at camp.

Here’s a reminder of Wednesday’s riddle and the answer:  If you throw me out the window, you’ll leave a grieving wife.  But leave me in the middle of the door and you might just save a life.  What am I? Answer:  the letter “n”.  Just to break it down for you, remove the “n” from “window” and you get “widow”.  Add the letter “n” to the word, “door”, and you get the word, “donor”.  Here’s today’s riddle:  I travel the world and yet I go nowhere.  I stay in a corner but journey far and near. What am I?  What do you think?  A camper spotted this riddle on an early released copy of the “Morning News” here in the office last night and he came up with the answer almost immediately. Can you do it?

Tonight’s evening activity is GROUPS!  All of the girls groups will play a big game of “Are You Smarter Than Your Counselor”. It’ll be similar to the game show on tv. On the boys side, Groups 1&2 will play Crazy Games while Groups 3&4 will have a Pool Party.  If the pool party gets rained out then the older boys will join the younger ones for crazy games.

Today’s special feature is select photos from Sky Zone yesterday.  Enjoy and until tomorrow, Visiting Day Eve, ILCUTHERE!

Hi everybody!  Today was Lazy Day and we had a busy day out of camp.  Groups 1 & 2 went to Montage Mountain outdoor waterpark and groups 3 & 4 went to Sky Zone (an indoor trampoline park).  We returned to camp just before dinner.  It rained here at camp for awhile but hey, we weren’t here for it!  We just hit some rain at the end of the day so the Montage kids weren’t too affected by it. As of 7:30 this evening, the rain seems to have let up.

Tonight we are flip flopping things around and we are having canteen first and then evening activity.  We’re showing the movie, Elf, to the whole camp in the theater as an early celebration for our Christmas in July theme day next week.

That’s really all I have to report for now.  Tomorrow I’ll post some photos that I took at Sky Zone.  I got some great action shots of our campers jumping around.  Until then, ILCUTHERE!

Hello Island Lake families! Today was yet another stellar day here in the 18462.  We woke up to mostly cloudy skies (gasp!) with temps in the 60’s but do not fret!  By early afternoon the temps warmed up to the mid 80’s.  What an amazing day to “play camp”!

But wait, I’ve got a last minute weather update.  As I’m about to post this blog, I hear some thunder in the distance.  Could we possibly be getting some rain?  We actually need it for our grass and flowers so it wouldn’t be a bad thing if we had some rain during our 3^rdminor right now.

Tomorrow is our 3^rdand last Lazy Day of the session.  Is time flying by or what?  Before you know it, it will be Saturday and many of you will be here for our big annual Visiting Day. I’ll discuss Visiting Day in much more detail in my blog in a couple of days.  Tomorrow we are going to let our campers sleep in a bit and then have big brunch consisting of eggs, home fries, bacon, sausage, fruit salad, and sticky buns. Brunch will begin at 9:30am for our older kids since they are going out of camp first.  We will take Groups 1 & 2 to Montage Mountain for a fun day at the outdoor water park.  We will take Groups 3 & 4 to Sky Zone for an exciting afternoon of jumping on trampolines.  I’m going to Sky Zone with our older campers and I’m looking forward to getting lots of steps on my Apple Watch with all the jumping I plan on doing.  (Wink wink!)

Now back to today here at ILC,…our avid golfers went out of camp this morning to a local golf course to play 9 holes.  Our mountain bikers returned from their overnight camping trip around 2:30 this afternoon.  They told me that the trip was “GREAT!”  You heard it here first ladies and gents.  The boys had an amazing time on this trip.  It was tough to get more info out of them but they all consistently told me that they had a great time.  They really enjoyed spending lots of time biking and hiking the trails and sleeping out under the stars.

Riddle time! Yesterday’s riddle was:  I have no arms or legs, but keep me warm and I’ll soon walk away.  What am I? An egg!  Congrats to Ben W. for getting this correct.  He’s 3 for 3 recently. Go Ben!  Great job, man!  Here’s today’s riddle, which is a real stumper:  If you throw me out the window, you’ll leave a grieving wife.  But leave me in the middle of the door and you might just save a life.  What am I?  Hmmmm,…any guesses?

Tonight’s evening activity is GROUPS!  Here’s a breakdown of what everyone will be doing.  All groups of girls: Lip Sync Battle down in the theater.  I’m gonna assume that I do not need to explain this evening activity in detail, correct?  On the Boys side:  Groups 1 & 2- a big game of Dodgeball;  Groups 3 & 4-  Casino Night. Just to specify once again, do not fear, as no real money will exchange hands.

Tomorrow’s blog will probably be much shorter, as I’ll only have lazy day trips to report to you about. Well, that and evening activity. I’m going to attempt to take some photos while I’m at Sky Zone, and Matt & Ricki will try to take some pics at Montage Mountain.  No promises as to whether I’ll have photos to share in tomorrow’s blog, but I’ll do my best.

Today’s special feature is SKATEPARK!  Enjoy these photos of campers skateboarding and rollerblading on our ramps and rails. Sorry that some pics do not clearly show our campers’ faces.  I tried to take action shots while also attempting to take pics showing their beautiful facades.  There’s one particular photo of a boy (wearing the “RECKLESS” shirt) spinning around, doing a 360, as he reached the top of the halfpipe.  It was soooo cool to watch in person, but it’s hard to see the amazement of it in a still image.  Sorry!  Another aspect to factor into these photos was the lighting.  I apologize for the darkness in some of the pics, but I did my bestest.  Enjoy and until Lazy Day tomorrow, ILCUTHERE!!!

Hi Island Lake families! I’m going to totally Groundhogs Day you by saying that it has been yet ANOTHER beautiful day here in Starrucca, PA.  I don’t know what happened to all of that rain we had in June but it seems to have disappeared for our campers in the month of July.  I wouldn’t mind a little nighttime rain to water our grass, yet not affect our campers’ activities.  This morning was chilly at around 60 degrees but again, it warmed up pretty quickly and we reached the upper 70’s by the afternoon hours.

Today was a very busy day for sports and out of camp trips.  We took our mountain bike enthusiasts on their first ever overnight trip to a campsite on the Delaware River.  They have mountain biking trails and hiking trails for the kids to explore. While there, our campers will also go swimming in the Delaware River.  It should be an amazing experience for our 8 boys and 2 counselors.

In sports, we had quite a few tournaments today.  Our 11^th  grade and younger girls went out of camp this morning for an all day basketball tournament.  We made it to the semi-finals and our girls fought hard. Our 9^th  grade and younger boys played a basketball game here at home this morning.  They won 44-22.  How awesome is that?!?!  Our 7^th  grade girls played in a Wayne County tennis tournament and won 3-2.  Yay!  Our 5^th  grade and younger boys participated in a tennis match out of camp this afternoon. Lastly, our 8^th  & 9^th  grade boys played in a soccer game out of camp this afternoon. They left too late for me to get their results for this blog.  We also started our tennis ILC Open here at camp once again.  It’s an in-camp tournament for all age groups, both boys and girls, and the winners will receive trophies.  I’ll list the winners for you in the blog once these challenges are complete.

Yesterday’s riddle was open to many possible answers, but I did receive a few “correct” answers according to Oliver’s list of riddles.  As a reminder, the riddle was:  What has branches but no fruit, trunk, or leaves.  The answer we were looking for was “a bank”.  Congrats to Jen W., Ben W., Adira B., Ross K., and Alexandrea W. for getting this correct.  Joe S. also had a couple of responses that I can see being correct.  He said the military or government.  I also thought the answer was government.  Here’s today’s riddle, which our camp doctor already got correct this morning at breakfast:  I have no arms or legs, but keep me warm and I’ll soon walk away.  No googling or asking Siri or Alexa people!  (Hehe!)

Our campers had so much fun at last night’s Bingo Bonanza for evening activity.  Many campers participated playing the bingo game, singing to karaoke, doing hula hoop challenges, and they received lots of Island Lake memorabilia for prizes such as the “I heart Island Lake” wristbands, ILC stickers, ILC slinkies, and more.  I also have to apologize for a typo in my previous blogs.  I recently found out that I’ve been spelling “hula hoop” incorrectly.  Who knew I would keep writing about that activity here at summer camp!

Tonight’s evening activity is Taste, Touch, and Smell for the entire camp.  The lower camp will play this interactive game in the gym and the older camp will play it in the theater.  Don’t worry, we give all of the live insects and disgusting concoctions to our counselors to eat, not our campers!  (Just kiddin’ of course!)

Today’s special feature is COOKING!  In the 1^stmajor today they made pasta from scratch.  In 2^ndmajor they made grilled cheese sandwiches. For our 3^rdmajor our sous chef, Jonathan, made a special appearance to teach our campers how to make sweet & sour sauce for chicken.  In the 1st minor they made roasted broccoli (we gotta add a healthy mix into the repertoire).  2^ndminor they made gnocchi while working on Bistro TV, which is a cooking show they’re making to post on our website when it’s complete.  In the 3^rdminor they cooked a variety of food for our kitchen staff to eat.  Enjoy and until tomorrow, ILCUTHERE!

Hey everyone!  Below is our week 2 video for your viewing pleasure.  Enjoy!

Happy Neon Day here at ILC! Today you will see pics of our campers decked out in their bright yellow, pink, green, orange, and purple, etc. clothing.  This brings back great memories from the 80’s, huh?  Today is also Sibling Photo Day so you’ll see lots of pictures on Waldo of siblings together (in neon clothing) at the picnic tables.  If we missed your children then it’s because of one of a few reasons:  A. They don’t listen to announcements in the dining room, B.  One sibling refused to be in a photo, C.   They both refuse to be in photos, D.  They don’t listen to announcements in the dining room.  (wink wink!)

Shocker, it was another beautiful sunny day here at camp.  It was a perfect Sunday Funday.  The morning started off cool in the 60’s but then it quickly warmed up to the low 70’s and we reached the mid 70’s by the afternoon hours.  We had mostly blue skies with sporatic clouds rolling through and no humidity.  Are you jealous of us up here in the mountains or what?

I hear that some of you in New York City suffered a black out yesterday evening, similar to what we went through a couple of mornings ago.  I can feel your pain and I hope you made it through the power outage without much loss of refrigerated food, air conditioning, or a J. Lo concert!

So I have a confession to make.  I lied to you about yesterday’s evening activity.   I had to lie in case any of you read the blog before a phone call with your child during rest hour.  Keep reading and you’ll understand why.  Although our evening activity started out as groups, we surprised our campers with one of their favorite evening activities of the summer,…Revival Night!  I’m sure all of our returning camp parents are familiar with what Revival is all about.  For those of you who are new to ILC, I’m going to let your children tell you all about it on Visiting Day.  Let’s just say it’s a huge Island Lake tradition that’s been going strong for 34 summers now.  Our campers love the anticipation that builds up to it and they enjoy the activity each session, summer after summer.

Yesterday’s riddles brought a variety of responses, some of which could potentially be correct. Here’s a reminder of the riddle: What is a thing that must be given before you can keep it?  The answer: your word.  Thanks to Jordan G. and Lisa A. for your responses, which I can see as a correct answer as well- “trust” and “your name”.  I have a feeling today’s riddle may also bring on a variety of answers, but here ya go:  What has branches but no fruit, trunk, or leaves?  Good luck!

Today I’m continuing my tradition of asking the oldest girls’ bunk, G24, to come to my office to blog about their summer camp experiences throughout the years. Although we have 2 bunks of girls going into 10^th grade, many of these specific girls started at ILC at a very young age and have circled around girls’ campus from bunk 1 through bunk 24.  One camper, Emily, wasn’t able to make it, but the rest of the bunk was here in my office during 1^st minor today.  Here’s what they had to say about their summers at their home away from home. They told stories and gave me quotes:

On the bunk OD sheet when we were in G2 we wrote a story about Dustin (our head counselor).  We just called him “Dustarella” for many summers. That memory stays with us. – Sami

I (Wendy) am going to tell a story that Sami still remembers like yesterday.  When she was in G4 I was riding by the girls bunks on my quad and a bunch of girls were screaming my name, “WENDY!  WENDY!”  I said, “That’s it, I’m changing my name!”  The girls asked me what my name was and for some reason I blurted out “MATILDA!”  So from then on, Sami has called me Matilda instead of Wendy.  And the humor is that during her last summer as a camper we’re putting on the show, Matilda.

“Ever since G1 we’ve had a peanut butter joke.  Right before bed at lights out we all say “peanut butter” which means “Good night! Love ya!”” –Ellie

“We make the leaning tower of chicken wings on the 4^thof July.  We pick someone’s hand as the goal height for the wings and we have to build our eaten wings that high on a plate.  We have to keep eating, and eating, and eating.  It’s become our fun tradition.” –everyone

I started camp at the young and ripe age of 6, ready and willing to take whatever was thrown at me. Unfortunately, being 6 years old, I wasn’t exactly the most mature young girl.  On the first day of camp, my first one ever, a girl in my bunk and I decided to start play fighting.  It started to get a little intense and I kicked the girl in the shoulder! Luckily, Wendy understood that I was still very young and also knew both of my siblings so she let it slide.  But to this day, people (mainly just my family but people, nonetheless) still know me as the little girl who kicked someone in the shoulder.  –Ellie wrote this down to share with all of you

“Fink (Rachel Finkelstein) started out as our CIT and then became our counselor for 4 summers.  Even though she hasn’t been our counselor for 2 years, she still comes to visit on July 4^thjust to see us.  We formed a bond with her and whenever we see her we can just pick up where we left off.  We all still feel very close to her.” -everybody, especially Gia

“Last year in G21 when we went bowling for lazy day we bought this plastic mermaid set.  It’s a little mermaid with a pink tail and pink hair. She came with fish friends.  For some reason she became a bunk daughter or bunk pet to us and we named her “Whiteasha”.  It was from the laser tag names.  All of her fish friends, we named them from laser tag names too that were so bizarre.  We still have her in a flamingo float cup holder.  She just chills with us all day.”  –Phoebe

“Throughout the years I’ve managed to make friends not just in my bunk, but in other bunks around me. I know that in the future they’ll stay some of my best friends forever.” –Ellie

“I like camp because it gives me opportunities to try things I never would.  Camp is a way for me to get away from home.  If it wasn’t for Island Lake I wouldn’t be able to go sailing or kayaking.  Camp is my summer vacation.  ILC has taught me independence.” –Teddie

“My mom and I were talking about how long I’ve been at camp.  It’s been 7 years and 7 weeks each year, which turns into almost a year of my life, a chunk of time.  It’s really shaped my life and who I am today because of the people here and all the things I can do.” –Sami

“I haven’t been here as long as everyone else in this bunk, so even though it’s only my 6th year, I’m kinda different here than I am at home, all in a good way.  I can be a different person and there are so many opportunities here and it doesn’t all have to be serious.”  -Phoebe

“Yeah, you can walk around with a kangaroo onesie with Crocs and carry around a pineapple floatie and people will be like, yeah, that’s normal!”  -Teddie

“Although I try to be my true self at all times, camp allows for me to be an even truer version of myself and gives me the freedom to do and be whatever I want.” –Ellie

“Honestly, sometimes the most fun times at camp can be the most simplest of things.  It can be sitting in the gym on a rainy day or just sitting at the lake with my friends.  Just sitting and having conversations with my friends:  it’s the people here who make it special.”  –Phoebe

“For the last 9 years, camp has always been my happy place.  It has always allowed me to be myself and form friendships with people and I know it will last forever.  My whole family is here so it allows me to not only spend time with my real family but also my camp family.” –Ellie

“This camp has basically been my life.  I’ve been here for 13 years because my mom is a camp nurse.  Staff kid!  It’s great getting to meet new people every year and getting to see my friends that I don’t get to see during the year because I live so far away (New Orleans).  This is my second home.”  -Gia

Tonight’s evening activity is Bingo Bonanza for the whole camp.  They will play a huge game of Bingo and include interludes of karaoke, dance challenges, hoola hooping, and more.  Sounds fun and I’m definitely going to attend.

Today’s special feature is the G24 girls writing this blog with me.  Enjoy and until tomorrow, ILCUTHERE!

Hello Island Lake families! I hope you’re all enjoying your weekend. Here at camp all of our days are the same, so we had another successful day of majors and minors.  Our weather started off cool (about 60 degrees when we woke up for breakfast this morning) and cloudy and by 1^stmajor the sun broke through the clouds and the temps warmed up.  We ended up having an absolutely beautiful sunny day with the temps reaching 80 degrees.

Our campers on the river trip returned this morning after a fun day of canoeing and kayaking down the Delaware River and then camping out overnight.  Our pioneering children also camped out last night up at Tent City. 16 campers, 10 boys and 6 girls, hiked up to Tent City after evening activity.  Earlier in the day they had pitched their tents, 1 for the boys and 1 for the girls, so it was ready for them when they arrived last night.  The boys built a big fire and all of our “campers” (get it?  They are camping and they are campers so therefore they are a double entendre of “campers”.  Ahhh, sometimes my puns go over even my own head!) enjoyed s’mores in the night time hours. They played card games in their tents until it was time to go to sleep.  At breakfast this morning they reported back to me that they had a great time. One boy even slept on a hammock!

Today was a busy day with sporting events for our ILC’ers.  This morning our 8^th  & 9^th  grade girls played in a tennis tournament here at camp and we won.  Yay!!!  We also had boys and girls of different age groups go out of camp for a big tennis tournament at another Wayne County camp.  Our 4^th  & 5^th  grade boys went out of camp for a baseball game this morning, too.  If I don’t mention whether we won or lost it’s because I wasn’t able to find out the results prior to posting this blog.

Shockingly, no one emailed me his or her guesses as to why we lots power yesterday!  I guess it’ll go into the “unknown” file.  Here’s today’s realriddle for you:  What is a thing that must be given before you can keep it?  I’m proud to say that for once, I actually got this answer correct!!!

Last night’s Luau was a hit! Our campers had fun with the slip & slide, water balloon toss (sorry, I missed getting any photos of it), tiki drinks, limbo, hoola hooping, and bubble making.  I took tons of photos and although you’ve probably seen many of these on Waldo, I’m posting a bunch of them as today’s special feature.

Tonight’s evening activity is GROUPS!  Here’s a breakdown of what everyone is doing:  GIRLS- all groups are going to participate in the game, “Are You Smarter Than Your Group Leader”.  BOYS- Groups 1 & 2- Kong Pong;  Groups 3 & 4- Campfire.

Okey dokey, that’s it for now.  Enjoy all of the Luau photos below and until tomorrow when we’ll Groundhogs Day this all over again, ILCUTHERE!!!