look who is back

I wish I had the time and energy to blog about the rest of camp, maybe one day I will do, there is literally just so, so much that happened that I could possibly talk about that I could go on forever!

The last few weeks went by really past, I got a lot closer to some people, and further away from others. The thing with camp is that at the start everyone is all shiny and happy and excited, by the end you have spent 9 weeks with people, enduring bonding, bitching, hook ups, break ups, people being either very helpful or very unhelpful with the amount of work they do. It all becomes pretty insane!

The last few days were pretty awesome, we made pancakes on the night we put up the art show. We had an icing tube to put the batter out and make pancakes in the shape of human organs, faces, spongebob squarepants-they were pretty hilarious!

The last day we all put camp away as a team, yay for team bonding! This involved lots of production line style putting away of chairs and dining hall benches. Art staff then had to clear the FAB for the staff party that evening. I went to buttermilk falls with a few people beforehand for some beers so by the time we turned up I was tipsy and finding it all very surreal. Seeing your place of work, where you have been teaching kids for 9 weeks, full of all the staff, boxes of pizza, wine boxes and kegs, with everyone drinking and dancing around-pretty damn strange!

Travelling after camp was awesome, I met up with a lot of people in New York after 2 weeks of travel. Was good to see everyone after a break to see what everyone had been getting up to and how they were finding real life. 

I flew home feeling a little bit sad, I had been homesick and kindof exhausted for a lot of the travelling but when I actually had to go I no longer wanted to. I had the most wonderful 12 weeks, there were times when being in the bubble drove me slightly crazy, but I loved it all the same, so, so many good memories and good people whom I already miss and want all my friends to meet!

I am now sat in my new room back at uni, wearing my bear hat (which got many comments at camp, and kept my head very warm when sat outside the bunk on duty). The last few days have been strange, I came back a little nervous about what this year would have in store. I found it hard to sort my head out and move on from things since camp was so, so far away from real life and the people I am with back here.

I think I have changed a little, I feel louder here, I feel like I want to make friends with and be nice to everyone, whereas before I was a little more shy of people. It is probably a good thing because I am social secretary for trampolining this year, and whilst I won't be standing on a chair to introduce myself as Josie Illustration anymore, I will have to get to know and be friendly to everyone :) 

This was going to be a post about how I just installed Spotify and how awesome it is, I got sidetracked. But anyway, Yellow Ostrich are becoming my absolute favourite band right now, perfect catchy, fun, room cleaning and course work music haha.

Now gonna get some sleep before sports and societies fair tomorrow, gonna be walking around for 6 hours in a leotard hassling the freshers. Apparently last year they all just got drunk, figure I may join in with that. Tipsy rambling about how much fun it is to bounce around will definitely get people involved, plus we have goody bags!

Peace out my lovelies x

FAB day off

So, the camp decided to try something different for our days off this week. They shut the fine arts building entirely so we could all have our day off together so that every station could be open for the rest of the week. This meant the entire FAB crew were off together so we all made plans to hang out for the whole day.

We started going for breakfast at the diner... well, we went to the diner, decided it would be too long to wait and then drove to 3 other places (none of which did breakfast) before going back to the diner-bit of a fail but the food was amazing and totally worth it! Eggs on toast here make me a ridiculous level of happy :)

We then went and bought food and booze from stewarts, $2.99 for 6 cans and $2 frozen cocktails in bags, oh and goldfish crackers and cookies, i cant have a day off without buying goldfish crackers!

A few of our crew knew a path through the woods to a lower part of buttermilk falls where the water is stopped by 3 massive boulders so you can swim and chill out, it is really quiet and gorgeous. I do like the other area too but it was really nice to have a place all to ourselves.

We chilled out there for a few hours drinking cocktails out of bags like the classy people we are and having some beers in the lake. I took my big camera so got some gorgeous photos, we ended up taking some model like shots for shits and giggles since the scenery was so gorgeous and Kevn and Meg both have awesome 80s hair! 

We then all went to Megs holiday home which is about 40 mins away from camp. We cooked up some gorgeous food and had key lime pie for dessert before curling up on the sofas to watch Harry Potter. I fell asleep for a bit and then we had to drive back to camp, seriously did not want to leave! But still, amaaazing day, I do love the FAB crew!

halfway through woop

So as of.. wednesday i think, we are now halfway through camp! It is going crazy fast right now, I am having a great time, but I am starting to feel like the end is just gonna creep up on me!

Second session brought much louder, more mature girls than last session. We just had friday night talent night and four of our girls performed, 3 sang and one did stand up comedy-they were all insanely brilliant!

As far as teaching this session goes, I have had some kids do some really good work, but I feel like I am running out of time to get them doing more. This is mainly to do with the peanut pals project! Peanut Pals is kindof like secret santa but in the summer. You take a peanut with a name in it, and you have to make that persons life good for the next 3 days. This could mean getting someone to take them hot chocolate, giving them candy from canteen, or making something for them in the FAB.

I have been running "peanut pals postcards" for the past two days and I swear if I see another drawing of a dancing peanut with arms and legs I may scream... My desk has been overrun with crazy children leaving half done peanut pal drawings everywhere and leaving no space for the couple who actually want to do good work which is making me sad, its all over tomorrow thank god, I am excited to get back to actual teaching!

I also really want to run some figure drawing classes but I have caught a bug that is going round camp and barely have a voice right now which sucks for telling off kids and trying to teach large groups. I really hope I can run a session next week so I can emulate Dean and get really excited about drawing and make them use some crazy materials.

Last weekend was pretty epic. My day off was on the saturday and my friend drives.We went to the diner in Long Lake for breakfast which was probably my best meal here, hadn't had properly done eggs or toast for 5 weeks! We then took a trip to buttermilk falls, a picnic site with a river to swim in and rocks to lie out on. We sat around with some beers and jumped in the river lots, it it a pretty magical looking place :)

Sunday we had zombie day, each sunday the FAB staff have a different theme. That day we had to go straight after breakfast to put zombie makeup on for morning meeting, where everyone makes announcements for what they are doing that day. We all stood around looking freaky whilst the camp directors daughter ran around pretending to "slay" us with a plastic sword!

The day continued with loads of kids getting zombied up as well as all of the kitchen staff. We went through so much fake blood, mint flavoured, it was weirdly tasty!

They then had a brain eating contest with jello brains that had strange and disgusting things in. The kids had marshmallows and cereal, the councillors had hot sauce, mayonnaise, sausages, and many other gross things... lots of them threw up after as it was rank!

We finished off with a zombie vs human waterballoon fight and I de-zombied for an afternoon of sports and chilling by the lake ;)

behind on blogging cos im knackered!

Gahhh, no idea where all the time went! So last I posted was after our first week of teaching when I was still trying to work out what on earth was going on... We have just finished our first 3 week session and there are 10 new girls currently asleep in the bunk :).

May add pictures to this at some point but for now its just words, sorry.

So, trying to remember all the events that have happened the past few weeks:

• I ran into a bear at 1am leaving the fine arts building and ended up hiding out there with a guy from circus which was pretty hilarious, it left eventually and I sneaked back!
• Celebrated 4th of July a day late because the fireworks got rained out... still, they were pretty good even if they were each 5 minutes apart :p
• I spent around 4 days on a project trying to make a giant papier-mache rock which completely collapsed when we took it off which ended up in a pretty hilarious situation of a load of us hiding inside of it trying to hold it up and failing miserably... I am pretty sure the fine art staff threw it away but I dont have the heart to ask haha.
• Put up my first ever long lake art show, my kids work was mixed in with painting, weaving and photography, we were up until 2.30 am putting everything up but it did look pretty awesome in the end!
• I survived parents weekend, this is basically the weekend where all the parents come to get their kids and watch all of the shows, there were over 20 different shows in the end which is crazy! I saw the circus, Jekyll and Hyde, Legally Blonde and Aida. The kids here are unbelievably talented, we have had a few talent nights and the standard is insane! They are all so confident in their singing and music too, I am secretly a little bit jealous.
• Bastard chipmunk stole my dairymilk :( there was one that kept coming in the bunk and running around on parents weekend and i saw it running out the door, chased it and it dropped 5 chunks of dairymilk!! I looked today and it has managed to get into the rest which sucks cos now I have no more british chocolate!

Now back to today. Second session starts with us all waiting out on the grass, playing guitars, frisbee and generally just chilling and waiting for kids to arrive. Very expensive looking cars start to appear and if a kid is in your bunk you are called to help them with luggage and show them in.

Last time we were all so much more excited, today we were being a lot more lazy with the cheering of cars arriving but ahhh well. Our bunk didn't actually have anyone arrive until the buses arrived at 5pm so we had 10 kids arrive at once with the most insane amounts of luggage you have ever seen! I didn't think they could bring more than the last ones but they proved me wrong! They all bring the 7ft long bags that look like they could store a body, this session one girl has two of these 7ft long bags!! I have 10 weeks worth of stuff in on 65 litre backpack...  

I am now sat in the rec hall where they store all the candy for canteen and theres a load of racoons in there eating crisps and raiding bins! The noises freak me out after th bear incident but they are kinda cute :p

Anywaaay guys, hope you can bear to read this without any visual stimuli, will try and whack some photos in but it may take me till september cos I am feeling crazy busy!

Please comment, I like knowing you guys are actually reading the rubbish I type, Josie xx

the giant inflatable sculpture

What the kids in 3D made this week, the photos are AWESOME!