February 2013 - YMCA OF THE PINES

Camp Kesem

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-26T10:59:10-05:00February 26th, 2013|

Nearly three million children live with a parent who has cancer and many more have lost a parent to cancer. This summer, Camp Kesem will provide life-changing summer camp experiences for over 2,000 children by empowering 1,500 college student leaders at 41 chapters across the country. We are proud to announce that YMCA Camp Ockanickon has partnered with the Camp Kesem – Columbia University chapter to provide 50 children whose parents have or have had cancer with a summer camp experience. This experience is provided for children at no cost to individual families and provides children affected by a parent’s [...]

Learn To Cook – Week 1

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-24T08:20:49-05:00February 24th, 2013|

Hello all! This past Friday we started our Learn to Cook program here in the kitchen and all 8 of our students showed up ready to cook! For the first class we started with a chat about kitchen safety and sanitation while we took a tour of our rather large instutitional style kitchen. […]

Beef & Ale Fundraiser

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-23T12:24:40-05:00February 23rd, 2013|

Well...just because St.Patrick's Day is a week before does not mean you cannot come out and celebrate St.Patrick's a week later. Please come out to Camp Ockanickon to support our annual campaign to send more children to camp. https://ycamp.org/documents/2013StPatricksDay.pdf

Code of a Camp Counselor

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-22T13:52:59-05:00February 22nd, 2013|

I have an old staff shirt from 1992, I believe. It is badly faded and is, at this point, more of a see-through shirt. I can't quite remember where I got it, because I was still a camper in 1992, but the words on the back of the shirt still ring true today for all of our counselors. I've never seen this anywhere but on that old shirt. We even used it again about 10 or 12 years ago on the back of a staff sweatshirt (that no longer fits around my middle!). I'm not sure who came up with [...]

School’s Out at Camp!

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-21T12:09:15-05:00February 21st, 2013|

Last week we hosted School's Out at Camp for our campers in the surrounding districts. We did some pretty fun activities: gaga, roof ball, archery, arts & crafts, and we even made our very own play dough! One of my favorite activities we did last week was play Predator vs. Prey in the Black Forest. Below is a picture of a few campers hanging out in the Black Forest waiting for a new game to start.

1-2-3

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-19T12:17:19-05:00February 19th, 2013|

Philadelphia often feels like the farthest place one can be from camp. With the lack of trees, the tall buildings, and the millions of people that swallow one up; it does not radiate the feeling of a welcoming tight-knit community that one feels out among the trees at camp. “The outside world,” can be a place where we are not as comfortable expressing ourselves in the way we do at camp for fear of negative judgment. However, for those of us who often lament that we are unable to be our camp-selves outside of camp, hopefully this story provides encouragement [...]

Stockwell’s Themes 2013

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-18T17:15:51-05:00February 18th, 2013|

It makes me so happy that I have gotten a ton of phone calls & emails about Stockwell's themes for 2013! Take a look at what's planned for this summer - Do you have any ideas about what activities we can do? Send any ideas or thoughts our way! Session 1 - Whacky Water Week Session 2 - Decades Week Session 3 - Harry Potter Week Session 4 - Adventure Week Session 5 - International Sports Week Session 6 - Amazing Race Week Session 7 - Mystery Weel Session 8 - Color Wars Session 9 - Game Show Week Session [...]

Learn To Cook

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-17T12:01:49-05:00February 17th, 2013|

Hello all! It’s that time of year again for our “Learn To” series of classes including Learn To Cook hosted by myself and assisted by my long time Assistant, Nick. […]

Bumble Bee!

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-16T05:43:18-05:00February 16th, 2013|

A couple of days ago I was reminded from my friends at 3Adventures of an amazing camp skit that I personally loved to do. I actually learned this skit when I was a 15 year old CIT at Frost Valley YMCA and have been doing this skit ever since. I actually only did this once at Camp Ockanickon during a Memorial Day Family Camp weekend, but would love to start this up again this summer....any takers? http://www.ultimatecampresource.com/site/camp-activity/bumble-bee-skit.html

Getting Excited!

By YMCA of the Pines|2013-02-15T14:41:30-05:00February 15th, 2013|

I think I probably wrote a blog about this last year, but since it is an annual event, I can probably get away with sharing my excitement again. It's a great thing to be able to honestly say that I love my job. I don't think that is the case for everyone. One of my favorite parts of being Boys Camp Director is assembling the "staff puzzle," as I like to call it. Each winter, I start to receive applications from new job candidates and rehire applications from returners. It's always great to see so many of last year's staff [...]

Monthly Archives: February 2013