Yesterday alone, Meier Parr won a game of king of the court and jail, Noah Gross bowled a 138 at bowling (the best score of any camper…and some counselors…including me). Cabin F survived a bee apocalypse in Challenge Course. I recently discovered that many of the scenarios in Challenge Course are fictional. Ashley Stern and Sofia Gonzalez-Kosasky won games of team jail. Additionally, the juniors had a very successful night bowling where everyone’s score in their second game was higher than that of their first.

But, alas, as much fun as these two weeks have been, it has to come to an end. Each session seems to have a few moments that stick out. Cabin 2 dazzled the camp with a well-choreographed dance to “The Show Goes On” only to be robbed (I’m still a little bit bitter) by an even better dance by Girls Tents. Teddy Geis flaunted his comedic talents at the talent show. Stevie Nocket and Catherine Ni Dhroighneain tried to coach Boys’ League teams. Jake Welfeld did a backflip at the first campfire. And despite numerous people telling me it would never happen, my brother returned to counseloring to become my co-counselor.

Even the day-to-day aspects of camp have been memorable. Everyone who tried, climbed the climbing wall, tubed, or shot a gun. As I write, campers are zip-lining right now for the first time, mastering their putting skills, and canoeing faster than ever before. I especially enjoyed how many kids improved their fishing skills from class to class. For as long as I have been here, I have never seen a group of kids adapt so well to Camp Tall Timbers. A special thanks to CIT2 extraordinaires Simon and Nathaniel Schwartz for being the best counselors-in-training ever in all my years at CTT.

So with my last bit of space, I want to thank all of you at home for reading. I hope the blog has kept you updated on your incredible kids and amused you from time to time. 3^rd Session 2011 has been a blast and I’m very excited for these kids to keep coming back and maybe attend 1^st or 2^nd Session. This blog has given me an excuse to eavesdrop, ask questions, get to know your incredibly awesome, hilarious, and witty kids better, and really remind me about how much I love this place. These past two weeks have been magical and I am very grateful to have had an audience (so to speak) for my first year of counseloring. I am sure that your kids will come home with significantly more stories than I have been able to give you and for that, I apologize, but with so much fun here, it is hard to report it all. In conclusion, thank you for reading and commenting, and I hope I have served you well.

Sincerely,

Zach Fang

The roller rink also allowed for campers to expand their horizons, with someone from almost every cabin skating for the first time. Simon Schwartz rolled skated for the first time and, as expected, was a natural and proceeded to skate around the rink 15 times without falling. Jenna Ross, Hailey Mostow, Taryn Dalton, Carly Dalton, Livia Lampal, Freddi Rappaport, Noah Gross, Aaron Rosenthal, Simon Rosenthal, Teddy Geis, Josh McConnell, Daniel Gonzalez-Kosasky, Quinn Cook, Matthew Van Aken, Ben Olek, Tony Spangler, Cole Williams, Justin Dryer and Meier Parr all roller skated for the first time and Adam Lampal and Oliver Walke roller bladed for the first time. Many of the experienced skaters played games such as tag, which Nate Schwartz claims he won, and had a limbo contest, which was won by Jake Welfeld with Oliver Walke in a close second. Flip Flop tried to slide under the limbo stick on his stomach in a bear costume but was disqualified despite the campers’ protests. The trip to the roller rink is always one of those evening activities that gives the campers a lot of freedom, and I was really impressed how this session’s kids got really into the theme and skating. We all had a great time and enjoyed the late wake up this morning.

Last night’s evening activity was the talent show. Thanks to tireless promotion by Maya, it was a huge success. We had 25 acts ranging from Jaclyn Welfeld’s growl to Boys Tents 6 song medley. The MCs for the night were Nick, Flip, and Albert. Albert also entertained the crowd with his animal noises in between sets. The vocal and dance classes all did their performances they had been working on in class, but anyone was allowed to enter. Keith made a band with campers and counselors. Daniel Gonzalez-Kosasky performed an acoustic version of “Stairway to Heaven” and his sister, Sofia, did a couple songs on the ukulele. Teddy Geis channeled “a comedian from 1980” and entertained the crowd with some of his own material while Quinn and Holden Cook told some more well-known jokes. Josh McConnell showed off some of the dragons he drew and explained their powers. Jenna Ross and Hailee Williams did a very funny scene about trying to get a mime to share pizza. Jake Welfeld showed off his acrobatic ability by doing such tricks as a backflip and a “kick-the-moon”.

In addition to Boys Tents, Caoimhe Ni Dhroighneain, Shelby Buyalos, and Gentry Stromer did a dance as did Catherine Ni Dhroighneain, Stevie Nocket, and Sofia Navas Sharry. Singing was also a popular talent. Hailey Mostow covered “Love Song”, Taylor Antonis sang Miley Cyrus’ “The Climb”, and Jasmine Williams won the talent show with her version of “Hate on Me” by Jill Scott. Flip Flop and Julie ended the evening on a messy note with a “Special Treat” cooking show that resulted in Julie, wearing a poncho, covering herself in whipped cream, chocolate syrup, and ice cream. Both the campers and counselors were in hysterics. This morning, a much cleaner Julie introduced the theme for this session’s trip to the roller rink: decades. It should be a blast.

We also had a number of firsts yesterday. Sofia Gonzalez-Kosasky shot a gun for the first time and her brother Daniel not only rode down the golf hill on a mountain bike, but also tried his first soda… and he really liked it. Sorry Mrs. Gonzalez-Kosasky.

Campers and counselors alike raced around camp last night to try to get to the bottom of the disappearance of one of the camp’s beloved figures, Mark Clark. It was Clue night! The campers raced around from station to station where counselors who might be involved in the crime made them do tasks in exchange for information. Emily’s station taught campers important life guarding information such as how to do chest compressions and when it is not safe to go into the pool. Keith’s station was a big hit. He created a court room environment and made campers debate on the merits of their favorite tv shows and he judged who had a better debate. In the end only Collin’s team correctly guessed the weapon, the murderer, and the location. They received canteen first. Overall another great day at Camp Tall Timbers. Today everyone will be preparing their acts for the 2^nd CTT Talent Show of the summer!

Like MTV night, the cheesy skits were very high quality. Each cabin was assigned a line that had to be included in the skit. Many of the skits mocked the various counselors. Cabin A scored very well with a skit about how Livia Lampal woke up with half a moustache. Cabin 1 worked around the line “fluffy little one” to create a detailed skit about wizards including Gandalf and Merlin. Cabin 2 had the line “why is there a tiger in the bathroom?” and parodied a movie with the counselors as the characters. Simon Rosenthal’s impersonation of Nick was hysterical.  Other notable impressions were Emily Walke attempting a British accent in her impersonation of Sean and Sofia Navas Sharry portraying Fairly Oddparents character Chip Skylark in the Girls Tents skit.

Closing the night was Boys Tents who blew everyone else out of the water en route to a perfect score. With Chet Stein repeatedly saying “mmm that’s some good pudding”, Boys Tents spoofed scenes from Harry Potter, Titanic and Star Wars. Boys Tents won a pool party but the campers have many more opportunities to win fabulous evening activity prizes, starting tonight with Clue.

Up at mountain boarding, Jake Welfeld, Brendan Cutick, Tyler Mostow, and Justin Welfeld all nearly made it down the challenging hill. Keegan Morrisroe and Shelby Buyalos won knock out games and Noah Braman and Ashley Stern shot bullseyes in zombie survival 102. Archery’s sister class, zombie survival 101 (riflery) saw Parker Mitchell and Simon and Nate Schwartz get head shots on paper cut-out zombies. Ben Olek, Shelby Buyalos, Ashley Stern, Taylor Antonis, Anja Schempf, Josh McConnell and Taryn Dalton all made it up the wall in climbing. Keith noted that Josh and Taryn were the youngest people to not only climb to the top but even attempt that wall all summer. Julie’s challenge course class “made it out of the bad house”. My goal for the end of the summer is to figure out what actually happens in challenge course. Taryn Dalton, Jaclyn Welfeld, Carly Dalton, and Livia Lampal all fished for the first time. I was psyched how they all picked it up really quickly for campers that young.

Jerry Smith received a special announcement for beating golf master Sean in a putting competition. In basketball, Holden Cook and Matthew Van Aken won games of knock out. Albert’s soccer class saw Jake Welfeld and Keegan Morrisroe win World Cup playing as the country Israel.

The evening activity was home alone night. The counselors created a variety of scenarios that kids would do while home alone. The activities included throwing pudding at Ethan, pillow sumo wrestling (something that Alex and I still do while home alone), writing on the walls, balloon toss, a fashion show, “trash the yard”, make-your-own-ice cream, and a dance party. Oliver Schwartz and Meier Parr won the balloon toss and Justin Welfeld dominated any challenger in pillow sumo. Tonight is cheesy skit night. After narrowly losing to Girls Tents in MTV night, Dan and I will be working with my kids all day to take home the victory.

At Cacapon, the campers and counselors spent the afternoon swimming in the water, making sand castles, or just chilling out and enjoying the nice day. The campers built a number of sand castles. Cabin A girls built a huge Chinese themed sand palace and Cabin G worked with some of the younger girls to build another large sand castle. Hunter Morrisroe and Jerome Williams both dug large holes big enough to sit in. Tristan Oldham found a baby turtle and most of the Cabin 1 and 2 boys spent a good part of the afternoon trying to convince their counselors to let them keep it as a cabin pet (they were unsuccessful). The boys of Cabins 34 and 56 spent a good portion of the day playing a water game they came up with called “Categories” and trying to tackle Flip Flop. Jake Welfeld received a special shout out from Flip Flop by successfully doing a backflip off of his shoulders. Tony Spangler and Josh McConnell spent much of the day looking for fish in the quieter shallows. Many of the other counselors and I spent a large portion of the day running away from campers who tried to drag us into the water in all our clothes. The kids were having so much fun that we decided to cancel the organized evening activity, a sand castle contest, and just let them play until we left at dusk. After a fun day in the sun, the counselors had little trouble getting most of their kids right to bed so they could get a good night’s rest before another busy day at CTT.

A number of other campers participated in other outdoor activities. Jerome Williams rode a horse for the first time. Freddi Rappaport and Taryn Dalton kayaked for the first time. Holden Cook and Carly Dalton made it to the top of the climbing wall. Emily Walke caught a nice bass. Simon Schwartz and Aaron Walsh had head shots in riflery (zombie survival 101). Catherine Ni Dhroighneain and Hunter Morrisroe won games of knockout in archery and Anja Schempf sniped a bullseye. During lunch, Flip Flop lead the boys side in the first “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” of the session. For those at home who don’t know, “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” consists of all the campers going to an empty table in the back, banging loudly, and singing a song with nonsensical phrases such as “where he at/ there he go/ peanut butter jelly with a baseball bat.” It is one of the most popular of the many camp mealtime traditions.

The evening activity last night was cabin night where campers are given the option of sleeping under the stars and building a campfire at a designated location. Quite a few cabins chose this option including Cabin B whose campers had never slept out before. The cabins were located anywhere between the lake and the golf course. I was with Cabin 2 which was located at the top of the golf course. We began the night by getting dried grass and logs to build a large fire. We then went for a lengthy hike through the woods on horse trails so it was dark when we lit the fire. After lighting the fire, we let it die down a bit and began to roast marshmallows. The night ended with my co-counselor Dan and I telling the campers funny stories and discussing our experiences with camp as the campers slowly faded off one by one. We woke up with a thin layer of dew on our sleeping bags and lugged our stuff back to the cabins to get ready for breakfast and another busy day at Camp Tall Timbers.

Yesterday morning we saw our first fish of the session with a nice size bass caught by Ashley Stern. Alec Geis, Sam Hu, Simon Schwartz, Noah Braman, and Jack Morrisroe all won contests in riflery, also known as “Zombie Survival 101”, because in addition to learning how to shoot guns, Ethan teaches campers facts about how to survive a zombie apocalypse. Ethan’s follow-up class, “Zombie Survival 102” (archery) also saw quite a few snipers with Adam Lampal, Harry Kaplan, and Julia Trice all winning games of knock out. Up at the tennis courts, Parker Mitchell, Noah Braman, and Justin Dryer won games of jail. The rock wall continued to be a hot spot for campers testing their courage and braving it to them top. Jaclyn Welfeld attempted the wall for the first time and Sophie Delta climbed to the top in her very first attempt. Nate Schwartz received a special shout out for climbing the wall faster than anyone had seen in a very long time. Not all announcements involve an individual accomplishment. Flip Flop gave all of cabin 1 an announcement for “finding the Holy Grail behind the spiderweb” during their challenge course session with him. I’m not sure what that means but cabin 1 claims they had a blast doing it.

Yesterday’s evening activity was the first skit competition of the session, MTV night. My first year at camp was 2003 and this was one of the strongest and closest MTV nights I have ever seen. Cabin A started things off with their rendition of “Circle of Life”. Everyone was quite impressed that girls that young could choreograph such a complicated dance for the entire song. Other highlights included Cabin B bringing back some of the favorite dance moves of the summer, Cabin F’s reenactment of the Taylor Swift song “You Belong With Me”, and watching Emma return to being a counselor and help the Cabin G girls during “I Want It That Way”. The night resulted in a three way tie between Cabin 2’s version of Lupe Fiasco’s “The Show Goes On” which the judges commented “felt like a real music video”, Girls Tents’ rickrolling the audience during their 80s Mash Ups, and Boys Tents’ hilarious delivery of a number of Boy Band songs. After a series of dance offs, Girls Tents came out the winners of the night. Overall another excellent busy day.

Up at horses with Tiffany and Dan, Jaclyn Welfeld rode a horse for the first time. Alec Geis, Livia Lampal, Margaret Rappaport, Jasmine Williams, Freddi Rappaport, Taryn Dalton and Caro Lipsitz all shot guns for the first time with riflery experts Ethan and Erin. Keith and Julie’s climbing classes saw Livia Lampal and Freddi Rappaport try the wall and Freddi made it all the way to the top. The lake also gave campers the opportunity to try many new activities with Taylor Antonis and Lori Belt tubing for the first time, Sophie Delta, Hailee Williams, and Gabby Heller canoeing for the first time and Hailee Williams and Jenna Ross kayaking for the first time. Even the older campers were trying new activities. Tent boy Nate Schwartz attempted mountain boarding for the first time, and did quite well according to Rachel. Much to the excitement of Emma, Dippies have become very popular this session, especially with the younger ladies of Cabins A and B.

In addition to attempting new things, a number of CTT campers exceled in their activities yesterday. Sam Greenberg hit a home run in baseball. Matthew Van Aken won the accuracy contest in golf. Caoimhe Ni Dhroighneain and Jasmine Williams won soccer world cup. In hockey, Holden Cook won a game of world cup and Quinn Cook and Justin Welfeld won the 2 on 2 game. The Cook brothers also won a game of jail in tennis as did Jake Welfeld.

At the campfire, each cabin had to come up with a cabin cheer. Cabin 56 wowed the judges with their creative cheer and backflips by Jake Welfeld. The campers also learned numerous camp traditions and songs such as Boom-Chicka-Boom, “The Friends Song”, “Lion Hunt”, “Herman the Worm”, and “Boomba”. The evening ended with the entire camp roasting marshmallows by the campfire and making smores.