Oh, joyous mismatched day!

Helloooooo, friends!! HAPPY DRESS IN THE DARK DAY!!! Campers and counselors alike have dressed “in the dark” this morning… meaning their clothes clash (a lot…)! Although, I think I personally spend more time picking out my mismatched clothes on this beautiful day than I do when I’m supposed to match!! We have some fabulous outfits today, including chicken hats, tutus, stripes with polka dots, and some eye-shattering colors!! And THIS JUSTIN!!!! (Geddit? Because this is the Justin Report! But it’s like “this just in!” Hahahahahahahahahaha!) PETER KASSEN IS WEARING NEW SOCKS TODAY!! Every Dress in the Dark Day for as long as anyone here on camp can remember, Peter has worn his classic Superman socks– with capes on the backs, of course! But today, Peter unveiled and debuted a new pair of Dress in the Dark Day socks! He payed homage to the classic Superman socks by wearing one, but his other foot sported a shining new Wonder Woman sock (this one also fully equipped with a functioning cape)!! What could this new addition to the classic PK outfit mean?? Perhaps Peter really DID get dressed in the dark today! Or maybe this gesture is intended to honor the female superheroes that make the world a better place every day!

At interest groups yesterday the whole camp gathered on the soccer field to watch the Soccer Team’s game!! Campers and counselors played side by side, mixed together within the teams! They fought hard, while bystanders chowed down on yummy hot dogs!! And no one can even remember who won– because everyone was so busy having a good time!!

After everyone won the soccer game, Evening Meeting held a special surprise! Our fifth-year campers received their FIVE YEAR VESTS!!! It’s an exciting honor to receive these vests, and those campers who have stuck with HVC for so many years, and who have contributed so much to this incredible place, undeniably deserve that honor! Thank you to those campers, and their folks at home, for being such an invaluable part of Hidden Valley!!

Last night we enjoyed another wonderful cabin night, with so many creative activities (as follows)!!

Loons did an egg drop from the Upper Carriage House!
LCH made Rube Goldberg obstacle courses from materials they found at the End of the World!
Avalon made a slingshot in Deer Meadows Field!
Gimme Shelter dropped stuff off the tree house!
Bermuda Triangle played Capture the Flag!
Chateau Fiasco had an astronomy night up at Tipis!
Forbidden Planet had a pancake race!
Wombles had a pool party!
Down Under made terrariums and s’mores!
French Quarter had a photo shoot with our resident photographer, Eden!
Paquatahnee joined Inge and Kristy for some glass fusing!
Shangri-La glazed the pottery projects they had previously made!
Valhalla made a yummy stir-fry dinner in the barn kitchen!
Camelot made s’mores pizzas in our pizza oven!
Wabanaki made glass beads with Carmi!
Taj Mahal had a hot tub party!
Fiddlers Green had a pool party!
Deer Meadows went to the lake with Phillie!
Halley’s Comet went jumping in the horse ring!

Everyone had a super duper time last night, check out the photos below!!

Our Community campers have been super busy recently! Yesterday they went to an elementary school in Portland and helped run some activities for students! What a treat for everyone involved!!

This morning we had a special surprise! But first, some backstory! We celebrate birthdays a little differently here than many other people do. We begin by calling up our Birthday Guru at Morning Meeting (this year she is an 80s Prom Queen/Valley Girl, you may have seen pictures of her in past posts). She announces whose birthdays we are celebrating on the given day, and leads the camp in a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday. This classic American tune is followed immediately by a rolicking rendering of the Dutch birthday song! We have sung this song for 19 years here at camp, and in that time, sung by people who don’t necessarily speak Dutch, the song has become a little warped from its original form. The current version is more of a race to see who can clap and sing the fastest, with little attention paid to the actual words we are singing. Thankfully, our resident Dutch expert, Inge, was at Meeting today, and helped us touch back with the original version she brought to camp 19 years ago! Dank je wel, Inge!! (That means “Thank you, Inge” in Dutch… Dank je wel, Google!)

We have a beautiful day ahead of us here at camp, ending with a fun evening program of Electives!! Stay tuned for pictures of that to come tomorrow!!

I’m off to find my matching socks!

Humming Bird

Greetings, earthlings! Olive Oyl here with lots of camp news for you!

Happy Jake Day! It’s one of our favorite days of the summer where we get to record our cabin cheers for the video yearbook (which we’ll receive sometime this winter) and take our cabin photos (posted on the website soon)! Despite a bit of schvitzy-ness and an early morning, we still had a blast performing our cheers in front of the camera and then getting to chow down on a delicious breakfast of egg sandwiches.

Before we get into the details of today, a quick rewind to the events of last night! After our yummy dinner of cheese ravioli, creamed spinach, salad, and rolls, we topped off our junk food day glory with an ice cream sundae bar complete with all the works. We had hot fudge, strawberry sauce, caramel, sprinkles, and cherries. Full of sugary sweet goodness, we headed over to the Rec Hall for our When I Grow Old Dance! We had lots of jams and dancing (of course!) in the Rec Hall, plus plenty of elderly-themed activities happening all around. We had guess the pill count (M&Ms), Bingo, Doing Taxes (sudoku), beard face painting and hair graying (with baby powder), a walker and cane obstacle course, and lastly, basketball for those feeling young and nimble. We had campers dressed with their pants hiked high, bellies stuffed with pillows, glasses and babushkas adorning their faces. It was a super fun night where everyone had the chance to let their inner grandma/grandpa shine.

Today also marks the first day of our new minis, where a bunch of our campers will be switching up their schedules from this past week. Folks will be trying boating, llama care, or hammock making for the first time or maybe for the hundredth time! Tonight we’ll have cabin night, a chance to chill with our bunkmates and do something super cool!

Be sure to check out all the awesome photos today of junk food day and last night’s dance!

Lovingly,

Olive

Lucky charms and a boston creme donut…what a creation!

Gooooooooood morning, folks!! Humming Bird here! IT’S JUNK FOOD DAY!!!! You know what that means!! Donuts and hot dogs and pop tarts, OH MY!! Campers entered the dining hall this morning and cheered for the sugary substances awaiting them in the lineup!! Let’s go to our correspondent who was on the scene. Humming Bird?

Thanks Humming Bird! This is Humming Bird reporting to you (not so) live from the scene of breakfast this morning! I’m here looking to gauge the general sentiments regarding JFD here on camp. Here are a few quotations I’ve gathered from various campers as they filled their plates this morning:

“Ooh, it smells so good in here!”

“I heard youre only supposed to take ONE donut?”

Humming Bird: What’s your favorite thing about JFD?
Camper 1: Tantalizing fumes in your mouth!
Camper 2: Will not go to sleep!!
Camper 3: Junk food only comes once a session!!
Camper 4: You can eat loops, but without fruit!
Camper 5: It’s the best day of my life!!
Camper 6: It’s incredibly excessive and unhealthy
(and my personal favorite…)
Camper 7: JUNK FOOD!!!! Continue reading →

Greetings on this beautiful sunny day!! Humming Bird here with TONS of updates on our INSANE last 24 hours!!

Last night we enjoyed a beautiful turkey dinner, provided by our wonderful kitchen staff! There was turkey with gravy, and cranberry sauce and stuffing– if I wasn’t at camp, I’d think it was November!!

After dinner, our evening program was THE WHEEL OF MISFORTUNE!!! Our counselors put together an elaborate show for us!! Campers arrived outside the Rec Hall, only to find COMPLETE AND UTTER MAYHEM!!! There were counselors on the roofs of the Pottery Studio, the Hilton Bathroom and even the Rec Hall itself!! Counselors dressed in wild Island attire lobbed water balloons and hose water from off the buildings, while cannibals roamed around on the ground, hissing at campers who dared to cross their path!! Our thoroughly soaked and enthusiastic campers entered the Rec Hall to find 7 people asleep on the wilderness-inspired stage, waiting to share their elaborate spectacle!! The premise was as follows:

7 lucky contestants were chosen to compete on a televised game show, which took place on Cannon Ball Island– but the contestants had no idea they were competing, let alone that their actions would be recorded and aired to Hidden Valley Camp! Also unbeknownst to the contestants, evil cannibals inhabited this particular island, patiently awaiting the moment they could strike! Our contestants steadily turned against one another and one by one, they began to disappear, until only one was left, and her complete and utter rage at the television executives– not only for their morbid manipulation, but also for their “grand cash prize” of a mere $12.01!!– led her to run screaming after them into the night! Continue reading →

Wombles with all their candy!

Oh, hello there! Olive Oyl reporting for duty with lots of details about last night’s evening program and what the future holds!

We had an amazing, multi-faceted night with our younger cabins doing Candy Crush, our middle cabins enjoying a cabin night, and our teen cabins hanging out with Community at Blodgett. First off, let’s talk about the magical mystery that is Candy Crush, with Wombles, Down Under, Avalon, Loons, LCH, and Paquatahnee. The night starts out with Granny and Willy Wonka, our hilarious MCs, who explain that Granny’s candy has become very popular, forcing Willy Wonka to try to push her out of the candy business by getting his oompa loompas (our lovely AWACs) to sabotage her candy. Each cabin has been hired on a mission by Granny’s company, “Candy Crush,” to acquire as much candy as possible, without getting any stolen by the oompa loompas. The only way to stay safe is to find a candy cane tree, conveniently marked in a few spots around camp. Campers run around collecting the candy (brightly colored balls) that’s hidden across camp, in addition to solving puzzles and challenges from counselors at different stations. The candy is then collected and assessed by Granny and Willy Wonka and the end of the night, who ultimately deem a cabin victorious (even though we’re really all winners here at HVC). It was a super fun night full of running around, imaginary candy, and goofy characters.

Our middle cabins were all doings their own things at cabin night! Gimme Shelter had an initiation ceremony to welcome their new camper and their lives in the older half. Bermuda Triangle played a game of Man Hunt, and Valhalla tie-dyed socks. French Quarter and Shangri-La joined forces for a party at the Lake, playing games, swimming, and going down the slide. Wabanaki took the “color personality test” and then tie-dyed t-shirts that corresponded to their colors. Fiddler’s Green made s’mores by the campfire and went on a hike around camp. Camelot was in the glass fusing studio making a cabin art project. Lastly, Haley’s Comet was doing some nature art, splatter painting at the Tree House.

And finally, our teen cabins, Forbidden Planet, Taj Mahal, Deer Meadows, Chateau Fiasco, were at Blodgett. There was a farm theme happening, with a three-legged race, pin the tail on the goat, and a game involving biting apples hanging from strings off a tree! Later we jammed on guitar, ate ice cream, and sat around the campfire.

Continue reading →

Thank you, Peter and Meg!! Now for our regularly scheduled programming! Humming Bird here, with more updates on our lively camp lives!

Last night we had a bountiful feast at Evening Meeting!! Selected campers, counselors and AWACs played the camp classic, BABY FOOD!! For those of you who might not be familiar with our Gerber Game, I will explain! Peter announces the game and within milliseconds, there are infinite hands shot straight into the air, BEGGING to be picked to do the following: go up to the front of meeting, sit on the picnic tables, get blindfolded, eat a spoonful of baby food, and guess what flavor of baby food they have just been fed. Guesses last night ranged from fecal matter, to steak dinner. What variety!! In addition to the normally sized spoonfuls, one person from each round gets The Dreaded Big Spoon!!! And our counselor, Mila, even got a surprise baby food bath!! Check out the pictures below!! Continue reading →

Rockin’ out at Timmy Night!

Greetings and salutations, one and all! Olive Oyl here with some news on our first day of new classes!

We had an awesome night last night with Timmy Night, where we heard all the rock band classes perform, plus some fun extra tunes and games from Timmy and his crew. We heard a bunch of rocking music from Rock Band, with a revised Lola by the Kinks, which became “Lila,” our awesome camper and lead singer for the evening. We also heard My Own Worst Enemy, Sweet Caroline, and a rockin’ version of the Cotton Eyed Joe. In between we had the awkward game, where campers battled for who could be more awkward on stage. We also had a counselor bad-dancing dance-off. The winners were quite hard to decide, as many of our staff members have a lot of embarrassing moves. We then heard some tunes from Neutral Milk Hotel, Someday by the Strokes, Feel Good, Inc. by Gorrilaz, and some acoustic camp classes, like Wagon Wheel and The Princess Pat. It was a super fun night, with a lot of inspired dancing (in our PJs!) and rocking out outside. Our campers are so musically talented and really know how to put on an entertaining show! Continue reading →

L.C.H. on their pool parade!

Hi, Friends! Olive Oyl here and back in action with lots of photos and PJ Day news just for you!

First things first, let’s talk about our amazing sharing night yesterday. We had a whole bunch of acts, varying from guitar and ukulele class to Wild Things, doing a poetry reading that turned into a crazy tribal dance. We also had an HVC-themed puppet show from our sock monkey making class, monologues from our improv class, and an original song from songwriting. We had some lovely dance, with a super cool city street scene from Stomp class, beautiful moves from jazz, ballet, hip-hop, zumba, tap, and contemporary, and lots of fun jumps and bounces from Irish step dancing class. We also got a sneak peek of the Musical, with “The Circle of Life.” And to finish off the night, we heard a lovely medley of songs with Hidden Valley-esque lyrics from our singing class. It was an all-around fantastic night where we got to see all that our campers have been working on these past two weeks. And boy did their hard work pay off! The dance moves were impeccable, the singing in tune, and the acting impressive. We can’t wait to see what more we accomplish the rest of the summer!

Today marks the start of our next two weeks here at Hidden Valley, which means class sign-ups! We have a bunch of fun, new classes for the rest of the summer. There’s hammock making, Hocus Pocus, Bill Nye the Science Guy, and an elusive HVC-favorite, Liquid Smoke. We’ve also got pinhole photography, trash to treasure, advanced ropes, a whole class devoted to artful face painting, poetry, and horse care. So many fun options! Continue reading →

Mmmmmorning folks, and a very happy pajama day to you all! Olive Oyl here with a quick dispatch on our laziest lazy day of the year.

We had a little sleep in this morning, munched on some delicious eggs and croissants for breakfast, and gathered for camp meeting (be sure to check out the awesome photos of some spectacular PJs!). No we’re off to lounge around at the pool until lunchtime. We’ll also be doing class sign-ups, getting our camp t-shirts, and picking out books!

This afternoon we’ll have a cabin clean, rest period, and a cabin day (imagine cabin night but during the day!) activity, which is sure to be a lot of fun. We’ll then gather back together to watch some videos that our video classes have produced these past two weeks. Then before we know it, it will be evening meeting and dinner time, before our fabulous evening program…Timmy Night! We’ll see all the rock band classes rock out at the gazebo and we’ll have a big outdoor dance party. Cant’ wait!

Continue reading →

Hey folks! Olive Oyl here with an urgent and extra special update.

The day has finally arrived. We heard that fateful buzz of the airplane engine just a few moments ago and campers were out of their crazy creeks faster than you can say “crazy creek.” The soccer field quickly became densely populated and full of sugary anticipation. We’re currently gathered back for meeting, sharing in our candy consumption and specially-written AWAC notes that came from the sky.

Stay tuned for more news and candy drop details tomorrow!

Much candy-love,

Olive