Saturday

Let me begin with a quick word about last night’s Opening Vespers. As I said before, this is a most unexpected EP to put into the first days of camp (directors would fear risking boredom, sadness, or disruption by a clown in the group). As it turns out, we should give our children more credit.

The girls were amazing. Their singing was absolutely wonderful. They listened to the LONG story (I got carried away and spoke too long… will work on that!) in absolute silence. They recited their verses perfectly and when it was finally time to light the candles they did so with a sense of the moment. A moment of beauty and significance that was not lost, thanks to their wonderful attitudes.

Since the story went long, we did not light the candles until almost 9:00. The sun had set and the cloud cover just added to the darkness of the pavilion at that late hour. The darkness provided the perfect setting as the light spread- first to the counselors then to the campers. A lovely image of the light of love impacting a community; an image that will be repeated at Closing Vespers in 3 1/2 weeks.

The fact is, life goes by very quickly. Nobody knows this better than a parent, but campers also discover it each and every summer. The candles are lit, admired, and blown out so quickly… but the moment lives on. It really is a great EP. I like it better with each year!

The forecast for the next week is almost the same every day. Warm (temperatures in the 80’s), muggy (humidity in the 80% range), sunny in the mornings, scattered thunderstorms in the afternoon. This is the weather that generations of Greystone girls have grown to know and love. God is Good!

I HIGHLY recommend you listen to today’s Morning Assembly Devotion. Sam taught on Patience (his fourth devotion on the theme of Love) and it is worth a listen. Already looking forward to Church tomorrow.

The Italian Dinner theme last night was a huge hit. Having been around here for a long time, I can honestly say it was one of the best theme dinners we have ever done. The highlights:

• Decorations… we put red and white table cloths on all the tables, also put 3 little battery powered candles on each table, hung Italian flags, put twinkle lights at the entrance.
• Assessories… little berets and stick on moustaches for each table.
• Fancy Drinks… we put strawberries and blueberries in the lemonaide and stuck lime wedges around the rim of the pitcher; also gave each girl a Shasta. Mix the Shasta and the lemonaide, add a squeeze of lime and you have a lovely fancy drink!
• Wonderful food… baked Ziti, roasted eggplant and peppers, meatballs, stromboli, maranara sauce, and canoli’s for dessert. YUM.

The girls loved it and the noise levels rose accordingly. The after dinner singing was WILD. So much fun!

Menu today: Pancakes and artisan sausage (yes, it came from an artisan butcher in Asheville… really good) for breakfast, Lunch is cheese burgers and dinner is chicken picata.

I could be going on and on about the food (I am a bit of a foodie and LOVE a great meal). The subject is worth touching on several times this summer, but never exhaustively… so today I will speak just about the salad bar. I am getting almost all my food intake from the salad bar this year. I am obsessed! Breakfast features an amazing assortment of fresh fruits and berries, home made granola, Greek yogurt, oatmeal, and even “power smoothies”. Lunch and dinner are all about the veggies (two kinds of lettuce, spinach, peppers in all the colors) and a lot of other stuff (pickles, cottage cheese, goat cheese, humus, pepito’s, sunflower seeds, Asian tofu) and two kinds of dressing. It is really wonderful and a very nice addition to the food service. It requires deliveries from the farmers market every other day and we always add in options from our Farm and Garden class when a harvest is required (we had beautiful lettuce from the garden yesterday). What a great kitchen!

Tonight we will have Team Fires. The Odds and the Evens will choose their mascots and most importantly their leaders. It is a great EP, marked by lots of cheering as we begin our preparations for Challenge Day next week.

Oh, one more thing… we are rolling out a HUGE Dance competition, first announcement made at Morning Assembly. The girls are encouraged to form dance teams (of 2 to 12 people) and come up with a dance that is good enough to make it into the finals. On July 11 we will have our first ever Greystone Dance Battle, the winning team given an amazing prize package (not yet announced). We did a video to announce the event and are putting professionally designed posters all over camp. The girls are all talking about it! So much fun.

I could go on and on… but it is Saturday. Time to go out and take some pictures!

Thanks for checking in.