Check out the adorable photo above…it’s from the Tour & More in the summer 2011.  That was the first time Kylie got to spend a night at camp, and she cannot wait to join us for the full summer in 2013!  Kylie is now a current 3rd grader, and will be a Junior Girl at camp this summer.  She lives in Plymouth Meeting, PA and here’s what you need to know about this awesome new camper…

• She has tons of energy, she was doing cartwheels and splits in the house, but she doesn’t even do gymnastics as an after school activity!
• She does a TON of dancing after school, it’s her favorite thing to do!  She goes to dance class three days a week, and she is on a dance competition team.
• She’s pumped for the inter-camp dance competitions this summer.  We are planning to host one at our camp, and travel to another camp as well!
• She hopes to be on the blue team during Color War…maybe she knows the blue team has won for the past two years?
• For her electives, she will probably choose to do gymnastics, dance and glass fusion…the last will be a mystery!
• She’s going to stay in the dance elective for the entire summer and change the other two.  I’ll see her in the programming office each week and help her swap her schedule!
• Kylie also takes piano lessons and goes to Hebrew School, she’s busy almost every night!
• She’s working on riding her bike before camp, she’ll be ready to hit our trails by June!
• Her favorite food is chocolate!  She likes chocolate covered everything!!  She got to try cooking when she was at camp two years ago, and can’t wait to go back!
• Just like me, she doesn’t like to fly…we talked about how it’s scary, but worth it when you get to sit on the beach in Florida!
• She loves Justin Bieber!
• She got to decorate her room (except the paint color…it’s blue but she’d like it to be aqua!), and she hung up all these cool vinyl stickers.  I can’t wait to see what she does with her camp bunk.
• At Kylie’s house they have “Salad Sunday” where the whole family gets to create their own salad from a big selection of veggies. She’s going to help teach her bunk mates how to eat and enjoy lots of salad bar items!
• She wants to have really nice counselors this summer, and we can guarantee that!

My next stop was across the street…Kylie & Ashton live on the same block!!  Ashton is a current 2nd grader, and will be a Lower Junior Boy at camp this summer.  He got a chance to spend the night at camp and do a ton of activities last summer when he came up for the Tour & More weekend (see the photo above).  He lives in Plymouth Meeting, PA and here’s what you need to know about this great new camper…

• He loves the game  Tchoukball!  Have you ever heard of it??  It’s something he learned to play at school, and it’s a really awesome.  It’s sort of like handball, and you can learn more about it here – maybe we’ll play at camp?!

• He takes a trip to the Outer Banks with his family every year.  He loves to hang out on the beach, dig huge holes and then wait for it to be filled up by the ocean, like a swimming pool.
• He loves to play sports, and he’s very athletic.
• He also likes cheering for the Philadelphia sports teams, so expect to see a smile on his face when the Phillies winning scores are announced at morning line-up this summer!
• One of his favorite sports he learned at day camp was archery.  He even has his own bow now, and knows how to safely use it (ie, not in his driveway!).  He can’t wait to do archery at camp, and will probably choose it as an elective.
• Ashton has an indoor Ping Pong table in the house, he is the ping pong champ of his family!
• He’d done a few campouts before, a few years ago a tradition was started in his backyard.  He camped out, made s’mores with his dad and had lots of friends come over.  Now they do it every year and call it “Occupy Ashton”.
• Truth be told, he’s not excited for MTV night (our bunk vs bunk music video evening activity) because he doesn’t like to sing and dance…but it’s so popular at camp, maybe he’ll like it?!
• He definitely plans to sign up for basketball elective, and spend time on the court during free play.
• He’s always been on the gold team for Color War at his day camp, so he wants to be on the blue team this year!
• He sometimes goes by the name “Ash”, and he does really well in school.

I also got to hang out with Ashton’s older brother Max, who is a current 5th grader and will be an Upper Inter Boy this summer.  It will be his third year at camp, and he’s been seeing a lot of his bunk this year, including recently at a sleepover party.  He specifically wore a Camp Canadensis shirt for his visit…he loves camp!  He also goes by the nickname “Witty”, and he told me we need to plan a good overnight in 2013 for the Upper Inter Boys, unfortunately they’ve had bad weather two years in a row!

Over in Livingston, NJ, I got to spend some time with Amanda, a current 2nd grader who will be a Lower Junior Girl at camp.  She also did the Tour & More Weekend at camp last year (photo above), and .  Here’s what you need to know about this fun new addition to camp…

• Her favorite TV shows are Dance Moms and Cupcake Wars – she can’t wait to have her room redone so she can get a TV in there!
• She goes to dance classes once a week.  If she has enough time, she would like to be on the competition team like her big sister.
• She is super busy with soccer!  She loves that sport, and she had even played a game outside the day before I came over (it had been realllly cold!)!
• I went over to visit on a snowy day in March, and she told me about the storm when they lost power and the whole family slept downstairs in the basement – she said it was sorta fun to camp out down there together!
• Her favorite ice cream flavor is coconut.  She had it once when she went to Mexico on a family vacation.  She hopes they will have it at the Casino Movie theater – it’s a trip that every Canadensis camper goes on, and they have sooooo many ice cream flavors to choose from!
• Her second favorite ice cream is mint chocolate chip (they’ll definitely have that!).
• Her soccer team name is the “Lady Leopards”.
• She gets to sleep in a Blue and Gold room every night at home!  The ceiling is painted like the sky, and it helps her fall asleep.
• She’s excited for the overnight camping trip!
• Amanda has never gone on a upside down roller coaster before, but she can’t wait to try it at Dorney Park!
• She got to do cooking as her elective during Tour & More last summer.  This year, she is going to choose gymnastics and maybe tennis as electives.
• She told me she didn’t like vegetables at all…but it turns out she does like carrots and broccoli…and that’s a really good start!
• For Halloween this year, she dressed up as a lady from “Monster High”.  Because of the Sandy Storm, they didn’t get to go house to house, but they went car to car and called in “trunk or treating” – very creative!
• She had a couple of requests for the summer: she wanted to make sure her counselors would all be girls (yes!), that they all be nice (yes!) and she hopes she can have a middle bed so she can have friends on each side.
• Amanda is both is a little sister and a big sister – baby Sloan (not pictured) and her like to do gymnastics together.

Her older sister Ashley is currently in 5th grade and will be an Upper Inter Girl this summer.  It will be her second season at camp and we can’t wait to have her back!  She has been really busy at school…I could barely tear her away from her homework!  She told me a little bit about her dance classes, and about the camp friends she’s been seeing at sleepovers.

February and March were full of trips, but now that it’s April I’m getting to spend some quality time back home in Philly – I love Philly in the Spring!!  I’ve been training the Broad Street 10-mile run on May 5th, it’s the largest 10-mile run in the country, more than 40,000 runners!!  I’ll be wearing a Camp Canadensis shirt, so maybe I’ll find some camp alumni along the way.  The picture below was taken a few weeks ago in Rittenhouse Square, one of the best parks in Philly.  Annie (the dog) and I loved hanging out with camp friends!

2012 Staff Members: Rachel Waxman (Evening Activities), Mel Taube (Photography) and Sam Ginsburg (Operations/Annie’s favorite baby sitter)

One of the highlights of the camp “off season” each year is the American Camp Association Tri-State Conference in nearby Atlantic City.  There are so many wonderful aspects to this large gathering of camp professionals.  We get to attend courses that help make each summer better and better – plus we find great resources in the exhibit hall!  Here are some photos from Tri-State 2013…

Jim Cain is my favorite presenter and Author, Eric won his new book of games by spinning a wheel!

How fun is this lycra tube??  A fun idea for small group games from Jim Cain!

For the first time this year, they offered an early morning 5K run on the Atlantic City Boardwalk.  It was good training for my 10-mile run!  Dave came to cheer me on despite the early start time and freezing temps!

We start planning out the gear and shirts we are going to order for camp each year…we love working with Kenn at Mr Dees Tees, and seeing the new shirt colors and designs!

A trip to London to hire International Staff took me a lot further from home, but it was a wonderful trip!  We travel with Camp America, and we are one of nearly 40 camps that participate in a “job fair”.  In one day, we have the chance to meet nearly 800 staff members – my mission is to find the best ones, and I’m so excited for you to meet them this summer!

Shane Dell and Bethany Freer are returning UK Staff Members, they were amazing help at the job fair, and we can’t wait to have them back at camp in 2013!!Former Group Leader, Lauren Berry is from Australia, but has been living in London for the past two years…it was SO wonderful seeing some of London with her!Even though this was my 5th trip to London, I’ll never get tired of taking “cheesy” London pictures with my friend Julie.

I’m so excited to introduce you to our first camper from Paradise Valley, Arizona!!  Jaden is currently in 4th grade, and she cannot wait for her first year as a Lower Inter Girl this summer! In the picture above we are hanging in her backyard in the middle of March on a sunny AZ day – she gets to wear shorts and tanks all year long!  Here are some important things you need to know about her:

• She loves being up on stage and is a great actress!  She has been in pretty much every show twice, including Suessical the Musical, and Alice in Wonderland.   Even though its hard work, loves it!
• She was in the newspaper when she was 4 years old playing the role of Dinah, the cat in Alice in Wonderland.  She’s also been in Grease, Willy Wonka and more!
• She’s really brave, there is a high dive at her school, and the first time she did it she wasn’t afraid at all!  She’s going to love our zipline this summer.  She also likes roller coasters.
• She’s got blue eyes, which you might get to see under her sunglasses!
• She once won a gaga medal on a cruise.
• Jaden really ikes tennis – and is excited to play at camp!
• She gave me a tour of her house, including her awesome new room makeover!
• She goes to a really good school, and she gets around three hours of home work every night!  She loves the “specials” classes, like art, music and technology.  She learning how to use iMovie – and she is creating a documentary about sea level rise.
• She says she used to be the teachers pet, now she’s known as more of a class clown.
• Blue and gold are also the colors of her school, she has lots of great things she plans to bring to camp for spirit and dress up!
• Everyone should watch out, Jaden knows how to do tae kwon do to protect herself.
• For electives, she is excited to try Canadensis Today & Glass Fusion.
• She loves to go horseback riding, on a horse named Candy.
• Jaden has a candy addiction (to the sweets, not the horse) and she even had some on display in her room – I’m impressed she’s not tempted by it all the time!
• We have a lot of her favorite candies in the canteen, including milky way, sour straws and gummy bears.
• She loves to be clean and organized, she is going to help her bunk win Honor Bunk every week!
• She loves mushrooms, but is not a huge fan of pizza.
• She has two awesome dogs named Joey and Whitney – (Whitney is named after Whitney Houston)
• She loves monkeys
• Jaden is a big sister, she has a younger brother Dylan (currently in Kindergarten)

While in Arizona, I also got to meet with one of the new staff members that will be joining our Health Center team this year!  Karen is so warm, and welcoming.  She is a Grandmother to 11 Grandkids, and there is one more on the way! She has so many hobbies: she spent a lot of last summer fishing with her brother, she is taking a quilting course, and she would like to learn how to crochet.   She also loves to travel, she’s see pretty much every corner of the country!  She’s been to Alaska (which reminded her of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan where she grew up), but her favorite state she’s ever visited is Oregon.  We can’t wait to have her join us in Pennsylvania for a great summer at camp!

While on the U of A Campus, I met with some of my AEPhi sisters who were applying to work at Canadensis, and we actually did the interviews at my old sorority house.  Above is a picture of me in college from the sorority composite!

My parents live in Arizona, so we were able to celebrate Passover together, in the desert…haha.  On the left is my sister who came in from Texas, it was great family fun!Even Annie got to come to Arizona, she’s my favorite hiking buddy!  It such a wonderful state, but it’s awfully hot there during the summer…I’m glad that at least 10 AZ residents are leaving the 120 degree heat behind, and will be joining us for a wonderful summer at Camp Canadensis!

I hope everyone has been enjoying my “Meet the CITs” postings, they really are an amazing group of people and you all have NO IDEA how much fun and spirit they are going to bring to camp this summer. You thought camp was fun? You thought we had spirit? To quote the song… You aint seen nothing yet!!!

But, I must take a moment to pause my regularly scheduled blogging to update everyone on all the happenings in and around my office life lately. Last night finally brought bread back into my life as another Passover passed over us, so today is made even better by the lack of matzo in my lunch routine! Our family’s Passover celebration was highlighted by the Macaron tower I created, much to the delight of everyone’s taste buds. Kosher for Passover, Gluten Free, Nut Free – there was a treat for everyone! Even my puppy, Bella, tried to devise a way to climb our chairs and tables to steal a treat… luckily she did not succeed!

Wondering how far she can jump...

That weekend, my mother and I had plans for a double show day in the city! Lucky for us, Sarabeth’s had an alternative to their usually delcious muffins…

Matzo Heaven!

After I posted that picture on Instagram, CIT Mindy sent me a message saying that she was at Sarabeth’s as well! We had been at the Tribeca location, while Mindy and her family were at Central Park South. After we saw our first show downtown we made our way back uptown and finally got to see the Rosenthals… along with surprise guest star, Alex Feigin!

Alex, Cara, Mindy, and Rachel!

It’s always fun to run into your camp friends, even if it’s only for a few minutes! After our evening show we made our way home, although we’ve already got plans to return for some more theatrical fun next weekend! If you’re going to be in the city perhaps we’ll have another camp story to tell!

Gifts Galore!

When I’m not seeing shows or busy working in the office I’ve been having a blast experimenting with all sorts of French Macaron flavors! I must give a HUGE shout-out to Jason Calabretta, who hooked me up with some insane flavors to try. From s’mores to chocolate fudge – my kitchen is practically a bakery! Perhaps this is an iCan night in the making – what do you think?

Leo would like a puppy macaron, please?!

Allow me to introduce you to some awesome new Canadensis campers!  First up is Alexa, a current 3rd grader that will be a Junior Girl this summer.  She lives in Gladwyne, PA and also goes by the nickname Lexi.  Here are some important things you need to know about this fun new camper…

• She has an adorable rescue puppy named Penny, because she is the color of a penny.
• She attends The Shipley School, and has the best teacher in the school, Mrs. Riley.
• Alexa loves Justin Bieber, and had more than 10 pictures of him in her room.  I left the house smelling like Justin Bieber perfume!
• She has a super fun bedroom now, but if she’s at camp for the full summer she gets to move into a new bigger room with her own bathroom!  Imagine the awesome camp friend sleepover parties she can throw!
• She is a big sister to Brooke, they are two years apart.  Brooke will be doing the Tour & More Weekend this summer!
• The best part about being a big sister is getting to stay up later!  Alexa is also an early riser.
• Alexa thinks she’s going to want to be in the camp show, and she suggested that we do Wicked.
• She will want to dance every day of the summer, and also will choose gymnastics as an elective.
• Currently, she takes dance classes three days a week and on Saturday she dances for four hours!  She’s definitely going to want to be on our inter-camp dance team.
• The name of her year round competition dance team is the “mini-pops”.   She dances with a lot of other Canadensis Girls at Liberty Me, including Kylie, Marissa, Skye, Brooke, Madison and Jenna.
• Shabbat is a big deal at her house, and a lot of fun!  They invite friends to celebrate each week.
• When Color War breaks,  she hopes she’ll be on the blue team!  Her mom was a blue team color war captain and did some cheers for us in the dining room!
• Her favorite color is purple and her favorite candy is “dots”.
• Her family went on an RV vacation to Niagara Falls, and along the way they jumped into a freezing cold gorge of water – so cool!!
• She has a super neat and clean room, her parents agreed that she is very organized.
• She had so many great questions about camp – how do phone calls home work, how do we celebrate stuffed animal birthday parties, and what kind of stuff do staff have to jump in the lake for?
• She’s already planned out what she wants to wear at crazy night (one of our wild evening activities!)
• She’s planning to try everything by the end of the summer!

• She has cut her hair three times for “Locks of Love”, a charity that provides hairpieces for disadvantaged children – so impressive!
• She loves piggies, and had too many in her room to count!  She taught me a fun song that shows you how a draw pigs really easily by making little circles and bigger circles…you can learn the song here.
• She has a snow globe collection, and has more than 20!
• Each week she takes more than seven hours of dance classes.  She can’t decide if hip-hop or modern dance is her favorite.  She knows Alexa (above) from dance, and does competition as well.
• Brooke is a great eater likes trying all different kinds of things.  Her dad is from my hometown (Hewlett, LI!) and her Grandparents still live there, so we have some of the same favorite restaurants, like Matteos.
• She’s got some awesome baking skills.  As you can see in the photo above, Brooke made an amazing cookie cake, that she decorated all by herself!!  It was SO awesome, and delicious!  We gobbled it up in the winter office the next day…thanks!!
• She is a really good big sister to her brother Aidan, but he’s impossible to share a bed with because he takes up the whole bed!
• She likes to ride her bike, even though she never has enough time.
• Brooke showed me tons of art project she’s made, like glass fusion trivets, ceramic projects, popsicle sticks bowls, hand soaps, and scented candles that smelled like hot chocolate!  She has an aunt who works at Make Meaning in NYC, and she gets to try tons of fun projects there.  If you are ever looking for something to do in NY, check it out!
• Brooke has an amazing memory.  She remembers so much about the Tour & More weekend, she already knows the locations of where everything is in camp!
• She is going to a Maroon5 concert before coming up to camp, and she is going to do a camping trip with her dad to get ready for the COALS overnight at camp this summer.
• Some of her electives choices will definitely be glass fusion and dance.  The 3rd elective will be a wildcard… maybe something at the lake?
• She might want to audition for the camp show – she has been in Glee and Grease in the past.
• Her mom is one of her dance teachers, and her dad is her soccer coach…some of the many activities she is involved with!  Her parents met at Ohio State University, and she has them winning in our Canadensis March Madness NCAA Bracket Challenge, and she’s been high up on the leader board the whole time!

Brooke wore a special Canadensis shirt for my home visit!

Jes is going to be returning to camp for her 2nd summer, she will be in the Lower Inter Girls division.  She lives in Maryland, and recently celebrated her 10th birthday.  She had a “color war” themed party, and the two teams were purple and pink!  In the photo above you can see Jes in the purple shirt in one of the competitions, she had to eat a donut off a dangling rope as fast as possible, just like the carnival game we play at camp.  Looks like tons of fun!

I must take a break from my regularly scheduled CIT Intro postings to tell you all about the amazing fun had with camp friends over the weekend!!!

For those of you who are new to my blog or have yet to meet me, you should know now that I loooove theatre – musical theatre and plays, from Broadway to community, I love it all. I spent my entire childhood and high school career performing in shows and now as a semi-grown-up, I try to see as much theatre as possible, as often as possible, with as many friends as possible. Loyal readers may have noticed that every few blog entries involves me being in New York with camp friends seeing a play or grabbing rush tickets to a musical. It’s just one of my favorite things…cue: Julie Andrews singing My Favorite Things from the Sound of Music…

My very first job at Canadensis was “Theatre Specialist” and it was here that [Junior Boy/now CIT] Brett Levine and I starred in the Camp Canadensis Production of “Once on this Island”.

Here we are in 2006, belting out a tune!

8 years later we still talk about how much fun we had doing Canadensis theatre, and I have always wanted to go see Brett perform in a show in the off season – kid has some serious talent! The planets aligned and this year I made it my goal to get to his musical, and in the spirit of this upcoming summer, I got some of the other CITs involved in the fun! Brett had no idea we were bringing along some of his camp friends, and the result was an amazing evening of friends, fun, and musical theatre!

Rachel, Carly, Mallie, Bari, Maddie, Melissa, Grama, and JRo pose after dinner!

JCal made an appearance to help get everyone to the show!

Grama shows off her Brett tee shirt!

Dani and Alex representing the Super Seniors!

Brett Fan Club with Brett after the show!

Dani and I are so proud of this talented kid!

Backstage tour for camp friends!

After the show the Levine family (who, if you haven’t heard, are AMAZING!) invited everyone back for snacks and silliness at their home. We talked about camp and our summer ideas and just had the most wonderful time being together. Camp friends may be miles apart, but when we all get together it’s as if camp was only yesterday!

And of course, no time with camp friends is ever complete without trying to take a selfie with their dog:

Tori, Kobe, and Dani for the Selfie Win.

Lauren Grama, just hangin around at the Rock Wall!

Name: Lauren Hannah Grama

Years at camp: This is going to be my 8^th summer (8 year jackets wooo!)

Hobbies when you’re at home: Cheerleading, I am the mazkirah (secretary) of my chapter board in BBYO (B’nai Brith Youth Organization), and of course thinking about camp!!!!

Secret Talent: I am probably the best acapella singer there is out there. I can sing but I am also good at modern dance, olden dance, and mermaid dancing which is a little different. I look forward to being the lead singer of Canacapella this summer so I can showcase these skills to such a large audience.

Favorite Camp Activity: Definitely tech booth doing the spotlight with J-Ro. But a close second is COALS!!!

Funny Camp Memory: My junior summer I was in mountain biking elective with Mindy Rosenthal. It was one of our first days at camp so we did not really know each other too well yet. As we were biking around the lake we had to cross over the dam that is right near the summit that had water running over it. I was the last one to cross and I of course was the only one to ride my bike into the lake.

Advice for a first time camper: I am sure you will hear this 100 times, but it is so important to really take it to heart. Literally don’t waste one second of camp fighting or disagreeing over the little things. You want to make memories in the few precious weeks you have at camp filled with only incredible things. So don’t sweat the small stuff! Also, don’t be afraid of what anyone thinks of you. Camp is one place where you can be yourself and no judgments will be passed. You don’t want to look back on your summers saying that you wish you did something; you want to look back on your summers being thankful that you did something. Savor every moment you have, because before you know it, you will be a CIT wishing that you could just relive it all again.

Something you learned at camp (that you couldn’t learn anywhere else): That your camp friends are the greatest people you will ever meet.  You wait all year to spend two crazy months with your best friends in the world.  You learn how to live cohesively with your sisters and to respect all kinds of people. It’s one of those lessons that you continue to expand upon each year at camp as long as you allow yourself to open up to new people and new experiences.

I never leave for camp without my: sleeping masks. I can’t sleep without them!!

If I could have any job in the world it would be: The owner of camp. I would be Aunt Grama and Aunt Terri and I would hang out ALL day. Also, Alex Feigin would be there.

My favorite place that I’ve traveled is: Camp. No vacation is better than camp!!!

One thing my campers will learn about me is: When I am in camp, I find that if someone calls me Lauren, I get very uncomfortable. My name is Grama in camp.

One fun fact about me is: My home friends yell at me whenever I talk about camp because that is probably the only thing I ever talk about!

Casey, Hannah, and Mallie are loving Color War!

Name: Hannah Schepps

Hobbies When You’re at Home: Cheerleading

Favorite Camp Activity: Archery

Funny Camp Memory: When I slid down the side of the bunk bed and ripped Carly Lieberman’s shirt!

Advice for a First Time Camper: Enjoy every moment of the summer because the friends and memories you make here last a life time!

Something You Learned at Camp: Color War Songs

I never leave for camp without my… Pillow Pet.

If I could have any job in the world it would be… Lion Tamer.

My favorite place I’ve traveled is… Dominican Republic

One thing my campers will learn about me is…  I am very funny.

One fun fact about me is… I used to live in Las Vegas