Sandra Saha LYOA Summer 2020 Family Story

The Saha Family’s Girl Scout Summer I've got four kids - Penny (Girl Scout - Cadette), Paul (Boy Scout - Bear Cub), Zoe (Girl Scout - Brownie), and Silas (Boy Scout - Lion Cub). With so many months off school, we got seriously stir-crazy hanging around the house every day. All our camps were cancelled and the one or two virtual camps I signed the kids up for couldn't hold the kids' attention for more than 40 minutes a day. At first, we explored local parks, but with playgrounds fenced off, they didn't have much appeal. After another month or so, we ventured to the State parks and forests. I remember going to Mounds State Park and having a hard time finding a parking space because it was SO crowded. I tried lots of other places, but we always had to arrive super early or choose an obscure location to be able to enjoy nature without tripping over tons of other people.

I couldn't WAIT for GS camp to open in June because I know safety is a priority whenever we plan things as Girl Scouts, so I would be able to relax about our visits and just enjoy them. I often chose to visit on weekdays and was rewarded by having the camp to ourselves or sharing with just one or two other families. In July especially, I felt like we had our own camp concierge service as staff offered activities and crafts at times that fit our schedule for the day. The kids could run around, play games with equipment we brought, meet new bugs, fish and tadpoles. We creekstomped, roasted s’mores, practiced compass skills, canoed (Paul & Penny fav), swam in the lake (Zoe & Silas fav), hiked, slept out in tents, enjoyed stargazing. Girl Scout camp is familiar, yet we had opportunities to do things we'd never explored on troop visits.

We did get a chance to visit all five camps, something I haven't been able to manage in my past five years of Girl Scouting because it's tough to convince an entire troop to travel to camps more than an hour away when we've got two awesome ones LESS than an hour away. Having seen them all now, though, I can make the case for why we should invest the car ride!

Camp Sycamore Valley has such cool structures to camp in. Na Wa Kwa has great terrain, multiple lakes and lots of fun things to do. Ada I'd already explored for winter camping with CSAs - lots of big space for group activities, plus the barracks rooms where lots of girls could hang out and play games between large-group events. For our camps I've visited lots of times with my troops, I got to try out things I've never explored before. We hiked all around the lake at Gallahue, not to mention having the beach all to ourselves in the heat of early August.

My son, who "hated" Dellwood because he was the oldest tagalong at summer camp last year, was thrilled to learn that there was a history trail at Dellwood, exploring the cemetery at length and listening intently about the prior owners before it was a camp.

The activity kits we picked up through our visits certainly saw some good use. The scavenger hunts we got in our first camp kit at Gallahue were used at several of the camps later on as well. The water bottles we picked up in our "Kroger Zero Hunger, Zero Waste" kits are handy as we start school, where water fountains have all been turned off. I found this patch program fascinating because I learned that Kroger recycles a lot more than I thought they did at their store. Because we visited so frequently over the summer, I may have picked up more than my fair share of kits - but I've shared them with other leaders in our service unit so that girls who missed the summer camp experience can still enjoy the kits and activities with their troops.

Both the Zero Hunger, Zero Waste and the Organ Donation kits strike me as being conducive to being earned virtually for troops that pursue that option this fall.

- Sandy Saha: Girl Scouts of Central Indiana Dedicated Volunteer