Jack's Summer Adventures

Jack had a couple of fun summer activities all his own as well.  In the middle of June, he went to day camp with the Cub Scouts.  (Yes, he should be in 11-year-old Boy Scouts since he is 11 but there wasn't an organized group near us at the time, and since our future with Boy Scouts is unsure right now, he's just continued to attend Cub Scouts as a Webelo.)  They spent the day learning and practicing first aid (for real, when a leader fell and got a cut), hiking, playing in the Battle Creek waterfall, cooking with a Dutch Oven, tying knots, practicing how to handle the American flag, and working on skits.

When the parents (and Suz and Whit) arrived that night, we enjoyed cobbler with the boys and watched them perform their skits.  Jack's group's skit was about a boy who kept catching a lot of fish and the other kids couldn't catch any.  Whenever the boys asked the other one why he was having so much luck, the boy would mumble his answer.  Finally, someone told the boy, "Come on, you can tell me!" and slapped the boy on the back.  A bunch of worms flew out of the boy's mouth and he explained, "You have to keep the bait warm."

Jack had lots of fun.

Jack, the most enthusiastic novelist in the family, also attended a writing camp at BYU.  When looking at the options and choosing which week to sign him up for, I first asked if he'd want to attend all day or half the day.  He said all day.  So I told him that camp was centered on a mystery writing theme.  The half day camp had a Harry Potter theme.  He chose the half day Harry Potter camp.  This camp was long on fun but a bit shorter on writing than I would have preferred.  The writing included coming up with his own spell, his own potion, and a deleted scene from a Harry Potter movie.  Then everyone's deleted scenes were printed and bound and distributed at the week-end BYU Creamery Ice Cream party.

Non-writing activities included being sorted into houses (Jack was Ravenclaw), decorating notebooks with different Harry Potter pictures, creating their own prophecy balls, and celebrating Harry Potter's birthday with cake and butter beer (cream soda + whipped cream).