character champion ymca camp day

every year madelyn has been chosen "character champion," we have been invited to a free day at the local (an hour an a half away) ymca camp for her and an adult; we can pay for additional parents and siblings. it is always offered on a friday and has never worked out with daddy's schedule for a day off and neither of us felt comfortable with me taking all four on my own. but this year we got it to work out! since both madelyn and mason were character champions this year, we only had to pay for maddux to attend (manning was free because of his age). the whole family gets a day of fun and lunch for the low, low price of $6. the kids were pumped!

maddux was given this hat at vbs a few years ago and received many compliments on it from the camp staff.

the stairs. going down was a whole lot easier than coming back up!

while we were checking in, we learned that the horses were sick and could not be ridden, the pontoon rides were already full and the kids were too young for the zip line. okay. that left us with archery, bb guns, canoeing and a few other camp activities.

everyone agreed on archery so we went there first. and it is a good thing because it took us an hour and a half to get to our turn! while i waited in line, matt took the kids to explore a little bit. when they game back they found that mason's bus seat buddy (and generally best friend) had arrived with his family!

these two hug every time they find each other.

 the wait was worth it for the kids - they were all excited to give it a try.

manning might have done the best.

they each pulled their own arrows too.

that face.

madelyn's target

maddux was super focused

maddux' final target

mason was able to do some archery earlier in the year when he and daddy went camping with his church group. it was his favorite part of the trip and he was really excited to try again.

mason's target - he is consistent.

now it was getting near to our scheduled lunch time so we headed back up to the front. we had a little bit of time, so the kids took a turn at roping.

i think manning loved the roping more than anyone.

lunch is served! hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, pretzels, watermelon and several types of bean salads (much to my delight). and the baked beans, oh the baked beans! i know the camp director and am going to try and get my hands on that recipe. yum. yum.

the view behind the kids was fantastic but it didn't capture in the photo.

some quick connect four while we took a bathroom break.

 trying to get some group pictures in front of the view of the lake...

then the kids wanted to give a try to the firearms. i am not sure they quite knew where their bbs were going. the targets (minion stickers on paper plates) were already fairly shot up so it was really hard to tell if they actually hit anything.

next stop was the lake for some canoeing and, luck for us, they freed up some more pontoon rides. there are not many pictures on the water because i was too chicken to bring my phone or camera out in the canoe with us.

you might have noticed them in the other videos - the cicadas were insanely loud! you could hardly hear over them when speaking to someone right next to you at times. they are also not smart bugs and would be picked up and held. they also flew into you and were every where! the video does not do justice to how loud they were or how many there were. i am happy to not have them out near us! yikes. you could even hear them while driving with the windows up as we were leaving.

our day at camp was winding down, but we stopped for one more try at archery on our way to the car.

such a great opportunity for some off-line family fun! (there was hardly any cell reception for most of the camp site.) thank you, ymca. love.