4-H Camp

OK so here's another nice thing about being retired....

You can help your friends with stuff whenever they call.

Today I spent a few hours helping Elsie get the flyers ready to mail. It's time for folks to sign up for this coming summer's 4-H camp....but first the flyers need to be taped, stamped and have the correct label(s) attached......2000 of them..give or take a few hundred.  This year we are using Harry Potter stamps- something the kids might enjoy if they see the flyer before their parents register them.

I was never a 4-Her myself and I ended up working at camp in a very round about way.

I had spent the previous 2 summers working as a VISTA Volunteer at Hull House in Chicago. In 1968 I was back in college hoping to be a social worker,(we know that didn't happen) and in need of a summer job. Butch Brzezicki, a long time family friend, suggested I apply at 4-H camp. He had volunteered many hours and was involved in 4-H activities and his son, Mike, was in charge of the waterfront. I found out that the summer staff had already been hired but I might be able to get a job via the work study program. I applied for that at the college and was told that our family income was too high for me to qualify.??? That really was ridiculous but I didn't know what to do about it. Luckily a friend had a friend who owed her a favor. I don't know his exact position in the town, but all of a sudden I had an "Uncle Frank" who wanted to know why the college wouldn't approve me for work study. Just like that they did.

I spent my first day at the Cooperative Extension office and then I think it was the next day that Ed Merritt drove me down to camp to introduce me to Elsie. The first time I heard her laugh, I knew it would be a fine summer.! The first night there we planted lilac and forsythia bushes in the rain and I began the first of 3 wonderful summers !  Of course it did take a bit of time for us to get to know each other. But that is a story for another post. Today's camp flyers are being sent to the children and Grandchildren of campers and staff members that I knew way back when.....