Thumbs up, Pawnees!
A Day in the Life of a Camper
By: Josie Turlington (16-year-old Pawnee camper)
You hear the soft groans of the girls throughout the tepee as the bugle sets off to get us up and ready for the day. Now here at camp we’ve got our morning people and our not-so-morning people. The older you are… the less morning you are, but at camp, that doesn’t really matter. No matter how tired a camper may be in the morning, she still gets up and ready and looks forward to the day she has here at camp with her friends. And so dawns a day in the life of a camper at Heart O’ the Hills!
So after we brush our teeth and put our camp clothes on, we clean up our tepee so we can get a perfect for our inspection because we don’t want to be shunned with a pigpen. To those of you that don’t know what I’m talking about, getting a perfect speaks for itself! A perfectly clean cabin! And I bet you can assume what a pigpen means– no good!
The girls fight for who gets to sweep the floor and who gets to take out the trash because, well to tell the truth, who doesn’t want a good tepee credit?! We turn out the lights and take our Camelbaks, caps, water bottles, and towels with us to start the day! We walk out of our tepees and head on down to the heart for flag raising, our morning announcements and prayer before breakfast.
Everyone tries to move their way to the front to be with their friends or to even be able to get food first– because it’s breakfast time and we are all totally ready to get some grub! We all line up along the heart while fellow Heart sisters unfold the flag and raise it high above our heads so we may say the Pledge of Allegiance. Then we gather ourselves and listen to the heads on our morning announcements and what day today is if there is a special event going on! Then… let the games begin.
Highland Games!
There is a spastic sprint to the Dining Hall as all the girls are dismissed from the heart to go and receive their breakfast. We all get together with our tables at our individually numbered hearts and walk in together. Mmmmm. The smell of eggs and sausage and… what’s that??? WAFFLES?! Camp food is the absolute best! Alright, it’s not the best of The Glass Knife menu, but you get the chance to try things you have never tried before and maybe even fall in love with them!
We all gobble up our food as quickly, and safely, as we can so we can go to our first activity of the day! Soon before we are done eating, you may hear a call for the war canoe girls to go off to their war canoe practice on the Guadalupe. As those strong girls stand up you can hear the buzz of the little ones throughout the dining hall on how they want to do war canoe someday!
Off to activities
Then, we are dismissed for our first class! A camper’s schedule may be chosen based on whatever that camper is passionate about! The Heart has everything from polocrosse to quidditch!! Cool, right?
Eat Out! <3
So we all head to our first class with our bestest friends and talk about what exciting things we have going on that day! We head on down to the old Trading Post to get ready for our archery class, archery is my favorite, and giggle about what medals we could try to achieve that week. We walk down and collect our bows and arrows and wait to load our bows until the counselor says so! Then…. Ready. Aim. FIRE!
As the day goes on, we attend so many exciting activities that we get to look forward to almost every day! We attend our lunch, where we get to go and sing all our favorite camp songs with Jane! The Rooster is the best because everyone will jump up and sing and dance along to it, including the Heads and Jane of course!
Lunch and siesta
We wrap up our lunch and have siesta and snack before we go to next few activities of the day. Horseback, swimming, arts and crafts… you name it! We have the absolute best time ever with our friends in our classes and even, being the Teen I am, being with our little ones is just like being with our best friends… because at The Heart, everyone is a Heart sister.
After the last activity of the day, we go to our cabins to clean ourselves up for dinner, gotta brush the teeth and hair so you don’t smell after a long day of being outside in the Texas sun! Then we head on down to the heart again and take down our high flying flag and say our nightly prayer and head on into dinner. After our munchies we get…. DESSERT!!!! Dessert is almost the best part of the day, because we get it EVERY DAY! We eat our homemade ice cream and sing our hearts out to some more fun camp songs to wrap up that fun day!
Evening is here
Then, after dinner, there is always a special, fun event that takes place that night before we go to sleep. One of the coolest nights is tepee night! You get to hang out and bond with your best friends from your cabin! It’s so awesome! You could do anything from hide-and-seek, to making s’mores, to braiding your hair, to dance parties and nail salons! Tepee night is the best! Lastly, the most amazing part of your entire day, well maybe… I think it’s pretty great, MILK LINE!
Closing Day <3
Give me a big ‘M’! You can get chocolate milk or regular milk right before you get to go to bed! A bonus treat to help you get some nice shut eye.
And after that eventful day, we head back into our cabins and take our showers, brush our teeth, put our pajamas on, say our goodnights, and go to bed with dreams of what the next day at The Heart has in store. [goodnight bugle] <3
–Josie <3
About the Author
