Red Forms, Blue Forms, Camp Forms, Sundials

Okay, I can't rhyme like Seuss but you get the point, eh?  Yesterday, with the help of some retired staff assistants we mailed out the camp "parent packet #1" and the latest issue of the "Sundial".  Caroline, Zach, Andrew, Lauren and Lindsey showed up at the winter office yesterday and got things done.  It was like a whirlwind of paper hovering around our desks as forms were collated and stapled, envelopes were stuffed and "Sundials" were stamped.  Both should arrive in camper homes in the next day or so.  The parent packet went out to the homes of currently enrolled campers.  If you haven't signed up yet, here's a link to the enrollment form! 

Also, thank you to everyone who has sent us Dr. Seuss-themed bunk group suggestions. I posted all the suggestions that have been sent in so far here. There's lots of time to think up more. You can send us your suggestions here.

Hope you like the Sundial,
Jeremy

While listening to NPR this morning, I heard a piece about Dr. Seuss. As it turns out, this year is the 75th anniversary of his first book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. It turns out that the book was rejected by publishing companies 27 times before Vanguard Press published it in 1937. If this peaks your interest, you can read the full story (or stream the audio) here.

Don't forget, this is the summer of Dr. Seuss at camp! Our bunk groups will be named after the characters, places, titles, and objects from his wonderful stories. You can submit your suggestions here for bunk group names. We've received a lot of great suggestions so far, but we need a lot more!

Thanks,
Tom

Tumblr and a New Recipe

Originally Posted on Jauary 20th, accidentally deleted and now reposted for your enjoyment:

Tumblr and a New Recipe

Today we are rocking the blogosphere with two huge announcements! 

The first is that we have officially launched the Campus Kids New Jersey Tumblr page.  You can view it at campuskidsnj.tumblr.com.  We will repost excerpts from this blog along with additional pictures, status updates and random camp geekery.   Be sure to follow us and feel free to comment on anything we put up!

The second is earth shattering, I hope you are sitting down.  As many of you already realize, Tom Riddleberger, camp director extraordinaire, is a man of vision and complex strategy.  Some call him "the man with the plan".  Every year, he puts together an awesome camp staff including its leadership team, counselors, staff assistants and administrative team.  He puts ideas in motion that make every summer at camp more amazing than the last!  Earlier this year, Tom had a new goal.  Some said it was silly, others thought it was just crazy and impossible.  Still others pledged their support and CPR expertise (thanks Robbie!).  Tom's latest brainstorm was to create a FRITO PIE PIZZA!  Today that dream has been fully realized and has at last come to fruition!  Tom and I made that frito pie pizza and ate it for lunch.  It was a culinary delight that will surely grab the attention of reputable food critics, Bon Appétit magazine and the Food Network.  We present you our recipe so that you can enjoy this wonderful meal at home!  Kids, please ask your parents for help and don't make this without their permission.

Ingredients •Fritos
•Sharp Cheddar Cheese
•Southwestern Style Salsa (mild to medium)
•Boboli pizza crust
•Fresh Tomatoes & Jalepeno
•Can of Chili (We used Amy's vegan chili but chili with meat should work fine)
Optional: Cilantro & Sour Cream



Step 1
Preheat your oven to 425˚.  Place just the pizza crust on an open rack in the oven and bake for 2-3 minutes (the longer it stays in, the crispier the crust).  Remember to take it out before it burns. 

Step 2While the crust is baking.  Microwave chili ~2 minutes or heat it up in a saucepan.

Step 3
Cover your pizza crust with chili.  Carefully spoon out the "meat" of your chili onto the crust and avoid excess liquid.  You don't want soggy crust.

Step 4Top with one or two handfuls of Fritos.  The proper Frito to Chili ratio is a highly controversial topic and we suggest that you experiment to find the amount you like best.

Step 5Add salsa, cheese, diced tomatoes and jalepenos.  Carefully spoon the salsa onto your pizza, again avoiding excess liquid.  Go for the chunkier bits of your slasa.  Cover with cheddar cheese as you would cover a regular pizza with mozerella.  Add diced tomatoes and jalepenos to taste.

Step 6 Bake directly on the center rack of your oven for an additional 8-10 minutes.  Ovens may vary and you may want yours more well done.  Just be careful not to burn the Fritos!

Step 7 Slice very carefully.  Garnish with sour cream and cilantro and.. Voila!  A meal fit for kings!  If you do decide to make one of these, take a picture of it and send it to us via email (jeremy@campuskids.com) or through our facebook page.  Or better yet, bring it over so that Tom and I can sample your Frito Pie Pizza.

Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!
~Jeremy

The Kids of CK!

If you are a camp geek like me then you probably love reading the "Sundial" as much as I do. One of my favorite features is "The Kids of CK!" that we run every year. It's the section where we write about the campers returning for another amazing summer at Campus Kids New Jersey. It's also where you find out about new campers who are coming to camp for the first time. Reading "The Kids of CK!" gets me so pumped up for the summer ahead because every installment features different members of the Campus Kids family. By the time you are done reading it, you'll want to meet up with all your camp friends so badly that you may start thinking about the feasibility of developing a time machine so that you can skip the months ahead and arrive instantly at the first day of camp. Don't worry... this is completely normal. The important thing to remember is the that the classic steampunk time machine from H. G. Wells, The Time Machine, did not require plutonium to power the flux capacitor used in the 80's classic, Back to the Future, and that's probably the better way to go in terms of time machine design.

Anyway... Beth, whom many of you know as the 2011 summer camp office manager (or Sam and Sydney's mom), started helping us out at the office this week. She'll be here 2 days a week during the off-season. One of the first projects she tackled was mailing out the "welcome" and "welcome back" forms. Every camper should be receiving one in the next day or two. By filling out the form, a new camper can tell the camp community a little bit about him/herself. Returning campers can let everyone know what they've been up to since camp. Not only do we loving reading about you or learning about all your great memories from camp, but these forms give us the information we use to write your entry in the "Kids of CK!". Please send them in quickly if you want to be included in the first installment! Everyone who sends in form gets into one of the "Sundial" issues before camp. So don't worry if you can't get it in right away or you don't see your name in the first issue.

One more awesome piece of news... Teri had her baby! She and her husband Jim have brought home Grady James, a healthy baby boy! The little dude hasn't yet made it over to the CK office but Tom, Devon, and Katie got to stop by the hospital the day after he was born. He happened to arrive while our leadership team was here for their planning retreat. We don't have any official pics of the little guy yet, but we grabbed this one off Facebook. His mommy will probably send some more soon. I'm sure we'll all get to meet the future camper this summer when he comes to visit.

Until then, be well!

~Jeremy

Leadership Blog

We've turned the calendars to a new year and it's well past the time for blog update. Tom and I both enjoyed the holidays with our families. We hope it was a wonderful time for all of you as well. During the days off, Vanessa and I played with our cats, got a new chimney for our house and relaxed at home. When I got back to work, Tom and I went straight to planning the last minute details for the 2012 Leadership Team Retreat.

Every year around this time, we gather the entire leadership team for 3 days of planning for the upcoming summer. Our agenda varies every year as we base the program on the goals and concerns of our LT members. Everyone prepares at least one session on topics like supporting new counselors, building confidence, staying involved with campers and staff, and planning for staff orientation. Most of the retreat was spent working hard and tackling some big topics. There were fun moments, too. We went for a walk through the Drew University campus on Saturday and played some team building games. Just like at camp, we had bunk meetings every night. In keeping with our bunk group theme, we read a Dr Suess story one night. We listened to a CD mix that the team created by anonymously submitting one song each. The theme for the CD was: Imagine your life was made into a movie, what song would you wnat to make sure was on the soundtrack! After each song played, we tried to guess who picked the song. Then, the person who picked the song got to tell us why they picked it. All in all, the retreat was a huge success and a great time was had. You'll get to read about all the leadership team in the upcoming issues of the Sundial.

Talk to you soon, ~Jeremy

December So Far...

As days pass and holidays creep ever closer, you’d think things would be settling down in our little “winter” office.  The opposite is true.  After the reunion we dove right into some other projects. 

First, we’ve been working with our leadership team in order to prepare for the leadership retreat.  The leadership team consists of our four head counselors, the five activity counselors and the directors.  Every year we kick off the season with a weekend training retreat.  We utilize an online forum to organize our work (both before and after the retreat itself).  People can post any ideas they have for camp and everyone is able to read and respond.  The leadership team’s first assignment was to post the goals that they had for the upcoming retreat.  Everyone contributed lots of amazing ideas.  Tom and I have been busy taking the teams goals and using them to design the content of the retreat.  We will be discussing things like: the responsibilities and priorities of the leadership team; giving the counselors the best possible support; the camper support coordinator position (which was introduced this year) and how it will evolve; brainstorming new art projects; and planning the staff orientation.  The retreat is just a couple weeks away and we’ve still got a bit of work to do beforehand.  It’s always great to see everyone in person.  Although, we will be working hard but it flies by.  Everyone loves talking about camp and the retreat just gets everyone more excited for the next summer.

Earlier this week we had to make some of the toughest decisions of the year.  It was time to pick who would become staff assistants for the summer of 2012.  We had almost 30 former campers apply for the job and we only had 11 spots available.  When it came down to it, we had lots of qualified applicants and not enough jobs to give out.  We did our best to create a team whose members complement each other with their strengths and skills.  We strive to build a team will work well together and do an awesome job.  I wish we could have all of you who applied on our staff and we hope that you keep in touch.  I’m sure we’ll see some of you back as counselors some day.  Congratulations to those that got the job and I look forward to working with you!

As many of you know, we announced that the bunk group theme for next summer will be “Dr. Suess”.  Weadded a link here where you can send us your suggestions for bunk group names.  When we get to camp, the counselors pick the names of their bunk groups from the list of names submitted by the campers.  We’ve already gotten several suggestions: Kittens with Mittens, Green Eggs and Ham, One-Fish-Two-Fish-Red-Fish-Blue-Fish, Barbaloot Suits, Cindy Loo Woo Crew, Star Belly Sneetches, Colliding Collusions, Pocket Wockets, and many, many more.  Send us yours today!

Well that’s it for this week.  Coming next week, holiday lunches!
~Jeremy

What a Reunion!

With dark winter days settling upon us and the final leaves falling from the trees, it was time for something to brighten our world and for CK-NJ folks that moment was our 21st Annual Camp Reunion on December 4th. Although I always know that the reunion will be fun, I'm still blown away by how much fun it really is. As each camper and staffer entered the Ice Vault (our reunion venue), the smiles increased, the noise level rose and the energy spiraled upward until we had created the perfect "camp storm". We laughed (and some of us screamed), we hugged, we skated, we consumed many pizzas, we shouted our birthday chant to two campers, we learned who won Zach B.'s mystery photo prize, we found out what the bunk group theme is for 2012 (see below) and we all got very cool CK wrist bands.


The crowd was too big for an accurate head count, but our official estimate is that at least 350 people were at the reunion. Thanks to everyone for coming out, especially to those staff members who had to make big efforts to travel and miss some precious time away from college papers and exam studying.


If you haven't found them yet, here's the reunion photo gallery.


Now back to that theme. As most of you know, our camp chooses to change the names of our four divisions and 22 bunk groups each year. We do that by picking an overall theme, after which the head counselors, counselors and campers pick their individual division and bunk group names. The bunk group theme for 2012 is . . . Dr. Seuss! That got a pretty good cheer when we announced it at the reunion, so I think we've got a winner. It's time now to ask you all to submit your suggestions for bunk group names. You can do this by visiting this web page and submitting ideas as many times as you wish. We'll share your ideas with the staff and they will pick the names from your suggestion list. Ready, set, go!


This cold weather makes some of want to hibernate, but we can't do that in the camp world because we have an exciting summer to plan, so the beat goes on here at the CK-NJ office. Our leadership team has begun using its online forum to make plans for next summer, and the whole team will be together in early January for a "planning retreat". We received many applications for staff assistants and have been conducting interviews. We'll be ready to announce our 2012 staff assistants in less than two weeks. The counselor hiring/re-hiring season is also underway and we're already excited about our new and returning counselors. If you know someone who has completed at least a year of college and would make a terrific counselor (must be able to teach one or more camp activities), now is the time for them to visit the staff information page of our website and submit their application.


Of course, we've also been speaking to families about camp, giving tours and receiving enrollments. We've also been updating our brochure and getting ready for camps fairs in January and February. January is when lots of new families start selecting camps, so we urge our returning folks to send in their enrollments, if you haven't already.


Well, I've got several interviews coming up this evening, so I'll sign off now. Hope you're having a fun (if cold and rainy) week. Talk to you soon.


Tom