It's Summer Camp Season

When Allan Sherman’s “Camp Grenada” starts playing in my head, I know it’s time to gear up for overnight summer camps.

Overnight camp is great for the kids. But each year 10 million parents across the country are stressed out by the long list of tasks needed to get them there. For parents of first-time campers, this can be especially overwhelming.

It all starts with finding the right camp to begin with. Our first time around, we spent hours searching online, getting information from other parents, and talking to camp directors. With an estimated 12,000 summer camps across the U.S., the arduous task of finding the right camp provides great training for the college search process that hit us years later! Thankfully summer camps don’t require entrance exams or come with rejection letters.

Once we found “camp paradise”, paid the bill (ouch) and completed dozens of forms, the real fun began with the “What to Pack” camp checklist.

The first time my two boys went off to summer camp, I spent hours trying to find every item that was on that list – from bed-bug-proof mattress covers, to cot-sized sheets, to laundry bags and footlockers. But I went one step further. Knowing that they’d miss us terribly, I created stamped and preaddressed postcards that they could simply drop in the mail after writing us their heartfelt notes.

The real fun was packing time. Sitting on the floor surrounded by dozens of items and my handy Sharpie, I put my boys’ names on every single item with the expectation that it would not get lost. I was determined that each sock, pair of underwear, jeans, t-shirt, toothbrush, soap dish, flashlight, pillowcase, water bottle and every other item packed carefully in the massive footlocker would be clearly branded with each son’s name.


With everything packed up and in the car, it was time to make the five-hour drive to upstate New York. On the way, we thought the boys would talk excitedly about the three weeks they’d be away from home, but they were quiet. So we spent a lot of time peppering them with questions…”Do you think you’ll like the food?”; “What are you most excited about?”; “Do you think the counselors will be nice?” Their little sister only wanted to know: “Will you miss me?”

Camp arrival and registration was uneventful, but it was pouring rain. We slogged through puddles to locate the boys’ cabins, meet their counselors, make their beds, organize their belongings and say goodbye. We were back on the road again within an hour, but this time with a family of three vs. five.

On the ride home, we talked about all of the projects we’d get done at home, and our seven-year-old daughter was excited about being an only child -- if only for a short time.

A week flew by, and no word from the boys. Surely a postcard would arrive soon, or we’d get a homesick phone call, but there was nothing. Two weeks later, we finally heard from our 11-year-old and the conversation went like this: “Hi Mom. I miss you. Hey…can you send me some money? Sorry I haven’t sent any postcards – I couldn’t find the mailbox.”



The remaining two weeks flew by, and before we knew it we were back on the NY Thruway to pick up the boys. On arrival, we found their cabins without a problem. My husband helped pack up one son, while I took care of the other. In my 11-year-old’s cabin, the footlocker that was once neatly packed with clean clothes was now empty (but the laundry bag was overflowing). The toothpaste, soap and shampoo were easy to round up, but the toothbrush was missing (and had been for some time, I was warned). The sleeping bag had to be rolled up (but the bag it came in was missing), and our son’s sheets had to be stripped from the bed (they hadn’t been changed since his arrival). And after discovering all of the unsent postcards in both boys’ backpacks, I also spotted a shack prominently located in the middle of camp with a large sign that said: “Camp Mailbox”.

So we loaded up the boys and all their “stuff” and head back home. With Dad singing “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh”, the drive was filled with stories about the friends made at camp, the new things they learned, and their favorite (and dreaded) camp counselors . Three weeks had flown by.

My husband and I may not have gotten through everything on our to-do list, and our boys may have come back with half the clothing, socks and underwear they started with (and that still bears their name), but they have countless memories that will last them a lifetime.