Mari’s Awesome, Supersplendiferous, Fantasticalicious Camp Pictures
Contributed by Blogger, Author, and Speaker Denene Millner of My Brown Baby a weekly blog that provides thought-provoking, insightful, wickedly funny commentary on motherhood, for moms who love their brown babies, by moms who do the same. Through their posts, our MyBrownBaby bloggers lift the voices of African-American moms looking for the 411/advice/a high-five on everything from pregnancy and childrearing to sex, work, and relationships—all filtered through the lens of the African American experience.
So my baby Mari survived her first sleepaway camp. More specifically, I survived Mari’s first sleepaway camp. She was gone for three… excruciatingly… looooong… days, hiking, repelling down mountains, shooting arrows, zip-lining, and sleeping in the woods with her two teachers, whom I like and trust (I guess, considering I’d only met them in person, like, twice), and her class. The only reason I didn’t do the total freakout is because she went with her Uncle James, bless his dear heart, who drove, and her cousin Miles, who loves and protects Mari like his very life depends on it.
I was so very happy when she got home, but you know what made me even more happy? When she came back with a smile on her face, a giggle in her voice and incredible stories about how much fun she had hanging with new friends, watching the sunrise, celebrating the Earth (she’s quite the environmentalist!) and summonsing up the strength and courage to overcome her fear of heights to do the repelling and zip lining. I’m super proud of baby girl. And I know that with this camp trip, she took one more step not away from me, but toward her independence.
To celebrate Mari’s big girl moves, I wanted to share with you some shots she took with her camera, which she hardly ever leaves home without. The girl is NICE with the Casio AND nice with the verbs (she’s the bold writer of the captions below each picture). Check it… and if you’re so moved, show sweetness some love in the comments section.
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This is the curvy mountainous road up the huge hill to Camp Greenville.
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| My pretty nice cabin (for a camp); girls on the right, boys on the left. |
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| My activities group walking to our next fun activity through the shortcut. |
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| One of the weird, exotic leaves that we came across on our wilderness trek, called Sassafrass. |
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| The sky through the trees on a sunny day. |
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| Our view of the orangey sunrise at Pretty Place. |
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| The rules at the awesome archery range that we went to for our activities |
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| The two targets that all of us shot at with our bows and arrows. |
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| My bow that I used to shoot. |
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| The ropes course that we had to WALK on high up in the air. |
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| Some of my group members jumping across the stream towards the water fall. |
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| A close up of the running water in the stream. |
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| My hand in the water while trying to take a picture. The water was freezing cold. |
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| Me having a blast in front of Rainbow Falls (the huge waterfall) |