Friday, July 13, 2012
Family Weekend
Dear parents, family and friends,
Today is Open Day here at Sunny Hill! At this present moment, the kids and leaders are running around getting ready for the visitors from our local chapter. It is a busy day for all of us, and when Open Day is over, the kids will leave for the home stay weekend. We have paired up the kids so that everyone get to go with someone they had requested to go with, and everyone is going with someone from a different country.
Your kids will be spending the weekend with local CISV-families and they are all going to have a great time!
We know you guys are anxious to hear what we have been doing the past days, and that you will be checking the blog for news over the weekend. We kindly ask of you to be patient, as we (the staff, leaders and JCs) are going away for leaders' weekend to a cabin with no internet, and we will not be able to blog as much as we have been doing so far.
We have however prepared a few treats for you which will be posted on the blog while we are away, and we promise to post lots of news next week!
Flag time at Sunny Hill
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Kiitos!
This is what we sing after each meal, it means thank you for the food basically, in Finish, Norwegian, Danish and Swedish! How about you guys learn it and surprise your kids when they get back from camp? Good luck!
One Day at Camp
We are a big group here at Sunny Hill, and to make everything run smoothly, we follow a daily schedule. It goes a little something like this:
At 08:00, the Delegation of the Day wakes us all up, sometimes by playing music, sometimes by yelling "wake up time!" in their own language. We get up, get dressed and brush our teeth, put on some shoes and run outside for...
... Flagtime! At 08:30, we gather around the flag pole to greet each other good morning in all the different languages, and then we raise the CISV-flag while holding hands and singing the CISV-song.
After flagtime, we go inside the main building for some breakfast. We eat our bread, and after some announcements, we clear the tables, hammer the "Everybody Dance Now"-tune on the tables, then get up to jump and sing the after-meal-verse: Kiitos!
At 09:15, we gather in delegations and venture out to clean the different areas of the camp site. We use hot water and soap to clean the floors, and we recycle all the garbage we find around the camp site grounds. (Below is a somewhat blurry picture of Henrik and Mie from the Staff presenting the Grand Wheel of Cleaning:)
At 10:00, we gather for the first activity! Sometimes the activity involves a trip to Lake Fake, sometimes we gather inside in the big Theater, sometimes we have running games outside.
We usually start each activity with an energizer! We do the Pony Song, the Shark Song, the Beaver Song, the Penguin Song, and the song about Fred the Moose, who likes to drink a lot of Juice! CISVers love animals, apparently!
A lot of the energizers are so-called "repeat-after-me-songs", and we love them! At 12:00, we gather for lunch, and after lunch and Kiitos, we get to buy candy and post cards and CISV-items in the JC-shop!
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After buying some sweets, we all have Siesta. Siesta is quiet time indoors for those who want to rest. After Siesta, at 14:30, we gather for Activity 2. Sometimes we run around, sometimes we do activities involving arts&crafts, sometimes we have to do a lot of thinking. After the activity, we usually do a little debriefing, and we get to answer questions like "how does this apply to real life?", "what could we have done differently when solving the tasks", "how did we feel when we succeeded in the end" and so on. The leaders always ask very thought through questions!

At 16:00, it's time for all the kids to take a shower, while the leaders, JC's and Staff gather in the leaders' meeting room for leaders' meeting. Four of the JC's take care of the kids while the meeting is on. In the meeting, the adults talk about how the kids are doing, discuss any issues the camp may have, ask for more fruit and less bread, present the coming day's activities and evaluate the past 24 hours.
At 17:00 the kids are all clean, and they gather with their leader for delegation time! For a full hour, the delegation gets to spend time together, speaking their language and sometimes also eating sweets from their home country, if they are lucky... ;)
When the hour is up, at 18:00, it is time for dinner, and after that, Activity 3. Activity 3 is often a National Night, where a delegation or two presents their country. We love the National Nights!
When activity 3 is over, we have a little snack, and then we meet at 21:00 around the flag pole, to say good night to everyone in all the languages, lower the CISV flag and to hold hands and sing the CISV song. Then we get ready for bed, brush our teeth, put our pajamas on, and gather in the Lullabies room for some quiet singing. And after that, we go to bed, hug everyone good night, cover our windows with garbage bags so the light won't keep us up, and go to sleep. And that's a day at Sunny Hill River Village!
At 08:00, the Delegation of the Day wakes us all up, sometimes by playing music, sometimes by yelling "wake up time!" in their own language. We get up, get dressed and brush our teeth, put on some shoes and run outside for...
... Flagtime! At 08:30, we gather around the flag pole to greet each other good morning in all the different languages, and then we raise the CISV-flag while holding hands and singing the CISV-song.
Some days the Staff's are the only ones on time! But some times, the Staff is late as well... We try to do our best to get to Flag Time on time! Here's Morten, asking "where is everyone??":
After flagtime, we go inside the main building for some breakfast. We eat our bread, and after some announcements, we clear the tables, hammer the "Everybody Dance Now"-tune on the tables, then get up to jump and sing the after-meal-verse: Kiitos!
At 09:15, we gather in delegations and venture out to clean the different areas of the camp site. We use hot water and soap to clean the floors, and we recycle all the garbage we find around the camp site grounds. (Below is a somewhat blurry picture of Henrik and Mie from the Staff presenting the Grand Wheel of Cleaning:)
We usually start each activity with an energizer! We do the Pony Song, the Shark Song, the Beaver Song, the Penguin Song, and the song about Fred the Moose, who likes to drink a lot of Juice! CISVers love animals, apparently!
A lot of the energizers are so-called "repeat-after-me-songs", and we love them! At 12:00, we gather for lunch, and after lunch and Kiitos, we get to buy candy and post cards and CISV-items in the JC-shop!
After buying some sweets, we all have Siesta. Siesta is quiet time indoors for those who want to rest. After Siesta, at 14:30, we gather for Activity 2. Sometimes we run around, sometimes we do activities involving arts&crafts, sometimes we have to do a lot of thinking. After the activity, we usually do a little debriefing, and we get to answer questions like "how does this apply to real life?", "what could we have done differently when solving the tasks", "how did we feel when we succeeded in the end" and so on. The leaders always ask very thought through questions!
At 16:00, it's time for all the kids to take a shower, while the leaders, JC's and Staff gather in the leaders' meeting room for leaders' meeting. Four of the JC's take care of the kids while the meeting is on. In the meeting, the adults talk about how the kids are doing, discuss any issues the camp may have, ask for more fruit and less bread, present the coming day's activities and evaluate the past 24 hours.
At 17:00 the kids are all clean, and they gather with their leader for delegation time! For a full hour, the delegation gets to spend time together, speaking their language and sometimes also eating sweets from their home country, if they are lucky... ;)
When the hour is up, at 18:00, it is time for dinner, and after that, Activity 3. Activity 3 is often a National Night, where a delegation or two presents their country. We love the National Nights!
When activity 3 is over, we have a little snack, and then we meet at 21:00 around the flag pole, to say good night to everyone in all the languages, lower the CISV flag and to hold hands and sing the CISV song. Then we get ready for bed, brush our teeth, put our pajamas on, and gather in the Lullabies room for some quiet singing. And after that, we go to bed, hug everyone good night, cover our windows with garbage bags so the light won't keep us up, and go to sleep. And that's a day at Sunny Hill River Village!
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
More Excursion Pictures
Here are a few more snap shots from our excursion yesterday! As you can see, we had to deal with a little rain... but we are used to that by now!
We also had to wait in line a little... but we are used to that by now, too!
The Spanish speakers become friends easily, that's no surprise to us by now :)
And last, but not least: Mecca and Morten showing us the world's smallest bridge between two nations. Wonderful!
We also had to wait in line a little... but we are used to that by now, too!
The Spanish speakers become friends easily, that's no surprise to us by now :)
And last, but not least: Mecca and Morten showing us the world's smallest bridge between two nations. Wonderful!
New Search Feature
To make it easier for you guys to find the entry you were looking for when showing the blog to grandma, uncle Paul or to your co-worker when time has passed and the entry with the gorgeous picture of YOUR child has been lost from the front page of the blog, we have added yet another feature to the blog:
The Ladies at Sunny Hill
We have a wonderful leaders' group here at Sunny Hill, and of the delegation leaders, 9 are female! Here is a picture of six of the Sunny Hill ladies, from the left: Sam (Italy), Sarah (Canada), Cris (Brazil), Mony (Mexico), Mecca (USA), and Alejandra (Spain). We love you guys!
Germans and Haribo
We are not sure why, but it seems that Germans have this unexplainable love for gummy bears. They seem to gravitate towards the Haribo-rack wherever we go! German parents, can you explain this, please? :)
Some More Fun @ Lake Fake
Morten from the Staff is dangerous in the water! He splashes around and will stop at nothing to get water into everyone's nose. Luckily the kids will splash water right back at him. Waterfight!
Some of you may have googled "Skarnes" and found that our camp site is in the middle of green fields and forests, and that our neighbors are small houses and big farms. And it's true!
It must be quite an experience to come here from Mexico City or Sao Paulo! You can walk long distances and not meet a single soul here in Skarnes. We like it that way!
It gives us all the time in the world to focus on camp and the people at camp - we have no disturbances around us!
What is Sam and Pauli doing with those bags of water??
Lake Fake - signing out!
Some of you may have googled "Skarnes" and found that our camp site is in the middle of green fields and forests, and that our neighbors are small houses and big farms. And it's true!
It must be quite an experience to come here from Mexico City or Sao Paulo! You can walk long distances and not meet a single soul here in Skarnes. We like it that way!
It gives us all the time in the world to focus on camp and the people at camp - we have no disturbances around us!
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