Sometimes the best-laid plans turn out to be less fun than just being spontaneous. I truly believe that our misfortunate need to postpone the outdoor French Camping trip due to the threat of unhealthy air quality, wound up leading to a great new Camp-IN event. I'm sure all the planned attendees were disappointed when we had to make that call on Thursday--after receiving a BSA recommendation to avoid outdoor activities. Then when the air quality was back to "normal" on a beautiful Saturday morning, we were all extra frustrated. BUT.... Our ad lib plan to move the event indoors was really WAY WAY WAY better than expected. The first thing we did was make a list of fun things to do on a dry erase board and we gradually worked our way through the majority of the list.
The highlights of the event were plentiful, but in my personal opinion the most fun was doing a lot of these activities together with the kids. Thanks to the adults who let out their inner child for a while to join in on activities. We played adults vs. kids in dodgeball. We had at least 4 adults running join in on Capture the Flag and even more for Hide N' Seek. We used 2 whole floors of Temple Lutheran Church for those events so people spread out and made it challenging. Su Pham was surprisingly good at everything despite his immobility knee brace. He was last to be found multiple times in Hide N' Seek and last out in dodgeball too. Hope his ortho isn't reading this.
The Capture the flag game pitted the upstairs vs. the downstairs with the stairwells as neutral territory. Both times the downstairs team won despite a tough jail to break out of. First Cubmaster Hatton sneakily stayed upstairs after a jailbreak as the jailor chased all the escapees. He secured the flag for the first W. Then in round 2, Sylvia Garrett joined the game late and when her dad (Den Leader Jack Garrett) found the flag (which was actually a T-shirt), he had her wear it so people wouldn't realize she had it instead of him. Crafty.
Another fun event was the Raingutter Regatta. This alternate to the Pinewood Derby was new for Pack 462 but the outcome was the same. Theo Pham wound up winning both and Conor Schwartz came in 4th both times. The boats don't run nearly as smoothly as the Pinewood, but building them is much simpler. And it often comes down to which kid has the most air left in their lungs to blow the thing along to the end. The start has a coiled rubber band to make the rudder rotate but boats barely make it out of the gates with that alone. Then kids quickly realized that recoiling the rudder takes longer than just blowing on the boat. Jack Garrett tried another crafty maneuver by using all the same pieces of the boat but in different formations to maximize the "sail" area. Despite all that, young Jack lost out in the end.
In between active games and events, we also had some more peaceful activities and great meals.
We had a board game room with a baseball matching game, a homemade Scout board game that was passed down from Den 6 (circa 2020), and Scrabble. Later in the evening the adults played cards while the kids watched movies on the big screen while sitting in pews in the Sanctuary. Committee Chair Tim Johanson pre-prepared meals including burgers & dogs, carnitas tacos, and sausage with eggs. Colin Hatton entertained everyone over breakfast by daring himself to do shots of hot sauce.
This was honestly a great time, a good change of pace, and could present a viable local "sleepover" option in the future. It's local so people can come and go to make it work with other schedules and it doesn't have to happen on a beautiful spring day. It could be our future rainout backup plan.
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