Graduation and a Day Off

On our sister date last weekend

On Thursday, my baby sister graduated from eighth grade. I realize that ending eighth grade and getting ready for high school isn't exactly "baby sister" territory, but it's a pretty hard transition. For me, anyway...she has no problem heading into this next chapter in her life. Not only am I the big sister, but while my parents worked many long hours at their restaurant, I grew up helping them raise her. Accepting that she's growing up has been quite the task for me, but I'm getting better. It is nice, though, to be able to carry on more adult and meaningful conversations with her.

With both my sisters after the ceremony. The ONE time I don't wear heels.

Anyway, back to graduation. It was a really nice ceremony, though the principal did get a little long winded. She hit the expected topics of how much they've grown up, highlights of the their last three years and high school prep. One thing that did make the ceremony unique was the really personal admissions from her. The principal had been diagnosed with cancer and was out for about seven months. She shared how the students helped her through the chemo and to fight her way through the disease. All of the students and staff had sent her little notes when she was first diagnosed, and she read some of funniest messages to the graduation guests. "I feel really bad for you, even though you aren't a relative," and "get well soon...like a boss" were two that made me LOL so hard I thought I was going to pee myself.

After the ceremony ended, we took a few pictures before my sister scurried off to be with her friends. My middle sister and I went to lunch at Panera and got to spend some time chatting. With her on third shift, me on first and me not living at home, we don't get many opportunities to hang out alone, so it was a really nice spur of the moment decision. I picked up some food for Man Friend and surprised him at work. We got to sit outside together while he was on his lunch break. We've never been able to have lunch together during the week and it made me wish we had more opportunities to do so. Hopefully if I ever get a job in town, we'll be able to do so once in a while.

I was able to spend the rest of the afternoon taking care of Monica. I went on a 2.5 mile walk, hula hooped with my weighted hoop, and finished Mockingjay, the third book in the Hunger Games trilogy. I finished each book in two sittings; they are so phenomenal. Young adult/unrealistic/overly popular novels normally aren't my cup of tea, but these books were actually really well written and very engaging. I couldn't put them down.

Finishing off the day, Man Friend and I met some of our friends out for drinks for a while. It was still nice enough out that we were all able to relax/sit out on the bar's patio. Now that's what summer is all about.

It's days like Thursday that I wish I was able to work four tens. Having that one extra day off during the week is so wonderful. I can get stuff done that I normally can't during working hours, tend to be obnoxiously productive, and feel less stressed about work because I'm only there four days instead of five.

Camp U-Nah-Li-Ya

Last Saturday was the end-of-session day trip to Camp U-Nah-Li-Ya with Girls Night Out. To conclude each session, the GNO groups from all the Green Bay Ys spend a day at camp. This particular trip was rather small, only two groups. It ended up working out just fine that way. 30 sixth graders is a tad more manageable than 60.

This was my third time up with GNO, and maybe the best. Certainly better than in December, that's for sure. The girls were super well behaved and seemed to really enjoy themselves. There was only one minor meltdown when one of the girls had a giant spider land on her and she started crying. Otherwise, a definite success.

The weather was beautiful, better than what we had anticipated. The sun was out all day, it was decently warm after lunch and there wasn't any snow. Because it was so nice out, we actually got to spend the whole day outside, whereas the last two trips we spend at least half the day inside.

The day was broken into two main chunks, survival skills and canoeing. My group did the survival skills section first, and the staff guy had made it a Hunger Games theme, which I think the girls really liked. It was cool to be able to make it into something relatable for them. I feel like survival skills were more appealing to them when they could think of it in terms of a movie instead of just because.

The girls learned how to build a fire, and became part of the one-match club. They split into two groups and had to use their new knowledge to build a mini fire. Each group had an area to build in between two steaks in the ground and a string tying them together. The first group to get their fire big enough to burn their string won.

When the fires had been put out, they moved a little farther into the woods and learned how to build shelters. Of the three trips, this group of girls had the best teamwork by a landslide, and thus, had the most successful shelters. I've found that typically one or two girls designate themselves to be leaders and completely take over while other girls stand in the background. Last Saturday, the girls communicated great, shared the work, and followed instructions to result in working shelters.

After some large group games/icebreakers and lunch, we headed out to the lake for some canoeing. I'm not even going to pretend like I was excited for this. In fact, I was really hoping we wouldn't go. Well, we did. One of the girls was really scared too, so we got paired together. At first I thought putting two scared people together was probably the dumbest idea ever thought of. Neither one of us really wanted to even get into the canoe. We both just stood there, trying to think of excuses for why we couldn't get in. I think we both realized at the same time that we weren't going to get let off that easy. Trembling, I got in and sat down.     Although we didn't master turning as well as most of the other teams, and we were still uneasy, we managed

to get out to about the middle of the water and we saw the giant snapping turtle.

When we finished canoeing, there was a little extra time left and the instructor took us on a nature walk through camp. We got to see some the brand new buildings, and got to see a bunch of turtles. The instructor told us that in the middle of the afternoon, the turtles like to come out of the water and soak up the warm sun, so if we were extra quiet, we would be able to see him. Believe it or not, 15 sixth grade girls managed to stay silent and we got to see at least 20 painted turtles and five or ten of the big snapping turtles. It was a phenomenal sight to see (pics coming soon).