Warm Hands Warm Hearts

Teens in Action is hosting the second Warm Hands, Warm Hearts workshop this December! These workshops are to teach you some basic crocheting or knitting skills. Warm Hands, Warm Hearts is also a warm clothing drive for children in the foster system. Donations of lightly used clothes, coats, shoes, NEW underwear, books and other supplies will be given to Citizens Caring for Children organization, a non-profit that provides assistance to foster families.

WHO: 3rd grade and above! This isn't just for kids, adults are encouraged to come and learn too!

WHEN: December 14th, 2008, 2 pm - 4 pm

WHERE: Yordi Training Center, CFUSA Main Office

BRING: Crocheting and/or knitting needles and yarn. Also bring any clothes that you want to donate to the clothing drive.

RSVP: December 11th, to Dace or London, at the Camp Fire Office, (405)478-5646.

l The first workshop was a success! Teens in Action had a big turnout, of both youth and adults, that came to learn how to knit and crochet. We have already received some donations of knitted scarves and clothing for Citizens Caring for Children. Make sure to RSVP for the next workshop, you don't want to miss out on this great opportunity to learn a new skill!

CHECK OUT THE CAMP FIRE USA STORE!

The store has gotten in their special winter line that is only available to the Heart of Oklahoma Council! We have red long sleeve shirts and navy hoodies in youth small, medium, and large and adult small, medium, large, x-large, and xx-large. If you sell 2 cases of camper mix you get a free red long sleeve shirt! But if you sell 4 cases you get a free navy hoodie! Call London @ (405)478-5646 for more information!


Put the Camp Fire USA store on your list of places to shop during the holiday season! We have lots of stocking stuffers and great leader gifts. Come into the store to see all our ideas! Everyone that mentions this blog will get a free license plate cover when they come into the store!

Teens in Action Spook House

After all the hard work that the teens put into the Spook House, we are all happy that it went great! We expected to have at least one slow night but we were so busy. All of the teens were exhausted by the end of the night, they worked so hard! Even though a few kids were quite scared, I think everyone had fun going through it. Several people went through twice! Teens in Action has a lot of new ideas for next year. We can't wait to do it again!

High Adventure Club

We had our first meeting this last Tuesday night, and started laying out the foundations for our club.

We have decided our next meeting time and date will be on December 18th (Thursday) at 6:00 p.m. At this meeting we will be planning our first activity which will be an overnight on January 16th here at Camp DaKaNi. Most likely we will sleep indoors, but we will have fun outdoor activities. This will be a good chance to assess our outdoor skills, plan future outings, nail down times for future meetings, and most importantly get to know each other.

Feel free to bring ideas and information to our next meeting on December 18th for things to do and places you would like the group to visit in the near future.

Look forward to seeing you all at our next meeting,
Ranger Terry

Haunted Forest A Big Success!

Well the 2008 Haunted Forest is over and our bodies are healing after back-breaking hours of taking down decorations and scenes, putting away leftover concession stand supplies, and organizing the storage sheds and closets to make things easier to find next year.

A big sincere “thank you”, goes to everyone on the Camp Fire staff that made this event a huge success – there’s no doubt it was way better than last year! And, thanks to the club leaders who had Carnival Booths, and the Klown Train Ride. They added a lot to the atmosphere of family fun.

As a staff, we are especially thankful for this year’s outstanding group of volunteers. Many people do not realize that it takes an army of volunteers to put on an event like this. Raymond and Jessica’s family and friends built and staffed the Moonlight Trail and served as trailer monitors on the hayride for safety. Cheryl and her three daughters created the Mummy scene and performed in it. Staff member’s families were everywhere, staffing scenes, selling tickets, showing people where to park, passing out treats and in the background making sure everything went smoothly. Board members pitched in as bridge monitors, and volunteered in the S’Mores booth, plus Scott was the scariest grim reaper in the cemetery. Board members, like Scott, even talked their friends into participating. That’s how we were able to enjoy watching Matt carve some beautiful and elaborate jack-o-lanterns.

Another amazing group of volunteers were the DaKaNi alums. Miss Gwen, Miss Vi and Miss Nancy rounded up a crew of former campers (who are now parents), and former counselors (who are now grandparents), to staff the Concession Stand and S’Mores Booth. Not only did they do a first rate job of serving Haunted Forest customers; it was fun for everyone to reunite with friends from their younger days.

I would also like to personally thank Rachel, one of our own WoHeLo Award alums, who rounded up a dynamite bunch of friends from her service fraternity at OU. These 14 young men and women were a lot of fun to work with. One young man told me he had been looking forward to helping in the same way a child can’t wait to go trick or treating. Half-way through he told the aliens in the next scene, “this is more fun than a barrel of monkeys!”

Another group of friends that helped all three nights was from the Society for Creative Anachronisms, or SCA. These men and women re-create the Middle Ages most weekends for fun – but they donated their time and talent to Camp Fire for the Haunted Forest, and did a scary, realistic job at scenes like the executioner and asylum all for a hug and a S’More.

Last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank the Teens In Action who staffed the Children’s Spooky House. By counting tickets we found out that even though it was designed for younger children, almost everyone who attended the Haunted Forest went through the Spooky House. There were no complaints this year, and everyone seemed to enjoy the experience.

To sum it up, Carolyn, our Board President, got to visit with people as they were leaving on Thursday night. She said she wished she had been able to write down the comments, but one of her favorites was a little boy who told her, “oh please, please have this again next year!”

Haunted Forest Fun

Haunted Forest was a blast. Using my chainsaws for something other than cutting trees at camp was a nice change, sorry if I scared you too much! My friends who volunteered also had a great time, and I have a feeling they will recruit more next year. I am looking forward to building new scenes for next year, and making it better than it already is. If you have a chance to come next year or even volunteer in some aspect please do so it's worth it.

Ranger Terry