{blogtober day 24} three things I miss about camp

This week, it feels like my social media is on the attack – on every front, I’m assailed with memories popping up and reminding me what weekend it is. Camp weekend. Guess where I’m NOT going this weekend, this very day in fact? Camp.

Not. Happy. Jan.

It started on the weekend, when the 2017 camp showed up at the top of my Facebook feed. “You might be interested in this memory from 2017”. No Facebook, I really wouldn’t, thanks for reminding me though. Then Tuesday, Pinterest, out of nowhere, suggested my “Camp At Home” board as the best option for whatever it was I was trying to pin. I don’t remember the exact pin, but it certainly had nothing to do with quilt camp. Yesterday, Instagram decided to stick the boot in, throwing up a post from 2020 where we launched the first Camp Covid. Then this morning, just because I wasn’t feeling it enough apparently, Facebook came back for round two with my traditional “leaving for camp” selfie from 2018.

After four skipped camps, I was hopeful this might be the year we would make it back to the coast for three days of crafty shenanigans. I even said as much to Bec when I bumped into her in the Southbank loos back in March. But then we started looking at calendars. Bear kicked off grad season at the end of August. Then September is birthday season for me, so we avoid even thinking about it for camp. Into the traditional October, and there were another THREE grads & formals to account for. Not going to work. November gets tricky as the remaining one school student, and my three homeschoolers, are busy wrapping up the year, and December is just madness. Camp was a bust for the fifth time.

For the first three years, I did camp at home. I wrote optimistic lists and sent gifts in 2021; surely our second camp at home would be our last. But then 2022 came and once again I was posting gifts and crafting on the couch. not only did we have covid to consider still, but it had been raining constantly and “river roulette” was a constant part of my days. The number of times our only road into town was closed that week, it was hit & miss if I’d have been able to get out anyway.

In 2023, I couldn’t commit to camp – with the house build being due somewhere between September and November, I needed to be flexible for the move and final prep. In the end it was a good thing; Boy2 pranged his motorbike pretty spectacularly on move in day, and I spent the month back and forth trying to work out if we were going to do surgery on his knee or not. In fact, camp week was spent running to Newcastle for yet another specialists appointment. Last year I didn’t even manage a camp at home weekend.

So here we are, the fifth year in a row where I am not at the coast on the last weekend of October, and I can’t even do camp at home, with commitments both days this weekend. Next weekend I maybe could do, but my regular company has plans, so that is probably a bit of a bust too.

It feels like it might be time to let go of quilt camp, and I am so very sad.

THREE THINGS I MISS THE MOST

The gifties// the challenge of coming up with something, the making, the secret keeping, the last minute rush and even the burning of feet at midnight (don’t ask). I miss it all. I did make gifts the first three years to post, but haven’t for the last couple of years, and to be honest, October doesn’t feel like October without the rush.

The memories// Car made me this amazing book at our last camp, and it brings me so much joy. I might pull it out over the weekend for a flip through of camps past. I think she even left 2020 blank for me to add my own, so I might blame her for jinxing us with a blank camp.

The shenanigans// when you only see each other once a year, there’s bound to be a whole lot of fun, and doing stuff for the giggles. In 2018, when Car couldn’t make it due to family commitments, we printed out a photo from Camp Coochie, and YASSSSCar came with us all weekend. In the above photo, Car is very excited about the art opening we went to. In real life, the real Car received a care package from me in advance, and a hand bound book of “her” camp adventures afterwards.

Hopefully, one day, we will all be in the same place together again, standing in a huddle and taking a photo of our feet like it’s 2012. In the meantime, at least it doesn’t take me a week to get over the weekend, I guess? I’ll take whatever mediocre silver lining I can find, to be honest.