Wednesday 5th July

So this is so unfair, the kids have a lazy day today meaning they don't have to wake up until 10.15am and have brunch at 10.45! Meanwhile, Alice and I were tiptoeing around at 7.30am ready for our 8.30am departure to New York City! However, this is FrenchWoods and when does anything ever set off on time.

We set off around 8.55 and arrived in the city and around 11.30. We were dropped off at Bryant park which is around the corner from Times Square.

We did our iconic "eat McDonalds on Times Square steps" thing. Then it was time for shopping. It's very dangerous when you place girls whom have been confined in a bubble in the mountains for 1 month without any kind of shops. Let's just say my bank is not my friend right now haha. I have the shopping mentality of my mother. Plus, i've hit a brick wall at the minute where I just miss home comforts. I don't necesseraly want to go home, I just want a luxury hotel with WiFi and to see my parents - or a luxury hotel in Mexico for 2 weeks... then i'll return to camp.

After shopping, we visited the Hersheys store and M&M's world. Needless to say, I was unimpressed with Hershey's. It is the tiniest store ever! The one in Canada was bigger! However, we got a free Hershey's kiss which I suppose made up for everything.

Gotta say, the best thing about M&M's world was Robbies Hilary Duff radar...

We then did more shopping and went to Walgreens to get some essentials before heading back to the coaches.

We didn't arrive back at camp until around 11.30pm, so it was a long but brilliant day. We even had a sneaky view of FrenchWoods sister camp on the way back, which has got nothing on Frenchwoods Festival. However, they do have WiFi all over camp... it's all about the WiFi haha.

Thursday 6th July

We awoke just as tired despite the day off. You can't win here haha.

The day proceeded as normal, I even taught another class of Nature Crafts by myself today! The kids and I made more pine cone animals.

how cute haha!

At dinner I was told that I was now taking Kaija's place in having alternate days off to everybody else, meaning I would at least now be with Amy on days off. However, this also meant that tomorrow would also be my day off. Thankfully it was sorted so I could last minute go on the trip to Binghamton (the place we went on the first day off to Walmart).

The evening activity tonight was the Race for the Arts again, whereby counselors and children get sponsored to pursue a career in the arts and are able to go to college.

Of course, Robbie and I walked the majority of the race haha. It took us around 40 minutes to walk 4k - I'm not sure how many miles that is.

The little kids played a little concert with their little rock bands they created at the start of the session at canteen. So cute.

It was also the staff night out to the cinemas. I realllllllyyy wanted to watch Despicable Me 3, however everyone else wanted to watch Spiderman. So instead of being a Billy no mates I watched Spiderman. It was surprisingly good! Ron even got us all popcorn and drinks again, what a sweetie.

We didn't even get back til 1.40am, so of course I went STRAIGHT to bed.

Friday 7th July

I woke up at 7.50am just as the kids were going to breakfast. It was bliss having a shower and getting ready in peace and quiet and not having to have breakfast!!

At around 9.50am we set off on the yellow school bus to Binghamton! Excuse the blurry picture haha.

As soon as we got there, we went to Starbucks for WiFi as I hadn't been able to message my parents in way over 24 hours.

It's so nice having the alternate day off in a way because there are very few people and it's a nice little group.

We headed to a nearby mall and almost fell into a dangerous shopping trap, however, I managed to stop myself after buying a new Bralette, Body suit, jeans and chokers haha. Number 101 of Confessions of a shopaholic haha.

Amy and I were running around old department stores which were targeted at people triple our age in seek of a massage chair. Amy also had fun running around and laying on every bed. You never realise how deprived you are at camp until you experience it and live in civilisation for a mere day.

Walmart was mine and Amy's next stop, we bought plenty of American snacks to last us. It was such a relaxing shopping trip, just having a wonder around various shops and ending in TGI Fridays.

It was a dream come true I tell ya. This lovely lady even overheard we were working at a summer camp and kindly gave us a voucher for 20% off our meal! The americans are truly so friendly.

Thats one thing about the americans, they are not afraid to compliment strangers. A lovely lady came up to me in Starbucks and said she loved my hair and I gave her a few of my hair hacks I use back in England. Another girl came up to me in Walmart and said she loved my voice, at least someone likes my common Yorkshire accent.

Once we got back, I headed straight back to WiFi to book a hotel for Newark airport for 2 nights so I can sleep and do absolutely nothing for a whole day before meeting my parents.

Saturday 8th July

Today ran as a normal day. I taught nature crafts, batik, jewellery and mosaics.

It was so great today just knowing that I have a lazy day tomorrow! I was so excited to have somewhat a sleep in.

For the evening activity a jazz band came to perform. I felt so rude, but my eyes were rolling I was falling asleep haha. They were all so super talented!

It was my first ever official bunk duty tonight which was fun. In a positive light, camp (especially session 2) has made me be less of a walkover and be more stern and finding it easier to say no haha.

I was finally able to get a decent nights sleep!! Usually i

Sunday 9th July

Today was lazy day! The girls going to Broadway to see War Paint woke us up at around 8.15am-8.30am - not quite the time I expected to wake up to say the least. Steph and Alice also got up early to go to Dorney Park which is both a water park and a theme park.

Brunch was at 10.45am and there were huge soft pretzels, cinnamon buns, mac and cheese bites and it was heaven. However, I feel like i ate for 3 people. Safe to say I was set up for the day haha!

We then made our way to the Scott Theatre to watch Cars 3, however, it was a really bad copy of the film and we ended up watching Beauty and the Beast. Of course I didn't mind! The only thing was, it made me almost cry because my Mum loves the film and we saw it together on Mothers day.

After the film finished, some of the girls and I headed down to the pool to chill out and sunbathe. A few of my friends were also there which was lovely, i needed time to just chill.

In the evening after dinner, we was able to go with upper camp and watch wonder woman! I went to see it at the cinemas on orientation week - unfortunately i fell asleep through it and this time was no exception.

The girls and I then came back and went straight to bed.

Monday 10th July

Today was back to normal. A usual day at camp, we created pine cone animals in nature crafts, I then taught batik to a little boy. After lunch I pretty uselessly helped out in ceramics, cut string for an hour in jewellery and finally, we continued making our mosaic piece.

The evening activity for tonight was the camper talent show. Some of these kids are just outstanding! Two of my girls sang - one sang a song from Wicked and the other sang a song about loving play rehearsal haha.

Robbie and I decided we would work out at the gym after the talent show and we actually stuck to our word! It's near impossible to wake up at 6am every day and work a pretty much 17/18 hour day and have enough energy and sleep for the gym.

Afterwards, we headed to wifi and ended up spending some time at Rock Shop until curfew.

Tuesday 11th July

Day 39 of camp! Wow its only day 39? It feels like i've been here a whole year!! I've officially been in the states 6 weeks now and I am almost halfway through camp. And GOSH i've never felt so far away from home.

Typical Tuesday, the same as the previous day. I won't bother boring you explaining my same old daily art schedule.

Evening activity tonight was the troupe night (basically a glee night). There were 3 troupes, 2 singing troupes and an improvisation troupe. The improv troupe was great and our Super C.I.T (counselor in training) was in it. They were basically given scenarios to improvise with the help of the audience, it was fun to watch.

A girl in our bunk lost her phone so I ended up spending a lot of time after evening activity at WiFi trying to search it through "Find My Iphone". It was a right palava!

Luckily when I came back, the girls were sound asleep and I had a nice chat on the porch with the counselors in the bunk next door. The mosquitos also had a nice feast on my legs THROUGH my gym leggings???! Grrr.

Wednesday 12th July

Today. Was. HOT.

Like I mean super duper humid and just overall hot. However, this is the mountains and we are in New York, so of course it was cloudy and rained.

Yes, today was the same as yesterday, and the day before that... and the day before that. It does get a bit exhausting sometimes doing the same things. However, we did eventually finish sticking the glass down on our mosaic masterpiece.

Pretty impressed to say i've never done it before. My hands are paying the price though, cut to smitherines.

So tonight marked the first night of festival week! Wow it's come around so fast!

The rest of the girls went to the film festival with Steph, Alice and Abby we to support the other girls in their "one act" drama performance. I went to support 2 campers in their Rock Shop performance, whom were also in a One act play and had to run around camp.

Tonight was bowling night yasssss. The best night, a night to chill and socialise! It was a lot of fun and a great precious few hours spent with some fab people.

Okay I am soooooooooo sorry about the length of this blog post, but I hope it was okay. I haven't had much time on the wifi as I take intermediate hip hop dance in my period off! I basically wrote the majority of this blog in 30 minutes haha.

My next blog post will be based around visiting/festival weekend.

If you have gotten this far, then thank you for reading. I have over 12k reads on my blog now which is insane!!

Until next time!

Jade xoxo