Banquet and Spirit Fire

The big surprise was finally revealed Tuesday Night— the theme for this session’s banquet. The CAs and their counselors select a secret theme for their banquet, which is essentially a huge elaborate party with special decorations, costumes, music, dance numbers, treats, and of course food, and the whole camp is kept guessing. What was the theme? Christmas at Rockbrook. The whole dining hall was decorated with posters of snow scenes, with garlands and spruce trees, and each table had wrapped presents, “snow” and candy canes. Several counselors dressed up as elves to join Rudolf, the Grinch, and Frosty the snowman. Even Jerry made an appearance as Santa!

The CAs served an awesome dinner of sliced roasted ham, mashed potatoes, green beans, yeast rolls, cranberry sauce, and decorated cookies for dessert. It was so yummy! The girls had a great time singing popular Christmas songs like Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree, Jingle Bells, and Frosty the Snowman. The whole camp ends up dancing toward the end of the banquet, with girls snapping photos and giving each other lots of hugs. It’s a great time and a true highlight of the session.

The final event on Wednesday night is our Spirit Fire final campfire. This is a more serious time to enjoy traditional camp songs and remember the camp session and some of the important things we all shared during these few weeks. Everyone dresses in their uniforms. Campers and counselors prepare short speeches about their time at camp, and Sarah gives a final talk reflecting on how the session has gone and her hopes for everyone as they prepare to leave camp the next day. It’s always an emotional time because the girls have made such close friends while at camp. It’s as if the campfire is one big hug celebrating how close everyone has grown as they’ve had such fun here at Rockbrook. It’s quite amazing to see just how meaningful the experience is for everyone, campers and staff members included. It really is a special moment.