Shane at Highroad (Summer)

Carrie and I picked up Shane together on Thursday! He was happy to see us!

I had an apple handpie from Yoder's waiting for him in the car. I picked up the lemon for us to share the next day.

We listened as a family to a new book on the way home called Wink. It's a cancer story (so not what I usually want), but well done and hopefully an eye-opener for Shane. We stopped at the Wal-Mart in Greene for a bathroom break and a few things (It was eerily empty....).

I was so happy when Shane hopped in the car and started tell HAPPY stories about camp!

I was a little sad to hear (and see) that he wore the dumb looking hat all week! I think I kept that to myself (hopefully).

Shane said he made a friend from Pennsylvania ("I'm really good at making friends far away from where I live") and had a good time!

I was so relieved by his good attitude as he told story after story when he got in the car. There were the wasps, the berries, the flooded mine, and the awkward movie night to name a few!

There were still challenges and struggles, but that's camp! I was surprised to hear that everything was updated and he got to sleep with air conditioning. I was half-worried about how he'd react to living in the tents like I had to as a kid (and half thinking it'd be a healthy eye-opener!).

I'm so proud of him for making the best of it!

We got a phone call Monday from the camp infirmary. Shane had a case of pool-toe and gouged out some skin. Carrie was aghast as the nurse described it (it sounds bad), but I'd had it before and knew Shane would be fine (though it does hurt). Shane told the clinic staff that "getting badly hurt at a new camp" was part of the process for him! I was glad he showed more of a tough guy attitude and we never heard from the clinic again.

I figured the pool would be one of the best parts of camp for Shane.

I wish I had more pictures of him in action. Shane said he was just off camera in this one.

And he was in the background here. 

He was trailing in the back with his pool toe on this one! I recognized the shirt!

Shane has a fantastic smile when it's natural. The moment you turn a camera on him and ask for it he can't reproduce it. I was thrilled to see Highroad still does the confidence courses. I loved those puzzle like group activities and capture the flag.

Shane loved the rock climbing wall. He said he got all the way to the top on the hard side, but was freaked out by the fact his "life was in the hands" of a few people holding the ropes! I wish they'd had the wall when I was a kid.

Shane was a Trailblazers 1 Boy for Week 3 of the Summer 2023 session. Camp Highroad put out a video of the week along with the other pictures I downloaded and put up here.

Nana and Pop wrote him a letter at the beginning of the week, too. Nana wanted to encourage him to be brave and eat the food, because Patrick had hated it and almost starved himself, ha ha! 

Now that Shane has seen multiple camps, I'm not sure where we'll send him next year. Him being off for the 4th of July is tradition at this point. It'd be great if there was something like the ACE Computer Camp I went to and worked at as a kid. We'd all be thrilled if it was something he could do with a cousin or a friend, too!