I was pleased with our choices around summer camp this year. When I was too slow to catch spots in the local city-organized camp in Manotick, I was forced to look for a camp outside the neighbourhood and came across some arts camps I thought would be of interest. Simon chose drama camp and Tristan chose painting camp. The camps were a little more expensive than the general-interest ones, but the boys were enthusiastic about the subjects and we managed to stretch the budget a bit for the sake of camps that hit the sweet spot of engaging content and easy access for pick-up and delivery. And, ahem, availability at the last minute. Procrastination FTW!
Early last week, we got a call saying Tristan’s camp had been cancelled due to low enrolment. I was ticked. IMHO a camp offered by the city should be subsidized well enough that it goes ahead regardless of low enrolment, but apparently the city feels differently. After a bit of scrambling, and a bit of whinging, and some kind offers of assistance from some lovely peeps on Twitter, we decided to enroll Tristan in the drama camp with Simon. If you know the boys, you know this is a bit of a stretch, but there is something to be said for convenience and staving off last-minute panic. Besides, it was only for a week.
That would be summer camp fail #1.
This morning, Beloved was rather disgruntled when he called me from the parking lot of the Nepean Sportsplex. For some reason, I had blindly assumed that the Nepean Creative Arts Centre was the same as the Nepean Visual Arts Centre. Aside from the one word difference in their titles, there is one other key difference between these two facilities: the latter is in the Nepean Sportsplex, which is on Beloved’s way to and from work, and the former is in Bells Corners, 20 minutes west of there. Guess which one houses the boys’ drama camp?
That would be summer camp fail #2.
So about half an hour after that I heard from Beloved again, who was now more agitated than ever after dropping the boys off in Bells Corners 15 minutes late for their first day. Poor Tristan took one look at the room full of his fellow campers and wanted to turn tail and run. In a room full of their fellow campers, Tristan and Simon were the only boys. And, just for maximum discomfort, it looks like all of the girls are younger than they are.
That would be summer camp fail #3.
Sigh. Remember that time I accidentally enrolled the boys in dance camp? I never thought that accidentally enrolling them in dance camp would be one of the BETTER camp choices I’d made. I’m so sorry, boys.
Seriously! Who has this much trouble registering their kids in an appropriate summer camp? All it needed to be was convenient (fail), affordable (fail) and not make the boys feel awkward and miserable (fail).
Clearly, someone needs to relieve me of my duties as chief camp organizers. At this rate, next summer I’ll have them enrolled in a fashionista camp in Carleton Place.
On the plus side, all these blog posts will make for an easy-to-follow trail of evidence for the boys’ future therapists. And I can probably use this to coerce them into good behaviour for most of the school year. “If you don’t quit it, I’ll enroll you in summer camp again next year and you never know what I’ll come up with this time!”
And hey, this whole fiasco has inspired a what I think is a great new tagline for the blog. “Parenting by misadventure.” Yep, that about sums it up.
OMG!!!! That really cracks me up Dani! the question is……. are they going back tomorrow???