Water balloons and bubbles.

There's nothing like playing with water to get children excited, so this week we devoted the whole evening to water games and challenges.

The first team challenge, was a water relay. The aim being to get as much water as possible in your teams bowl, should you go for slow and stead, or run faster and risks the spills.

The next challenge was an individual one, race with your water balloon and spoon to the far end and back. After watching several balloons burst one person found a novel way to keep his balloon intact. Definitely one of the slow and steady school.

Then back to the team challenges, working together to carry a leaky bottle whilst trying to preserve as much water as possible.






Finally the foam challenge, again a relay but this time each person had a bubble blower and tried to fill their teams container with foam.

Leather work

Our Pioneers have been busy over the last few weeks with their leather work. Starting with designing their own pattern for phone pouches, then cutting, punching and sewing the leather shapes to create the finished objects. The plaited bracelets proved quite popular too.

Mosaics

Take a look at some of the amazing creations that the Elfins made this week. We started with some balls of clay, beans, lentils, shells, pressed flowers and leaves. The photos don't do them justice, in reality the beans stood out much better against the grey clay.

r mosaics.

Campfire cooking

As we drove out to the site the rain on the windscreen was suggesting that perhaps today was not the ideal day for spending round a campfire. However a bit of rain wasn't about to put us off, knowing that the woods should give us some good cover if needed.

As it turned out it the rain didn't stay long and we had a great day, den building, playing on the rope swing and whittling a variety of spreading knives, toasting forks and spoons.

Of course all that hard work made for hungry children, so some campfire cooking was definitely needed. The bread twists made great hot dog buns with toasted marshmallows for pudding. Yum.

A Knotty evening

This week we decided to practice our knots, it was great to see how many of the children who made knotted bracelets at camp remembered the technique and were able to show some of the younger children what they needed to do.

Look at all the little knotty people we made, perfect for hanging on the outside of a rucksack at the next camp to identify them.

Spring camp 2015

Our preparations started a few weeks before the camp, making a few things to take along with us to show others a bit about our group. We already have a wonderful banner which our Pioneers made some time ago and which has come along to several events with us but with so many new members it was time for something new.

This year we opted for a totem pole, with each person decorating thier own section to add to the finished pole. It made a great feature in the marquee.

The Pioneers were once again busy baking 140 servings of cake!. The chocolate marble cake looked amazing when it was done.

The weather this year meant we spent plenty of time in the marquee working on crafts. There was something for everyone with the knotted bracelets and tissue paper lanterns proving particularly popular.

The Sunday afternoon wide game is always a firm favourite, this years theme was bees. The aim of the game being to collect nectar and take it back to your hive, pollinating flowers along the way. There were various activity stations set up in the woods to earn extra nectar, whether it was by performing a waggle dance to show your partner where the pollen was hidden, or following the smell trail to get to the nectar. Some like the fire lighting were less bee themed but no less fun.

It was a tired and muddy but happy group who went home on Monday

Off to camp

Time has flown this term, and we haven't got round to showing off the wonderful creations the children have been making. We've been busy getting ready for this weekend's Spring Camp.

The Pioneers enjoyed making the cakes last year, and the whole camp enjoyed eating them so we thought we'd have another go this year.  Mmmmmm.

I think we've covered the really vital equipment for keeping the adults going through the weekend.

Now just the last few bits to load up before we set off and get the site ready for the children arriving tomorrow.