Camp Aspire

I've been meaning to blog about this for the last few days...

Last week, in the school holidays, Princess Sleepyhead went off to Camp Aspire, a motivation and life skills camp, for teenagers. Sending her was somewhat of a no-brainer for me. Recently, I was having a whinge about her behaviour to Bren, one of my writer friends, and Bren said that another writer she knows had sent her daughter off to this camp and said it was fantastic, and her daughter had come back a changed girl. Now, I never expect miracles, and am aware that any kind of change, even a small one, requires great motivation, but, hey, what did we have to lose by at least looking into it? So, thinking it would be horrendously expensive, I got onto Google, and was surprised to find that it was reasonably priced. So I emailed for more details and got a very friendly response. The day I sent off the application, Princess Sleepyhead had a special day at school, run by an outsider, and quite fortuitously the person running it was Dobbo, who runs the camp. Princess Sleepyhead came home so excited -- "Oh, Mum, Mum, he was fantastic." I hoped the camp would live up to the hype.

Princess Sleepyhead came home from camp with chocolate mousse in her left ear and happier than I've seen her in years. At first she talked nonstop about it -- though when we reflected on what she'd said, she hadn't actually told us much. But just to see her glowing with happiness was amazing. That real high lasted two days -- longer than I expected -- and now she's settled back into a more regular routine, albeit with a few minor changes. I think she is a bit more self-confident, and happier, more positive overall. She's keen to go again, and it's something we'll have to discuss, because finances are tight, and Rick's contract's about to finish. But I reckon if we can swing it we will.