Hello campers and staff! We hope you are all doing well and staying warm during this freezing Winter! I know that I would much rather be having a waterfront day on Blue Lake than being stuck home with all of this snow! There have been some exciting updates since our last Agazine and Blog and we wanted to share what has been happening!

In just 10 short days, we will be coming together for our biggest reunion of the year. The Chicago area reunion will be February 9th a 3pm and our New Camper Orientation will be that morning at 11am. The 2014 Agawak Spirit Day video will be shown for the first time and will also be on this years Reunion video, which will be for sale. You won’t want to miss it!

Just last week, Mary and Brandon headed to Mexico to catch up with some former staff members and hire new support staff.  Be sure to check out the website for pictures of their fabulous trip! They had a great time seeing familiar faces and we are very excited to welcome the following support staff to the Agawak family:  Monica Alcantara Soto, Karla Cuautle Cabanas, Faviola Cuevas Silva, Stefania Lopez, Valeria Rodriguez, Cindy Janet Sanchez Trejo and Adriana Velazquez Cabrera. We would also like to welcome back Christian Porras Mendiola.

After only being home for a few short days, Mary once again packed her bags for her trip to beautiful Australia. After a very long flight, Mary was excited to land in warm weather and begin her recruiting trip in Melbourne than onto Sydney. We can’t wait to hear about her trip and the wonderful new staff members that will join us this summer.  We will be posting pictures on the website and Facebook throughout the next week, so be sure to check both places.

Hey Campers…did you hear about the GIANT new addition to camp?!? We are all anxiously awaiting the snow to melt, as that means our brand new CLIMBING TOWER and ZIP LINE can begin to get installed! Our new tower will be in Little Siegel Park and will be incredible! We are so excited for our campers and staff to work together to climb to new heights this summer!  Click on the picture above to see a larger example of what Agawak’s will look like.

We are beyond excited to welcome some new campers this summer. Grace Kalmin and Sydney Glazer from Highland Park will be joining us for a taste of Agawak during Rookie Camp! Please also help me welcome Lucy Paull and Molly Dean form Highland Park, Casey Schwab and Kylie Cohen from Deerfield, Lucy Friedman from Madison, Lindsey Bellowe from San Diego and Winter Rafal from Scottsdale! Jessica Zelen, from Northbrook will be joining her big sisters at camp too!  We cannot wait for you to step off the bus for the first time and experience the beauty of Camp Agawak!

Our staff list continues to grow by the day and we will have our staff pretty much complete when Mary returns from Australia. This summer, we have an exceptional group of JC1s joining us after completing their CIT summer:  Kiera Abramson, Danielle Bassock, Melissa Kramer, Meredith Leon, Gabrielle Pascal, Sydney Salit, Nikki Sheinkop, Spencer Weiss and Chloe Weiss will all be joining us on Staff. We know they will make a beautiful transition from CITs to JC1s! Since our last Blog, we have a handful of JC2s retuning for their second summer on staff. Meredith Rush, Julia Spathis, Jordan Weiss and Julia Zazove will be back to spread their camp love and excitement! Making their Agawak Staff debut as JC2s will be Emily Friedman and Ellen McNeil. We know they will make great additions to our staff! Coming for the first time from all the way overseas are Olivia Ambrose, Alice Brown and Sabine Whitehurst-Cully. Jordyn Kass, Ryan Loeb, Marissa Lachman, Alissa Warsh, Jamie Pascal, Emily Wilensky and Hannah Levitz will be back as SC1s and are excited to have them back for their 3rd summer! Jessi Morris and Heather Adolph will be returning as SC2s and Jessica Hosey, Kaylie Keiser, Kara Bunkers and Erin Vander Pas will be joining us for the first time as Senior Counselors. Angela Fox will be a wonderful addition to our staff as she will be joining Ducky and Abraham as one of our cooks! If you can’t tell, our staff is sure to be amazing this summer!!

Our staff this summer is filled with incredible enthusiasm and leadership. Many of them will be stepping up to fill different positions and we know that you will love all of their new ideas and creativity! Jenna Spathis and Jessi Morris will be heading up Blue and White and Julia Spathis with be assisting them. Between the three of them, treasure hunt this year is sure to be exceptional! Lainie Kleifield will be heading up our evening programs, with Marissa Lachman and Alissa Warsh helping her out! We know that this trio will be hilarious and energetic! Stacey Rhum, Jamie Pascal and Emily Wilensky will be taking charge during Olympic Day and Marley Isaacson and Jessie Allen will be Division Heads and in charge of Final Four. Returning senior counselor, Jamie Bronska, will be in charge of all of our social media and we know she will do a great job of keeping everyone in the loop! Jordyn Kass will be our head inspector and she will be making sure our cabins will be spick and span this summer!

A note from the office – Pre-camp Packets will be mailed out the beginning of March.  If you’d like to get a jump start on your physical form, please go to the website and under the “About Us – Enroll at Camp Agawak” link there is the Healthy History form you can print to take with you to your appointment.  Physical forms are good for one year!  Please remember to have the doctor sign the form or your attached immunization record.  Other forms will become available on-line after the packets have been mailed but should be used only if you’ve misplaced the blue forms from the packet. 

Our count down to the summer continues and we are just 138 days away from the best summer yet!

Camp hugs to everyone!
Xoxo,
Becker

February Birthdays
Bea Kaufman – 1            Devyn Much – 10             Stefania Lopez – 20
Sophie Gray – 2             Marley Isaacson – 10         Anais Zoub – 21
Stefani Gutmann – 2       Marley Berk – 11             Molly Walzer – 23
Anita Racz – 3                Jamie Granick – 11           Sophie Plattner – 23
Rachel Wartell – 4        Alice Brown – 12              Jorja Slade – 23
Jaclyn Weiss – 5            Drew Bernstein – 13         Catherine Pappas – 24
Raegan Sonday – 5         Julia Spathis – 13               Madelyn Moss – 24
Lucy Paull – 5                Natalie Korach – 15          Haley Cohen – 24
Jara Kider – 6               Ellie Jordan – 16                Ava Silverglade – 25
Shriya Kilaru – 7           Melissa Granick – 19           Shayna Rudman – 25
Dot Legget Lane – 7     Sarah Mossler – 20             Lindsay Saltzberg – 26
Hadyn Revell - 8            Jennifer Rosenwasser - 20   Lilly Adelstein - 28