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Our final week of Camp Gan Izzy introduced the greatest Jewish heroes of all time and what we can learn from them. Plus: We traveled and celebrated a birthday.

Spikey the Nike reporting:

We began on Monday with learning about our very own Jewish hero, Avraham Avinu, who gave up more than any of us ever would just because G-d told him to.

After that we prepared for our very own Gan Izzy concert. Each bunk prepared their own song and dance to present. We quickly skipped onto boxing and learnt some new kicks. As soon as we were done our yummy lunches we had a delicious surprise for Itai's birthday. 

We then painted beautiful pictures with Miss Valencia and to end off our fun filled day, we had an amazing presentation by our very own CGI counselors!

Tuesday began by learning about another one of our Jewish heroes, Rivka, a rose amongst the thorns. She behaved like a true princess even though all those she lived with were evil and liars. 

We had to rush off to play a crazy game of twister in shaving cream, then do some awesome water activities because as soon as we were done lunch, we had to leave to gymnastics! There we did some relay races and an obstacle course and then we got to play around for a while! When we got back to camp we had some yummy ices to finish off our very busy day :)

And Wednesday's Jewish hero was Moshe! The greatest leader ever for the Jews, never complaining once and always being there to take care of the Jewish people no matter what. Today we also met someone new! Mrs. Zee's son, Men, came make delicious candy dots with us! We made different colors and set them aside for Thursday. Then we had a toe-painting competition! What fun that was, getting our feet full of paint. 

After lunch, Mr. Mad Science came and taught us about rockets and even showed us some take off in our very own front yard! We all got a cute little rocket-balloon to take home with us. We ended off the day with a carnival with many booths like the bubblegum race and shave the balloon!

On Thursday, we learnt about Rabbi Akiva, a man who it took 40 years to realize that if he tried hard enough, he'd be able to learn as much as anyone else. And guess what? He turned out to be the greatest leader in Torah learning of his generation!

After learning we took out our white t-shirts and made them not-so-white t-shirts by tie-dying them! They all became so beautiful with all the different designs and colors.  We then baked delicious ice cream cupcakes and while they baked we ate lunch. After lunch were water activities! When we got back inside, we ended off our day by decorating our cupcakes and playing dead-fish.

And then sadly enough, Friday, the last day of camp came around.  We had the very last booming loud lineup of the Gan Izzy summer. We began by learning about Shlomo Hamelech, a very great Jewish king. We baked Challah for the very last time and had a delicious snack at the very last Shabbos party and heard an amazing story by Rabbi Yudi.

I was so sad to see every one of our delicious campers go but I know I will see them all again next year!

It was a very creative week at Camp Gan Izzy with campers creating an eco-friendly fasion show, playing golf and leaning about safety and welcoming guests.

Al Gore would be proud.

Campers of Camp Gan Izzy of Tucson were both the designers and the models of their very own "most amazing fashion show of all time" on Thursday.

With the help of their counselor, each bunk designed a outfits made from this week's newspapers. Dresses, wedding gowns and even tuxedos were carefully created.

"Everything in the world was created by Hashem," they were told by Head Counselor Mushkie Shemtov. "The Torah teaches us not to damage or waste."

Shemtov added, "as Hashem has created this world, it is our duty to make him welcome in our home and even in our room. One way to do that is to have a charity box and Jewish books."

Week three of the Chabad day camp was filled with lessons from the Torah and pure fun.

There was boxing again, this time the campers learning new techniques on how to box like a professional, and they then baked black & white cookies with "Mrs. Zuchenshtein." And that was just Monday.

On Tuesday, the camp went Fire Station 7. The friendly firefighters spoke about safety during dangerous situations and showed the campers where they sleep when they're not on call. They even got a turn to knock down an orange cone with the oh-so-strong fire hose.

Water continued to be a major enjoyment in camp, with swimming in the pool, awesome water activities, slip and slide, water sponges and not to forget the sweet ices.

Among the creative things the children have done was a photo-booth and creating sound makers with Mr. Mad Science, and drawing peacocks with pastels and watercolors.

The week concluded with an exciting laffy taffy hunt and a Shabbos Party with Rabbi Yudi, leaving everyone excited for the last week of camp.

Love, spiky the Nike!