September 2008

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ICPJ Peace Campers Prepare Fruit Salad at Gettysburg Soup Kitchen

This year’s Peace Campers visited the Gettysburg Community Soup Kitchen and prepared an elegant–and incredibly healthy–fruit salad for the guests. Each camper brought a piece of fruit. The resulting salad included apples, oranges, cantaloupe, honey dew, strawberries, raspberries, grapes, and peaches! According to Peace Camp director, Denise Weldon-Siviy, “The point of making the salad was two-fold. First, the Soup Kitchen can always use fresh healthy salads to serve the guests. Just as important though, we wanted the children to see how easy it can be to complete a large project like making salad for 50, when everyone in the community pitches in.”

Peace Camp is sponsored by the Interfaith Center for Peace & Justice. This year, 48 children aged 6 to 16 attended the Carbon Footprint Peace Camp. Following the environmental theme, campers learned about biodiversity, vampire appliances, alternative energy, and how important it is to share.

In addition to making crafts, this year’s camp took field trips to the Soup Kitchen, SCCAP's Food Pantry, and the Adams County Public Library, plus hikes through the battlefield picking up litter and looking for evidence of biodiversity.

Campers also learned a nice selection of co-operative games from long-time volunteer Mary Gemmill. Known as “Koko” to the children (that’s Swahili for Grandma), Mary used her long experience as a Red Cross nurse to also help the children learn emergency preparedness skills.

Sabrina Paxton-Daily, another Peace Camp staffer, points out, “We try to bring the kids a little bit of everything. Crafts, games, stories. We even throw in a little science and adventure on the side. ”

Peace Campers listen to Soup Kitchen Director, Jan Guillory.

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Last updated September 7, 2008

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