Campnames

Campnames are a girl scout tradition in many parts of the country. Some areas only allow camp councilors to have them, but where I live, the whole troop has campnames. I introduce the concept to leaders at my Leader-Daughter themed camp every fall. Many of whom fully love it and take it back to their troop.

How it all started for us...

My oldest was in third grade and our troop was at a service unit camporee just about to have breakfast when I am informed there is a campname ceremony right after breakfast and we will be naming all of our troop that attended. This was not done when I was a child scout so it was explained to me. My co-leaders and I discussed theme for our troop while we ate. We live in Florida and love Disney so we choose to do Disney characters, Princess names for our girls and dwarf names for the 7 leader/moms.

I was given Grumpy because it was the first time I had camped since I was about 20, I was in my late 30's. We were by a lake with loud frogs etc all night, in uncomfortable camp cots, so I barely slept. The girls were horrible that morning and I had not yet had coffee so...there ya go, Grumpy. I was fine with it and deserved it then, but I have embraced it so much that I have about 20 clothing items, cups, ornaments, etc with Grumpy on it...and I LOVE IT! There are many leaders in the council that don't even know my real name.

Since this time we have name dozens of campnames and have truly embraced the tradition. Each new girl is given a campname at our fall ceremony chosen by the leadership team.

They keep their campname always. But in our troop just until they bridge to cadette, because they are often given kiddie names as daisy/brownie. Upon becoming a cadette they are allowed to change it if they want (many don't) and they get to choose it themselves but no one else is allowed to know (except me) until that fall ceremony when it is announced.

Benefits?

1. When you have 3 Emilys , 2 Sarahs and 3 Isabelles in your troop, having campnames saves you having to always add the last initial.

2. Leaders daughters can be like everyone else because they to get to use the campnames for the leaders, including their own mom.

3. At scouts, the name 'Mom' is never used so there aren't 12 girls walking around calling out 'Mom' and 8 women turning around every time to see if it was theirs saying it.

4. At camp it reduces homesickness. When young girls hear someone calling out Mom they begin to think of their mom and how she is not there and homesickness sets in. With campnames this is less of an issue and rarely comes up.

5. It's just plain FUN!!!