Greg and the Shorties

Half of my time with the YMCA of Marquette County has been at the YMCA with the day camp kids and the other half has been at Vandenboom, which is the daycare center run by the Y. Marquette Area Public Schools (MAPS) still owns the building, so they use two of the rooms for kindergarten during the school year.

At the YMCA I worked with the day camp kids and I also worked with them at Vandenboom on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Day camp kids are much older than the daycare kids. They are 6-11 years old. Day camp kids are really fun to hang around. We play lots of games with the kids like basketball, card games and we also make lots of arts/crafts.

Greg with George and Noah in the blue room

The younger kids at Vandenboom are very funny and very entertaining. They run around the classroom like animals in a jungle, but you got to love them. I especially like the blue room which is up to a year old or when the parents chose to move them up to the purple room. That room is peaceful except when the babies are crying.

I do a lot of maintenance work at Vandenboom when I am not with the kids. I've helped paint almost every door to the classrooms. I've washed walls, painted kiddie chairs and spray painted hopscotch on the ground outside. All of the staff loves our fantastic work.

I have never worked with kids this young so this is all new to me. The staff has been really helpful to get us used to the kids.

~Greg

What I’ve done in Marquette MI:

I climbed to the top of Sugarloaf Mt. to see one of the most spectacular views of Lake Superior. It was one of the most breath taking view I’ve ever seen.

I went swimming in Lake Superior which is just like an ocean except there are no sharks or scary sea creatures to attack me and it doesn’t taste awful. It’s some of the clearest water I’ve ever seen you can see straight down to the rocks at the bottom more than 40 feet below you.

Hillary climbing over rocks to Marquette Lighthouse

This brings me to the next thing I’ve done, Darcy and I located one of the lighthouses Marquette has on Presque isle, and climbed a quarter mile out over huge boulders to climb up to it. When we started climbing we weren’t sure if what we were doing is allowed. That is until we met our first Yooper (a nickname given to people that live in the U.P. of MI) that told us “we’re in America, we can do whatever we want, eh.” When we climb up to the lighthouse and looked over the edge the water looked no more than ten feet deep, when it was actually more like 44 ft. deep and you could see ever rock on the bottom.

The fact that you can see the bottom is probably what makes jumping off of an 18 ft. cliff into the water so terrifying. I could walk up to the edge of the rocks, look straight down and see a hair scrunchy someone had lost. It took two trips to Black Rocks to finally get me to jump, but once I did I loved it, and jumped three times. Phil, Christina and I also found a jump site off the back on Little Presque Isle, a small island you can walk out to. We climbed and hiked over the difficult side of the island and jumped off the backside. It was awesome adventures that lead to us going back another time with the whole team. That time it was windy and only Phil and I ended up jumping off, because the water was wavy and made it difficult to get out.

Phil, Hillary and Christina at Little Presque Isle

These are all my favorite adventures I’ve had in Marquette so far, but tomorrow we are off to find another.

~Hillary

Christina in the Red Room

For the past few weeks Maple 4 has been working with the YMCA in Marquette, Michigan. I have been working mostly at Vandenboom, a school for little kids. I have worked mostly in the Red Room which is the 4 year olds classroom. These kids are really rambunctious. Ray has been asking me since the first day I came into the class if I was their “new teacher", even though each time I respond I will only be here for 8 weeks. Jake loves Spiderman, he even has Spiderman light up shoes that I am slightly jealous of. I used to love light up shoes. Emma always shows me her flower hat towel and butterfly water bottle. Lachlan is always excited to have me sit next to him at lunch time or walk next to him in line.

“ Drew and Christina do the dinosaur dance.”

The first day I came into their classroom they were choosing pirate names; some of my favorites were Fackson Hook, Crockson Hook, and Captain Carrot. They all wanted to either be a Hook or a Captain, and later that week we even went on a treasure hunt. This week is healthy food week; they’ve been making healthy snacks in class such as trail mix with coconut (my favorite), chocolate chips, Cheerios, Chex, raisins, and pretzels. It was really good. They next day they made soy butter (no peanut butter because kids are allergic) and banana sandwiches. Today they tested strawberry, chocolate and normal milk. Strawberry milk won their vote for best flavor of milk.

Our housing is within walking distance of Lake Superior, which is amazing. I am from New Hampshire, so I miss the coast. The biggest of Great Lakes almost makes up for the lack of coastline. Especially when you go into the lake swimming and realize it is just as cold as the Atlantic Ocean.

~Christina

Do YMCA with NCCC

“Hillary, Christina, Gaby, Phil, Sam, Greg, Drew of Maple 4”

After our summer break, transition and the events that followed Vinton's storm, our team began the 11 hour journey to the home of our third round project. We are currently serving in Marquette, MI for the next eight weeks working with the YMCA of Marquette County. We are primarily working with children in ranges from infants – 17 years of age and assisting with the summer programs and day care. One of the schools that we are working with is also in the process of trying to get accredited and has many maintenance projects for us to do during our stay.

“On top of Sugarloaf Mountain”

Being that I am from Florida, there is nothing quite like the landscape of Marquette. For example, Florida has no mountains, but maybe small hills in more northern areas like Tallahassee. So you can imagine the surprise for me to drive into Marquette and see tall trees and mountains on one side of the road with Lake Superior on the other side. Needless to say, it was beautiful.

Currently, our team has been broken up into separate groups working with three different areas within the YMCA. For my current schedule for the next week, I am working with the YMCA day camp which is for ages 5-12 year olds. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, the YMCA day camp goes to the YMCA Rec Center and gets to swim in an indoor pool, play in a mat room, visit a local park next to Lake Superior or play different board games. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, the YMCA day camp goes to Vandenboom a local school that does a YMCA day care program where they play in a gym, play on a playground, and do many arts and crafts projects. Every Wednesday, the day camp also goes on fields trips which can be things like kayaking, ice cream trips or the movies.

“Lake Superior”

Every minute I am here, I am continually thankful that I have got the experience to meet all these people and travel to all these places that I probably would have never seen before. For example, in the past week I got to meet adorable children of all ages, swim in Lake Superior, climb my first mountain and visit on the best bakeries in town. For anyone who is even remotely hesitant about whether or not AmeriCorps NCCC would be a good fit for them, I beg you to try it. You will go a million places that you never thought and learn more about yourself everyday. I am continually finding more things I love about Marquette, MI and could seriously see myself spending many more years living here.

~Gaby