Camp Twigs, a three-day camp for children with Type 1 diabetes, was canceled this weekend because of fire danger in the Eastern Washington.
STEVEN'S COUNTY, Wash — Camp Twigs, a three-day camp for children with Type 1 diabetes, was canceled this weekend because of fire danger in the Eastern Washington.
NonStop Local spoke with staff, participants and parents about the decision. The camp director said poor air quality was part of the reason organizers called it off.
Lily Campbell said she was disappointed after hoping to go back to camp this year.
"I was sad because I really wanted to go..." Lily Campbell said.
Lily said swimming was one of the things she enjoyed about summer camp.
"I like to swim..." Lily Campbell said.
Camp Stix in Spokane County and Camp Twigs in Stevens County were designed for kids with Type 1 diabetes. Organizers built the camps with close supervision and extra medical support.
"It's really just a summer camp, we just have a lot of extra steps we have to go through..." Jacob "Jagger" Thies said. "These are kids that have a chronic illness and have high medical needs..." he said.
Thies said the supervisor-to-participant ratio was near or greater than one-to-one. He also said canceling the camp was difficult even though safety made the choice clear.
"It's the best part of my summer. It's the best part of my year. I talk about it constantly and taking away that from the kids, even in this hard time, just absolutely broke my heart..." Thies said. "The easy part was to decide that it wasn't safe. The hardest part was taking camp away from these kids..." he said.
Lily's father, Mike Campbell, said her first year at camp stayed with her long after it ended. He said the camp gave families a place where support felt shared.
"She talked about it for probably a month afterwards..." Mike Campbell said. "When you have the community like that it's like it turns that burden into a shared journey..." he said.
Mike Campbell said telling Lily about the cancellation was tough because she had been excited.
"That was a hard one to break to Lily cause she was really looking forward to it..." Mike Campbell said. "She's so excited to be able to do the sleep away camp..." he said.
Even with this year's cancellation, Lily said she still remembered time spent with other kids at camp.
"I remember that we used to play together. I don't remember her name." Lily Campbell said.
Originally published on khq.com, part of the BLOX Digital Content Exchange.
Please disable your ad blocker, whitelist our site, or purchase a subscription
Sorry, an error occurred.
Already Subscribed!
Cancel anytime
Thank you .
Your account has been registered, and you are now logged in.
Check your email for details.
Submitting this form below will send a message to your email with a link to change your password.
An email message containing instructions on how to reset your password has been sent to the email address listed on your account.
No promotional rates found.
Secure & Encrypted
Thank you.
Your gift purchase was successful! Your purchase was successful, and you are now logged in.
| Rate: | |
| Begins: | |
| Transaction ID: |
A receipt was sent to your email.
(0) comments
Welcome to the discussion.
Log In
Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Don't Threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be Truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism that is degrading to another person.
Be Proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
Share with Us. We'd love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article.