One dad’s chaotic, hilarious, and ultimately successful quest to find the perfect summer camp (without losing his mind).
Let’s be honest — when I first heard the words “summer camp search,” I thought, “How hard could it be?”
A quick Google search. A few phone calls. Sign the kid up. Boom, done.
Ha.
HAHAHAHA.
Oh, sweet, naive me.
Turns out, finding the right summer camp is like shopping for a car, adopting a puppy, and planning a wedding — all rolled into one chaotic package. But I lived to tell the tale, and if you’re a tired (but awesome) dad like me, here’s how you can survive it too.
Step 1: Accept That It’s Going to Get Weird
First off, you have to understand that the world of summer camps has exploded.
Gone are the days of two options: “arts and crafts” or “kickball.” Now, it’s Robotics Engineering Camp, Theater Camp, Nature Survival Camp, Coding for Toddlers, Extreme Pickleball Camp (okay, I made that one up — but probably not by much).
There’s a camp for everything, and every one of them promises to change your child’s life forever. It’s overwhelming, but also pretty cool… once you stop hyperventilating.
Step 2: Make a List (and Then Set It on Fire)
Like a good dad, I started with a spreadsheet.
Columns for costs, dates, activities, distance, how many unicorns would be involved, etc.
By the time I was done, I had 22 tabs open, 14 emails flagged, and zero actual decisions made.
Lesson learned: you cannot spreadsheet your way out of chaos.
Instead, I asked my kid two simple questions:
- What would you have fun doing this summer?
- What’s something new you might want to try?
Their answers (archery and building robots) helped me focus. Suddenly, half the spreadsheet disappeared like magic. Goodbye, Underwater Basket Weaving Camp.
Step 3: Trust Your Gut (and Your Kid)
After a few tours and a Zoom open house (yes, camps do Zoom now — welcome to 2025), I realized something:
It’s not about picking the “perfect” camp. It’s about finding the “good enough and my kid is excited” camp.
If the staff seemed friendly, if the activities matched what my kid liked, and if the bathrooms didn’t look like horror movie sets, it was a winner.
Did I still overthink it? Of course.
Did I still have nightmares about missing registration deadlines? Obviously.
But ultimately, trusting my gut — and letting my kid feel involved — made all the difference.
Step 4: Practical Tips for Fellow Tired Dads
- Start early, but don’t panic. Camps fill up fast, but options pop up even late in the season.
- Prioritize location and schedule. No one wants a 45-minute drive twice a day in July.
- Budget realistically. Some camps offer financial aid or sibling discounts if you ask.
- Plan a backup. Seriously, have a Plan B (and C). Stuff happens.
- Remember why you’re doing this. Camps give kids independence, skills, and a break from screens — even if finding the right one makes you temporarily insane.
I won’t pretend it was stress-free. At one point, I genuinely considered just building a mini-golf course in the backyard and calling it Camp Dad.
But in the end, when I dropped my kid off at their chosen camp — excited, smiling, ready for adventure — it felt worth every late-night Google search and frantic spreadsheet session.
Tired dads, you got this.
And if you need to, there’s always next year’s camp search to get even better at it. (Or so I tell myself.)
