20 campers enjoy Camp Happyland at a hotel in Jordan Landing

WEST JORDAN — There’s a special summer camp going on for kids with neuromuscular diseases like muscular dystrophy. It’s called Camp Happyland and it’s happening right now at a hotel in Jordan Landing.

This year’s camp theme is space, so the kids have gotten to create temporary space tattoos and make shirts with swirling galaxies on them.

Lesha Applegate is the program director for Project Strong, which is putting on the camp. She got involved years ago because of her brother.

“My older brother had muscular dystrophy. And he passed away years and years ago, 20-something years ago. And now I have a nephew that is here at camp for his last year.”

Applegate said they’re trying to create an experience for all kids with neuromuscular diseases.

“We invite anyone from ages 7 to 17 and they’re more than welcome to come. We are always trying to build and look for those that could possibly come,” she said. “We just put a lot on our social media and hope to find all that we can.”

Hopes for expansion

Project Strong President and Executive Director Michael Anglin said they would like to expand the program, but they only have so much funding.

“It does cost us on average $800 to $1,000 per camper to put on summer camp. We do whatever we can to raise funds. We have plenty of generous donors that give to us. We’ve had great success working with Bingham High School. They were a large fundraiser for one of our events. And we continue to look for ways to bring in revenue so that we can continue to do this great work.”

He says they would really like to expand.

“We’re hoping that this will grow in length in terms of number of days that we can do it, and in terms of number of campers that we can serve. So our goal ultimately is to serve as many, if not all, of those kids (with) with muscular dystrophy that want to attend this camp. We want to make sure that we give all of them an opportunity.”

The head of marketing for Project Strong, Mike Farnsworth says they want to expand the event for older teens as well.

“In the future, we’re hoping to implement some more programs for young adults. Right now, we got it down for the kids under 18. Right now, it’s just a lot of keeping the community together, keeping these kids uh connected to their peers,” said Farnsworth. 

Camp Happyland was built to fill a need

Applegate says Project Strong and Camp Happyland got started when the Muscular Dystrophy Association stopped doing camps in Utah.

“For many many years the Muscular Dystrophy Association did a camp here in in Utah. And they now have camps around the country, but they don’t have one here in Utah anymore. And so many of us who had been volunteering at camp for years and years and years decided that we still needed to give the kids that opportunity.”

She says the kids get to do a lot of the same activities at Camp Happyland as kids do at other camps.

“When they come here we divide them into groups and in the groups, they do a cheer. They make flags, they make name tags and door signs. We have cheer off all the time to see who has the better cheer. We are painting galaxy shirts.” 

Applegate also said they are planning on a science night, a carnival, a talent show, dances and going to a movie. 

Farnsworth said they’re even going to go over to the Rush Funcenter and will go swimming in the hotel pool for a while.

“We’re here at Jordan Landing. There’s a movie theater right across the street. We’ve worked it out with them. I think we’ve got a theater rented. We’re going to the fun center over there. It’s nice being located here because we’re connected to everything. Then we got a lot of arts and crafts.”

Brook Green started going to camp with her brother and now also goes with her son who has MS. 

“There’s such a special feeling and the people here—you don’t find better people. And it makes them feel important and loved and cool. And it makes them feel like they have lots of friends and it’s just a really neat.”

Green says her and her family really look forward to the camp. 

“My brother would look forward to it all year. It was his favorite part of summer, part of the year actually. And then for me, just I get to meet all these amazing people and for my son, he just he looks forward to it too and it’s just so fun.”

Project Strong is always looking for more help and donations. If you want to get involved, you can find all the information to do that at the Project Strong website.

 

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