Playing on a five-day schedule

At Winter Camp Costa Mesa, kids try wacky versions of dodge ball and polo -- and save time for good deeds.Ever since school got out, the children at Winter Camp Costa Mesa have been at play five days a week. Along the way, though, they’ve had a few serious moments -- and for Preston Patterson and Ilania Keju, those may have been the most rewarding parts.

The day after Christmas, Preston, 7, and Ilania, 8, visited the Mesa Verde Senior Center along with their peers to bring ornaments to senior citizens. Both Preston and Ilania, who are best friends and live in Costa Mesa, ended up handing a craft to a disabled person.

“My person was blind and they couldn’t see at all,” Preston remembered. “They had to reach into my hand and say, ‘Thank you.’”

Added Ilania: “One of the persons had an ear problem, so they couldn’t hear me. They gave me a paper that said, ‘Merry Christmas.’”

Winter Camp Costa Mesa, run by city recreation coordinator Lisa McPherson, offers children a diversion during the holiday vacation weeks. During and after the new year, enrollees make crafts, compete in sports and take excursions around Southern California -- with a little public service mixed in.

“I like for the kids to give back to the community, and the seniors love it,” McPherson said.

For the rest of last week, Winter Camp Costa Mesa was all fun and games, as the children mixed playground activities with trips to Knott’s Berry Farm, “Disney on Ice,” Bolsa Chica State Beach and elsewhere.

Thursday morning at the Balearic Community Center, two teams faced off in Pillo Polo -- a form of polo in which players attempt to bat the ball into their opponent’s goal with foam-rubber sticks. Across the yard, other children ran races and played Red Rover.

Many of the sports in the camp are invented by the counselors, all of them college students and some of them former enrollees in the camp. One popular game, called Dynamite, is a variation on dodge ball in which the players throw seven or eight rubber balls in the air and attempt to peg each other until one person is left standing. There is also a “Star Wars” version of it in which two of the players hold polo sticks -- or “light sabers” -- and use them to deflect the balls.

“We take what’s going on, like movie themes, and incorporate that into the camp,” said Steven Thomas, a photography major at Orange Coast College who attended the winter camp as a child.

Students said the camp offered opportunities for fun and made everyone feel welcome -- especially in a wild sport like Dynamite.

“Everybody in the camp wins once,” said Devon Brady, 10, of Costa Mesa.20060103ishuubncDOUGLAS ZIMMERMAN / DAILY PILOT(LA)Marcie Mathieu plays Pillo Polo with other children during Winter Camp Costa Mesa at the Balearic Community Center.