With stars in their eyes and images of their name in lights emblazoned on their consciousness, a group of future Central Whidbey thespians dove into their craft this summer. They wrote scripts, designed costumes, built sets, rehearsed, and performed live in front of a roaring crowd — of their parents.

“They basically learned how to do a production in one week,” said Mary Hritz, a volunteer who helped kids at the Coupeville Boys and Girls Club produce their plays.

The week-long drama camp is the latest in a series of fun and educational camps put on by the 2-year-old Boys and Girls Club.

“It’s my second favorite camp this summer,” said 9-year-old Caitlin Zarifis.

The drama camp had some tough competition. Zarifis’s favorite camp of the summer was horseback riding at the M-Bar-C Ranch in Freeland.

But in the midst of drama camp, with paint smudges all over, Zarifis was the picture of happiness as she and her friend, Samantha Martin, busily painted play sets outside Coupeville Elementary School.

During the drama camp, participants took popular fables, such as Rumpelstiltskin, and rewrote them, putting their own twists on the tales. In all, they performed four plays in front of their parents last Friday.

The club offered 15 different camps this summer as opposed to the two offered in its inaugural summer season. The camps took place over a nine-week period. Throughout the summer, kids learned about such diverse topics as rockets and Asian cultures, and they toured a good chunk of Whidbey Island with excursions to local beaches and several state parks.

Peg Fenstermaker, director of the Coupeville Boys and Girls Club, said expanding the number of camps came from parental input. Busy parents always need things to keep their kids occupied during the summer. To offer more flexibility, some of the camps were held at the Coupeville Elementary School multipurpose room, which offered a bit more space for the kids to work.

The summer program list isn’t the only thing that has grown since the club opened its doors in 2005.

There are now approximately 200 children taking advantage of the Coupeville Boys and Girls Club programs, which is up from the 50 children enrolled a year-and-a-half ago.

Fenstermaker said groups such as the Lions Club, Island Thrift and Soroptimists, businesses including Wal-Mart, and a host of individual donations have helped fund the additional programs.

While the program offerings grow, staff is looking to upgrade the club’s equipment. The Boys and Girls Club is holding its new “Mussels on the Bluff” event to raise money for the purchase of new computer equipment. The club recently received a grant from the Gates Foundation to purchase new software. Unfortunately, the software doesn’t work on the club’s current, outdated computers. Among other things, the software allows Coupeville members to chat with kids in other Boys and Girls Clubs around the country.

The fund-raiser takes place 4 to 7 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 18, at the bluff above Ebey’s Landing.

The Coupeville Boys and Girls Club, which is currently affiliated with the one in Snohomish County, still operates out of the old fire station located on North Main Street near the hospital. The club shares the space with Gifts from the Heart food bank.

The club’s fall program begins in September when students return to school. The Boys and Girls Club operates after school every weekday except when the food bank is doling out provisions to the needy. Kids can spend time completing their homework or participating in other activities.

Fenstermaker said the Boys and Girls Club will be open during the long Christmas and spring breaks this school year in another effort to take some pressure off parents.

Things are going so swimmingly, in fact, that the club is showing signs of bursting at the seams. With an ever-increasing number of kids participating in Boys and Girls Club programs, Fenstermaker said there is concern there won’t be enough space to meet the children’s needs. The current building has room for approximately 50 children at one time. That could pose a problem if any single event proved popular.

“If all the kids showed up at the same time, we’d have to turn away three-quarters of them,” said Jackie Feusier, a volunteer who is coordinating Saturday’s fund-raiser.

Fenstermaker said even though she’s grateful to have the former fire house location, talk could begin soon on how to find a new, and bigger, location.

“We’re thrilled to have a place for kids to come, but we’re quickly outgrowing it,” Fenstermaker said.