Vacation 2008

Bathing camping style.
Splish Splash C is taking her bath

My buddy Dave

I really love camping & even tenting like the kids & I did this time. We tented for two weeks & it was a good time (as long as you have good air mattresses, tarps & enough blankets to stay warm). Dave & Dylan slept in their big motor home & we just squatted at the back of their site.

Camping with two little ones is a ton of work though. Wish I would have had one or both of my big kids with me to help me out & relieve me of some of my parental duties, or just give me a break for a few minutes when I reached my breaking point. It was really dry & dusty there too so the kids always looked so dirty. After the first couple of days the kids slept better as any changes to their routine always take awhile for them to adjust too. The first couple of days the tent & air mattress were like their own private bouncy room so sleep time was not easy. They were outside all day swimming & playing in the heat, so they were exhausted at bed time once the thrill of the air mattress became old hat.

The lake is clean & had large turtles swimming around as well as lots of little fish that nibbled on your feet & toes, crayfish, garter snakes & large toads so the kids were thrilled with all of this new stuff to see. The only thing this lake is missing is a nice sandy beach.

We met up with a lot of folks that Dave met camping there last year as well as some old friends, so there was a very large group of us to hang around with. We had the one whole area of the campground with just our group & our collective 15 dogs. It was lots of fun & they were all such great people. Everyone took the kids under their wings & it felt like a very safe environment to expose them too for a first camping trip like this.

It is amazing how much D's language skills blossomed in these two weeks. Maybe because there were so many people paying attention to him? I don't know but he is now speaking quite clearly.

We had a great time & look forward to many more trips in the future.