Saturday, October 04, 2008

Camping Redefined

These beautiful kids came camping with us today and we had an awesome time. Hiking, collecting leaves, bird-watching, playing on the camp playground, cooking dinner, reading books, playing in the tent, playing "bear" with Dad, making friends with other kids at the campground, throwing rocks/grass into the bushes, making Jiffy Pop popcorn and eating it with mittens on...

Hopefully, these are the things that Jackson and his cousin, Tommy (second photo), will remember about today. Not that we came home after just eight hours outside. It seems that this next beautiful child pictured here had other plans for tonight that did not involve sleeping outside.
She eventually settled down and I'm pleased to report that both of my kids have been sound asleep in their own beds at home for an hour and a half now (Grama reported in: Tommy conked out too!). We just didn't want to be "those people with the screaming child" at the campground. (Luckily, we were just 20 minutes from home...)

With night-time temps in the 40s now, it was a bit of a stretch to take the wee ones with us anyway (though this Knitter was convinced that the combination of wool + parental body heat would have kept the kidlets warm). We'll pack away the tent and sleeping bags until next year now. Maybe Amelia will be game for tent camping when she's almost one?

7 comments:

Michele said...

love the picture of Amelia!!! too cute...

Cloudberry said...

Beautiful pictures.
The hat and jacket Amelia is wearing looks so cosy and warm!

Heide said...

You are such a fun family. I'll bet the Minnesota nights will indeed be unforgiving to campers for quite some time now, so it's a good thing you were able to enjoy one last outing.

Gretchen said...

Oh, we were so tempted to get out the tent last night! We spent the afternoon hiking in a forest- I'm so proud of my tough kiddos for hiking three miles!- and we were driving around the campgrounds at dusk. Everyone had tents up, fires crackling, food out... looked so good! Maybe next time!

Christy said...

Holy Moly! You are solely responsible for my huge "need a baby" urge! Amelia looks like such a young lady already!

Aunt Jenny said...

Cute cute pictures of the kids!! Amelia is getting big so fast!!
It is getting cold here at night too. Husband and youngest son are set to go on a scout campout Friday night and husband is less than excited. Son IS excited though..he will have fun no matter what. It is always hard to accept that summer camping time is over. I packed up our stuff (all but the sleeping bags since the boys go on a campout during winter sometimes...called "the Klondike" up in the mountains) today when I finally got out the Halloween and Fall stuff. We have alot of fall decorations and it is ABOUT time I got them out I guess.
Have a fun week!!!

Rob and Maria said...

Awesome camping story. Love the photo of Amelia. She has such a sweet smile! Love and miss you all!