Our annual church Family Camp last weekend was the best ever for our family! We finally managed to last for two nights of camping and fun. It was great.
I'm amazed at how much our family is changing as the children get older. It's so much easier now to do things like camping than it has been for us in about ten years! I can see all kinds of new adventures opening up before us.
This year, we opted to let the big boys sleep in their own tent, next to ours, and the girlies were invited to share a tent with a couple of their best friends in the campsite next to ours. That left only Roger, Andrew, Micah and me in the big tent.
It was wonderful! We slept much better. Well... we slept... which was much better!
Roger was also kind enough to agree to keeping our menu super-simple, which allowed me to enjoy camping much more, rather than cooking and doing dishes all weekend. It worked out great!
We also joined forces with another family. My friend, Jeanine, who was in my high school youth group 25 years ago, and her son, Ike, camped near us and we shared food and fellowship. She is the BEST. I have never seen so many hot dogs and marshmallows in one place, outside a grocery store, before! We had a blast sitting by the fire together in the morning as everyone else slept. And SHE built the fires before I got up!
I really did have a wonderful, relaxing weekend.
I should have taken more pictures. I realized when I looked at them that I only really got one picture of Mary, for some reason. And it looks like this:
Which is, in fact, how the icy cold swimming hole made her feel. But it's a terrible picture! So I included these for her benefit:
Another terrible picture, but at least she's smiling, which she did almost the whole weekend! Here, she is chatting with friends while waiting for the evening service to start.
And this one:
Which is of the back of her cute, little head, while listening in the evening service... I guess I owe her a good photo shoot some time soon!
Noah is a master marshmallow roaster. And he usually shares the best ones with me! He's an amazing kid! He was able to enjoy LOTS of freedom at camp to go and hang out with his friends, but he stuck pretty close for the most part, because he's such a great kid!
The swimming proved to be too chilly for my swimming pool lovers. At least they played on the beach and they all gave it a try to some degree.
Micah LOVES playing in the water, but even he didn't get very wet in the river.
He did enjoy his buddy, Nathan, though. The family we camped next to has five adorable children. With us and with Jeanine and Ike, we made quite a conglomeration of little people!
This is NOT a great picture of Jeanine, and I blinded her terribly when I took it with a flash as we were sitting around the campfire in the dark. But I had to capture her snuggling my little one off to sleep as we were singing worship songs around the campfire on Saturday. Too sweet!
Daniel was the only one remotely brave enough to swim in the chilly water. We actually bribed him to swim across the river and jump off this old concrete foundation. I think he really enjoyed it... although he wouldn't have done it without "incentive."
Anna had a great time with her friends!
They made sand sculptures at the beach.
Andrew was born to camp. He LOVES playing outside and being dirty and eating junk food. He also managed to sleep until 10:00 both mornings, laying in a sleeping bag on the concrete pad where we pitched our tent. And he never once mentioned anything about it being uncomfortable. Ah, to be five again!
He also loved the swimming hole, although he shivered the entire time we were there, in spite of it being like 90 degrees outside.
None of this family fun would have been possible without my amazing man. Roger and I have loved camping together since the beginning. We are doing it very differently now than we did when it was just the two of us, but we are finding that we are entering a new phase of our family, in which camping may again become one of our favorite things to do.
I can't wait for next summer!!
..the LORD your God went ahead of you on your journey... to search out places for you to camp and to show you the way you should go. ~Deuteronomy 1:32-33
I'm amazed at how much our family is changing as the children get older. It's so much easier now to do things like camping than it has been for us in about ten years! I can see all kinds of new adventures opening up before us.
This year, we opted to let the big boys sleep in their own tent, next to ours, and the girlies were invited to share a tent with a couple of their best friends in the campsite next to ours. That left only Roger, Andrew, Micah and me in the big tent.
It was wonderful! We slept much better. Well... we slept... which was much better!
Roger was also kind enough to agree to keeping our menu super-simple, which allowed me to enjoy camping much more, rather than cooking and doing dishes all weekend. It worked out great!
We also joined forces with another family. My friend, Jeanine, who was in my high school youth group 25 years ago, and her son, Ike, camped near us and we shared food and fellowship. She is the BEST. I have never seen so many hot dogs and marshmallows in one place, outside a grocery store, before! We had a blast sitting by the fire together in the morning as everyone else slept. And SHE built the fires before I got up!
I really did have a wonderful, relaxing weekend.
I should have taken more pictures. I realized when I looked at them that I only really got one picture of Mary, for some reason. And it looks like this:
Which is, in fact, how the icy cold swimming hole made her feel. But it's a terrible picture! So I included these for her benefit:
Another terrible picture, but at least she's smiling, which she did almost the whole weekend! Here, she is chatting with friends while waiting for the evening service to start.And this one:
Which is of the back of her cute, little head, while listening in the evening service... I guess I owe her a good photo shoot some time soon!Noah is a master marshmallow roaster. And he usually shares the best ones with me! He's an amazing kid! He was able to enjoy LOTS of freedom at camp to go and hang out with his friends, but he stuck pretty close for the most part, because he's such a great kid!
The swimming proved to be too chilly for my swimming pool lovers. At least they played on the beach and they all gave it a try to some degree.
Micah LOVES playing in the water, but even he didn't get very wet in the river.
He did enjoy his buddy, Nathan, though. The family we camped next to has five adorable children. With us and with Jeanine and Ike, we made quite a conglomeration of little people!
This is NOT a great picture of Jeanine, and I blinded her terribly when I took it with a flash as we were sitting around the campfire in the dark. But I had to capture her snuggling my little one off to sleep as we were singing worship songs around the campfire on Saturday. Too sweet!
Daniel was the only one remotely brave enough to swim in the chilly water. We actually bribed him to swim across the river and jump off this old concrete foundation. I think he really enjoyed it... although he wouldn't have done it without "incentive."
Anna had a great time with her friends!
They made sand sculptures at the beach.
Andrew was born to camp. He LOVES playing outside and being dirty and eating junk food. He also managed to sleep until 10:00 both mornings, laying in a sleeping bag on the concrete pad where we pitched our tent. And he never once mentioned anything about it being uncomfortable. Ah, to be five again!
He also loved the swimming hole, although he shivered the entire time we were there, in spite of it being like 90 degrees outside.
None of this family fun would have been possible without my amazing man. Roger and I have loved camping together since the beginning. We are doing it very differently now than we did when it was just the two of us, but we are finding that we are entering a new phase of our family, in which camping may again become one of our favorite things to do. 
I can't wait for next summer!!..the LORD your God went ahead of you on your journey... to search out places for you to camp and to show you the way you should go. ~Deuteronomy 1:32-33
