New Experiences

 

We decided that it was part of our “parent responsibility” to take Luke camping.  I’m not a camping girl.  Not because I’m fancy or find personal cleanliness particularly important, but mostly I’m just lazy.  Camping takes a lot of work and I don’t like pretending I don’t have a home. Or a bed. Or a potty I have to walk down a road to find in the middle of the night.  But Luke might like it. His friends go camping. So maybe we should too.  The Gartins were kind enough to bring us along for the trip.

Please note: I have not been camping in at least 9 years. And that last camping trip . . . well, it was a one night deal and I didn’t have to do much since I was only 12. Now I am an adult and responsible for others. Or so I’m told.

How grossly underprepared the Bickels were.

Camping in August? Hot, right? No. No it wasn’t.

I can’t say that I have ever been so cold in my entire life.  We didn’t even bring pants for Luke. Not even pants.  It was so cold and wet . . . that part was pretty miserable.

We did have fun though – the boys had a great time and it was nice to relax and hang out and be away from cell phones and tv.

How did it become “Noella-style” camping? We went out to breakfast the first morning. Woot! Why you ask? Because everything was soaking wet the first morning and raccoons attacked all our food. But I got nice warm breakfast at a restaurant! Score!

Off for a walk with the boys

Just because one is camping in the woods does not mean that one does not take one’s Sally with them.

Luke figured out how to ride a scooter – he thought that was pretty awesome.

After the first wet and abysmal night, we bought a pop up screened in tent-y thing at Walmart to cover up the table and the gear.  Please note – it did not rain.  The condensation was so heavy that it fell like rain.  But only in certain parts of Mt. Madonna.

You know, our campsite.

The pants came from the excursion to Walmart post-breakfast as well.

As long as we have a thumb and a Sally, we can go just about anywhere and do just about anything.

Fire and fruit snacks – life’s simple pleasures.

The boys had so much fun chasing each other in the woods and searching for banana slugs.  They thought banana slugs would both repulsive and awesome.  I’m more in the “repulsive” camp, myself.

Every Saturday night during the summer, they have a folk group that plays live music at their amphitheater.  It isn’t much but it was a lot of fun.  We ended with smores (a hit) and glow sticks (also a hit.)

Overall? A lot of fun and we’ll do it again, definitely.  The clean up stunk as everything was completely soaked.  But the kids had a great time and admittedly, I did as well.