Camping at Big Bear Lake

we went on our annual camping trip last weekend for another one of kent's summer fridays. we LOVE camping! but we will love it even more when it doesn't involve a pack n' play =o]

this is for ONE NIGHT lol

we made the ridiculous mistake of not reserving a campsite beforehand and so got to drive around to three different campgrounds before getting the LAST spot at this one. and we were on the way out when natalie shouted "wait look! that one has an open sign!!" whew! we decided to be grateful to even get this sunny sandy one! =o]

we brought this chair for seth to sit in and when he got just as dirty in it as out, i strapped it to the table bench and he had a ball watching the kids run around or they would bring him things to look at when i needed both hands to do something, which happens so often while camping! 

natalie brought her daring book for girls and had fun reading about all the things we could do while camping before doing them lol

like admiring our surroundings =o]

playing i spy with the sets of binoculars that we brought, 

exploring! (my personal favorite!)

playing with rocks 

and building fires! 

unfortunately both jenna and seth had a fever the entire time we were gone. seth is teething and jenna kept complaining about her ear popping. she kept telling me she was tired and asking to sit in her car seat with her "baintee" (blanket). no naps for either of them the whole time we were gone didn't help matters. luckily i had brought some tylenol for seth so they both made it through. 

one of our favorite parts of camping is the FOOD!! =o]

for some reason my kids think lemonade is like the most special drink ever. (sometimes i feel like i have turned into my aunt who calls soda "the bubbly death" lol and kent just shakes his finger at me and smiles in this certain funny way i can't explain when the kids tell him he shouldn't be drinking soda because it isn't good for his body ha ha)

here is jenna on one of her tylenol induced highs =o]

caleb caught sight of all the marshmallow around his mouth just as i snapped the picture ha ha 

after i put the littles "to bed" for the fiftieth-and-only-good-until-we-turn-in-time, we sat around the campfire telling stories and waiting for the stars to come out so we would use the astronomy book and maps we brought. the kids were in heaven with our undivided attention =o]

the night was rough. let's choose to not remember it =o]

here is the shell shocked seth saturday morning lol

here is what 'sleeping on the hard ground while waking up every 30 minutes but still having a great time' looks like =o]

and here is our little breakfast chef going to work! this kid has got serious skills!

after breakfast i realized that i hadn't gotten hot yet. you know how when you are camping you wake up freezing but then you get overly hot after a bit. didn't happen. should have been the first clue. while in the tent getting all the kids ready for the day, kent mentioned that he "didn't like the look of those clouds" when he got back from taking out the trash. a few minutes later it started to sprinkle. kent started packing stuff up outside and i started packing up inside and gradually it turned into a steady rain. seth was happy as a clam crawling around the tent and playing with all the stuff, jenna was zoned out in her sleep deprived and feverish stupor with her blanket and fingers in the corner, and the older kids were "helping dad" and having a blast the whole time breaking camp so it really wouldn't have been half bad that we had to cut the trip short, except that we had a muddy tent and tarps to clean up and had to bring food back home. food brought back from a campsite is hard for me to swallow lol oh and we didn't get to practice our knot tying. ah well! next time =o]

the drive home was just as long and winding as the way up had been, but at least the kids slept. kent and i kept encouraging each other that next year and all the years after this are going to be a completely different story for camping, and all vacations really, since i won't be pregnant or nursing a little baby, because for the past almost EIGHT YEARS every time we went camping one or the other was true! this was a fun trip, and we are looking forward to future trips even more!!