Camping

After a three year break from family camping, we spent three days and three nights of our July 4th weekend camping at Grayson Highlands State Park in Virginia. Matt has been anxious to go camping with the family again ever since our summer camping spree in Maine. We shared a group campsite with Katrina and Joey Gaspar de Alba and Melissa and Justin Crane and their families. With a combined total of 13 children there was not a dull moment. We arrived at the campsite just after dark on Thursday evening. The Gaspar de Albas and Cranes had arrived earlier and set up camp.

Friday morning we spent some time putting up extra tarps, which ended up being worth while with the intermittent showers the rest of the weekend. The kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins and getting dirty. Our group campsite was conveniently across the road from a field with a swing set and trees to climb. The kids enjoyed exploring, going on hikes, roasting marshmallows, and sitting by the fire. They celebrated the 4th of July with glow sticks and s'mores.

Brayden didn't appreciate all the spiders. His favorite part was playing in and watching the waterfall. He was trying to keep up with his cousins Mario and Jose climbing the rocks around the waterfall and slid down a rock and hit his mouth and got a pretty nasty fat lip. Kylee's favorite part was the last hike with Justin and Melissa when she got to hold a centipede and see salamanders. She is a nature lover and is fascinated by living creatures that might disgust other girls her age. Julia enjoyed pushing Denali's toy stroller around the campsite and sitting in her pretty pink camp chair. Blake did great for a two month old. He took some serious naps in his netted bassinet and seemed to know and enjoy that he was out of doors.

Sunday afternoon, we finished up the trip with the kids loaded in the cars and the car toppers strapped on, spending a frustrating hour and a half thinking we were stranded with transmission trouble before figuring out that one of the kids had pushed the Suburban four wheel drive into neutral. I guess that helped all of us appreciate being able to get home a little more.

Funny quotes from the camp out:
7-3-08 - On the way to the camp out the kids were watching movies on our portable DVD player in the car. Julia was pulling on the cords and I told her to stop. She started to cry because she had gotten in trouble. I tried to distract her and told her to watch the movie. She stopped crying and said, "NO, I crying." Then she proceeded to continue crying.

7-4-08 - After lunch Brayden was trying to throw something away in the trash. Somebody had moved the trash bag and hung it up on a pole. When Brayden noticed the trash bag gone he got really concerned. He said, "There is something really wrong. Somebody stole our trash."