Camp Out!

I took the kids camping with my friend Alli last weekend. Her husband was going to be hunting all day and so she thought it would be fun for me and the kids to hang out with her. Initially I said no, because the thought of me taking all the kids without Rich terrified me a little. Rich wanted to come but he had finals to study for. So I finally decided to go, I had been dying to get out the house anyways. Not knowing if this campout would be a blast or a disaster we took our chances and went.

One of the nights we were there it rained really hard for a couple of hours, the kids thought it was really fun. We played Skipbo in the tent while the rain poured down.

Samantha and A.J

I love this picture, Samantha was so bright eyed the 1st morning we were there. So I started to take pictures of her. I love her expression, if I were to guess what she's thinking it would be this..."Mom, why are you taking pictures of me at 6:30 in the morning!" Or maybe she's thinking..."Mom you look terrible, you need some lipstick and a hairbrush!".

What I love about camping is that it's ok to leave your makeup and hair stuff at home. I love getting a break from the routine of fixing myself up everyday.

We went on a little hike in the afternoon and found a little stream. Blake completely drenched his last pair of pants, so the next day he was wearing his p.j's all day. I thought 4 pairs of pants would be plenty for him for two days, obviously not!

Brooklyn loves being outside. She loves to pick me bouquets of wildflowers and weeds.

Brooklyn and Addison

Weston and Addison planning their attack on the rest of us. There were MANY water gun fights.

Weston has been working on breaking in his glove for fall ball that starts up next month. He takes baseball very seriously.

This little girl can color for hours.

Somehow I forgot to take pictures of us eating and making smores, that's my favorite part of camping. I love eating good food and talking around the campfire. I've always felt like it's ok to eat junk food when your camping, it's the one time that you can really just eat what you want and not feel guilty about it. I remember as a kid we never had sugar cereals at home, or twinkies or soda pop. But when we went camping we got to eat everything that we normally didnt eat at home. I LOVED it!

We did miss Rich while we were gone. It's always better when he's around, but I'm glad we went. It's always nice to get out of the daily routine that we all do everyday. It can be very mundane doing the same thing day in and day out. Sometimes I feel like I get in robot mode and I'm just going through the motions of life. When I notice myself feeling that way I need to do something fun with my kids so I can remember that being a mom is suppose to be fun and not a chore.

We're home now and it feels good to be home. Normally I dread doing laundry but I was excited to see my laundry machines and know they were going to wash our filthy clothes and make them smell good again. I was even a little excited to put some make-up on and do my hair, it's nice to feel like a girl again. I'm glad I took Alli's invitation to go camping, I really didn't think I would have as much fun as I did. I thought it would be more work then fun, but it ended up being the complete opposite.