Camping

I really enjoy camping. Evan had three weeks (four weekends) without school, so I decided that we must camp on one of those weekends. He said that camping with kids is a lot of work; I told him to get over it. ha ha By the last day of camping, I was wondering if it really was worth it; but now I am looking at the pictures and remembering only the good parts!! ;-)

My parents and some friends of ours went with us, and we really did have a good time. Nathan and their little girl Miriam kept each other company, and it was more successful than we even dared to imagine! Nathan and Miriam played in the water together, pushed each other in the hammock (I'm really sad I didn't get pictures of the times they were in the hammock together), and played with rocks/sticks/whatever else they could find.

Noelle enjoyed the outdoors and played nicely in her pack-n-play, but when naptime came around she would not go to sleep! We finally figured out we could put her in the hammock with a bungee cord holding the sides and she would actually sleep! She still didn't get as much sleep as she needed, but at least she slept. She loved the water and kept us busy trying to keep all the pecan blossoms out of her mouth. They were falling like rain, so I ended up putting a crib sheet over the pack-n-play whenever she was in it.

The first night I got in the tent with my kiddos to try to get them to sleep. I tried to lay Noelle down in the corner in her little place; she lay there for a minute (until her eyes adjusted, I think) then spotted me. She crawled, laughing hysterically, over to me and cuddled up, sucking her thumb. Then she was grabbing my nose and giggling. I felt like I was at a slumber party. Nathan was supposed to be in the other corner of the tent, but he put his head next to me and wanted my hand on his cheek. I felt so very blessed at that moment, cuddling with my baby girl and having my boy rub my hand on his cheek. And they both went to sleep.

The last night was not so picturesque. Noelle wouldn't stop screaming, and it took me about an hour to get her to sleep. I think the biggest problem was that I was so worried about bothering other people, although they were loud enough on their own. ha Anyway, I had to keep bringing up the image of two nights before when I was so thankful. :-)

Our morning wake-up time was about 5:30 or 6:00 since a wonderful crow decided that that was the perfect time to start cawing in the tree overhead. Of course, both kids woke up so happy and would begin crawling all over me and Evan. One morning Noelle woke up and just lay there looking out the top of the tent at the trees.

Nathan had a blast. He asked me today if we could camp forever and move our house there. ;-) ha I definitely would want a bathroom that wasn't a hole in the ground with a toilet seat over it. Walking a little way to the bathroom also caused a certain little boy to have an accident, which was probably the occasion that sent me into the "is this worth it???" blues. ha I got over it, though.

Both of my kiddos took three-hour naps today. I think they were tired. :-) I'm trying to remember some of the cute things Nathan did and said, but I can't think of them now. Maybe they'll come to me later.