Camping was a lot of fun. These daytime pictures show how well the weather cooperated. They don't show how things didn't go so well our first night. Friday night my dad and I set up my tent. It was getting dark when we finished and I hadn't set it up in two years, but we thought we did it correctly. It started raining during the night. Maggie started wimpering in her sleep so I got her off her cot and onto mine with me in my sleeping bag since I thought she was probably getting cold. She went right back to sleep and I lay there pondering the rain and wind. I noticed that the corner tent pole was leaning into the tent. I was trying to remember how angled it was when we went to bed. I then noticed that it was more leaning than when I got Maggie into my bed with me. I looked behind me and the other corner pole was also leaning in. I then pondered do we stay or do we make a run for Mom and Dad's camper?
The tent poles blew in more and I thought I better get us out. I thought I could take Maggie and come back for Mena but as soon as my feet hit the floor Mena was up. I got my shoes on and got Mena (40 pounds) on my right hip and Maggie (30 pounds) on my left hip and made a run for it. It was a slippery muddy hill that I slide/ran down to Mom and Dad's camper. The storm had woke Dad up and he had the lights on. He opened the door and told me to come in. I yelled for him to take Mena before I dropped her! I got the girls in and then decided I needed to go back for our sleeping bags.
I got back and both girls wanted to sleep with me so we were trying to decide which of the two beds was bigger for us to sleep in--the table folded down or the couch folded down. Dad proceeds to pull a tape measure out of his jeans pocket!?! Who carries tape measures in the middle of the night?!? So he measures the bed. They are both 41 inches. I picked the table bed. Dad then procedes to open the discussion for can we zip the sleeping bags together. No, Dad. I have an adult sleeping bag and the girls have kid sleeping bags. He's trying to make a plan and at 3 am I just throw the sleeping bags down and call it good and climb into bed before he's finished processing how to arrange the sleeping bags. Mena decides that I should sleep by the window so none of the kids mess with the blinds like last time we slept in Grandma and Grandpa's camper (good memory, kiddo) and that Maggie should sleep in the middle so she doesn't fall out and she should sleep on the side. Ok, everybody lay down. Maggie snuggles up under my arm, but Mena is disturbed by my hand being in the way of her head. We get that arranged and we all go back to sleep pretty quickly!
The next morning Dad finds the poles folded in on the tent. Turns out we forgot about 20 velcro straps. We attached all of those to the poles and the tent worked just great on Saturday night. I did buy a space heater to use in the tent next time that the weather is cold at night but nice during the days.
The week before I found a camper shell on craig's list that fit my truck so we have everything we need for camping and I can keep it all in the back of my truck so all we have to pack is food and clothing and we are ready to go camping again!
