Camping

We hadn't gone camping for a long time, but I finally remembered to reserve a campground in advance before it got too hot to go. We decided to try Double Lake and do two nights, since church doesn't start until noon. We got there Friday evening, and Amber started setting up the tent while I got the fire going for dinner.

We cooked tin foil dinners that night while we watched it get dark. They turned out pretty good.

On Saturday morning we had pancakes for breakfast.

After breakfast, we went exploring. The kids had a lot of fun wandering in the woods near the campsite. They found a dead tree that they got lots of pieces of bark off of. Miles found a big leaf.

Carmen found she still likes trees.

We went to see the lake, but there wasn't a whole lot to do other than look at it. It was not hot enough to swim in.

We wandered around the lake for a while and got some pictures of the kids.

We found a trail into the woods and decided to hike it.

It was a nice hike through the forest. It was interesting to see the results of some obvious floods and fires.

As it turns out, the trail was over 5 miles long, so we ended up stopping about halfway. The girls were not interested in going any further.

But it was enough for me to get my nature fix.

It sprinkled a little during our hike, and we made it back to the campsite in time for lunch and predicted storms. It did rain a bit more, but not as much as forecast. In any case, it was a good excuse to nap in the tent. Afterwards, I tried my hand at whittling and Carmen finished her rock drawing of the evil sorcerer from the activity book she had made for Miles.

When she was done getting ash, we got the fire going again for dinner. I brought a boxful of sticks from the yard that I had been accumulating for months (years?), and since this was the last fire, I let the kids burn everything. They were up to the challenge.

We had hot dogs for dinner.

The storm brought cold weather with it, and it was pretty cold that night. We were glad to be up and eating donuts the next morning.

We made it back in time for everyone to shower and get to church. A couple days later, I was helping Miles get a bath ready and noticed this tick on his back. Oops.

We were able to get it out. Hopefully it was disease-free.

Schlitterbahn

The Murphy family invited us to go to Schlitterbahn with them. Amber and the kids went with them last year during spring break and said it was a lot of fun, it's indoor so it's not too cold, etc. They went on a Saturday this year so I agreed to go with them.

This year was apparently not quite as warm as last year, because when we got there the water was cold! We braved the lazy river and did the water slides, but it was definitely too cold to fully enjoy it. Every transition into or out of the water was shocking. The worst was standing in line on the drafty stairs of the waterslides.

A lot of time was spent at the children's play area, which was heated, and the outdoor hot tub. We soldiered on, though, and got our money's worth, until people had had enough.

If there's a next year, we're definitely checking the weather first.

Pinewood Derby

The A-Days girls were invited to do the Pinewood derby this year and the 7-turning-8-year-old boys were also invited, so we got to help Carmen and Damon make cars.

Carmen got hers cut and sanded at an activity, but she still needed to paint it and decorate it and get the wheels on. She chose to make hers into a dog.

Damon wanted his to be a mouse.

They ended up looking pretty good.

Despite being dropped several times between the Saturday we did most of the work and the Friday of the derby, they performed admirably. The dog and the mouse each won a couple of races.

Carmen ended up first in her age group, while Damon got second in his.