New adventures in......Camping

Can you say dirt!! Lots of it. This is our first real camping trip as a family. By ourselves. For 5 days!! With 3 kids, 4yr, 2yr and 4mo. Yeah, what were we thinking. Well, we had one week off and no $$ and nowhere to go. Some of the prices on hotels where we usually go(Pismo Beach, and Santa Barbara) were $90-150+ for ONE night! Camping was only $25/night. So there was the reasoning, one night or five nights for the same price. I think we ended up paying more trying to gather and borrow camping gear and food for that week. Way too many trips to Wal Mart.

Destination: Lake Berryessa. Just 20mi NE from Napa, CA. Spanigh Flat Resort. Great place, just 1 1/2 hrs from home. Easy camping, open area, local store, marina, and.... hot showers and flushable toilets! That's right, ladies and gentlemen, camping w/ perks. The only way to go if you have kids like ours. Speaking of "kids like ours", the first 2 days were pretty rough!! Screams, fits, tantrums, fights, and more dirt. We had to move to a new location to get away from other campers w/ teens. Good for them, good for us. Much better after the move, and could relax. Saw lots more wildlife up on the hill. Third and fourth day were better, by fifth day, we were way ready to go home. Next time, only short weekend camping trips.
With all that, it was still fun.

Our site by the water. Lake level was real low.







"i'm sorry"








Yeah, Smores!







dirt angels









4 month old and camping. wow. She might have had the most fun of all of us.






PS: comments back on. (if you visit, positive comments please :-)

Summer 1/2 over....

...and nothing to show for it(yet). Every day is pretty much the same. Routines are nice, but common, we need some adventure in our lives. I miss friends, and going different places, and building memories. Of course, we really can't do much bec/ of the baby, thing-1, and thing-2. We are planning a vacation in middle august, visit friends and head towards Santa Barbara or Pismo Beach(our annual vac spot). We might venture the camping thing, that's a might. More fun for the kids than the parents. Maybe we'll practice camping in the back yard for a few nights.

Yeah, that's the ticket !! heh heh.
jl