"Camping"

With Derek having a calling in the Young Men's, he is quickly becoming quite the camper. Every time he goes on a campout, which is at least once a month, the kids always want to go with him. We have been saying all summer that we would take them camping, but it has been so unbelievably hot, that we never went.

We figured that over Labor Day would be the perfect time to go "camping". I use that term pretty loosely because "camping" consisted of setting up the tent in our backyard, cooking hot dogs and smores over the fire, and sleeping 40 feet from our nice comfortable beds.

The fire pit is always a family favorite, lets face it, I love it as much as the kids! There is nothing better than a perfectly cooked hot dog over an open flame, ok, I take that back the ONLY thing better is a perfectly ooey gooey smore.

Allee and Pierce got new sleeping bags and they thought it was pretty cool that we were all sleeping right next to each other.
It was a very windy night. The kids slept great, Derek and I on the other hand, not so much. The bugs are so much louder out here in Missouri than Utah, it isn't the gentile chirp of crickets but the irritating buzz of cicadas. Then there are the animals. We live right up against the woods, and there are plenty of possums, raccoons, and armadillos which I believe were the cause of the shrieking screaming noise that scared me half to death. There was scratching on our tent at least twice in the night and sometime around the crack of dawn Derek and I fell asleep.
Pierce woke up bright and early as always and this is how I found Derek and Allee, she is the lump of red sleeping bag.
I took Pierce inside for breakfast which he insisted on eating outside, so he and I ate cereal outside the tent while Derek and Allee slept a bit longer.

Will I do this again, probably.

Was it worth the sleepless night, absolutely.

The kids were so excited and ate up every minute of "camping".

One of my favorite parts of the evening was staying up and talking to Derek around the fire. We were able to just talk for hours and enjoy the warmth of the fire.