Father's Day

When I realized we had a completely free weekend for Father's Day, I started planning a camping trip for R.  We recently found a "new" lake a lot closer than our usual spots and we figured we could get up there Friday night and actually spend all weekend--rather than just one night.

I'm a planner.  I make lists, I cross stuff off (I think I've mentioned that I add things I've already done just for the satisfaction of crossing them off. . . ), in my mind, I've figured out how it's "supposed" to go.  So I packed sand toys, bubbles, bikes, and sidewalk chalk for the girls--they were going to frolic happily in the great outdoors.  I grabbed not one, not two, but THREE books for me--there would be lots of lazy, summer sitting soaking up the rays and reading.  I figured out what we would cook--LOVE eating at camp--and we packed up a "new-to-us" tent that had tons of room, our kayaks, beach umbrella, and coolers.  I was beyond excited to get away.

View from campsite--Not bad!

Then reality set in.  R got home late from work and the hour drive that I had planned involved three stops.  Gas/bathroom, another (false alarm--thanks Stinkus) bathroom break, and dinner.  It was dark by the time we got there--which isn't a fun time to set up camp.  By 10 am on Saturday, we had already endured:

• 1 6 am wake-up call:  "Wook!  It morning time!"  (Despite telling children that it's still "night-time,"  for some reason a tent is bright VERY early. . .)
• three Stinkus face plants--one involving a nasty scrape on her upper lip (not sure how you scrape your upper lip, but she found a way.)
• two runaway screenhouse incidents and one plate of French toast (Crazy wind. . . I guess that's why this lake is so popular for sailboating. . .)
• 8 million trips to the bathhouse. . . We were not-so-pleasantly surprised to find that the facility was a pit-toilet.  Bleh.  We had several "Never mind, I don't have to go" moments only to walk back to camp, change our minds, then hike BACK.  Though I will say, the girls were troopers.  It was nasty but they quickly became masters of the "Don't breathe or look and just let er go" technique.     
• way too many "What can we do nows?" because apparently I didn't pack enough entertainment. 

I was about ready to call it a day.  But then things started to look up.  We headed to the swim beach and ran into some gals I work with.  The girls LOVED the beach--it made me really excited to hit the "real" one next summer.  :)

Beach babe!

Hot sand!

Of course, there was sand everywhere, fights over sand toys, and sunblock protests--but I won and I'm happy to say no one got burned.  We had been telling the girls it was "ok" to pee in the lake and what does Stinkus do?  Squats at the water's edge so that a visible stream is running out of her suit, and THEN looks upside down between her legs at said visible stream running out.  Even better: she then runs full speed back to our umbrella yelling, "I peed, Mommy!  I peed!"  Yep, pretty sure everyone already knows. . . Later, she let it go again after napping ON Daddy's cot.  And gave us absolutely no warning other than, "I just peed."  Thanks for that, Stinkus.

We watched the lightning all evening and thought surely it was all north.  Then the wind woke me at 3 am.  It was whipping our tent around like CRAZY.  I truly thought the whole thing was going to get sucked up.  And then the rain started.  And not just any rain--crazy, hard BUCKETS of rain.  Mind you, we're in a different tent, one R just knew would leak because it was a Wal-mart brand.  And I will admit the fabric isn't nearly as thick and durable as our Cabela's one.  I was just totally in love with all the extra room we had.  Although, ironically enough, we soon got all kinds of cozy. . .   Sassy was awake by now and nervous about the storm, but to her credit, she never once cried (I meanwhile was trying not to!)  Stinkus, on the other hand, slept the whole time.  ha!  I actually had to wake her because not too long after the rain started, sure enough, water was coming in on the far side near their air mattress.  So I scooped her up and put her on my cot, and Sassy climbed onto Daddy's.  Two and half hours later, the lightning woke me.  It was that scary, cracking, hitting-way-too-close-to-us lightning and all I could think was we were REALLY close to the lake and under a big tree. . . .   Then suddenly I felt water on my face and well, the rain fly FLEW.  R yelled that it was off and we grabbed the girls and what bedding we could and made a mad dash for the truck.  The rain finally stopped about two hours later and of course, all I could think was: Worst. Camping.Trip. Ever.

It wasn't at all what I had envisioned or planned.  I think I may have read three pages all weekend, let alone three books.  Everything was absolutely drenched.  We didn't even take the kayaks out because today we just wanted to get home.  But there were some pretty sweet moments in the middle of all the chaos.  There we were on a Saturday morning at 6 am watching a crane right outside our window walk up and down the shore--that we would have missed had a certain someone not been wide awake at such an ungodly hour.  I got two and half hours of cuddle time with a little girl who won't fit on my cot much longer and until the rain fly went MIA, it was pretty cozy to sleep through the storm with her sweet little head tucked in under my chin.  We got some great swimming in at the beach and right off our shore--I love that the girls love the water.  We discovered an awesome new way to grill corn, and dinner last night was AMAZING.  And there were no plate casualties this time.  :)  This morning, amid all the clean-up, and trying to find missing stakes, and picking up other campers' things, a sweet little voice screeched through the whole campground when she remembered what day it was:  "Happy Fodder's Day, Daddy!!!!!"  

Happy Father's Day, Daddy!

One of the things I really need to work on is realizing that life seldom goes as planned.  Things happen.  Like rain.  And I want the girls to handle it better than I do.  I want them to see by example that you can roll with the punches and not sweat the small stuff.  So on the way home, when we stopped at Sonic for some food, there was only one thing to do when I heard a little voice (strapped in her car seat) say, "I just peed."  Laugh.  Hard.