Camping

We have been talking about it for a year now.  How would Trey do if we decided to take him camping?  What about his schedule?  What if he hated it?  What if we hated it?  This weekend, after much debate and more questions, we bit the bullet and went.  We had a blast!  The pictures tell the story of this trip...

Since we had a long weekend, we decided to leave early Saturday morning because we didn't have a reservation for a camp spot.  After much research the night before, it seemed as though every camp site in Washington had been reserved.  Although some sites still had  "first come first served" spots available, I can't say I wasn't nervous about driving the hour there only to turn around and bum around at home.  We left the house with all our necessary camping gear and happy faces... only to get down the road and realize we forgot something... twice.  You could no longer dub us "happy campers".  Once we arrived, we got the last available spot and, in my opinion, the best one.  Our moods lifted at once and we started to unpack our things.  Trey could not have been happier.  He helped Daddy set up the tent and brought him the necessary items.

 
After the our things were set up, we got to enjoy Trey enjoying his surroundings.

We climbed rocks...

went on a bug hunt...

and explored every square inch of the campsite.

Meanwhile, Brian tried (in vain) to build a roaring campfire by which we would cook our dinner that evening.  Much to an extremely frustrated and agitated Brian's disappointment, our campfire wood was wet, leading to a three hour session of wood chopping and blowing on a "fire" the size of a matchstick flame.

The next morning was my turn to be agitated and ready to leave... it had rained all night and we awoke to a very chilly morning.  I refused to leave the warmth of the tent and asked (in tears) if we could drive to North Bend to buy pants.  We left the cold, misty campsite and drove the 45 minutes to the closest town and bought warmer clothes.  After living in the Northwest for 2 years I should know better than to trust a weather forecast that says 72+ degrees and sunny all weekend.  Poor Trey had to stay dressed in his jammies half the day because they were the only long pants I packed for him!  It clearly had no effect on him whatsoever...

However the trip to town proved to be successful in several ways: we were warm again, and Brian broke down and bought charcoal, lighter fluid and a fire-starter.  We had a much better (and warmer!) fire Sunday night...

Over the several days that we were there, we had so much fun.  We got away from phones, the computer, the tv, and modern amenities (excluding lighter fluid and fire-starter - how did the cowboys do it??)  We soaked up as much of the scenery as we could...

and we are already planning to go again this weekend!