A friend in our new ward has
planned a campout every Labor Day weekend for the last three years and includes
nine other families. The ten
families basically stay the same year after year unless someone can’t go or a
family moves away. We were invited last year, but we’d already made plans to go
camping with some of our Auburn friends to Kalaloch. I was glad that in January
when she started to make plans for this year's campout we were still included
on that short list. I was really looking forward to spending a few days getting
to know these fun families even better.
Sommer reserves a group campsite
each year and it’s been at a different Eastern Washington recreation
destination each year. This year
she decided to try out Alta Lake State Park. Justin took Friday off and we were on the road around 11am, a
little later than I had hoped, but the timing worked out perfectly for our
anticipated lunch at Cafe Rio in
Wenatchee. We were the first to arrive at the campground around 3pm and were
impressed. There was a huge green
grassy area surrounded by trees and a cute little stream running through
it. We picked out what we thought would be the coolest
(weather-wise) campsite and proceeded to set up camp. Five other families joined us that
evening and the rest arrived Saturday morning. We spent that evening setting up camp and enjoyed a potluck
dinner. The rest of our dinners
and breakfasts were provided by two families working together on just that one
meal (we provided our own lunches).
I can’t even imagine how crazy it would have been to pack and prepare
all of our own meals all weekend.
This arrangement worked out perfectly and there was always plenty of
food for everyone to get their fill.
Carly has been asking me for months
if she could carry Drew around in the Bjorn. I finally let her – she’s such a great little mother, but
wasn’t too keen on getting her picture taken – I’m glad Justin was able to help
me out.
We spent all day Saturday at the
beach. One of the families has a
boat and took groups of kids out tubing and wakeboarding all day. Those of us not on the boat hung out on
the beach or in the large swimming area.
Usually when the boat was coming to
shore to switch out kiddos all the kids would sit on the tube on the ride in.
The weather was in the 90’s, which
is hot, hot, HOT for me so I was happy to stay in the shade with Drew.
Drew once again was amazing. We committed to this trip way before
Drew was born and while we’ve camped with young babies before without a problem
I feared I could have a more difficult baby or that he would wake me and
everyone else up at night. Not at all the case. He went to bed each night about 9pm and woke up once in the
early morning to eat and went right back to sleep. I was worried he would have a hard time sleeping in a cold
tent so I kept a little beanie on him at night so only his hands and face were
exposed.
About half the families attended
church at a small nearby branch on Sunday. Drew and I stayed back and when Justin and the kids got back
from church we spent the afternoon hanging out at camp with some of the other
families. The kids had lots
of fun playing in the stream and building dams.
I didn’t have any Internet service
all weekend which ended up being quite refreshing. It was nice to relax, visit with friends, and be completely
unplugged for four days. The major
bummer was that we couldn’t have any fires. Camping without a fire just doesn’t feel right. It’s especially disappointing at night
when the adults would typically sit around the campfire at night after all the
kids are in bed. We still stayed
up late visiting and playing games, but I definitely missed the campfire &
smores (the plus side of that is that we didn’t smell like smoke all weekend).
Monday morning we packed up then
spent all day at the lake. Camping
with a baby was a little tough cause there really wasn’t a place to lay Drew
down to nap so I usually just held him… or if he was out cold I could try to
lay him down.
We left the lake close to
7pm and after another stop at Café Rio for dinner we got home close to
11pm. That gave us just one day to
get out of summer mode before school started. I wasn’t ready at all, but it happened anyhow.
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