A Camping We Will Go...

This weekend our whole family went on the Cub Scout Campout near Westmalle, Belgium which is about 1.5 hours from home. What fun!!

FRIDAY:

Jeff is the quartermaster so he took the day off work to take all the pack's gear up to the campsite and set everything up. Clark got to take the day off school to be with his dad. I brought the rest of the kids up after school.

Katie immediately got down on the dirt and started eating pine cones. Here is how she looked when we first got there:

And here she is after a couple of hours crawling around:

Here is our tent, which we borrowed from Jeff's coworker. It is enormous, big enough for us to put Katie's port-a-crib up in one end.

Katie liked to explore the tent too:

I made dinner - boxed chicken rice, marinated chicken breasts, canned green beans, and fruit.

Here is Clark playing around in the trees:

After dinner, I gave Katie a bath under the food tent inside a dish pan:

Everything was perfect. Katie went to bed in her port-a-crib at 8pm and then we all followed around 10pm. Then..... at about 1am Katie started crying. She cried on and off until 4am. I just couldn't settle her since I was sleeping right next to her. She doesn't know how to sleep with me anymore, so I couldn't just put her in my sleeping bag - she would get bothered by me. And I felt like I couldn't let her cry it out because there were 10 other families there. Finally at 4am I took Katie - in the pitch dark - out of the campground, back to our car and then drove her around until 6:30am. I kept having to stop because I was so tired and I was afraid that I'd fall asleep - but whenever I stopped, Katie would wake up and cry. She really only sleeps in her bed now (which has its pluses and minuses).

SATURDAY:

So at 6:30am I came back into the camp and put Katie back into her bed. At this hour most of the people were up so I let her cry for a minute or two and then I went back to bed too. When we woke up around 9am the world looked a lot brighter! Nobody complained about her crying, but we did get a few, "Is she okay? What was wrong with her?" But, like I said, by 9am things seemed much better and the rest of the day was great.

The day started with skill stations. One station was whittling. Clark got to do it with his own pocketknife:

Emily and Blake got to carve soap instead:

Another skill station was the orienteering. That was a lot of fun.

In the evening the pack (about 90 people in all) gathered around a campfire pit. Here is Katie ready for the festivities:

Clark's Bear Den opened the evening with the Color Guard:

Next came some skits. Here is Clark and his den participating in a skit about a flying saucer:

After the skits, each of the boys received their rank advancements. Clark received his Bear badge and next week he will cross over to become a Webelo. Wow!

We had a really fun time. Everyone there seemed amazed that we'd bring all our kids with us - especially Katie. Emily was one of only 4 sisters that came. I kept telling people that I was raised by a mother who would put us in the baby backpack and go moose hunting. This was nothing.