Can't wait to go camping!

Carol (my sister) and her family came to town from Kansas. We have a tradition to go camping together when we get together in the summer. Ron (Russ's brother) came to town the same week. So we ALL went camping together. It was so fun! It had all the ingredients of a good camp: friends (cousins), a hill to climb, a great campfire, sleeping in a tent, and of course a creek to play in.

Here's a picture of our camp.

This picture is grainy because I took it by the campfire at night. It's Natalie (Carol's daughter) holding Mattie (mine) and Olivia (Ron's). Everyone mixed together and had so much fun!

Are we having fun yet? (Carol, Laura, and Leslie)

I think Joshua is having a good time (I could be wrong though . . .)

If A.J. has a stick, he's happy! (he calls them his bikes and rides them like a stick horse)

Big cousins (Jenna) are so much fun!

And now for the CAMPFIRE!

In the evening, we had a great campfire with stories, jokes, singing, laughing, smoke inhalation, etc. Basically it amounted to "love".

Uncle Ron telling a funny story.

What's a campfire without roasting marshmallows for s'mores?

(Ethan enjoying his and Caleb getting ready to roast)

Can you say "fluffy bunny"? A game where you put marshmallows in your mouth and try to say "fluffy bunny". The one who gets the most in and can say it, wins! (Mostly it ends in giggles)

(Ethan, Adam, and Caleb. Betsy isn't interested)

Here's another picture of us singing and laughing around the fire.

Playing in the creek.

Oh what fun!

Oh yeah, we got the Tramp!

We went to Idaho Falls and spent some of the woad money on a tramp.  Here are the kids enjoying it with the sprinkler underneath.

Russ and Caleb's 25-mile backpacking trip

Russ and Caleb and their scout troop went on their 25 mile backpack trip.  After a few challenging starts (broken packs and bad trails) they took off.

Here's a picture of the guys as they took off. . . 

. . . Now things get interesting with packs on!  :-)

Here's breakfast cooking on the campfire

And the chef!

They really saw some beautiful country.  Here is a picture of  Russ's pack with some of the pretty scenery behind.

Devon is up in the tree gathering firewood.

They hit the end of the trail!  Yeah!  It was a really good camp.

Making money on Woad

Here in Wyoming, they have a weed control program.  They are trying to get on top of a noxious weed call "Dyers Woad".  The program will pay a certain amount per pound to kids 5-16 who pull/dig the weed and bring it in to the Weed and Pest office.  They have to show at least 3 inches of root on each stem.  Anyway, Caleb, Hannah, Betsy, and Mattie worked on the program with some of their friends.  They worked really hard for the week that the program was available and earned $350.  This is a picture of their friends as they dug the weed.  The kids decided that rather than divide up the money they would use it for some family fun gift.  They've got their hopes set on a trampoline.  

I'm happy when I'm camping . . .

My nephew Gordon and his family came on vacation from Texas.  We had talked to them before they came and decided that it would be really fun to go camping with them.  Their kids match up in age with our youngest 4.  So, we headed up to 3-bull flat in Greys River.  It looked a little stormy as we took off but we weren't worried.  (suspenseful music here)

When we got there it was getting pretty cloudy so we really scampered to get the tents up.

Of course as soon as we got the tents pitched, the storm blew over and it got nice and clear.  (happy applause and cheering)

We enjoyed eating dinner and sitting around the campfire.  

About bedtime we could hear some thunder way off behind the mountains.  Coren asked me if I thought it would rain and I said "Naw, I don't think we are going to get any rain."  (famous last words!)  About forty five minutes later, the clouds opened up and dumped on us.  It rained for about 3 hours!  

We didn't have sufficient rain flies on 2 of our tents and Gordon had a tarp sticking out from the edge of his tent that funneled water under his tent.  To make a long story short, we got VERY wet! 

It was pretty wet the next morning but was so beautiful and misty.  We saw several deer and the kids had a great time.  All in all, it was a pretty good time.  

We all got home tired and wet and had to dry a lot of gear but we made good memories!