I Hate Camping! (but I still go every year)!

Last weekend was our annual camping trip again!

Once again, I spent 2 days packing and 2 days unpacking, so I could sit in the dirt and smell like smoke for a day and a half!  I just don't get the whole "camping thing" at all.  So why do I keep going back every year if I hate it so much you ask?  That's easy . . . because I love my kids and my kids LOVE camping.  I also get to spend time with some of my very bestest friends (even though I think we could all have just as much fun spending time together in a luxury house in Sunriver, but that's just me).

Here I am . . . trying to act like I love camping,

Pancho and I were in charge of dinner the first night.

Notice Pancho's shirt with "baby Carlos" on it!  Ha Ha

This year's camping trip was at Suttle Lake in Central Oregon.  There were 6 families, including 11 adults and 14 kids. The Fultons, The Hakalas, The Dacars, The McCarthy's, The Cyphers, and The Browns.  We were so happy that the Cyphers could join us this year.  Dina was a very good friend of Christy, Liz and I at Linfield College.  We used to hang out with Dina and Randy all of the time when we lived in Portland.  It was so fun to catch up, and hang out with them again, as well as their daughter Delaney and son Blaine.  Liz's best friend from High school Tina Brown and her son Luke have been coming with us for a few years now as well.  It is a Super Fun group, and we often laugh so hard we have tears and stomach pains!  The bathroom situation added lots of jokes and laughs this year!!!

I have always barely been able to tolerate camping WITH flush toilets and running water!

This was a HUGE reason for my camping hatred this year

(notice that the toilet does NOT have a flusher on it!  YIKES!!!)

Oh Yes, and where do you wash your hands? yuck!

I know, I am such a wuss!

OK, so on our Girls Weekend in Vegas, we ran across these "Hangover" T-shirts at Caesars Palace.

You have to have seen the movie to think this is funny, but we all got our husbands a T-shirt.

Donnie and Doug's say "One Man Wolfpack" and Kevin's says "Tigers Love Pepper".

Pancho's has baby Carlos in a baby bijorn.  You should see the looks that he gets when he wears it!  So funny!  (Randy didn't have a shirt, but he snuck in there too)

Ethan and Lucy

I have lots of pictures of Lucy and hardly any of the boys.

That's because the boys took off running, fishing, swimming etc. the minute we got there, with all of their friends, and I hardly saw them.  Which is probably why they love camping so much . . . freedom!

Brendan, Max and Ben

rowing away from me, rarely to be seen from there on out :)

The nice thing about Suttle Lake is that it is very shallow and therefore very warm.

The kids could stand until they were quite far out in the water.

Jessica (Natalie's friend), Natalie (Christy's daughter) and Delaney (Dina's daughter)

They were just little girls, like yesterday . . . seriously, where does the time go?

 . . .the whole group (or most of it) around the campfire.

25 of us in all

roasting marshmallows and singing campfire songs

Lucy is just like me, she loves to cook marshmallows but hates to eat them.

Max started roasting mint oreos and putting chocolate between them!

Now that is my kind of smore!

Liz and I before . . .

. . . and Liz and I after!

We brought the boat and we all had so much fun being drug around the lake on this big orange tube!

I was so surprised that Lucy actually went on the tube (see her holding on for dear life), she is usually very nervous about things like that.  Ethan and Sam, on the other hand, were surfing and dancing on the thing, while it was moving pretty fast!

 

Dina (learning how to NOT paddle in a circle)

loading up the boat for another run . .

Pancho and Lu

(so cute!)

Dina and Liz (supermoms)

This is what it felt like the Mom's were doing the whole time. . . carrying everyone's towels, drinks, floaties, sunblock, snacks, coolers, oars, chairs, etc. etc. etc. from one place to another.  It's all so much work!  Once again, Sunriver anyone?

How sweet is this picture of Lucy and Liz!

I love it!

Christy, Me,  Liz and Amy

OK once we got all of the $%#t set up, it was nice to relax and chat with girls.

All in all, once I get home and get the last bit of laundry folded and put away, I do have to admit, that camping can be a little bit fun.  I always say that this is my last year and that I will never do it again, but I always end up there again the next year. Looking back, these will probably be some of our funniest and most fun memories.  I think that this was about our 8th annual camping trip, but I still hold out hope that I can change everyone's mind and move it all to a beautiful vacation home (with a flush toilet) one of these years!