Ward Campout

Our ward planned a ward campout (a first for our ward) just before school started.  We had planned to go as a whole family, but as the day came, we started to have some resistance from some family members.  I for one was worried about sleeping well through the night.  There is only one outhouse up there for everyone to use, and I get up 3 times a night because I'm pregnant.  And Savannah and Sara really didn't want to camp.  In fact, they refused to go unless they didn't have to stay the night.  So, to make things easier, we took 2 cars up and the boys stayed to camp, while the girls drove home to their beds.

We camped up past Emmett, so it was only a 40 minute drive.  It was a beautiful grassy spot with a perfect sandy beach. 

All of our kids gave fishing a try.  

A grandpa in our ward helped Aaron work on his casting.

We had grabbed dinner on the drive up (pizza), but our ward had a dessert cookoff that we got to taste test.  Savannah had a lot of fun hanging out with the other teenage girls her age, and the boys loved playing night games with all the other kids from the ward.  The girls actually had so much fun, that they started to have a change of heart and were thinking about staying the night.  But we weren't prepared to spend the night (we didn't have Sara's contacts, my medicine, or a bottle for Kate).  So we stayed till midnight, then drove home to sleep.

Then we got up early Saturday morning (7am) and made the drive back up so we could have breakfast with the ward.  A few families had brought their boats, and all of our kids got a chance to go on a boat (except for Aaron who chose to stay at the beach).  The pictures are of Nate on the tube, and Owen in the boat (the other kids were on another boat).

All in all, it was a really fun campout.  We stayed till the end and helped clean up, then drove down to Emmett to have lunch at Sonic.  Savannah did not want to stop (she needed to get back for a friend's birthday party), so she stayed in the van and pouted, but the rest of us enjoyed shakes and tots.

Sad story - we were in two vehicles, and Owen had gone with Scott in his truck.  As we stopped at Sonic, I walked over to the truck to meet them.  Owen was in the back seat crying that his bum hurt.  As he got out of the truck and walked over to Sonic, he kept crying that it really hurt.  He could barely walk because it hurt so much.  I wondered if he had sand on it that was chaffing him.  When he kept crying, I finally pulled the back of his pants out and looked down to see what was wrong.  And there was a big old red fire ant crawling up and down his little cheeks.  There had been fire ants by the boat dock, and Owen had been sitting there.  That fire ant had to have been in there for quite a while, and every time Owen moved, it was biting him! Poor kid!  I got rid of the mean ant, and then Owen was just fine and was able to enjoy his milkshake.

 (And yes, we made it home in time for Savannah to go to the birthday party.)