I am going to begin with the texts that I sent my mom throughout the weekend while we were camping. We borrowed my parents' pop-up camp trailer and communicated with them while we were up there. After the text transcripts I will explain some other things that were not mentioned in the texts. I hope that you will a. feel sorry for me after reading and b. laugh about our adventure. And I hope it isn't too long and that you don't get bored! One reason I want to write it is so that we can have all of the details of the memories later. Here it goes! (The reason the texts I sent are typed up is because my mom thought they were hilarious and sent them to a couple family memmbers...so the "comments" are hers and the sentences in quotation marks are what I texted)
DAY 1:
>
> “Hey! Did you send
> the camera with Josh? Can’t find it.”
>
> “Mercy passed out on ground by campfire ring – she’s exhausted!” (turns out she took a 5 minute cat nap. Figures.)
>
> “Aaaaaaaannnnndddd we just had our first face-plant and
> busted lip of the day.”
>
> “Mercy is pretty bloody and swollen but its all good now –
> cleaned up.”
>
> “Is there enough propane for me to cook dinner AND use the
> heater?”
>
> “Dude! This stove
> works better than my one at home!”
>
> “Josh has bloody nose from handle on hand pump. But we are having fun!”
>
> DAY 2:
>
> “Don’t worry about going by our house to feed the dogs – we have
> to run down the mountain into town for a few things.”
>
>(MOM: "What do you need in town?")
>
> “A. Pillows cuz my
> neck has never hurt so bad
> B. Drugs for Mercy
> C. Steaks cuz after last night we deserve more than
> hot dogs for dinner tonite
> D. More ice for cooler
>
>(My Mom then asked what we need drugs for...if Mercy's mouth was that bad)
>
> “NO! Shes not in
> pain!!!! She wouldnt sleep! We got 2 hours sleep MAYBE collectively
> lol! Josh busted nose doing better. Also I got pretty burned yesterday, didnt
> realize we were closer to the sun up here, need sunscreen
>
> “We are still having lots of fun, tho’. Going to hike to the spring after we get >back from town.”
>
> Awhile Later....
>
> “Hey where IS the spring??? You said it was about 1/2 mile???
> We got to sign that says Black Mountain 7 miles. We passed sign that sez 3/4
> mile back to campground awhile ago Mercy freaking cuz of bugs and weeds.”
>
>(To which my mom replied that we had clearly gone way to far)
>
> “Keep thinkin’: STEAK
> tonite!”
>
>"Still can't find spring"
>
>(So my mom calls and says that the spring probably no longer exists, that it was almost dried up last time they were there which who knows how long it had been since they were last there...)
>
> “Can’t find spring – but found a bunch of stinky sheep and some
> smelly water that Mercy wants to play in because we have promised her water. Mercy happy now cuz she sees the sheep. Its all good now. And we passed a man on a horse too! He let her pet his horse.”
>
> (Then I see a suspicious looking bug on Mercy's shirt and again text my mom)
>
> “Hey are ticks an issue here?”
>
>(She says we won't get sick(well thats good news) but that we should strip and check for them when we get back to camp,....if we make it back to camp...but yet they aren't an issue???? Hmmmmm....)
>
> “Back in camp. 3 miles with a 2 year old and 5 month old, and
> no artesian spring. I have blisters on my feet – forgot my tennies”
>
>(Well that was fun. Then she asked if we were going to bed early from sheer exauhstion, we must not forget that we didn't sleep at all the night before and went on a 3 mile hike for something that didn't exist)
>
> “Pretty sure Mercy has the only vote that counts and im pretty sure shes leaning towards late night/all night party again.”
>
>(I will be sure to talk about the rest of the evening later)
>
>DAY 3
>
> “Hey how long does it take to clean up and get the trailer all back down again? We arent staying long today.”
(We had planned to stay until late afternoon originally)
>
> “ We slept a little more last nite… Mercy only woke up at 12,
> 1, 3 and 5 for an hour at a time. Then she got up for good at 6:30.”
>
>“We still having fun. ( Fun or not thats what I say because it was so sweet of my mom to let us use their camper I fear saying anything different) "Taking walk before we come down mountain.”
>
> “While we take walk we are airing tent trailer out.”
>
>(We set up trailer on our own and took it down on our own but were unsure of what all needed to be done to complete the take down once down at their house...Did we need to set it back up etc???
>
> “U won’t be at the house when we come back???” (note desperation in the tone)
>
So, they were home when we got done and because we (and when I say we I mean ME...) had taken it down well and cleaned it so good we didnt have to set it back up...THANK GOODNESS!
Let me begin by saying we had intended to read, play board games, maybe do some school work. In general have a GREAT time. Well we figure GENEROUSLY that we had about 60% fun and 40% miserable-ness. HAHAHAHA We laugh about it now. The first and most important thing you must know is that Mercy is TERRIFIED of anything that flies, particularly bugs, but birds too. (One time this summer she was playing in the car while I cleaned it out and a "tweet tweet" flew in and attacked her, clearly she will never be the same) When she sees a bug within a 2 foot radius of her she screams "buttafly" (obviously not knowing the difference between a sweet butterfly, pesky fly, or wasp etc) and cries until it is gone.) AND she HATES flowers, weeds, grass, or anything like that that touches her. She has always disliked those things but it seems to get worse. She acts like a pretty flower in the wild or just in my parents garden is a deadly poisonous snake. SO what are there tons of in the mountains when your camping???? BUGS, BIRDS, FLOWERS, and WEEDS. AWESOME.
Mercy loves to play in water, whether its the pool, or a creek, or just a bucket of water. We were at Freeman RESORVOIR where, according to the name, one should be able to play in it. HOWEVER, I couldn't really let my baby play in the LEECH infested water. (As humourous as it would have been and tempting it was). Which is why we went looking for the spring that didn't exist. All weekend I promised my child water to play in. On our hike we did pass some people on horses and Mercy got to pet them. She loved that. And while searching for the spring we came across some sheep. Mercy loved that as well! She "baaaa-ed" to them!
Total we managed to play a half a board game, read a few sentences in a book, and sit peacefully for maybe 20 minutes TOTAL. The 3 mile hiking trip was definately the worst. Both kids cried the entire time. It was hot. I had blisters. We were sweating. Never again will that happen. Here is something funny...you know that Mercy didn't want to sleep, and I had been telling my mom that the whole time we were there. Well on Sunday night my parents came up to roast marshmallows with us and shortly after they came Mercy fell asleep on my moms lap. After awhile my mom and I decided to try to put her in the camper...I told my mom she would wake up and that it was a waste of time. Well thank you, Mercy, for making me look like a liar. She did stay asleep for a bit. And when my parents left to go home, my mom gave us hope and said "Since Mercy has stayed asleep this long, I bet you will get to sleep tonight!" Boy was she wrong. Shortly after they left she woke up. Good and refreshed for another night of no sleep. But she was still exhausted so it wasn't a fun night. It was a night of drifting off filled with sobs and whining. Mercy would wake up Gracie, Gracie would wake up Mercy...It was a vicious cycle. One person in the family slept wonderfully. That would be my wonderful husband. He could sleep through a train hitting him. He slept through it all both night actually. Of course he complained in the mornings saying "Oh, I woke up a couple times, I didn't sleep completely through the night, Im tired too" Poo on him. What he means is he maybe rolled over a few times, didn't open his eyes, didn't here the kids" Even though I attempted to wake him up...because if I am going to suffer he will suffer with me. But I wasn't successful. Because he would just roll over and stay asleep.
Did I mention that it was cold? I could see my breath in the mornings. That just added to our fun! When we went to town we went to Wal-Mart to try to find some things to entertain Mercy for the rest of the trip. We got water-guns, playdough, and markers. They kept her entertained for maybe 20 minutes total! We had bought her a kitty back-pack and that had kept her more entertained than anything we actually boght to keep her happy.
Oh and the bears!! We didn't see any and I knew we wouldn't...but that didn't stop my paranoid Texas husband from being scared! (My dad over warned him to be careful I think). Bears were almost in every conversation we had..."better wipe Mercy down so she doesn't smell like food" "are you sure Gracie should have a bottle??? Do bears like formula" "If we cook the trailer will smell like food" "do bears like diapers" and so on. A couple times Josh said "Oh I'm not scared...I could take on a bear" That made me laugh! He would run and cry and scream if he saw one a mile away! (I'm not being mean to him, by the way, I want to clarify that I love and appreciate him very much. I am just stating the obvoius...I would be scared too!)
On our bug and weed infested hike we did find a stream to play in for about 3 minutes. The bugs were even worse there but at least Mercy finally got to put her feet in the water!
As for injuries sustained over the weekend, they definately weren't as bad as they could have been. Shortly after we got camp set up Mercy tripped on a rock and face planted on a pretty good. She got a busted lip that swelled up and a bloody nose (and had several bloody noses the rest of the weekend) That was a great start to her weekend! I don't think she has ever fallen that hard!
Later in the afternoon we went to the water pump where Josh was seeing how fast he could pump the water out. He got it going pretty fast and then his hand slipped off and he punched himself in the nose really hard. He had a bad bloody nose for about a half hour and his lip also swelled up. I was sure that the way things were going Grace and I would end up getting hurt by the end of the weekend but luckily we didn't! Grace got a nice little tan through the sunscreen, and that was the extent of her unfortunate events. I got a few good blisters on the hike and a good sunburn (as mentioned before we were closer to the sun in the mountains...I never burn). Oh and I burnt my finger in the campfire somehow.
This camping trip was quite and experience. It really was alot of fun...just not the exact fun that we had planned to have. It definately could have been more enjoyable, but its not at all possible that it could have been more eventful. We are just now getting caught back up on sleep! We just can't wait to go camping again next year! But we have definately had enough camping for this year! We enjoyed our time as a family (minus the fighting and foul language that we used at times to express frustration). We loved sitting around the campfire looking at the moon and the beautiful stars. It was a pretty good experience!
