bye-bye babyhood...onto new family adventures: camping!

Long ago, before kids, Jeff introduced me to camping. I hadn't done it growing up other than a few girl guide camps here and there. We used to have so much fun the two of us, exploring lots of fun areas, doing long bike rides, late walks on the beach...ah those were the days. Then we had Kyle and decided camping would be fun with kids. And it was, with one kid. Along came Jillian and we tried camping a couple of times for very, very short trips and we (moreso me) decided it was far too much work with a toddler/preschooler. So the camp stuff stayed in the very back of our basement storage closet for years and years.

Now we have 3 big kids, no more babies or toddlers so we decided to give it a try. First we had to buy a family sized tent (and thankfully we went with a quick setup tent, I love it). We packed the van to the very top (and I do mean jam packed) and headed on the road. We decided to go to Pinery, one of our favourite campgrounds with a beautiful beach and lots of great trails.

The camping trip was a success, everyone had fun (despite some rain), and the kids are ready to go for another. We learned a few things:

1. we MUST have a campsite near the bathrooms because Leah's bathroom trips keep me busy
2. we should bring more games when there is rain in the forecast (playing rushour was great but got old after a little while)
3. cooking food over the fire is a pain, I think we'll stick to our propane stove and grill for meals and just use the fire for marshmallows
4. the camp store always runs out of milk by mid-afternoon so buy it early in the day

The kids had so much fun exploring the campsite...they each had a fort and a "tri-fort meeting area" along with rules and responsibilities...Kyle is the official bug catcher, all caterpillar sightings are to be reported to Jillian and strangly Leah is the treasurer (not sure why they need one?)

CANOEING

My activity of choice during the camping trip. Jeff and I used to canoe on this river every summer when visiting the Pinery either as campers or daytrippers. It's a very easy canoe ride with lots of pretty water lillies. The kids did great in the canoe, Kyle & Jillian both helped with the rowing. We went out for quite a while all 5 of us in the canoe, then came back and dropped the boys off so the girls could do a short canoe ride together.

FISHING

The kids really wanted to try fishing so Jeff picked up some gear before our trip. Kyle & Jillian really enjoyed the fishing (Leah got bored after a short time). I was very impressed with Kyle & Jillian getting their hands dirty. When I squirmed a bit at the sight of moving worms, Jillian stepped in, grabbed those worms, ripped a piece off and put it on the hook without so much as blinking an eye. That's my adventurous girl! Jillian caught a fish and Kyle caught three!