First Time Camping

We went camping for the very first time with the kids. We borrowed a pop up tent trailer and the jet ski's  again and headed out to Lake Sonoma for the weekend. Stephanie is back in town from teaching in Mexico City so she came up along with her sister and her 3 kids and her younger brother. We had a total of 6 kids ages 4 months, 2 yr, 4 yr, 6 yr, 8 yr, and 16 yr! It was busy and chaotic but a total blast full of lots of laughter. Zoe and Grey did amazingly well sleeping in the camper. Grey loved hanging out with the other kids around the campsite, going for walks, playing at the park in the campgrounds, hunting for lizards and bugs, and playing in the water and of course on the jet ski's. If Grey had his way, he would have spent all day every day on the jet ski's. Even when we were back at camp, he loved to play on them, pretending he was going fast! Zoe might have allergies like her dad though because her nose was constantly running and her eyes would get really watery. Poor girl was a trooper though and loved watching the kids run around, checking out the trees, putting her toes in the water, and gazing into the fire as we made s'mores.

Helping daddy get the jet ski's ready...don't ask about the ear muffs, he likes to accessorize!

 Lucas and Grey "going fast" on the jet ski's at the campsite

 Grey playing football with daddy as we unloaded the truck, he also made frien's with some college guys in the campsite next to us and got them to play too!

 Melissa and Zoe playing at the campsite (aka Melissa getting her baby fix!)

 Hanging out on the beach

 Trying to catch lizards

We only had one scary incident that turned out ok but could have been disastrous. Zippy, being the amazing guy that he is, decided to take all the kids to the bathroom Saturday morning. The campground had a broken water pipe so there was no running water, just portables like they have at big events. Zippy was carrying Zoe in the wrap and I thought it was adorable watching him with all of them so I tagged along with my camera.

See? Cute, right?

I was going to the bathroom when I heard Zoe start crying. I come out and Zippy is holding Zoe in his arms and he is looking white as a ghost. She had fallen out of the wrap as he had tried to put down a cover on the seat of the potty for one of the other kids! We are so lucky she did not fall INTO the potty and that it wasn't one of the outhouses with the huge pits!! I cringe just imagining that...luckily, she didn't fall far and stopped crying in less than a minute.  I think it will be awhile before he feels comfortable carrying her again in the carrier! Zippy felt terrible and I am sure it doesn't help that I tease him about dropping his daughter in a porta-potty every chance I get!

The kids played hard and we all had a really good time. We are looking forward to doing it again soon! Especially when we are leaving and I turn around to talk to Grey and this is what I see...he had fallen asleep holding Zoe's hand!