Shorts about the camping trip: Part 2

On Saturday morning we got up and took off, back to the same place that we'd been. The SCA was meeting and that had Darrin cracking up at me for choosing the place. There were these "freaks" (I say that lovingly) in period garb running all over the place and ignoring normal folks. They jousted and spoke in a mix of Present Day and Early Modern English.

We needed two spaces, so we chose them right across from each other.This worked well because I had my new Dutch Oven to cook on over coals and the kids wanted a camp fire. Each space had a fire place. The kids went to the play ground and hiked on and around the trails with my husband.

My dad used to hunt-- everything from do it yourself back country hunting with pack horses to luxury hunts where he was catered. I also dated a guide who did the luxury hunts. Both said essentially the same thing, being that camp fire food is some of the finest cuisine available and that if you can master it, you can please a lot of people. I made some delicious food. This time it was simple-- a chicken chili and a goulash. I also baked a cake in my oven while I fried bacon on top of it. (Mmm: bacon!) My sons loved helping me cook-- there is fire, an element of danger, and they wanted to be there with me and that was cute. I have always been a decent cook, but this time they were eating like ravenous wolves, but with manners. For my crew we had to make two cakes-- we ate, cleaned the oven by putting it upside down on the fire pit, then sprayed it with non-stick cooking oil and did it again.

The boys were asking my husband if they could build a pit for my Dutch ovens-- or maybe two pits and they could buy me another Dutch oven, for Mother's Day, then decided that they didn't want to wait that long and decided that I needed a pit by October, "What holiday is in October? Can we give her a fire pit for Halloween?" Ah-- the gift that keeps giving back! If they do a fire pit for me, I hope they enclose it-- one of my brother's friends fell into one when he was little and burned much of his body and was in a lot of pain. I am terrified of that happening, but we could work something out to make it safer.

On Sunday morning we awoke to rain. I think that rain is romantic-- but not when you are in a tent without padding. (No one told us that we needed padding on the bottoms of the tents!) The grass that I had been wrestling with my kids on the night before that had seemed to soft was not soft. We postponed it. I got up and made the delicious breakfast outside which was really nice for the kids to wake up to.

The dog slept all day on Sunday. Apparently the noises outside kept him awake all night, or the noises inside the tent kept him awake.

Starshine was startled by a chipmunk. While Mudd called it a "Chip-monkey-- ook! Ouk! Ouk!" she did not like it. I said, "Look, it's just a squirrel!" She cried into my shoulder.I pointed out his bushy tail and she screamed. It was comical later-- I don't know why he upset her so much! I wonder if he was hoping to scare her and cause her to drop her cracker!

We had wanted to hike, but I think that this being our first time, it was good that we did it close to home and at a place with a nice bathroom, a playground, and lots of other nicer things that are not at most camp sites. Because we were not at home, we were not thinking about what needed to get fixed. We all took off our watches and had cellphones on in case our parentshad an emergency.