Camping- we made it through the night

So a few weeks back we went camping with our good friends, the Geddes family. We both had not camped in a long time and so it was nice to go together. We were also both up for only camping for one night as to give us a pretty good idea of whether or not we could actually do it- us with our 4 kids (one of them being 13 months old) and the Geddes's with their 3 kids (one being just about the same age as Gabe). So we drove about 1.5 hrs north of here up by Point Reyes and we put our families to the test.

I knew from talking to Julianne that all of our older kids were super excited about the adventure. They couldn't wait. My kids had been counting down the days for about two weeks. Julianne's two older ones were also super excited. They did not fail us. From the moment we opened the van doors, these 5 were all over the campsite running around, playing together, begging for the tents to be up in lighting fast speeds, and genuinely enjoying the novelty of camping. Immediately, we decided to see if the campsite was open for one extra night. We thought we could do two nights. And we probably could have...but the campsite was taken the next night and pretty much the whole campground was full for the weekend so we would stick to our original plan. Which turned out ok. We packed so much into that Friday-Saturday that when we got to our house Saturday evening, I was so happy to have a shower and nice comfy bed that there was no complaining from anyone.

So thanks to the Geddes Family for being our camping buddies. We are now totally up for another round! Anyone else up for camping??

In a fairly small amount of time, camp was set up.


There was an open grassy area to play. They had a volleyball net set up. We had frisbees....


Let the roasting of marshmallows begin!


The cleanest one at all times....


Saturday we went up to a state park and played in the water and on the sand


But we left after not too long because there were lots of these dead jellyfish around:


So we left and went up to this great meadow/picnic area.

In the end, we all had such a great time. And I love knowing that my kids are dying to go again!