Our first camping trip!

Last Friday we took our first family camping trip. With all that we brought, you'd think we were headed out of town for a month. We stopped at a gas station on the way out of town and one of the locals made a comment about how much stuff we had. That's what happens when you travel with a baby! We had originally planned to camp near a river we saw on our way to Mesa Falls, however, we found out that that campground required a 4 day reservation. We weren't that well planned so we had to find somewhere else. Ryan knew of a place just outside of Rexburg so we headed there. It was out in the middle of nowhere, but it was great.

Here's me and Priscilla with all of our stuff stuffed in the back.

Happy girl!

Happier girl with some root beer ice cream!

Oops. This picture is out of order. Nonetheless, here's Ryan making our fire!

Mommy is intent on getting ice cream to her little girl.

Hmmm.... keeping an almost walking girl away from a fire pit. Kind of hard.

I wanted to make sure Zoe got her dinner in before we had our hobo dinners.

Ryan had prepared EXCELLENT hobo dinners.

Aunt Priscilla with lil' Zoe!

Happy girl in her play pen. Once we got that put up, she was having so much fun!

What's up with her squinty eye in this picture? She loved romping around in the tent.

No pictures please!

Ok, so here's my story about the sleep, or lack of sleep. We put Zoe's play pen in the tent with us so that she'd have a secure place to sleep. She went down a little later than usual, but slept pretty well for the first couple hours. The weather forecast for overnight said it would get down around 45. That's not too bad, but still a little chilly. We had Zoe in two layers of clothes and a little beanie. The beanie didn't stay too well on her head though. She woke up countless times throughout the night. Jordan and Priscilla were in the tent with us and I felt bad that Zoe's crying woke them up, but they didn't complain once. Troopers! Anyway, we determined that Zoe was a little on the chilly side. As adults, we know that we can pull the covers over our faces and keep warm that way. A little almost toddler and 1 year old doesn't know that. Eventually, Ryan brought Zoe to sleep with him in his mummy bag. I still had a hard time sleeping. We heard coyotes throughout the night and I could just imagine them coming closer and closer to the tent. On top of that, one of the times I woke up, I had to pee. We didn't bring a flashlight with us (lesson learned for next time), and I really didn't have any desire to go outside of the tent in the dark to pee. I thought I could hold it. But something weird goes on in your head (ok, maybe not yours, but mine for sure) when you tell yourself you can hold the pee. It got worse for me. I tried to turn over (no sleeping pads, so I was turning over on hard ground) and ignore the pressure, but it was too much. This may get a little too personal, but if you're brave, keeping reading (I also told Ryan, Jordan and Priscilla I wasn't going to blog about this, but oh well). I was trying to think of a way I could relieve myself and still stay in the tent. I certainly couldn't just pee on myself. That wouldn't have been very comfortable sleeping in wet clothes. Then I thought: Diaper. Yes, diaper. I got into Zoe's bag at the foot of my sleeping bag and grabbed one of her diapers, opened it up and put it where it would be of most use. I tried to lay down and pee into the diaper but that wouldn't work. Even sitting up wouldn't work (thank goodness I had the cover of my sleeping bag to hide all of this). I eventually ended up squatting (still in the sleeping bag), and was finally able to let things flow. Unfortunately, those diapers aren't meant to hold an adult sized bladder's worth of pee and I could soon tell that it was full. I decided to stop though instead of getting out another diaper. I had relieved enough of the pressure that I could finally go back to sleep. Anyway, that's my peeing in a diaper story. Back to camping!

Ryan all mummified in his mummy bag.

Zoe and I got up before everyone else and went outside to enjoy the morning. Guess who still had to pee?

Having fun with the tent.

Ryan had quite a case of bed head.

Jordan cooking up the sausages. Yummy! Priscilla also made delicious eggs for us.

Dare I say it? Here are the happy campers.

We did have yet another memorable family outing. We're starting to get into some weather here that's a little too chilly for camping, so it may be awhile before we camp again. Oh, and here's some video of me and Zoe having a good laugh.