Showing posts with label Camping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Camping. Show all posts

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Loads of Fabulous Photos!

Here we are with the camping pics from May Long Weekend
First off, Here we have the Bean Passed out in the truck on the way up to the lake.

Here is Hunter Bean in his own chair. We strapped him in with the bag from the seat. :)

He's not a fan of being strapped into anything.


And he's not much of a fan of sitting still. So we set out a place for him to play on a blanket with toys. They funny thing about this, is up until this weekend, Bean hated grass and wouldn't be caught dead crawling on it, so I figured he would stay on his blanket as he usually does.


That was NOT the case at all. We couldn't keep him ON the blanket.
Me - "Daddy!! He's gonna get a sliver!!!"
D - "Yup"

This picture sequence is all screwy but I can't fix it. These first three are AFTER the nap and the last one is obviously DURING the nap. :P




Sitting with My cousin Gage!

Hammock Time!



Stinky Feesh!



Sitting in the big boy chair.




Cookies in the lil boy chair.



Daddy wait on his feesh. That's the smart way of feeshing.

The Boys having a snooze in the Hammock.


The Dutch Swinger on another Fabulous May Long Adventure.
Are you missing it Gram? It's a heck of a lot smaller, now that I'm a lot bigger.

Ha Ha! This was awesome. I looked over at Hunter at one point and he had pulled his sweater up over his head. Gage figures he will make a good Hockey player, so long as he figures out that he has to do this to the OTHER players and not himself.
That fancy play pen there was purchased that weekend so that Dave and I wouldn't break our arms holding him. He's weighing in at 23 + pounds now.


This is where we got our water from for the weekend. There was a spring about 500 feet back in the bush along the side of the road and someone plumbed it and ran the line to a pole and there the spring ran out. Fresh and clean! Nom nom nom.

This is Cayden, Hunters lil cousin. Cayden seriously loved Hunter Bean.

LOL!
Daddy and Beany being silly in their camp chairs!





More Rainbow feesh!



This is Gage! He is 14!
And even though he is 14, he was very helpful with Beany all weekend.

These are two pretty cool pics here. There was a fire going on somewhere and at one point the Helicopter (duckaduck) came swooping down and scooped up a bucket of water as we sat around the lake.
Very Neat!
Here are some more pics of the lake from my camp fire chair. Totally nice spot Kerry and Tim have picked out! I can't wait to go back.

I put him to sleep one afternoon in the hammock. He slept in there for nearly 2 hours.
We just took turns going back to give him a push!
That Cocoon is the bean!

Our steak and Coleslaw dinner one night!
Ya Ya Boring pics!

Bean and dad sharing a pickle! Bean hearts Pickles!
It's crazy how much he loves them.

Bean was a bit cranky by the end of the weekend cause he was pretty constipated. He seems to not like pooping out of his element! lol He got better when we got him home!
^ Cranky Bean^


Just a few quick notes. That Sunday night there seemed to be a fire and the helicopter was one of probably 5 different aircraft flying over the lake. At one point there were two large water planes with big water bellies (I don't know what you call them) circling around and around. There was another lake near to us that I am pretty sure they were getting water from as our little lake was so teeny tiny! At one point there were some folks who stopped by to put their tin can boat in the water and go fishing and they mentioned that Phyllis lake was evacuated and Dave figured we were probably next. Not long after that there was a helicopter that landed in the field of the Conservation society place, thingy, area. You probably can't see it very well but it was directly across from us on the lake. The Duckaduck landed and we figured the Conservation officers were being told that they needed to evacuate the area, but that never happened, and as night came on we noticed that even the Conservation society had a camp fire going so it must not have been too serious a fire issue.

Friday and Saturday night the weather was decent. We used the furnace all three nights that we were out there. Sunday was the worst. The day was lovely but by about 9 pm it was threatening to rain and it poured pretty much from 9 am till it started snowing early in the morning. We knew that there was a chance of rain/snow so we had everything packed up and ready to go before bed. Dave wanted to be ready so that all we had to do was hook up the trailer, throw a few things in the pick up and drive. I think we left at 6:30 am.

It was super nice to get home. I napped for 2 hours on the couch. Best Nap Ever!

Dave and I found it ironic that when you go camping, your intent is to relax and take it easy, but cooking and cleaning and living in a tiny 1976 Dutch swinger isn't relaxing! And the clean up involved when you get HOME is excruciating. All the blankets and pillows need to get into the house, then into the washing machine THEN into the dryer BEFORE going back on the bed! So no one is sleeping till THAT all gets done first! Then there is the copious amounts of left over food, drink and snacks that need to come into the house and be put away. THEN LET'S NOT FORGET THE STINKY LAUNDRY! Or the Coolers with the fish and fish blood... ANY WAY!!! It's a lot of work.

There are some things that Dave and I are leaving for Saturday. I was way too exhausted to handle putting all the dishes back in the cupboard. Apparently when we left, I forgot to close the cupboard door on the dishes. They were absolutely EVERYWHERE when we got home. And... in our haste we also forgot to lock the fridge. Sooo, there were cans of pop rolling amok. Nothing broke, nothing spilled, just clutter. Phew! In my defense, I was super tired and cold and I had to get Bean all sorted out and into the truck as well as make sure we weren't leaving anything behind.

We didn't really get much sleep that weekend either. Hunter was having some sleeping issues and woke up pretty well every 2 hours the first night. I thought he might have been cold but I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case as you see from the picture, he was well bundled. The second night wasn't any better. Both those nights we ended up putting him in the bed WITH us. Dave refers to him as a telepost. If you know what a telepost is. He's so small but he can sure take up a lot of room and make two very large people, VERY uncomfortable! There were some naps to be had on Sunday! Sunday night D says to me "If he wakes up again tonight, he can sleep with you and I'll go sleep in his bed." And so he did. Hunter woke up, daddy grabbed him and I snuggled him and rubbed his belly for a bit till he fell back to sleep and dave snuggled up with Sam and slept next to Hunter Bean's Sleep Sheep.

The freaking Furnace in that camper is an All or Nothing sorta dealio. If you turn it on, be prepared for warmth. Here it is, snowing outside, and all of us are sleeping with no blankets. On the first night Sam slept in the top bunk. He woke up at one point and said he couldn't breath, so he came down and slept next to Hunter on the double bed. On the third night, our options were, Heater On = No blankets + Too hot to breath or Heater Off = Freeze yer tits off. It was great! I felt bad for D who was sleeping with Sam who is a bit of a blanket hog and Hunter's Blankets aren't exactly big enough for Daddy! So when I finally couldn't take the heat and asked if I could turn the furnace off, Dad had to suffer. The heat dispurses fast in those little campers, so probably 30 minutes after turning that furnace off, I'm sure dave was freezing. I however, had the Bean who is a tiny, flesh furnace, a quilt and a duvee. :) And, for some reason, the cranky Bean actually SLEPT after he got tucked in next to his mommy!


Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Summer Time And The Living's Easy

UHG! So my last post reminds me of the holiday trailer! What to do? What to do?

So this is our DUTCH SWINGER! And I don't know what to do with it. I absolutely love the swinger. It was purchased in 1973 by my grandparents for roughly 2000$ and has been handed down through the family and has wound up in our hands. It's never had bugs, mold, or rodents. It's in mint condition considering it's age. The stove, fridge, furnace, sink and electrical all still work perfectly. There are tons of little cupboards and closets and drawers for storing all our dishes, utensils, pots, pans, books, games, toys, linens, towels food, beer (can't forget beer) and any other useful or useless goods we decide to drag along with us on week long camping trips. It's Ugly! I'll give you that. And it weighs more than our truck (see diagram 2.0).

But I DON'T WANNA GET RID OF IT!!!!
(To be read in a really whiny temper tantrum-y sorta voice).

There is a nice lil bunk bed for Sam that he loves snuggling into, kind of like his own private penthouse. The lower double bed is uncomfortable compared to our queen at home but I would prefer that to sleeping on an air mattress on the ground ANY DAY! The kitchen table is great for cards or for entertaining. For crummy, rainy nights when eating at the picnic table just isn't pleasant. The storage alone keeps me sane the whole time we are camping. I hate storing things in Rubbermaid bins and duffel bags all weekend. Just knowing where everything is and having a proper place to put things make the whole domestic aspect that much easier. And to be able to boil a pot of water and wash dishes at a proper sink is really nice especially when you are cooking and cleaning for four people. The security is nice when you have a baby. I don't have to worry about "What will we do if it starts raining?".

Well! The issue here is that D would rather sell the Swinger and get a nice tent so that we can do some more off the beaten path camping. Every time we take the Swinger out it's an event! The cost of gas last summer was frigging ridiculous and it was costing us upwards of 500$ for gas, camping site and extras every time we took it out. If we don't use the Swinger we don't necessarily need to stay in Official camp sites and we wont need to pay the stupid gas prices to haul it. As I said it weighs more than the truck and it's not cheap to pull!

Diagram 2.0


My Boys Camp in Style Yo!
This is a pic of the Bean May long weekend 2008. This was the weekend we picked up the Swinger and used it for the first time at Wasa Lake in BC. Beany is lounged out in the shade. It was a very hot weekend. He was about 6 weeks old here.


Ha ha! Sam took this picture below of the Bean's Belly button. I should do a post of some of Sam's better pics. He takes some really good pictures. He has a totally different perspective on things. I think this is partially due to the fact that he is 11 and still has an imagination! He He He.

And this is one of my fave pics ever! Sam holding his lil baby brother. They both look so peaceful and happy to be in one anothers arms!! /cry



The Lil Bean slept in a laundry basket that weekend. He was still so tiny and it was pretty cold at night, but the laundry basket was a perfect lil bed for him. Nice and cuddly and warm for him. See his Sleep Sheep! :D It makes white noise like a Mothers heart beat, Whales, The Ocean or Rain. Nice night time sleep pal.

All Snuggled up!
Ha ha! Momma and her Sleepy Bean!
Another Great Pic of Sam and His Lil Brother Bean!
DADDY and The BEAN! Laxing!! Look how big D is compared to the Lil Baby Beany!




So I really don't know what to do! Financially, it makes sense to get rid of the Swinger. I see D's point completely. It's not the most convenient beast of a trailer to haul around but I don't know if i want to give up the convenience that it affords us when it comes to storage, security and sleeping arrangements. I suppose I will have to make a decision before too long. I want to get started camping this May again! If only we had a nice newer holiday trailer that wasn't so god damn heavy and old! Perhaps D would be more willing to haul it around. I'll keep you posted.