Camping, Round 2

I knew beyond any shadow of doubt what the girls' reaction was going to be when I told them that Daddy and both of the older boys were going camping for the weekend, so I decided to head it off with the announcement that I would be taking the girls camping when the boys got home.

There were only four small problems with this strategy.
1. I've never been camping and I'm a bit hazy on the details.
2. We were incredibly busy that week.
3. The campground was infested with Lyme disease bearing ticks (as in, we knew two people who had gotten Lyme here).
4. It was 98 degrees.

The solution to #1 was to be my usual foolhardy and overconfident self (how hard could it be?).
The solution to #2 was to set up the tent in the afternoon, come back home to do Grammy's birthday party and then return to camp in the evening.
The solution to #3 was to spray our clothes and tent with permethrin and apply DEET at high concentration over the rest of us. We also hiked along the paved roads instead of the woods. We also prayed! We got this strategy here. It worked! Even though we saw three ticks while setting up the tent, we didn't get any on us!
As to #4, we got hot and sweaty, but it cooled off some overnight.

We actually had a very nice time. Keeping it to one overnight was key (unless I can learn to build a better fire). But we hiked, talked, played games, sang, cooked, roasted marshmallows and ate S'Mores. I think that was the extent of our "Things to Do While Camping" checklist, so we were all quite satisfied.

Camping, Round 1

Round 1 was the Boy Scout Camp and Fish and Hike and Do Cool Stuff Extravaganza. This was Zorg and the Emperor's first time doing the scout camping thing. I should be clear that this was all over one weekend, the actual week long camp will be in August!

I should also point out that I didn't go, so my commentary is second hand (or perhaps third rate!).

They camped out by the fish ponds and boated and fished.
Despite their best efforts, no one fell in!

They then cleaned, cooked and ate their catch.

















They also did quite a bit of fun hiking - scrambling over rocks and stuff. They found this interesting plant. We looked it up and discovered that it is Indian Pipe (AKA Corpse Plant!). This is amazing (Biology Geek Alert)! It has no clorophyll! It's a parasite on a particular fungus and tree symbiote!


They also found this recently used turtle nest. Those white scraps near the hole are the egg shells. It's a bit weird to call them shells when they are more leathery, but there you are.


They also made a side trip to an Amish farm. The Amish boy in the picture was raising an abandoned fawn and let Mxyl and Zorg pet it. How fun is that?

Happy First Day of No School!

Yes! It's that time of year again! Monday was the day the public school kids went back.

What I had hoped to do was give the kids a preview of all the fun stuff we'll be doing, hang out and celebrate our freedom from the school schedule by doing lots of fun educational stuff they wouldn't be doing if they went to school. And get slurpees.

What actually happened was that our beloved Grammie was going off on a trip later in the week, so we ended up spending most of the day with her, hanging out, and having slurpees. So that was OK!

We just pushed everything else later into the week. Happy First Week of No School, was nearly interrupted on Tuesday by a Mommy meltdown, but that ended up being PMS, so that was OK (eventually, after chocolate).

Which brings us to today which was great! We tried out our new workbooks (we like doing workbooks from time to time) and then went off on an expedition to the Arboretum.

That was lovely! Our first trip with Oob walking! He loved the nice soft grass under his toes (ours is a bit crispy at present). Best of all: gravel! Yes, the beds in the dwarf conifer garden are mulched in gravel. Perfect for picking up and dropping back down. (I don't totally get the appeal, but I have not yet had a toddler that hasn't loved spending an hour or so doing this, so who am I to argue tastes?)

The older Zoomlians took pictures (the picture was by Mxyl) and played a game of hide and seek that was either wildly successful or dismally unsuccessful. No one found anyone (the garden is vast and lushly planted, and Zoomlians are wily) but no one minded, so that was OK. And they collected 172 cicada shells. That's not hyperbole, they counted them when they got home. Interestingly, Zorg, who collects cicada shells, had just yesterday found one with the cicada still inside ("one without a hole"). It was examined carefully then placed on our maple tree.

I taught the older Zoomlians how to identify pines and cedars. This was a triumph for me which nearly expunges my mortification at discovering (at the age of 10) that not all evergreens were pine trees. I went to visit my grandmother in Washington state and I was surprised at how many pine trees they had... In my defense, we didn't have many conifers on the base where I grew up. To my grandmother (born and raised in conifer heaven), it was like calling an oak a maple. As shocked as she was, maybe it was more like calling a telephone pole a maple. I'm pretty sure my Mom heard about it. My point is: look Grandma, my kids can tell a cedar from a pine! I'm still working on the spruce/fir thing myself. I think it's spruce cones point down and fir cones point up. Or the other way around.

In other news, we are going camping on Assateague this weekend. Please don't rob my house. We have a tent. We can put it up. We can take it down. We have an enormous list of WHAT NOT TO FORGET. I don't know where I put it. This will be fun. Really. Kate told me so! We are actually getting pretty excited!! Now I remember: I have to call Coleman and tell them I found the missing pieces under the tent when I took it down. We'll be fine. We're going to have a great time! Right, Kate?