Our Camping Adventure

Friday night of Labor Day weekend, we went camping with a bunch of our friends. It was quite the experience, to say the least. To start off, let me tell you who was there. There was a total of five families, all with a child that's 1 year or younger, and two women who are pregnant. We had 12 kids there under 10 years of age and then a 13 year old. So, 13 kids to keep track of. I thought for sure one of the toddlers were going to fall into the fire, but thankfully, that didn't happen! Anyways, we started our adventure Friday after work and headed up the mountain around 5:45. Only one car got lost and one car got stuck, but that was nothing compared to the rest of the trip. Friday night, we're all hanging around the campfire, eating, chatting, and trying to calm down our babies. I don't think there was 10 minutes the whole night that one baby wasn't crying. At about 11 or so that night, one of the kids started throwing up. She made it out of the tent the first time, but not the second time. So now we are short a sleeping bag and it wasn't a warm night. We gathered blankets and everyone was okay. We all went to bed around 12:30 or 1 and personally, I slept pretty good. Celeste was a trooper and did awesome. She still slept great and stayed warm. Here is a picture of her sleeping. I had her bundled up pretty good!
So then morning came. Nebels made breakfast and it was fantastic. We just played and hung out all morning, ate lunch and waited for the babies to wake up from their naps so we could take a hike. Meanwhile, the 13 year old was playing, tripped, and started screaming. Everyone ran over to find the blood, but there was none. Instead of blood, they found an elbow that was out of socket. Luckily we had a dentist and a pharmacist amongst us who popped it back into the socket but thought he may have broken his arm also. After a blessing and pain drugs, this child's dad loaded him up to make the long ride to the hospital. However, he didn't want to go alone so Ryan was volunteered to go with him because none of the other wives wanted to be left alone with their three children. (They thought I could handle our one!) So they headed down the mountain and I was left alone. We all decided to still take our hike. It was a short, fun, pretty hike though. Here are a few pictures of the hike and the lake we hiked to.

See all the kids running around? I think Celeste quite enjoyed the hike.

When we got back from our hike, we started to pack up camp. All my great friends helped me take down our tent and pack up since I was alone and had Celeste to take care of also. We headed down the mountain to try to catch up with the men who made the hospital run and decided to do our dutch oven dinner at the bottom of the mountain. After everyone was back together and we heard the news his arm was broken, we started our dinner. However, we didn't make it too far when we realized we didn't have any charcoal fluid for the coals. We ended up going out for burgers that night. We were all exhausted and ready to be home. I was in bed by 9:30! Here are some other pictures of everyone that was there (minus the children...they were off playing in the trees!)

Our Happy Little Family

Here are the Petersons. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of them together.

This is Fowlers and Blacks

The Nebels

P.S. All the stories (getting lost, stuck, throwing up, and broken bone) happened to the Nebels. I think they had rotten luck this trip. I felt bad for them and hopefully the arm heals quickly. Even though it was an adventure, we all had a great time and glad we went. And yes, we probably will go camping again next year!