conference campout

Last November, we camped in Jerry and Bev's backyard over General Conference weekend. It was a fun experience, even though we only lasted in the tent till 3 or 4 in the morning.  When we realized that Easter and Conference fell on the same weekend this year, Kevin started talking about camping out again.  He guilted me with, "Do you want to ruin the conference campout tradition??", haha.  I knew it would be fun, but I also knew that I wouldn't get much sleep.  I also have been waking up at least 3 times a night to go pee (post to follow soon), which isn't exactly conducive to camping.  Needless to say, I was a bit reluctant. Then Kevin started in with, "So, you're telling me that bug and I are going to have a father-daughter campout??".  I just laughed and told him that he was more than welcome to camp with Brooke.  I actually thought that would be really interesting, since I have always been the one to get her to sleep when we were camping, in a hotel, at a different house, etc.

But, he was up for the challenge, so that was the plan. Saturday afternoon, we set up the tent.  I absolutely loved how excited Brooke was about everything. 

 "Helping" Daddy set up the tent.  A cute little helper if I do say so myself!

 Kevin built a fire in the outdoor fireplace, and we were ready for some "camping" fun.

 The Peacocks came over, and all three girls had fun in that tent.  Kinley and Brooke kept running around inside and squealing :)

 After dark, we broke out the s'mores, and Kevin was the all-time marshmallow roaster.  Kinley and Brooke also tried to roast one, but they were easily distracted, and the marshmallows ended up in the ashes or totally burnt.  When we gave Brooke her completed s'more, she wanted nothing to do with it.  I took my eyes off Brooke for a minute, then looked back, to see that she had opened her s'more and was eating the melted chocolate from the middle.

 It was ALL over her face, but she clearly enjoyed it.

 After s'mores, Kevin pumped up the aerobed (per my request, in case I was to sleep outside), and the girls thought it was awesome.  The bed was super tall though, and literally took up the entire tent!  Brooke was about ready to crash, so after the Peacocks went home, we quickly got ready for bed and headed out to the tent.  I decided last minute that I would join them because I didn't want to miss out on the fun memories.   I had intentionally stopped drinking much water a few hours prior so that I wouldn't have to go to the bathroom as much during the night, haha.

So, there we were, all snug as a bug in our queen sleeping bag, with a very tired little girl.  She only wanted to lay her head by me, and it took like 45 minutes for her to finally fall asleep.  About 1 am, I woke up to rain falling on the tent.  It was kind of cool at first, but I couldn't go back to sleep.  Brooke was sleeping well, but moves a ton in her sleep.  She had cozied up to Kevin, which he loved.  (He later told me that he was pretty disappointed at first when we were going to bed, since Brooke didn't want much to do with him.) Around 3 am, I woke Kevin because the rain was coming down harder and the thunder and lightening had just begun.  We waiting till the rain let up a bit, then headed into the house.  Again, it took Brooke forever to fall asleep in bed with us, but eventually, we were all sleeping peacefully!

Although we didn't make it all night again, I would say it was a camping success.  And that's the beauty of camping in the back yard, right??  You can always head into the house :)