WagMommy: camping adventure 2019

We've been on many camping trips as a family, starting with Dan, Twitch and pregnant me. We've never really had a smooth camping experience. Camping pregnant isn't super fun. Camping with babies isn't much better. We gathered after two or three times in high altitude that Winter gets altitude sickness. I didn't know that was a thing. She also gets carsick and seasick. So does Addie. We learned all of that the hard way. I'm pretty sure I've seen more puke than most moms out there.

Another thing that has made it hard for me to go camping is that I have such impossibly low tolerance for kids in the car. They really aren't allowed to raise their voice above a whisper. Kidding. I just can't do all that noise in one place. Usually it's spread out throughout our two story house. Even happy loud laughter bothers me in the car. And all the places Dan likes to camp are at least 5.5 hours away.

Two summers ago, Dan went up to his favorite spot outside of Yosemite with Winter and Addie (I stayed home with Mya who had pneumonia and 2 year old Angus) he made sure to take medicine for Winter's disagreeable tummy but HE came back with a fever.

I kind of just gave up on camping after that. But seeing as 2019 has been such a great year and we've had a pretty good summer, I had a new confidence that we could actually make it happen without anyone getting sick. We bought Dramamine to handle the carsickness, planned on camping at lower altitude and bought DVD players and head phones for every kid to watch on the ride to the campground. It was actually a really great ride there. No one asked how much longer it would take. Every now and then I would hear Angus or Addie answering Dora The Explorer's questions or Winter and Mya laughing at funny parts of them movie they were watching. But that was pretty much all we heard out of them. It was quite lovely. We left the dogs with my friend Elizabeth, dog-sitter extraordinaire. Dan packed the Van with sleeping bags, camping chairs, a tent, a stove, pillows and... the suitcases didn't fit. So we borrowed some sort of metal contraption that hooked up to our trailer hitch from a neighbor and strapped the suitcases on and we were on our way. We forgot our shoes...

But Dan realized about a mile from home and we turned back around and there they were patiently waiting for us. Then we were on our way.

Dan's cousin and her fam joined us. They are some favorites for sure, so it made our time up there that much better. The site was amazing and the kids had a blast and it was a wonderful trip. The campground where we stayed is called Summerdale. It's just outside the West side of Yosemite. We were so pleased.

Of course we also experienced kids fighting, time-outs, whining, crying, complaining and all the normal things that come with kids but for the most part they had a blast. And I felt better about letting them watch so much TV all summer.

Always photo bombed by at least one kid. Always.

Addie wanted the rock all to herself.

All better.

This kitchen tent thing was pretty cool. No bugs. Just you and your food.

Lots of Emoji Uno was played.

And sticks. Lots of sticks.

Two of Winters great loves are cooking and fire. So both combined is where it's at.

I'm not a fan of s'mores. And I'm really not a fan of kids and s'mores. Especially when you let them roast their own marshmallows and they swing their hot sticks around nearly burning each other. But the kids love them.

Day adventures.

Photo bomber.

I was pretty proud of Mya. She was a total trooper about not getting her post wart-ectomy foot wet and dirty.

This guy tried to impale himself with a stick. And there it is in his left hand. It didn't hurt enough to get rid of the dangerous weapon I guess. He did feel very betrayed though.