The Great Outdoors! (even greater when I'm not in them:)

Last weekend, Boone decided to take Ry and Keaton camping along with the male component of the Patterson family. We aren't brave (read "stupid") enough yet to try Branik in a tent with his sibs, so he and I stayed home. I am perfectly fine with this arrangement for as long as it holds.

Anyway, Ry and the boys drove about 30 minutes to Clarks Hill Lake for a quick overnighter, but you'd never have guessed it by looking at the car! I wish I would have taken pictures of the back of the Tahoe on the way out because they had enough gear to go to Mars. Even so, they stopped at McDonalds on the way out (because kids don't eat foil dinners, okay?) arrived to a totally empty campground, set up the tents, and went to lake.

Keaton spent most of his time doing this (throwing fistfuls of rocks into the water)...

...and then cleaning his muddy hands on his pants. Nice. This is similar to how he cleans syrup off his fingers, only he uses his hair instead of his bottom (but only because he is sitting on it).


Rylan spent the majority of her time like this...

... gathering THOUSANDS of clam shells off the lake shore. They were both in heaven and loved having the kind of free reign that comes only when Mom is in another county and therefore unable to think about the laundry accumulating by the minute.

When it started to get dark they headed back up to build a fire and make Smores. At about 10:30 when they were all sufficiently sick and sticky they called it a night (note the school bus and Harold on Keaton's pillow -- classic).


Boone reported that not much in the way of "sleeping" occurred -- it was more "laying quietly in tent" until Boone HAD to pee at 5:00 am (he's old). The kids were pretty much awake after that which meant Saturday was a recovery day for all of them (Keaton begged to go to bed at 11:00 am and crashed out for around 3 hours when they got home). I, on the other hand, got over 8 UNINTERRUPTED hours of sleep for the first time in I don't know how long. It was awesome.

Anyway, they got up early and had pancakes, because everyone knows that the only way to follow a McNugget and Smores dinner is with a boatload of maple syrup and juice the next morning!

After this, the 3 kids managed to convinced the dads that they REALLY needed to swim in the lake at 8:00 in the morning -- how could anyone say no to these faces?


Well, if you're me, you just say "Ummm, no." But I'm mean, and at the time I was still unconscious in my bed (tee-hee!) so you can guess what happened...

They all had an absolute blast and Keaton keeps asking about when he gets to go camping again. Kudos to Boone for being a great dad and gutsy enough to attempt this with young kids (and take a bunch of pictures too!)

I suppose Branik and I will be joining them soon enough, and I will do my very best not to ruin all the fun by being the Mom. Although it looks to me like I probably should have been there for what appears to be Ian and Rylan's lakeside wedding...

Feel free to send the happy couple gift cards to Target -- I swear they'll get them...