Third Weekend - Second Camp Out Ever - March 29-31, 2019

This weekend I took the kids camping. The ward was going to have a camping trip but they canceled it. I decided to go camping anyway. I decided to camp out on the church property. If that didn't work, we would have camped out in our backyard.

When I went to pick up the children, Tiffany was especially angsty. Most likely from a misunderstanding in our texting earlier that day. Nathan was balling on the floor - out of his element it turned out, from a fall off of the monkey bars earlier at school. He had a bump on his head. I checked him later and he was in good condition. I kept asking about his head the rest of the weekend and he did better and better each day. I asked them if their mom had spoiled the surprise of the weekend and it turned out she didn't. We still share calendars so I expected she would have.

On the way home we stopped by the store to get s'mores and Nate guessed we were going camping. After getting everything loaded into the van and taking a detour, we arrived at the church before 6:30pm and started the fire. I had each of them help crinkle the news paper into balls. I had them each gather kindling, then small sticks, then large sticks. I formed the large sticks into a teepee shape then lit it with a long lighter and it lit very well. Then we worked on setting up the tent. They each helped with this as well. They all enjoyed that quite a bit as well. Once the tent was set up, I put the foil dinners in the fire. I took some pictures of the kids helping with the final stages of the tent setup and some with them in the blue bonnets. Then we went into the church to use the bathrooms because it was open for a pinewood derby event.

Then it was time to eat. I had made three foil dinners of potatoes with cheese and the kids all liked it even though they didn't eat all of them. I ate from each of theirs while also helping them eat. They ate enough that I was satisfied that they could all have s'mores later, but none of them finished them - granted each one had two potatoes and a lot of cheese in them. Then before s'mores we needed to finish setting up everything left, so I filled up the air mattresses and had them bring their sleeping bags and set them up in the tent. They loved using their flashlights. We chose places that they could pee in the woods. Lily and Nate only needed to go once each before bed and Nate went once in the middle of the night.

Lily was so ready for bed that she didn't even want s'mores. After laying in the tent for a little bit she realized she needed to go potty. After going potty in the woods I offered her a cookie and she accepted that. Matthew didn't want the s'mores only the marshmallows so he roasted a few tiny ones then ate more. He probably also had cookies but not with marshmallows. Nate liked the s'mores and had two. I had a couple but they were all ready for bed. I stayed up a little to clean up all the food and make sure the fire was mostly out before going to bed. They were all asleep before I got in there. The boys did not get in their sleeping bags but as the night got colder I helped them get inside them. I think I was the least comfortable of all of us and should have used another blanket. Lily was the one that slept all the way through the night without any interruptions.

In the morning, there were scouts that came by and it turns out there was an eagle project happening right next to our campsite. We found out the church wasn't open and I wasn't in the mood to cook breakfast or have Lily pee in the woods in the daylight so we went home. After letting Swisher out we all ate cold cereal instead of the pancakes I had planned. Then we went back to the church to break down the tent and the kids wanted to help with the eagle project. They tossed wood that had been cut by the workers on top of the wood pile. Throughout the whole camp out, I tried to keep Matthew from running because he still had a lingering cough from the previous weekend that was aggravated when he exerted himself or ran too much. Tiffany warned me about this.

As we left, the kids grabbed some snacks provided for the workers which I was okay with because they did work; then we went home. They were not hungry for lunch because of the snacks, so we delayed that. Nate was convinced that we could go to Dollar Tree instead of have lunch but I suspected they would get hungry before dinner time, which they did. At home, we started unloading the van. Once that was done, we started making a to-do list and tried to put it on a calendar but that didn't work well. So I clipped all of the kids nails while they took turns coloring.

I had Nathan read some scriptures while the others just played. I could tell Matthew was tired so I told him he didn't have to do what we were doing but he could go sit on the couch. After a little bit I looked over and he was struggling to stay up so I suggested he lay down which he did and quickly fell asleep. Soon after, it was time to do something on the to-do list and suggested they either sort clean laundry or clean one of their rooms. Lily agreed to help Nate clean his room so the three of us completely cleaned the middle of his room. While we were doing that, we found the missing puzzle piece of his 100 piece Pokemon puzzle and that is what they wanted to do once the middle of the room was clean.

After I let them relax and play for a little while, it was time to go help a woman move into a nearby neighborhood. I woke up Matthew who had slept for at least two hours. There were so many people helping with the move that I focused on trying to find things the kids could help with. Most of what they did was put couch cushions and pillows on the couches. Lily was upset that she couldn't help with the boxes and Nate was upset that he couldn't go on the truck to help unload it. Matthew helped for a while but then he wanted to just lay down on the couches. Then we went home.

I knew they needed an early dinner so I let them play outside after we got home while I put in a frozen pizza. Then we did scriptures and bath time. Lily had been complaining about her bum hurting and I asked when her last bath had been. Nate claimed that he and Lily got a bath a week ago but not Matthew because he was sick. That may mean that Matthew had not had a bath since I last bathed him two weeks earlier.

After bath time and scriptures were done, we watched a Netflix movie called Once I was a Beehive which I chose because it has to do with camping. After they went to bed I started preparing for my lessons that I needed to teach at home and at church the next day.

In the morning, Nate was up early, easily before seven, and he had brought Matthew downstairs with him and his crankiness woke me up early as well. Matthew ate first. I shaved while Nate ate. Lily slept till nearly nine thirty. I showered while she ate. Once everyone had eaten and gotten dressed for church we did scripture story time. We focused on the miracles surrounding feeding the thousands. Before that, I had Nate read more scriptures and during scripture story time he wasn't too focused and instead chose to read directly from the scriptures in his head. I was okay with this and it looked like he enjoyed that better.

We ate lunch and went to church. The kids kept me pretty distracted with Lily and Matthew each wanting to be on my lap and the people next to us squishing us down to two chairs. After church we went straight home and Nate persisted in asking if we could make cookies. This is something he had on the list of things to do this weekend since he was here two weeks ago. Since we don't have chocolate chips I chose to make peanut butter cookies and had each of them help. Nate put the sugar, egg, and butter in, Lily put in the brown sugar and shortening, and Matthew put in the peanut butter. After I beat that, Matthew put in the flour, Lily put in the baking powder, and Nate put in the salt. We had plenty of time so I was pretty relaxed about how long it was taking, until I started the oven. I had each of them put two cookie dough balls on the cookie sheet and taught them how to use a fork to imprint the peanut butter cookie prints. For the second batch they wanted to use cookie cutters so I let them do that.

Once the cookies were done I had them play or color until dinner was ready. We had a can of beef stew with a can of corn added. They all ate what I gave them, cleaned their bowls, and then each had three cookies while we talked with my parents on Google Hangouts. After dinner Lily was begging for Tiffany to pick them up tomorrow because she wanted to stay longer. I had them each do scriptures and then we loaded up the van with anything they wanted to take with them. We had some extra time so I read them two stories and Nate read another. Then we headed out to exchange the children near a halfway point. Before they got in the van I gave each of them big hugs and kisses because I knew I wouldn't be able to do that with the car exchange.

Tiffany refused my request to have the children twice a week by saying if I want to change the agreement I need to get a lawyer. I told her that since she hasn't filed for divorce we don't have an agreement. I may get a lawyer because seeing them only once every two weeks is not enough. They need me more than that.