Camping Craziness

This post is a few days late, but life in general prevented me from getting on until now. This past weekend we left the craziness of the world behind and traded it in for some good old relaxing craziness up in the mountains. My family tries to do a camping trip every year, but it has become difficult for us all to get up there at the same time, so this year Grandma and Auntie DaLene stayed for a week while the rest of us came and went as we could. Josh and I, along with my parents and sister, went up Friday night. The dogs were excited and ready to go!

Poor Shena would later lose her enthusiasm after spraining her tail. She lives life with such excitement and energy, but sometimes the poor girl beats herself to death!

It was nice to get away, and we had a lot of fun. The food was great, with Taco Salad and Dutch oven roast beef and potatoes as the highlights. There was also Dutch oven popcorn and giant roasting marshmallows. There were about 20 of us up there, so nights around the fire were full of fun conversation. Aside from 20 people, we also had six dogs...

Note little Kashus in the back. He loved the dogs, and even learned a few lessons from Toby that included how to stick your face in a bowl of water to take a drink...oops! It was interesting having to wade through the dogs to get to the other side of camp:

One of the highlights was our Nerf war:

You can take the soldier out of the military, but can you take the military out of the soldier?

Kurtis' nerd look...

We had a lot of fun, playing protect the commander and storm the base...that is, until cranky rude caretaker came out and yelled at us for playing in a "public park." Tell me, what good is a public park if you can't play in it? When EJ told him he was rude, he once again overreacted and decided to call the cops. He proceeded to yell at Mom and I when we brought Lexi over, because "dogs aren't allowed in the park." Except that she's a service animal. Needless to say the cop wasted his time, told us the guy felt "threatened," and said we were allowed to use the (gasp) "public" park. Did we really need the drama?

Of course we all had our cozy tents set up (in every nook and cranny available). Here's Mom taking a nap in hers...with some tent crashers, it seems!

Speaking of tent crashers, take a look at these sleeping bag stealers! Thankfully I had just woken up, or else I might have been disgruntled when Toby came over and laid right on top of me!

And of course, as with any good vacation, it was nice to come home. The dogs weren't incredibly thrilled to get baths, but we sure couldn't wait to wash the dirt and smoke away. We can't wait until the next vacation. Ready or not, Atlanta here we come!